Temporal and prosodic characteristics of infant-directed speech to children with cochlear implants

Infant-directed speech (IDS) quantity and quality are important characteristics affecting child language acquisition (D’Odorico & Jacob, 2006). Language learning in children with cochlear implants (CIs) may benefit from a prosodically richer speech signal and from enhanced mother-child coordination in interaction. However, only a few studies have considered these aspects with children with CIs. This study aims to investigate the prosodic and temporal characteristics of IDS before and after CI activation and their relationship with child language outcomes up to three years after implantation in Italian-speaking children. Participants were 16 dyads of mothers and their children implanted between 10 and 36 months. Fundamental frequency characteristics and pitch range for each mother and mothers’ and children’s vocalizations, overlaps, and within- and between-speaker pauses in interaction were analyzed. Children’s receptive vocabulary after implantation was also considered. Results indicate that children’s vocabulary three years after implantation is negatively predicted by early maternal overlap frequency and positively associated with mothers’ pitch range before implantation. These results suggest a positive role of prosody and temporal characteristics in IDS for children with CIs.