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Published in final edited form as: Infant Behav Dev. 2022 Dec 19;70:101804. doi: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2022.101804

Latino toddlers’ bilingual output and their caregivers’ bilingual input and acculturation

Jordan Sierra Perry 1, Perla B Gámez 1
PMCID: PMC9977142  NIHMSID: NIHMS1859640  PMID: 36542897

Abstract

The current study’s aim was to investigate how Latino toddlers’ bilingual language development relates to their caregivers’ bilingual language use (i.e., input) and cultural orientation (to the US and their heritage country). Video recordings of caregiver-child interactions, collected when toddlers were approximately 1.5 (Mage = 18.73 months; SDage = 1.11) and 2 years old (Mage = 25.13 months; SDage = 1.29), were used to measure caregivers’ (Mage = 33.29 years; SDage = 4.95) and toddlers’ language use (i.e., output), respectively. Specifically, the total number of words used (i.e., tokens) in Spanish and English were derived from the video-recordings. In addition, caregivers’ cultural orientation (i.e., acculturation; Mexican/heritage culture-oriented to US-oriented) was assessed using a multidimensional measure of acculturation. Descriptive analyses of tokens showed that caregivers and toddlers used both Spanish and English during interactions with each other, though caregivers used a higher ratio of Spanish-to-English (i.e., more Spanish than English) than did toddlers. Mediational analyses further revealed that caregivers’ acculturation level was indirectly related to toddlers’ bilingual language use, specifically as a function of caregivers’ bilingual language use. These findings suggest that caregivers’ bilingual input acts as a mediator between caregivers’ acculturation and their toddlers’ bilingual output.

Keywords: acculturation, language, input, bilingual, caregiver-child interactions, Spanish

Infants and toddlers are exposed to and learn language primarily from their caregivers (Lewis et al., 2016). Caregivers’ language use plays a particularly important role in language learning for the 23% of children in the United States who are exposed to a language other than English at home (National KIDS COUNT, 2019), of which many are Latino and exposed to both English and Spanish. That is, while Latino children will necessarily gain exposure to English in US schools, their bilingual exposure and notably, exposure to Spanish, may come primarily from caregivers in the home (Arriagada, 2005; López et al., 2020). For many Latino caregivers, maintaining access to both English and Spanish better ensures their children’s bilingual learning, despite it being a challenging task to maintain bilingual access (López et al., 2020). Because relatively few developmental research studies have focused on bilingual language development in Latino and bicultural families in the US (Basilio et al., 2014; Padilla, 2006), little is known about the unique and interrelated cultural contexts that influence bilingual language use in Latino homes. In particular, there is more to learn about how acculturation (i.e., the extent to which caregivers adapt to another culture after prolonged contact; Cabassa, 2003; Cote & Bornstein, 2014; Page, 2006) influences bilingual development in Latino families, especially when multiple cultures and languages are prevalent in the home. Thus, this study examines the relations among 1) toddlers’ bilingual (Spanish and English) language use, 2) their caregivers’ bilingual language use, and 3) caregivers’ acculturation.

Theoretical Perspectives

The current study is guided by interactionist theories of language, which emphasize the key role that verbal interactions play in children’s socialization and learning (Snow, 1994; Vygotsky, 1978). These theories posit that children acquire the language skills needed to participate in society by verbally interacting with their caregivers during daily activities and routines (Fuller & García Coll, 2010; García, 1983; Vygotsky, 1978). Indeed, research has shown that children’s speech patterns are influenced by their caregivers’ speech patterns. This relation between caregivers’ and children’s language use has been shown for both monolingual (Huttenlocher et al., 1991; Rowe, 2012) and bilingual children (Place & Hoff, 2011). Notably, bilingual children, who are in the process of acquiring two languages at once, tend to use one language more than another, if they are exposed to that language more often (Hammer et al., 2009; Lewis et al., 2016). That is, the amount of input that bilingual children receive in each language corresponds to their output in each language (De Houwer, 2011; Pearson et al., 1997).

Caregiver input is also considered to be an important tool used to transfer sociocultural knowledge to children (Vygotsky, 1978). Thus, the relative amounts of each language used by bilingual caregivers may reflect their cultural values and experiences (Fuller & García Coll, 2010). Additionally, different amounts of language input may place emphasis on which language or languages children should learn. Supporting this notion of sociocultural transfer is the Integrative Model of Child Development (García Coll et al., 1996). This model describes how cultural processes can directly and indirectly influence children’s developmental outcomes. In particular, cultural processes, such as practicing cultural traditions, may directly influence children’s developmental outcomes. Cultural processes may also indirectly affect children’s development. That is, when caregivers adopt or borrow traits from both their heritage culture and the dominant culture, it may inform their family decisions and values, including those about language use. Consequently, these decisions, including ones related to language use, may influence children’s developmental competencies, such as their bilingualism.

When caregivers adapt to and borrow traits from another culture after prolonged contact, it is commonly referred to as acculturation (Page, 2006). Acculturation is a bidimensional or multidimensional concept, where each dimension conceptually represents one’s adherence to that culture (Cabassa, 2003; Zea et al., 2003).1 Acculturation is also a complex concept that involves both conscious and unconscious processes and consists of multiple interconnected components or domains. Examples of these interconnected domains are language use or proficiency, cultural values and attitudes, cultural identity, and social affiliation preferences, as well as dietary inta e and popular media preferences (Cuéllar et al.,1995;Marín & Gamba, 1996; Page, 2006; Schwartz et al., 2010; Zea et al., 2003).

