The Influence of Early Mother--Child Interaction on Preschool Cognitive/Linguistic Outcomes in a High-Social-Risk Group.

In this paper, elements of early mother—child interaction are related to later cognitive and linguistic outcomes in a sample of 53 high social risk mothers and their preschoolers. Mother—child interaction was observed longitudinally when the children were 13 and 20 months old. Multiple regression analyses were used to predict cognitive and linguistic outcomes at 3 and 5 years form measures of early mother—child interaction. The results indicated that the quality of early mother—child interaction was a significant predictor of preschool cognitive and linguistic outcomes. This was shown to be true regardless of the contribution of the mother's IQ. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]