MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories Research Articles

Complementary food exposure and children’s early understanding of food words: the approaching eating through language (APPEAL) study

IntroductionLanguage skills, such as the ability to understand words (receptive language), develop during infancy and are built through interactions with the environment, including eating. Exposure to complementary foods also begins in infancy and may play a significant role in language development, especially in understanding of food-related words. However, the relationship between the complementary foods to which a child is exposed and early language acquisition has not been previously studied. We hypothesized that young children’s food-related receptive language (FRL) would reflect the complementary foods to which they were frequently offered by caregivers.MethodsCaregivers of young children (4-26 months; n = 408) in the Approaching Eating through Language (APPEAL) Study in the US were surveyed via Qualtrics. FRL was assessed by caregiver-report via a modified MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory. Complementary foods offered (CFO) by caregivers were assessed using a modified Food Frequency Questionnaire. Latent Class Analysis (LCA) was implemented to identify, 1) groupings of foods frequently offered (>1x/week) and 2) groupings of food-related words understood by the young children.ResultsA 5-class best fit LCA model was identified for CFO (-log likelihood [-llik]=-8727) and for FRL (-llik=-5476). Cross-classification of the CFO and FRL derived classes revealed that children with higher exposure to complementary foods were perceived by caregivers to be most likely to also understand a greater number of food-related words (Probability=0.48). As expected, children having been offered a greater number of complementary foods and who understood a greater number of food-related words were older, compared to those with less complementary food exposure and food-related language acquisition (p < 0.001).DiscussionThese findings support the potential role of introduction to complementary foods in development of food-related language.

Heart-to-heart: infant heart rate at 3 months is linked to infant-directed speech, mother-infant interaction, and later language outcomes.

Previous studies underscore the importance of speech input, particularly infant-directed speech (IDS) during one-on-one (1:1) parent-infant interaction, for child language development. We hypothesize that infants' attention to speech input, specifically IDS, supports language acquisition. In infants, attention and orienting responses are associated with heart rate deceleration. We examined whether individual differences in infants' heart rate measured during 1:1 mother-infant interaction is related to speech input and later language development scores in a longitudinal study. Using a sample of 31 3-month-olds, we assessed infant heart rate during mother-infant face-to-face interaction in a laboratory setting. Multiple measures of speech input were gathered at 3 months of age during naturally occurring interactions at home using the Language ENvironment Analysis (LENA) system. Language outcome measures were assessed in the same children at 30 months of age using the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory (CDI). Two novel findings emerged. First, we found that higher maternal IDS in a 1:1 context at home, as well as more mother-infant conversational turns at home, are associated with a lower heart rate measured during mother-infant social interaction in the laboratory. Second, we found significant associations between infant heart rate during mother-infant interaction in the laboratory at 3 months and prospective language development (CDI scores) at 30 months of age. Considering the current results in conjunction with other converging theoretical and neuroscientific data, we argue that high IDS input in the context of 1:1 social interaction increases infants' attention to speech and that infants' attention to speech in early development fosters their prospective language growth.

Home Musical Activities Boost Premature Infants' Language Development.

Infants born prematurely are considered at risk for language development delay and impairments. Using online parental reports, the present study investigated the influence of early musical experience in the home environment (Music@Home Infant Questionnaire) on language development (MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory) while controlling for general enrichment at home (Stim-Q Cognitive Home Environment Questionnaire) and perinatal post-traumatic stress disorder (Perinatal PTSD Questionnaire). Caregivers of 117 infants between 8 and 18 months of age (corrected age) without reported developmental difficulties completed an online survey. Results revealed that the musical home environment significantly predicted outcomes in reported infants' receptive vocabulary and gestural communication, independently from infants' corrected age and general enrichment of home activities. These findings constitute the first evidence that an enriched musical experience can enhance the development of early communication skills in a population at risk for language delays, namely infants born prematurely, opening the path for future intervention research in home and/or early childcare settings. Given that the majority of participants in this study were highly educated and from socioeconomically stable backgrounds, considerations regarding the generalizability of these results are discussed.

Developing Dovyko I: The Czech Adaptation of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory

Developing Dovyko I: The Czech Adaptation of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory

Thyroid autoimmunity in euthyroid pregnant women is associated with slower productive language acquisition. The Odense Child Cohort Study.