Of note, though acculturation is a multifaceted concept, some research studies assess acculturation using only language-related components (i.e., language use or proficiency; Lee et al., 2011). The reason that other components are omitted is that the domain of language can sometimes explain most of the measured variance in acculturation (Coronado et al., 2005; Cuéllar et al., 1980; Thomson & Hoffman-Goetz, 2009). However, without using a robust acculturation measure that takes into account its other components (e.g., social affiliation preferences, dietary intake, media preferences, cultural values and identity), the culture-related pathways toward developmental competencies remain unclear (Schwartz et al., 2010; Thomson & Hoffman-Goetz, 2009). For example, it is unclear how caregivers’ acculturation influences Latino children’s bilingual outcomes, and whether caregivers’ language use decisions play a distinct role in that association. In attempting to answer this question, the current study draws on interactionist theories of language (Vygotsky, 1978) and the Integrative Model of Child Development (García Coll et al., 1996) to hypothesize that caregivers’ acculturation, through their own language use, may indirectly influence their children’s language development in bilingual homes (Cote & Bornstein, 2014).

Caregiver Acculturation and Language Input on Child Language Output

Past research provides support for the idea that children’s language use is related to their caregivers’ acculturation and language use. For example, Boyce and colleagues (2013) conducted a study with Spanish-dominant mother-child dyads in the US and used the mother’s connection to English and Spanish language and media as a proxy for acculturation. Results indicated that maternal levels of language-and-media acculturation were correlated with toddlers’ total productive vocabulary (combined English and Spanish performance) by 36 months of age. That is, mothers who self-reported using more language and media in English, than Spanish, had children with higher total productive vocabularies. The researchers interpreted this positive association as suggesting that acculturation was directly related to children’s language use. However, because only the language domain of acculturation was measured in that study, the language-and-media variable may be better conceptualized as a language use variable, one that is influenced by acculturation. Thus, the findings by Boyce et al., (2013) may suggest that maternal acculturation has an indirect association with toddlers’ vocabulary scores, which occurs through mothers’ language use.

Indeed, another study that similarly included a sample of immigrant families in the US (Cote & Bornstein, 2014) found that maternal acculturation was indirectly related to toddlers’ productive vocabulary size in English. Specifically, mothers’ language use acted as a link (i.e., mediator) between their acculturation level and their toddlers’ vocabulary skill. In that study, maternal language use was conceptualized as an estimate of the percentage of English that mothers used with their toddlers. Toddlers’ vocabulary size was assessed with caregiver-reported checklists of productive vocabulary. The acculturation measure included questions about language, friendship, behavior, attitudes, and cultural identity (to the heritage or US culture), rather than only including language-related questions. The study findings indicated that mothers who had a higher degree of US-acculturation tended to report speaking to their toddlers more in English, which in turn lead their toddlers to produce more English vocabulary words. Additionally, mothers who were more heritage culture-oriented tended to expose their toddlers more to their heritage language, which, again, lead their toddlers to develop larger heritage language vocabularies. Thus, using a robust measure of acculturation, Cote and Bornstein (2014) found that mothers’ self-reported English use acted as a mediator for the indirect relation between maternal acculturation and toddlers’ productive vocabulary.

Though this indirect pathway of influence has been identified in the literature, those past studies have focused on participant samples that represent only a subset of Latino families in the US and relied heavily on parent-report data (Boyce et al., 2013; Cote & Bornstein, 2014). First, past acculturation studies that have focused on caregivers’ language use and toddler’s vocabulary have included predominantly immigrant caregivers who reported either being mostly monolingual and/or relied mostly on the use of one language (i.e., Spanish). This is despite many Latino families in the US being non-immigrant and skilled in both Spanish and English (Basilio et al., 2014). Second, acculturation and language use in the above-mentioned studies have been measured almost exclusively via self-report and caregiver-completed standardized assessments, respectively. Yet, utilizing speech samples may be more reliable than parent-report measures, especially when measuring bilingual language use, as measures of actual language patterns have been shown to capture more variability in bilingual language environments than do parent-report measures alone (Marchman et al., 2017). As the acculturation and actual language use patterns in bicultural and bilingual Latino families have not yet been systematically explored, the present study builds upon the existing literature-base by utilizing actual speech samples (instead of solely parent-report) to investigate toddlers’ and caregivers’ language use in relation to acculturation in a bilingual sample.

Present Study

Specifically, the present study examines the relations between bilingual toddlers’ language use and their caregivers’ acculturation level and bilingual language use. To study these relations in Spanish-English bilingual homes, we collected self-report measures and actual speech samples from Latino participants. On a background and language questionnaire (Duursma et. al., 2007), caregivers self-reported on which language or languages they typically use with their children. To assess caregivers and toddlers’ actual bilingual (Spanish and English) language use, we video-recorded caregiver-child interactions during a play task (the Three Bags Task; Brady-Smith et al., 1999) in families’ homes when toddlers were 1.5 and 2 years of age. We additionally assessed caregivers’ acculturation level using a self-report measure of acculturation (Cuéllar et al., 1995).

The guiding research question for this study was: What are the relations between toddlers’ bilingual language use and their caregivers’ bilingual language use and acculturation? Given theoretical (García Coll et al., 1996) and empirical evidence that children’s language skills may be influenced by the amount of input they receive in each language (Pearson et al., 1997; Place & Hoff, 2011), in addition to cultural processes, such as acculturation (Boyce et al., 2013; Cote & Bornstein, 2014), we expected to find an indirect relation between caregivers’ acculturation level and toddlers’ bilingual language use. That is, we hypothesized that caregivers’ acculturation level would influence their bilingual language use (i.e., act as a mediator), which, in turn, would influence their toddlers’ bilingual language use. In particular, we expected heritage culture-oriented caregivers to use more Spanish than English and US-oriented caregivers to use more English than Spanish. We also expected that, six months later, toddlers would use similar Spanish and English patterns as their caregivers. These patterns were expected to emerge because past studies show that caregivers’ acculturation level may be related to their self-reported bilingual language use (Boyce et al., 2013; Cote & Bornstein, 2014), and that language input patterns influence children’s language development (De Houwer, 2011).

