The Relationship between Socioeconomic Status and Child Language Development: Do Maternal Education and Family Income Play a Role?

Despite plethora of studies in child language development in recent years, there is dearth of research on the socio-economic status as a major source of variability in Iranian children's language development and vocabulary growth. To examine the associations between socioeconomic status and children's language development, ۶۹ male/female preschoolers (aged ۵ to ۶:۱۱) were selected non-randomly from a number of kindergartens in Kerman and Rafsanjan, Iran. Their language development was tested using Test of Language Development-Primary (TOLD P:۳). Furthermore, their parents were required to complete a scale containing questions about the level of maternal education and family income. The results of Pearson product moment correlation revealed a significant relationship between maternal education, family income, and expressive/receptive language development of the children. Moreover, the regression analysis indicated that maternal education was a stronger predictor of language development than family income. This study has some implications for child language educators, researchers, parents, and school authorities to develop programs for improving the development of language skills in children from low socioeconomic families.

کلیدواژه ها:

Socioeconomic status ، language development ، children