Maternal thyroid autoimmunity and thyroid function in early pregnancy may impact fetal neurodevelopment. We aimed to investigate how thyroid autoimmunity and thyroid function in early pregnancy were associated with language acquisition in offspring at 12-36 months of age. This study was embedded in the prospective Odense Child Cohort. Mother-child dyads were excluded in case of maternal intake of thyroid medication during pregnancy. The parents completed MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories (MB-CDI) every third month to assess their offspring's productive vocabulary. All completed reports for each child were included in the analyses. Logistic growth curve models evaluated associations between MB-CDI scores and levels of maternal thyroid peroxidase antibodies (TPOAb), free thyroxine (FT4), and thyrotropin, respectively, measured in early pregnancy (median gestational week 12). All models were stratified by offspring sex and adjusted for maternal age, education, pre-pregnancy body mass index, parity, breastfeeding, and offspring age. The study included 735 mother-child dyads. Children born to mothers with TPOAb ≥11 kIU/L, opposed to TPOAb <11 kIU/L, had a lower probability of producing words at age 18-36 months for girls (OR=0.78, p<0.001) and 33-36 months for boys (OR=0.83, p<0.001). The probability of producing words was higher in girls at 30-36 months of age with low-normal maternal FT4 vs. high-normal FT4 (OR=0.60, p<0.001), and a similar trend was seen in boys. Results were ambiguous for thyrotropin. In women without known thyroid disease, TPOAb-positivity in early pregnancy was negatively associated with productive vocabulary acquisition in girls and boys. This association was not mediated by a decreased thyroid function, as low-normal maternal FT4, unexpectedly, indicated better vocabulary acquisition. Our results support that maternal thyroid autoimmunity per se may affect fetal neurodevelopment.

A Comparison of Expressive Vocabulary in Spontaneous Language Sample and Parent Checklist of Young Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Objectives: This study aims to examine the differences in vocabulary abilities in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) using a parent checklist and spontaneous language analysis.Methods: Participants included 10 children with ASD, aged 18-30 months, and 10 typically developing children matched for language age. Data were collected using the Korean version of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory (K M-B CDI) vocabulary checklist and spontaneous language analysis. The total number of vocabulary and the number of 5 word classes of vocabulary were measured and a repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) and Pearson correlation analysis was performed to compare the two groups.Results: Children with ASD demonstrated a higher total vocabulary according to the parent checklist compared to typically developing children. However, there was no significant difference in the results of spontaneous language analysis. While the parent checklist indicated higher vocabulary across all five word classes for ASD children, spontaneous language analysis revealed that they predominantly used nouns and verbs, with fewer occurrences of determiners, independent words, and relational words. Moreover, the vocabulary overlap between the two methods was lower in the ASD group compared to the typically developing group. Conclusion: This study highlights the challenges faced by children with ASD in appropriately using their known vocabulary. It emphasizes the importance of considering not only the parent checklist but also analyzing spontaneously used vocabulary in real communication situations. This integrated approach may provide valuable insights for developing personalized interventions and therapeutic strategies for language development in children with ASD.

Stress biomarkers and child development in young children in Bangladesh

BackgroundHundreds of millions of children in low- and middle-income countries are exposed to chronic stressors, such as poverty, poor sanitation and hygiene, and sub-optimal nutrition. These stressors can have physiological consequences for children and may ultimately have detrimental effects on child development. This study explores associations between biological measures of chronic stress in early life and developmental outcomes in a large cohort of young children living in rural Bangladesh. MethodsWe assessed physiologic measures of stress in the first two years of life using measures of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis (salivary cortisol and glucocorticoid receptor gene methylation), the sympathetic-adrenal-medullary (SAM) system (salivary alpha-amylase, heart rate, and blood pressure), and oxidative status (F2-isoprostanes). We assessed child development in the first two years of life with the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories (CDI), the WHO gross motor milestones, and the Extended Ages and Stages Questionnaire (EASQ). We compared development outcomes of children at the 75th and 25th percentiles of stress biomarker distributions while adjusting for potential confounders using generalized additive models, which are statistical models where the outcome is predicted by a potentially non-linear function of predictor variables. ResultsWe analyzed data from 684 children (49% female) at both 14 and 28 months of age; we included an additional 765 children at 28 months of age. We detected a significant relationship between HPA axis activity and child development, where increased HPA axis activity was associated with poor development outcomes. Specifically, we found that cortisol reactivity (coefficient −0.15, 95% CI (−0.29, −0.01)) and post-stressor levels (coefficient −0.12, 95% CI (−0.24, −0.01)) were associated with CDI comprehension score, post-stressor cortisol was associated with combined EASQ score (coefficient −0.22, 95% CI (−0.41, −0.04), and overall glucocorticoid receptor methylation was associated with CDI expression score (coefficient −0.09, 95% CI (−0.17, −0.01)). We did not detect a significant relationship between SAM activity or oxidative status and child development. ConclusionsOur observations reveal associations between the physiological evidence of stress in the HPA axis with developmental status in early childhood. These findings add to the existing evidence exploring the developmental consequences of early life stress.