Method

The data used for this study were collected as part of a larger, on-going research study on bilingual language development (Gámez et al., 2022). In the larger study, participants include bilingual (English- and Spanish-speaking) caregivers and their children (N = ~50). Video recordings of primary caregiver-child dyads are collected during home visits every six months, starting when the toddlers are 1.5 years of age. Caregivers also fill out demographic and language background questionnaires, in addition to an acculturation measure. The data analyzed in the present study are from a subsample of primary caregiver-child dyads (n = 37), where the primary caregiver self-identified as Latina/o and had available video and questionnaire data at child ages 1.5 and 2 years old. These ages were of interest because they are when toddlers (both monolingual and bilingual) are rapidly acquiring new words (Fenson et al., 1994; Pearson & Fernández, 1994) and receive most of their language input at home from their primary caregivers (Song et al., 2018). Thus, these early ages are suitable for analyzing toddlers’ language use at the word level in relation to primary caregivers’ language input.

Participants

Thirty-seven primary caregiver-child dyads were included in the present study. Toddlers (female = 20; male = 17) were 1.5 (Mage = 18.73 months; SDage = 1.11; range = 17.97 – 22.87 months) and 2 years of age (Mage = 25.13 months; SDage = 1.29; range = 23.67 – 28.23 months). They were reported to be Latino and bilingually-exposed. Specifically, toddlers were exposed to Spanish from birth (n = 37). They were also exposed to English from birth (n = 31) or by their first year (n = 3); three participants did not provide a date of English exposure.

All participating caregivers (n = 37; female = 36; male = 1; Mage = 33.29 years; SDage = 4.95) self-identified as the primary caregiver for their child. Most primary caregivers were college graduates (i.e., received Associate’s or Bachelor’s degrees) or higher (75.67%; n = 28); the rest (24.33%) of the primary caregivers had completed some (n = 2) or all of high school (n = 7). All primary caregivers reported living in the Midwest and identified as Latino, the majority of Mexican descent (83.78%; n = 31; includes Mexican, Mexican-American, Mexican-and-Other identities). Other ethnicities (16.22%) reported by caregivers included Guatemalan or Guatemalan-American (n = 3), Columbian (n = 1), Ecuadorian/South American (n = 1), and Cuban-Peruvian (n = 1). Additionally, primary caregivers identified either as first (37.8%; n = 14) or second (62.2%; n = 23) generation in the United States; first generation caregivers are immigrants to the US. All primary caregivers learned Spanish from birth (n = 37). The majority of primary caregivers learned English during childhood (n = 20; age range: 3–9 years old). The remaining primary caregivers learned English from birth (n = 5), adolescence (n = 2; age range: 14–16 years old), or adulthood (n = 5: age range: 20–39 years old); 5 did not report a specific age of English acquisition. Finally, families reported one of three income categories based on if their household earnings were 1) less than $35,000 annually (n = 10), 2) between $35,000 and $75,000 annually (n = 14), and 3) greater than $75,000 annually (n = 13).

Materials

Background and Language Questionnaire

A researcher-developed questionnaire was used to gather information on primary caregivers’ ethnic and language background, including birthplace, ethnic identity, and generation. The questionnaire also included questions about when toddlers began receiving consistent and significant exposure to English and Spanish. This researcher-developed questionnaire, which was inspired by the Parent Interview Response Questionnaire (Duursma et. al., 2007), was also used to determine primary caregivers’ self-reported language use. Primary caregivers indicated which language or languages they typically use at home with their toddlers on a five-point scale, where 5 = Only Spanish, 4 = Mainly in Spanish, 3 = In English and Spanish Equally, 2 = Mainly in English, and 1 = Only English. Finally, the questionnaire included questions intended to determine primary caregivers’ education level as a measure of their socioeconomic status (SES; Bradley & Corwyn, 2002, Hollingshead, 2011). That is, primary caregivers reported their last grades completed in school on a six-point scale, where 1 = “Elementary–6th Grade”, 2 = “7th–8th Grade”, 3 = “9th–12th Grade”, 4 = “1–2 Years of College”, 5 = “3–4 Years of College”, and 6 = “College Graduate and Higher.”

Acculturation Rating Scale for Mexican Americans-II (ARMSA-II)

Scale 1 of the Acculturation Rating Scale for Mexican Americans-II (ARSMA-II; Cuéllar et al., 1995) was used to determine primary caregivers’ acculturation levels. The ARSMA-II was created to assess acculturation in Mexican-American individuals residing in the United States. However, to be inclusive of all participants’ cultural backgrounds, we added the clause “or country of origin” to any question referring to Mexican culture. Similar adaptations of the ARSMA-II have also been used with participants from other cultures, such as Jamaican-Americans (Ferguson et al., 2012), Arab-Americans (Jadalla & Lee, 2015), and Asian-Americans (Lee et al., 2006).

The ARSMA-II (Cuéllar et al., 1995) is a bidimensional measure of acculturation comprised of two distinct scales, where one assesses Mexican orientation and one assesses Anglo (i.e., US) orientation. The ARMSA-II is comprised of 30 questions. 17 questions assess Mexican-/heritage culture-orientation (i.e., comprise the Mexican Orientation Subscale; MOS; α = 0.88) and 13 questions assess US-orientation (i.e., comprise the Anglo Orientation Subscale; AOS; α = 0.86). Test-retest reliability ratings for the MOS and AOS are 0.96 and 0.94, respectively (Cuéllar et al., 1995). For the current sample (n = 37), Cronbach’s alpha was 0.78 for the ARSMA-II as a whole (α = 0.78 for the MOS and α = 0.87 for the AOS).

