Beneficial effects of BookStart in temperamentally highly reactive infants

AbstractAt the birth of their child, parents living in areas where BookStart has been adopted receive a Package containing a baby book, a CD, and a flyer about book sharing. In this study we tested whether this extensive, nation-wide intervention is a stimulus for language development. Three hundred and fifty-nine ‘BookStart families’ were compared with 225 control families. Assessments took place when the infant was 8months old, and 7months later. The overall effects of BookStart on language development at 15months were small (d=0.05) but moderately high (d=.46) in a sub-sample of temperamentally highly reactive children (25% of the sample). Findings were in line with the differential susceptibility model. A reactive temperament proved a risk factor for language development, due to low verbal stimulation from parents in the first years, but an asset when parents increased verbal parent–child interaction under the influence of BookStart