Mean Length of Utterance: A study of early language development in four Southern Bantu languages.

Mean Length of Utterance (MLU) has been widely used to measure children's early language development in a variety of languages. This study investigates the utility of MLU to measure language development in four agglutinative and morphologically complex Southern Bantu languages. Using a variant of MLU, MLU3, based on the three longest sentences children produced, we analysed the utterances of 448 toddlers (16-32 months) collected using the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory, a parent-report tool. MLU3, measured in words (MLU3-w) and morphemes (MLU3-m), significantly correlated with age and other indices of language growth (e.g., grammar and vocabulary). MLU3 measures also accounted for significant variance in language development particular morphosyntactic development. Our results suggest that MLU3-m is a more sensitive measure than MLU3-w. We conclude that MLU measured in morphemes provides a useful addition to other indices of language development in these kinds of morphologically complex languages.

Communicative development inventory in type 1 and presymptomatic infants with spinal muscular atrophy: a cohort study

ObjectiveThe aim of this study was to assess early language acquisitions in treated individuals with spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) type 1 and in infants identified by newborn screening (NBS).MethodsParents of...

A randomised controlled trial of the effectiveness of parent-based models of language intervention for 2- to 3-year-old children with speech, language and communication needs (SLCN) in areas of social disadvantage.

Early language delay is exacerbated by social disadvantage. Factors such as parents' low levels of literacy, confidence and self-perception can affect the capacity to act on advice received, critical to empowerment. Methods used to achieve successful health outcomes in socially disadvantaged clinical populations may need enhancing. To compare the impact of standard parent-based intervention (PBI) to enhanced PBI for young children with speech, language and communication needs (SCLN) and their families living in more socially disadvantaged populations. A multicentre clustered blind randomised controlled trial was used to compare the effect of parent-based group interventions to improve early language development with children (mean age 27.5 months) from more socially disadvantaged populations with an expressive vocabulary of 40 or less single words. Intervention sessions were delivered by a speech and language therapist, over a 20-week period. Participants received one of two interventions: (1) Standard Care - indirect group PBI - (PBI) (2) Enhanced Care: indirect group enhanced PBI - (EPBI). Both standardised and non-standardised measures were used as outcomes. Parent engagement in the intervention was captured through analysis of attendance and the Parent Activation Measure - Speech & Language Therapy (PAM-SLT) (Insignia Health, 2014). The PAM measures a person's knowledge, skills and confidence to manage their own health and well-being (NHS England, 2018). In this study, activation referred to parents' knowledge, skills and confidence to manage their child's language development. One hundred fifty-five participants were randomised at baseline. Children in both groups made significant improvements in the outcome on MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories Sentence Length, from pre-intervention to post-intervention and 6 months post-intervention (p < 0.05). Changes in vocabulary and expressive language skills were more equivocal, showing wide variation in confidence intervals for both groups. Where parents attended at least one intervention session almost all effect sizes were in favour of the EPBI intervention. Parents' activation levels significantly increased for both groups (EPBI p < 0.001, PBI p = 0.003), with a moderate effect size in favour of EPBI (Hedges' G 0.37, confidence interval -0.02 to 0.76), although wide variation was found. This trial provides some evidence of facilitating the language development of children with SLCN from more socially disadvantaged areas through supporting caregivers. However, we found variation in outcomes; some children made excellent progress, whilst others did not. Further exploration of parent engagement and its relationship to child language outcomes will be valuable to understanding more about mechanisms of change in interventions that involve parents. What is already known on the subject Speech, language and communication needs (SLCN) have a knock-on effect on emotional well-being, school readiness, literacy and school attainment, putting children at increased risk of long-term consequences such as poor literacy, mental health problems and unemployment. In disadvantaged areas, the prevalence of language difficulties is higher than elsewhere. Factors such as parents' low levels of literacy, confidence and self-perception can affect the capacity to act on advice received, critical to empowerment. What this paper adds to existing knowledge Children with SLCN from more socially disadvantaged areas can make improvements in their language development through parent intervention, although wide individual variation was found. There was some evidence that children achieve better outcomes with EPBI, which employed an interagency collaborative approach. Parent's engagement (activation levels) increased significantly over time with intervention, with the increase twice as big for EPBI. What are the potential or actual clinical implications of this work This trial provides some evidence that it is possible to facilitate the language development of children from more socially disadvantaged areas through supporting their caregivers. Further research would be useful to determine whether increases in parent engagement are related to adherence to intervention and change in child outcomes.