As the ARSMA-II includes questions about cultural practices and identity, in addition to questions about language use, it is a thorough and multifaceted acculturation measure (Cabassa, 2003; Martinez et al., 2018). For example, some ARSMA-II questions are “My family cooks Mexican [or other country of origin] foods,” “I like to identify myself as an Anglo American (non-Latino White),” and “I enjoy English language TV.” For each question on the ARSMA-II, primary caregivers selected the number that best applied to them on to a five-point scale, where 5 = “Extremely often or almost always”, 4 = “Much or very often”, 3 = “Moderately”, 2 = “Very little or not very often”, and 1 = “Not at all”. Each primary caregiver’s mean MOS score was subtracted from their mean AOS score to obtain a linear acculturation score (Cuéllar et al., 1995). The linear acculturation scores obtained from the ARSMA-II are comparable to the linear acculturation scores that would be obtained from the original ARSMA (concurrent validity = r = 0.89; Cuéllar et al., 1980; Cuéllar et al., 1995). Linear acculturation scores typically range from less than −1.33 to greater than 2.45 (Cuéllar et al., 1995), where negative scores indicate more Mexican-orientation, scores close to zero indicate balanced biculturalism, and scores greater than zero indicate more Anglo/US-orientation.

Caregiver-Child Video-Recorded Interaction: Three Bags Task

The Three Bags Task (Brady-Smith et al., 1999) is a video-recorded structured task. Researchers provided caregiver-child dyads (i.e., each primary caregiver and their toddler) with age-appropriate toys in three cloth bags labeled with the numbers 1, 2, and 3 (Bag #1: wordless children’s books titled Good Night, Gorilla and Buenas Noches, Gorila; Bag #2: a farmhouse set and multiple pairs of toy animals; Bag #3: a toy kitchen set). Primary caregivers and their toddlers were allowed to play with the toys from each bag for as long as they desired within the 10 minutes, provided they progress in order (1, 2, 3). In general, speech collected from structured tasks, such as the Three Bags Task, is consistently child-directed and dense (i.e., few fluctuations between speech and silence; Tamis-LeMonda et al., 2017). Moreover, the one-on-one structure of the Three Bags Task isolates bilingual language patterns used specifically between the primary caregiver and toddler. As such, the Three Bags Task provides a controlled environment for measuring the influence of only the primary caregiver’s language use. Thus, the current study used video recordings of caregiver-child dyads participating in the Three Bags Task to capture actual language use patterns of primary caregivers and toddlers.

Video Recordings Capturing Language Use

Handheld video cameras (i.e., Sony HDRCX405 HD Video Recording Handycam Camcorders) placed on tripods were used to record caregiver-child dyads during the Three Bags Task.

General Procedure

The data for this study were collected in two separate visits to the participants’ homes. These visits occurred at two time points, when toddlers were 1.5 (Time I) and 2 (Time II) years of age. At the first time point, research assistants received consent from participants, collected questionnaires, administered the ARSMA-II, and video recorded primary caregivers and toddlers during the 10-minute structured task. At the second time point, background and language questionnaires (e.g., caregiver self-reported language use) were re-administered and primary caregivers and toddlers were video recorded during the structured task. Throughout the study, researchers interacted with families in their preferred language (i.e., in Spanish or English). All questionnaires, including the ARSMA-II, were in the caregivers’ preferred language and completed by primary caregivers. Families were compensated with gift cards for their participation. IRB (Institutional Review Board) approval was obtained prior to recruitment and data collection.

Collection of Language Samples via Video Recording

At each time point, each primary caregiver and their toddler were invited to participate in the video-recorded structured play task, the Three Bags Task. No language use restrictions were placed on this task; primary caregivers and toddlers could use both Spanish and English as they desired. Research assistants also left the room for the 10-minutes of video recording as not to interfere with the task. Of note, some video recording sessions were delayed (nTime I = 4; nTime II = 9) due to the COVID-19 pandemic and either conducted outdoors (nTime I = 5; nTime II = 22) or virtually (nTime I = 1; nTime II = 3; via Zoom) as a precaution against COVID-19.

Scoring

Transcription of Caregivers’ and Toddlers’ Speech.

All Spanish and English speech from the primary caregivers and toddlers in the video recordings (10 minutes each) was transcribed. Transcription (i.e., a systematic, written record of speech) was guided by the standard conventions of the Codes for the Human Analysis of Transcripts (CHAT) system of the Child Language Data Exchange System (CHILDES; MacWhinney, 2010). All transcribers, who are proficient in English and Spanish, have been trained to reliability (>87% inter-rater reliability) using the CHAT transcription conventions. For example, transcribers were required to transcribe all speech in its entirety and break speech into utterances (i.e., segments of speech bounded by pauses or other interruptions in one’s speech pattens). Additionally, transcribers marked the speakers (e.g., mother, father, child) and the languages (English vs. Spanish) used in the transcript at the utterance level, and, when necessary, at the word level. After initial transcription, all transcripts were checked by a second reliable transcriber to ensure that CHAT conventions and language rules were correctly used. A third reliable transcriber then checked all transcripts from Time II to ensure that the toddlers’ speech was correctly transcribed.

Quantification of Caregivers’ and Toddlers’ Speech.

