The importance of household environments for early language development of Head Start children

Abstract

This dissertation explored literature from a variety of fields including sociology, economics, and child development to determine how household relationship structures and related features of the home environment may be associated with child language outcomes. Beyond household relationship structures, other key features of the home environment included developmental supports available at home, environmental stress in the home, and cultural differences among preschool aged children. The literature reviewed in this dissertation provided the foundation for an analytic rationale which ultimately informed a series of empirical models employed to answer the study’s research questions. Data from the Family and Child Experience Survey 2014 cohort were used to identify the associations between key features of the home environment and language outcomes among children enrolled in Head Start. Head Start is a federally funded program designed to provide services primarily to promote school readiness for young children who live in low income households and their families. Most children included in the sample were between three and five years of age. A series of single predictor and stepwise regression models were implemented which resulted in 112 statistical models developed to explore and understand the relationships between the home environment and early language assessment scores. ☐ Findings provide key insights into the relationships between predictors within each feature of the home environment and child language outcomes at baseline and after the completion of one Head Start program year. Dual language learners were associated with substantially lower language assessment scores at baseline, but analyses on gain scores provides promising information about language growth for these children. Household sizes of three to five were associated with higher language assessment scores at baseline for many children, and results suggest it may be beneficial for children to live in two-parent households (i.e., legally married or cohabitating). Results also show positive associations between developmental supports in the home and language outcomes while negative associations with language scores were observed for children in living poverty. ☐ This study’s results lay an important foundation for future research to further our understanding of the complexity of children’s home environment and its effect on language development. Ultimately, this dissertation project serves as an important early step in understanding how key factors in the home environment may influence child language development in the earliest years and provides insights into mechanisms and potential supports that might help at-risk children served by Head Start.