Socializing Children through Language

Using psychological theory as a basis, Socializing Children through Language examines interactions between parents and children in the context of achievement, self-regulation, food consumption, and television watching to illustrate how parents of different socio-economic means interact and a discuss a variety of topics in the home. With a large sample of families across diverse educational and income levels, this book demonstrates how parent language directly relates to and can predict child behaviors over time. It also considers additional empirical data such as achievement tests, regulation tasks, and parenting information (home environment, educational expectations, and parent/child warmth), presenting an altogether revolutionary way to understand and think about how family socialization works across socio-economic levels. Focuses on mother-child talk about desires, thoughts, and emotionsStudies the relationship between math talk and children’s math knowledge and achievementEmphasizes the management language used by mothers to guide the behavior of their childrenExplores children’s media environment in the home, the conversations that occur during digital technology use, and whether it relates to children's outcomesConsiders food-related discussions in families prior to and during mealtimes, including how parents and children express food likes and dislikes, hunger, mealtime routines and expectations, and explanations about nutritional values