Language and Symbolic Play in Toddlers

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Abstract
Language-play relations were examined in 110 18-month-old toddlers by observing their play actions in the Symbolic Play Test and assessing their language skills with the CDI parental report and the Reynell Developmental Language Scales. Significant associations between both language comprehension and production (vocabulary, use of suffixes, utterance length) and play were found when percentage of symbolic play was used as the measure of play competence. The total play score which included both functional-relational toy manipulation and symbolic play was not as strongly associated with the language measures. In both play measures relations were, however, higher between play and language comprehension than between play and language production. Out of the symbolic play categories other-directed pretence discriminated children’s play best. The relation between language and play was also supported by a subgroup analysis which showed that early talkers displayed significantly more symbolic play than late talkers. Children belonging to the latter group had a small productive vocabulary and they did not yet exhibit any sentence combinations or grammatical suffixes. The total play score correlated significantly with language comprehension among late talkers, whereas a significant connection was found between language comprehension and percentage of symbolic play among early talkers. Methodological issues concerning the assessment of toddlers’ play will be discussed.

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