The number of word tokens (i.e., the total number of words in a segment of speech; Rowe, 2012) in English and Spanish was used to quantify the amount of speech used by caregivers and toddlers. That is, the number of word tokens used in each language by caregivers at Time I represents caregiver input in English or Spanish. The number of word tokens in each language by toddlers at Time II represents child output in Spanish or English. A higher number of word tokens in a language represents more language use, and a lower number of word tokens in a language represents less language use. In this study, the bilingual language use for caregivers and toddlers was conceptualized as ratios. Ratios were calculated by dividing the number of Spanish tokens by the number of English tokens used in a transcript. For these ratios, scores from zero to 1 indicated more English than Spanish use; scores equal or near to 1 indicated a balanced use of English and Spanish (i.e., more balanced bilingualism), and scores greater than 1 indicated more Spanish than English use.

Thus, for each transcript, the number of word tokens in English and Spanish was determined for each primary caregiver and for each target toddler using the Computerized Language Analysis (CLAN; MacWhinney, 2010) software of CHILDES. Specifically, the CLAN software provided initial counts of the words spoken by the primary caregiver in the transcripts from Time I. Similarly, the CLAN software counted the words spoken by the toddler in the transcripts from Time II.

Identification of Caregivers’ and Toddlers’ Words.

Any words that were said clearly and in full by caregivers and toddlers were counted as word tokens. However, because toddlers’ vocalizations can convey meaning, regardless of correct pronunciation (e.g., protowords) or exact reproduction of an adult word target (i.e., a word said by an adult that a toddler is trying to replicate), toddlers’ vocalizations were also counted as word tokens if 1) they were used in an appropriate context with a clear referent or 2) the toddler reproduced a consonant-vowel (CV) or vowel-consonant (VC) pairing consistent with the adult word target (Huttenlocher et al., 1991). For example, if a toddler said “ita,” in response to their mother saying “sopita” [“soup” in diminutive], that toddlers’ vocalization would be counted as a word token, as it reproduced part of the adult word target. Additionally, onomatopoeic sounds were counted as tokens if they were also used in an appropriate context with a clear referent. For example, “neigh” was counted as a token in instances where the toddler or caregiver made that onomatopoeic vocalization while holding or pointing at a toy horse. In this instance, the onomatopoeic sound “neigh” was also counted for the caregiver because their communicative intention was to initiate an imitative response from their toddler. Therefore, onomatopoeic sounds were also counted as tokens if the toddler said them in imitation of their caregiver (Pan et al., 2005) or in response to a response-initiating question from the caregiver (e.g., “What does the horse say?”).

Analytic Plan

SPSS 27 (IBM Corp., 2020) and the PROCESS tool (Hayes, 2017) were used to run a mediational analysis investigating whether caregivers’ acculturation level indirectly predicted toddlers’ bilingual language use, as a function of caregivers’ bilingual language use. We also ran regression analyses to confirm the coefficient values for each path of the main mediational model (i.e., the causal steps approach; Baron & Kenny, 1986). As a precursor to these analyses, we examined descriptive statistics of toddlers’ and caregivers’ number of word tokens, in addition to their self-reported bilingual language use and acculturation levels.

Results

Descriptive Analyses

Table 1 shows caregivers’ and toddlers’ tokens from video-recordings at Time I and Time II, respectively. Primary caregivers used, on average, 486 Spanish tokens and 57 English tokens during the 10-minute video-recorded caregiver-child interaction task (Time I). Six months later (Time II), toddlers used, on average, 36 Spanish and 13 English tokens during that 10-minute interaction task. Thus, while primary caregivers and toddlers used their two languages while interacting with each other (i.e., are bilingual), they used more Spanish than English. That is, caregivers used Spanish about 9 times as much as they used English (~9:1 Spanish to English ratio), while toddlers used Spanish about 3 times as much as they used English (~3:1 Spanish to English ratio).

Table 1.

Bilingual Language Use (Tokens) and Acculturation Averages

Measure Caregivers’ language use (Time I) Toddlers’ language use (Time II)
 Average number of Spanish tokens 486.34 (181.99) 36.06 (29.97)
 Average number of English tokens 57.43 (92.37) 13.09 (19.60)
 Average Spanish : English Tokens Ratio 8.47 : 1 2.75 : 1
Measure Caregivers’ acculturation level (Time I)
 Average linear acculturation score −0.770 (0.948)
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Note: Standard deviations are reported in parentheses. n = 35; Ratios in row 3 are the average numbers of Spanish tokens (row 1) divided by the average number of English tokens (row 2). Average numbers are per 10-minute interactions (i.e., the Three Bags Task). Acculturation was measured by the ARSMA-II (Cuéllar et al., 1995; scores = ~0 indicate biculturalism).

In line with the number of word tokens that they used during the video recording (Time I), primary caregivers also self-reported using more Spanish than English in interactions with their toddlers. No caregivers reported using “Only English.” On average, they reported using between “Spanish and English Equally” to “Mainly Spanish” (MTime I = 3.97; SDTime I = 0.785; MTime II = 3.76; SDTime II = 0.987). Paired-sample t-tests revealed no statistically significant difference in caregiver self-reported language use between the two time points (p > 0.05). There was also a moderately strong correlation between caregivers’ self-reported language use at each time point (τbn = 0.643, p < 0.001). Thus, for any relevant, subsequent analyses, we used primary caregivers’ self-reported language use from the first time point (not Time II) to be in line with the analyses using caregivers’ actual language use.

Additionally, the average linear acculturation score for caregivers (n = 35) was −0.770 (SD = 0.948; Table 1). As noted, according to the cutting scores specified by Cuéllar and colleagues (1995), a score of −0.770 indicates that primary caregivers in the current sample were, on average, “Mexican/heritage culture-oriented” to approximately “Balanced bicultural.” Thus, while caregivers in our sample were bilingual and bicultural, they nevertheless self-reported speaking slightly more Spanish than English and being more Mexican/heritage culture-oriented than US-oriented.