Two-word Utterances in the Speech of Young Children: Gender Aspect according to MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories

Two-word Utterances in the Speech of Young Children: Gender Aspect according to MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories

Cognitive Prerequisites for the Acquisition of Grammar in Children Based on the Materials of the MacArthur-Bates CDI and Case Study

This article considers the phenomena preceding the development of grammar acquisition in young children. The study is based on the analysis of questionnaires completed by parents (MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories). Estimates from 1037 questionnaires on children aged 18–36 months (550 girls, 487 boys) were entered into the database. Additional data were also obtained from a case study. The results of our analysis support the view on the priority of the cognitive component over the linguistic one in young children. At first, they develop the intention to convey certain ideas (about the missing owner of an object, as well as about the future and past) and then learn to express these ideas with specific linguistic means. The hierarchy of mastering utterances by children is determined by cognitive rather than linguistic factors. Most children find it easiest to name the adult who is not there at the moment when they see that adult’s things, and the ability to produce utterances about the objects they do not see or about the near future develops later. The utterances about the past are the most difficult because they are less important to children at an early age. Therefore, the non-morphological ways of expressing the meanings are gradually replaced by the morphological ones as children grow older.

Examining the relationship of acetaminophen use during pregnancy with early language development in children.

Acetaminophen is the only analgesic considered safe for use throughout pregnancy. Recent studies suggest that use during pregnancy may be associated with poorer neurodevelopmental outcomes in children, but few have examined language development. The Illinois Kids Development Study is a prospective birth cohort in east-central Illinois. Between December 2013 and March 2020, 532 newborns were enrolled and had exposure data available. Participants reported the number of times they took acetaminophen six times across pregnancy. Language data were collected at 26.5-28.5 months using the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories (CDI; n = 298), and 36-38 months using the Speech and Language Assessment Scale (SLAS; n = 254). Taking more acetaminophen during the second or third trimester was associated with marginally smaller vocabularies and shorter utterance length (M3L) at 26.5-28.5 months. More acetaminophen use during the third trimester was also associated with increased odds of M3L scores ≤25th percentile in male children. More use during the second or third trimester was associated with lower SLAS scores at 36-38 months. Third trimester use was specifically related to lower SLAS scores in male children. Higher prenatal acetaminophen use during pregnancy may be associated with poorer early language development. Taking more acetaminophen during pregnancy, particularly during the second and third trimesters, was associated with poorer scores on measures of language development when children were 26.5-28.5 and 36-38 months of age. Only male children had lower scores in analyses stratified by child sex. To our knowledge, this is the first study that has used a standardized measure of language development to assess the potential impact of prenatal exposure to acetaminophen on language development. This study adds to the growing body of literature suggesting that the potential impact of acetaminophen use during pregnancy on fetal neurodevelopment should be carefully evaluated.

Factors of parental investment in the home language environment in peri-urban China: A mixed methods study.

The home language environment is a critical point of investment in early language skills. However, few studies have quantitatively measured the home language environment of low-socioeconomic-status households in non-western settings. This mixed methods study describes the home language environment and early child language skills among households in a low-socioeconomic-status, peri-urban district of Chengdu, China, and identifies factors influencing parental investment in the home language environment. Audio recordings were collected from 81 peri-urban households with children ages 18-24 months and analysed using the Language Environment Analysis (LENATM) system. The Mandarin version of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory was administered to each child's primary caregiver. The quantitative results revealed large variation in home language environments and child language skills among the sample, with relatively low average scores when compared to other Chinese samples. Qualitative interviews with a subset of 31 caregivers revealed that many caregivers face constraints on their knowledge of interactive parenting, compounded, in some households, by time constraints due to work or household responsibilities. The findings indicate a need for increased sources of credible parenting information for peri-urban caregivers of young children to promote investment in the home language environment.

