African American Mothers’ Views of Their Infants’ Language Development and Language-Learning Environment

Abstract

The purpose of this investigation was to develop an understanding of how African American mothers living in an urban setting in the South (a) viewed their children’s language development and (b) structured their children’s language-learning environment in general. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with six African American mothers of low socioeco-nomic status (SES) and six African American mothers of middle SES as part of a larger study. Three themes emerged from the analysis of the data: (a) how children learn to talk, (b) perceptions of children’s language development, and (c) structuring children’s experiences. Results revealed some similarities between the views of mothers of low and middle SES, with individual variations occurring within each of the groups.