Table 2 shows correlations between primary caregivers’ acculturation level and language use (number of word tokens and self-reported amount). Caregivers’ acculturation level was significantly related to their actual Spanish language use (i.e., number of Spanish word tokens; p < 0.01) and self-reported language use (p < 0.01); the correlation with actual English language use (i.e., number of English word tokens) was positive, but not significant (p = 0.198). The significant correlations suggest that when caregivers were more oriented to their heritage culture, they used more Spanish and rated their language use closer to “Only Spanish” (i.e., higher on the 5-point language use scale). Moreover, when caregivers used more English or more Spanish, they rated closer to “Only English” or “Only Spanish,” respectively.

Table 2.

Correlations Between Caregivers’ Acculturation and Language Use

Acculturation Level Number of English Tokens Number of Spanish Tokens Self-Reported Language Use
Self-Reported Language Use −0.388** −0.479*** 0.303* -
Number of Spanish Tokens −0.489** −0.268 -
Number of English Tokens 0.226 -
Acculturation Level -
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Note: The number of English tokens was log-transformed (natural log) due to being right skewed (3.336). Kendall’s tau-b is reported for self-reported language use correlations.

***

p<0.001,

**

p<0.01,

*

p<0.05

Of note, these and all subsequent analyses excluded two participants who were identified as outliers (Spanish and/or English tokens were greater than or less than +/−3 SDs from the mean; Kwak & Kim, 2017). Moreover, when the bilingual language use variables (i.e., Spanish to English tokens ratios for caregivers and toddlers) were used in analyses, they were log-transformed (natural logarithm) due to being right skewed (CaregiversTime I = 4.340; ToddlersTime I = 2.472). As some participants used zero words in English or Spanish, their log-transformed bilingual language use variables could not be defined. Consequently, any further analyses using the bilingual language use variables include a reduced sample size of 30 due these statistical limitations.

Main Mediation Analyses

Mediation analyses were used to examine whether there was an indirect relation between caregivers’ acculturation and toddlers’ language use (i.e., the natural log of the ratio of Spanish to English tokens used) via caregivers’ language use (i.e., the natural log of the ratio of Spanish to English tokens used). The output from PROCESS provided the confidence interval (CI) for this hypothesized indirect pathway of influence, in addition to unstandardized beta coefficients (B) within the mediational model. As zero was not within the bounds of the 95% CI [−0.8457, −0.0061], the mediational analysis revealed that the indirect pathway was significant (Hayes & Rockwood, 2017). That is, caregivers’ acculturation level was found to influence toddlers’ bilingual language use when mediated by caregivers’ bilingual language use. Of note, an additional mediational analysis was performed to investigate the relation between caregivers’ and toddlers’ bilingual language use, with caregivers’ acculturation as a mediator. Mediation was not supported in that case because zero was within the bounds of the 95% CI [−0.0801, 0.2125] (Hayes & Rockwood, 2017).

Table 3 shows the results from regression analyses (n = 30) that were performed to confirm the unstandardized B coefficients that, taken together, indicate that caregivers’ language use significantly mediates the relation between caregivers’ acculturation and toddlers’ language use. When the mediator (i.e., caregivers’ language use) was not included in the model, a strong and positive relation (p < 0.05) between caregivers’ acculturation and toddlers’ bilingual language use (i.e., path c; B = −0.661) was revealed. That is, as caregivers’ acculturation scores decrease by one unit (i.e., are more heritage culture-oriented), there is an associated 48.37% ((e−0.661 - 1)*100; Stock & Watson, 2006; UCLA: Statistical Consulting Group, 2021) increase in toddlers’ bilingual language use ratio (i.e., more Spanish). However, after controlling for caregivers’ bilingual language use, the effect of caregivers’ acculturation on children’s bilingual language use was no longer significant (path c’; p = 0.124). This change in significance indicates that the direct pathway of influence from caregivers’ acculturation to toddlers’ bilingual language use is not significant. That is, it indicates that the indirect pathway, with caregivers’ bilingual language use as the mediator, is significant.

Table 3.

Regressions Relating Acculturation to Caregivers’ and Toddlers’ Bilingual Language Use

Parameter Estimates - on Toddlers’ Bilingual Language Use B SE t-value
Intercept 0.836 0.328 2.549
Caregiver Acculturation (path c) −0.661* 0.255 −2.594
Parameter Estimates - on Caregivers’ Bilingual Language Use B SE t-value
Intercept 2.314 0.358 6.464
Caregiver Acculturation (path a) −0.630* 0.278 −2.265
Parameter Estimates - on Toddlers’ Bilingual Language Use B SE t-value
Intercept −0.124 0.470 0.793
Caregiver Bilingual Language Use (path b) 0.415* 0.157 2.640
Caregiver Acculturation (path c’) −0.400 0.252 −1.587
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*

p<0.05

Indeed, strong and negative relations were found between caregivers’ acculturation and caregivers’ bilingual language use (path a; B = −0.630; p < 0.05), and between caregivers’ acculturation and toddlers’ bilingual language use (path b; B = 0.415; p < 0.05). These two paths (a and b) make up the indirect pathway within the mediational model (Figure 1). In particular, the results for path a reveal that as caregivers’ acculturation scores decrease by one unit (i.e., are more heritage culture-oriented), there is an associated 46.74% ((e−0.630 - 1)*100) increase in caregivers’ bilingual language use ratio (i.e., more Spanish). The results for path b show that as caregivers’ bilingual language use increases by 1% (i.e., more Spanish), their toddlers’ bilingual language use ratio increases by 0.415% (i.e., more Spanish).