Cohort profile update: The Canadian Maternal-Infant Research on Environmental Chemicals Child Development study (MIREC-CD PLUS).

The pan-Canadian Maternal-Infant Research on Environmental Chemicals (MIREC) study was established to determine whether maternal environmental chemical exposures were associated with adverse pregnancy outcomes in 2001 pregnant women. The MIREC-Child Development (CD PLUS) study followed this cohort with the goal of assessing the potential effects of prenatal exposures on anthropometry and neurodevelopment in early childhood. MIREC families with children between the ages of 15 months and 5 years who had agreed to be contacted for future research (n = 1459) were invited to participate in MIREC-CD PLUS which combines data collected from an online Maternal Self-Administered Questionnaire with biomonitoring and neurodevelopment data collected from two in-person visits. Between April 2013 and March 2015, 803 children participated in the Biomonitoring visit where we collected anthropometric measures, blood, and urine from the children. The Behavioural Assessment System for Children-2, Behaviour Rating Inventory of Executive Function, MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories and the Communication subscale of the Adaptive Behaviour Scale from the Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development-III are available on close to 900 children. There were 610 singleton children who completed in-person visits for neurodevelopment assessments including the Social Responsiveness Scale, Wechsler Preschool Primary Scale of Intelligence-III and NEuroPSYchological assessments (NEPSY). Currently, we are following the cohort into early adolescence to measure the impact of early life exposures on endocrine and metabolic function (MIREC-ENDO). Data collection for the MIREC-CD PLUS study is complete and analysis of the data continues. We are now extending the follow-up of the cohort into adolescence to measure the impact of early life exposures on endocrine and metabolic function (MIREC-ENDO). MIREC-CD PLUS is limited by loss to follow-up and the fact that mothers are predominately of higher socioeconomic status and 'White' ethnicity, which limits our generalizability. However, the depth of biomonitoring and clinical measures in MIREC provides a platform to examine associations of prenatal, infancy and childhood exposures with child growth and development.

Sometimes larger, sometimes smaller: Measuring vocabulary in monolingual and bilingual infants and toddlers.

Vocabulary size is a crucial early indicator of language development, for both monolingual and bilingual children. Assessing vocabulary in bilingual children is complex because they learn words in two languages, and there remains significant controversy about how to best measure their vocabulary size, especially in relation to monolinguals. This study compared monolingual vocabulary with different metrics of bilingual vocabulary, including combining vocabulary across languages to count either the number of words or the number of concepts lexicalized and assessing vocabulary in a single language. Data were collected from parents of 743 infants and toddlers aged 8-33 months learning French and/or English, using the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories. The results showed that the nature and magnitude of monolingual-bilingual differences depended on how bilinguals' vocabulary was measured. Compared with monolinguals, bilinguals had larger expressive and receptive word vocabularies, similarly sized receptive concept vocabularies and smaller expressive concept vocabularies. Bilinguals' single-language vocabularies were smaller than monolinguals' vocabularies. The study highlights the need to better understand the role of translation equivalents in bilingual vocabulary development and the potential developmental differences in receptive and expressive vocabularies.

The Effect of Combined Intervention on Improvement of Early Lexical Development in Minimally Verbal Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder defined by severe communication deficits and limited and repetitive behavioral tendencies. There are several treatment approaches and methods for minimally verbal children with ASD; nonetheless, there is inconclusive evidence about how early lexical development could be improved. The present study aimed to investigate the effect of combined intervention derived from the principles of different theories-including contemporary behaviorism, schemas, sociocultural, and event representation theories-to improve early lexical development in minimally verbal children with ASD. In this single-group pretest-posttest study, 10 children with ASD (mean age, 47.9 ± 8.3 months), including 7 boys and 3 girls, participated. Participants received 16 intervention sessions in 8 weeks. The combined intervention consisted of various methods derived from contemporary behaviorism, schemas, sociocultural, and event representation approaches. The MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory 1 (Infant form) assessed early lexical development before and after intervention and after a 2-month follow-up. The Friedman test was used to analyze the data, and pairwise comparisons were performed with the Will-Coxon test. Cohen's d was used to investigate the effect sizes. Significant increases in expressive vocabulary (P < 0.001) and receptive language (P < 0.001) were seen after the end of the intervention and at the follow-up (P = 0.005). Large effect sizes were found for expressive vocabulary (d = 3.7) and receptive vocabulary (d = 2.17). This study suggests that the combination of intervention based contemporary behaviorism, schemas, sociocultural, and event representation approaches improved receptive and expressive vocabulary in minimally verbal children with ASD.

Relationship between 4-month functional brain network topology and 24-month neurodevelopmental outcome in children with congenital heart disease

Survivors of complex forms of congenital heart disease (CHD)∗ are at high risk of neurodevelopmental disabilities. Neuroimaging studies have pointed to brain anomalies and immature networks in infants with CHD, yet less is known about their functional network topology and associations with neurodevelopment. To characterize the functional network topology in 4-month-old infants with repaired CHD, we compared graph theory metrics measured using resting-state functional near-infrared spectroscopy (rs-fNIRS) between infants with CHD (n = 22) and healthy controls (n = 30). We also investigated the moderating effect of graph theory metrics on the relationship between group (CHD vs. Controls) and developmental outcomes at 24 months. At 4 months, both groups presented similar functional brain network topology. At 24 months, children with CHD had lower scores on the language scale and the expressive communication subscale of the Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development, Third Edition (Bayley-III), as well as lower scores on the Grammatical Form scale of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory (MBCDI). The relationship between group and expressive language was moderated by the normalized characteristic path length (λ) and the degree (k). Although infants with CHD have functional brain topology similar to that of healthy controls, our findings suggest that they do not benefit from an optimal functional brain organization in comparison with healthy infants.

Associations of screen use with cognitive development in early childhood: the ELFE birth cohort.

The associations of screen use with children's cognition are not well evidenced and recent, large, longitudinal studies are needed. We aimed to assess the associations between screen use and cognitive development in the French nationwide birth cohort. Time and context of screen use were reported by parents at ages 2, 3.5 and 5.5. Vocabulary, non-verbal reasoning and general cognitive development were assessed with the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory (MB) at age 2, the Picture Similarities subtest from the British Ability Scales (PS) at age 3.5 and the Child Development Inventory (CDI) at ages 3.5 and 5.5. Outcome variables were age-adjusted and standardized (mean = 100, SD = 15). Multiple imputations were performed among children (N = 13,763) with ≥1 screen use information and ≥1 cognitive measures. Cross-sectional and longitudinal associations between screen use and cognitive development were assessed by linear regression models adjusted for sociodemographic and birth factors related to the family and children, and children's lifestyle factors competing with screen use. Baseline cognitive scores were further considered in longitudinal analysis. TV-on during family meals at age 2, not screen time, was associated with lower MB scores at age 2 (β [95% CI] = -1.67 [-2.21, -1.13]) and CDI scores at age 3.5 (-0.82 [-1.31, -0.33]). In cross-sectional analysis, screen time was negatively associated with CDI scores at ages 3.5 (-0.67 [-0.94, -0.40]) and 5.5 (-0.47 [-0.77, -0.16]), and, in contrast, was positively associated with PS scores (0.39 [0.07, 0.71]) at age 3.5. Screen time at age 3.5 years was not associated with CDI scores at age 5.5 years. Our study found weak associations of screen use with cognition after controlling for sociodemographic and children's birth factors and lifestyle confounders, and suggests that the context of screen use matters, not solely screen time, in children's cognitive development.

E-Babylab: An open-source browser-based tool for unmoderated online developmental studies.

The COVID-19 pandemic massively changed the context and feasibility of developmental research. This new reality, as well as considerations about sample diversity and naturalistic settings for developmental research, highlights the need for solutions for online studies. In this article, we present e-Babylab, an open-source browser-based tool for unmoderated online studies targeted for young children and babies. e-Babylab offers an intuitive graphical user interface for study creation and management of studies, users, participant data, and stimulus material, with no programming skills required. Various kinds of audiovisual media can be presented as stimuli, and possible measures include webcam recordings, audio recordings, key presses, mouse-click/touch coordinates, and reaction times. An additional feature of e-Babylab is the possibility to administer short adaptive versions of MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories (Chai et al. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 63, 3488-3500, 2020). Information pages, consent forms, and participant forms are customizable. e-Babylab has been used with a variety of measures and paradigms in over 12 studies with children aged 12 months to 8 years (n = 1516). We briefly summarize some results of these studies to demonstrate that data quality, participant engagement, and overall results are comparable between laboratory and online settings. Finally, we discuss helpful tips for using e-Babylab and present plans for upgrades.