Figure 1.

Figure 1

Open in a new tab

Visual Representation of the Final Mediational Model

Note: Language scores are log-transformed Spanish to English tokens ratios. Values reported are unstandardized B values. Paths described in parentheses relate to components of the causal steps approach to mediation (Baron & Kenny, 1986).

*p<0.05

These findings confirm that all components of the causal steps approach to mediation (Baron & Kenny, 1986) were satisfied (see Figure 1). In this approach, mediation is supported when paths a, b, and c are all significant (p <0.05), path c is greater than path c’, and path c’ is nonsignificant (Fritz & MacKinnon, 2007). Thus, our findings support that caregivers’ bilingual language use is acting as a mediator for the relation between caregivers’ acculturation and their toddlers’ bilingual language use. That is, our analyses revealed a significant, indirect relation between caregivers’ acculturation and their toddlers’ bilingual language use via caregivers’ bilingual language use. Note that the proxy variable for SES (i.e., grades completed in school) was consistently nonsignificant in the aforementioned regression analyses, and as such, it was not included in the final models.

In general, the findings from these main mediation analyses indicate that, when caregivers are more heritage culture-oriented, their toddlers use more Spanish than English. Caregivers also use more Spanish than English when they are more heritage culture-oriented. These results additionally reveal that as caregivers use more Spanish, their toddlers use more Spanish six months later, and vice versa for English use. Overall, caregivers’ acculturation was indirectly associated with toddlers’ bilingual language use when caregivers’ bilingual language use was included as a mediator.

Discussion

Few studies have investigated how Latino toddlers’ bilingual language output is related to their caregivers’ input, while ta ing into consideration caregivers’ cultural orientation and experiences (Boyce et al., 2013; Cote & Bornstein, 2014). Thus, the current study examined the relations among primary caregivers’ acculturation level, their bilingual language use, and their toddlers’ bilingual language use. To do so, we video recorded caregiver-child interactions during home visits at child ages 1.5 and 2 years old to obtain samples of caregivers’ and toddlers’ speech, in addition to administering a robust measure of acculturation (Cuéllar et al., 1995) to caregivers. Our study findings suggest that caregivers’ acculturation may be indirectly related to their toddlers’ actual bilingual language, as a function of caregivers’ actual bilingual language use (i.e., the mediator).

Our descriptive findings related to caregivers’ actual language use during interactions with their toddlers (i.e., number of word tokens from the video recordings) revealed that while caregivers and toddlers used both Spanish and English in interactions with each other, they each favored speaking Spanish. For caregivers, a similar pattern was found with self-report data. That is, caregivers self-reported using slightly more Spanish than English with their toddlers. However, for toddlers, their actual Spanish and English use tendencies were more balanced than that of their caregivers. These findings, which were obtained from video recorded samples of caregiver and child speech in bilingual homes, expand on the previous bilingual input literature that has relied heavily on caregiver reports of language use (Carroll, 2017; cf. Tamis-LeMonda et al., 2019; Weisleder & Fernald, 2013).

In terms of Latino caregivers’ acculturation level, our findings showed that primary caregivers reported being bicultural. On average, caregivers maintained ties with both the US and their heritage country. This is in contrast to previous studies on acculturation and young children’s language use (Boyce et al., 2013; Cote & Bornstein, 2014) that primarily included heritage culture-oriented caregivers who were born outside the US (i.e., were immigrants to the US). Additionally, the acculturation level of caregivers in the current study was significantly correlated with their (actual and self-reported) language use, such that heritage-culture orientation was associated with more Spanish use and ratings closer to “Only Spanish”. This association remains consistent with previous findings relating caregivers’ acculturation to their self-reported language use (Cote & Bornstein, 2014).

Mediation analyses further revealed a significant indirect relation between acculturation and toddlers’ bilingual language use, with caregivers’ bilingual language use from six months prior serving as the mediator. In particular, when caregivers were more heritage culture-oriented, they used more Spanish than English with their toddlers, and in turn, their toddlers used more Spanish than English at follow up, six months later. Thus, the mediational results are supported by the Integrative Model of Child Development (García Coll et al., 1996). Just as García Coll and colleagues (1996) place culture at the core of child development (not the periphery), we found that culture (e.g., caregivers’ acculturation level) indirectly influences toddlers’ development, specifically their language development, through processes related to family decisions (e.g., caregivers’ bilingual language use). These results are also in line with interactionist theories of language (Snow, 1994; Vygotsky, 1978) and findings in the bilingual input literature (De Houwer, 2011; Pearson et al., 1997; Place & Hoff, 2011), as analyses revealed that the amount of input a bilingual toddler received was positively associated with their language development.

Our findings additionally expand on findings from prior acculturation and language use studies (Cote & Bornstein, 2014), as we used actual speech samples and focused on different populations of bilingual speakers. For example, Tsai and colleagues (2012) included a sample of older, Chinese-American children (Mage = 5.11 years) in their study, while the current study included Mexican-American toddlers’ (Mage = 25.13 months). Even though both studies identified an indirect relation between caregivers’ acculturation and their children’s language use via caregivers’ language use, our findings generalize to families with children at a different stage of language learning (e.g., two-word stage in toddlers vs. advanced language in kindergarteners) and who use different language pairs (e.g., Chinese-English vs. Spanish-English). Thus, differences in our study design allow the present study to have slightly different implications than previous acculturation and language use studies (e.g., Tsai et al., 2012).

Further, our study was designed to capture and represent our bilingual and bicultural sample. To do so, we utilized an acculturation measure that maintained the bidimensionality of acculturation, but provided a linear acculturation score (ARSMA-II; Cuéllar et al., 1995), which may better represent balanced biculturalism. We also used bilingual variables (i.e., Spanish-to-English word token ratios) as our mediator and outcome variables, as to better represent the bilingual experience, in which languages are not always used separately. In contrast, Tsai et al. (2012) conceptualized acculturation in ways that may not have fully represented biculturalism and bilingualism. That is, the researchers used two separate acculturation variables as predictors (i.e., caregivers’ Chinese cultural orientation and their American cultural orientation) and two separate language variables as outcomes (i.e., children’s Chinese language proficiency and their English language proficiency) in their mediational models. Additionally, they only included caregivers’ heritage language use as the mediator in their models, rather than also considering the influence of caregivers’ English language use. Of note, Tsai and colleagues’ (2012) models are conceptually similar to those used by Cote and Bornstein (2014), who ran separate models relating acculturation to 1) caregivers’ and toddlers’ heritage language use and 2) caregivers’ and toddlers’ heritage English language use. Though previous studies have found similar indirect pathways (Cote & Bornstein, 2014; Tsai et al., 2012), findings from those studies are only applicable to families with immigrant caregivers, and may only represent single language transmission (rather than bilingual language input and output) due to the use of monolingual variables. In contrast, our findings are more generalizable to and representative of actual bilingual language use patterns in the larger Latino population in the US than previous studies.

Limitations and Future Directions

This study has some limitations related to the study design and sample size, which indicate promising directions for future research. First, while the observational component of the current study is a notable strength, we cannot make causal claims about the observed relations, as they are correlational in nature. That is, while our findings have theoretical support (García Coll et al., 1996), the significant relations among caregivers’ acculturation level, caregivers’ bilingual language use, and toddlers’ bilingual language use should be tested experimentally. Second, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, some participants did not agree to video recording visits. This restricted the final sample sizes that we were able to use for descriptive (n = 35) and mediation analyses (n = 30). Though it is not uncommon for labor-intensive studies, such as ours, to have lower samples sizes (e.g., Place & Hoff, 2011; n = 29), future research should include a larger, more diverse sample.

Specifically, as our findings may have limited generalizability to families from non-Mexican-American backgrounds (the majority group in this study) or who do not speak Spanish, future work should consider how cultural processes and language use are connected in other Latino samples in the US. With a larger, more diverse sample, there would likely be greater variability in acculturation scores and language use tendencies. This would lead to more generalizability of results. Additionally, greater variability in caregiver characteristics would likely lead to more variability in caregivers’ acculturation levels. Thus, future research could also investigate which domains of acculturation are driving the relation between acculturation and caregivers’ and toddlers’ bilingual language use.

Conclusion

In summary, we expanded on the few existing acculturation and language use studies (Boyce et., 2013; Cote & Bornstein, 2014; Tsai et al., 2012) by collecting video recordings of actual language use in a sample of bicultural and bilingual caregivers and toddlers. Studies that assess bilingual input (see Huttenlocher et al., 2010; Marchman et al., 2017), such as the current study, require a number of additional resources compared to monolingual studies (Hart & Risley, 1995; Huttenlocher et al., 1991; Rowe, 2012). These include, but are not limited to, engaging self-identifying Latino researchers to recruit and collect data from bilingual participants, as well as training a number of highly-proficient Spanish- and English-speaking (i.e., bilingual) research assistants in the processes of transcription and coding in, not one, but two languages (English, Spanish). We addressed several of these challenges in conducting this linguistically-detailed study of bilingual language use.

As a result of our labor-intensive data collection and research efforts, our findings showed that Latino caregivers’ acculturation indirectly influences their toddlers’ language use, via their own language use. These findings build upon previous research that relied on self-report measures of language use and focused on immigrant and single language-dominant families (Boyce et al., 2013; Cote & Bornstein, 2014). That is, we included a more diverse sample, one that additionality includes bilingual and bicultural caregivers, which allows our results to be more generalizable to the broader population of Latinos in the US.

Highlights.

  • Latino caregivers’ acculturation indirectly related to their toddlers’ bilingual output via caregivers’ bilingual input.

  • Caregivers and toddlers used Spanish and English while interacting, though toddlers’ bilingual use was more balanced.

  • Caregivers’ acculturation scores, revealing biculturalism, related to their self-reported bilingual and actual Spanish use.

  • Toddlers’ actual Spanish and English use is influenced by their caregivers’ actual bilingual language use and acculturation.

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the undergraduate students in the Bilingual Language Development Lab at Loyola University Chicago, namely Maily Galindo, Carla Jauregui, and Alexia Flores, for their assistance with data collection and transcription for this study. We also thank Dr. Catherine Snow and Dr. Francisco Palermo for their advice during the planning phase of this project. Finally, we are so grateful for the participation of the families who welcomed us into their homes so that we could learn more about bilingual language learning.

Funding:

This work was supported by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development [grant number 1R15HD097589-01].

Footnotes

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Declarations of interest: none

AuthorStatement

Jordan Perry: Writing- Original draft preparation, Investigation, Analysis. Perla B. Gámez: Writing- Original draft preparation, Supervision, Funding acquisition.

1

Compared to the unidimensional framework, where an individual loses adherence to their heritage culture as they adjust to the dominant culture, the bidimensional or multidimensional framework of acculturation seems to draw more empirical support (Kang, 2006; Ryder et al., 2000; Thomson & Hoffman-Goetz, 2009) as it is thought to better represent the realities of the process of acculturation (Berry & Sam, 1996; Rogler et al., 1991).

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