[HN Gopher] Kids with chattier parents are more talkative, may h...
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       Kids with chattier parents are more talkative, may have bigger
       vocabulary
        
       Author : kherndon
       Score  : 65 points
       Date   : 2023-12-22 13:12 UTC (2 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.science.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.science.org)
        
       | kdwikzncba wrote:
       | Some times it blows my mind to discover that some bleeding
       | obvious things arent well established. Next thing you're gonna
       | discover that kids with funnier parents tell more jokes, or that
       | kids with angrier parents shout more.
        
         | andyferris wrote:
         | Of course the interesting science would be - nature or nurture?
         | 
         | Eg in a "village" would the kids of quiet parents be exposed
         | all day to all these other talkative people, and therefore the
         | effect disappears? Or is it genetic?
        
           | mewpmewp2 wrote:
           | Great identical twins studies would be very interesting here.
           | 
           | And I agree due to the complexity of this, it's one of the
           | most fascinating questions out there. How much and with what
           | kind of likelihood I as a parent can influence my child?
           | 
           | Because due the complexity of it all, it sometimes also
           | happens that bad parents providing bad environment and
           | perhaps bad genes as well, get good children and vice versa.
           | No one likes the ideas of this happening though as it
           | dismisses the idea of responsibility, and no one likes the
           | idea that they won't have 100% control over raising their
           | children.
           | 
           | It would be great to know the exact odds, e.g. if you
           | classified parents into different buckets, how often could it
           | happen that with whatever rules that are perfect environment
           | would it happen that children happen to grow up in a bucket
           | where they aren't with desired characteristics.
           | 
           | Then sometimes identical twins who grow up with same parents,
           | still become different personality wise. What exactly
           | explains that? Is it that one of them just happens to take
           | the leading role in their relationship and the other just
           | balances and the difference between them snowballs because of
           | the dynamic they just built with each other.
        
         | FirmwareBurner wrote:
         | It may be obvious, but as a relative HN long timer, I've been
         | hit too many times with the "source please" when making
         | statements based on what I thought were obvious well known
         | things, so studies like these are ammo for those sticklers who
         | insist on seeing the sauce for everything.
        
         | redcobra762 wrote:
         | The whole point of study is to break down these "obvious"
         | conclusions and make sure we understand the exact causal chain,
         | free of confounding variables. Extremely often something is
         | studied that seems "obvious" and turns out to be anything but.
        
         | dang wrote:
         | " _Please don 't post shallow dismissals, especially of other
         | people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something._"
         | 
         | https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
        
           | kdwikzncba wrote:
           | Every comment in this thread is a shallow dismissal. Are you
           | going to parrot that BS at every one of them, or just me, you
           | dong?
        
         | lnxg33k1 wrote:
         | Are you sure it's obvious? I have parents that are always
         | joking and what they transmitted me is to hate everything, in
         | my experience people tend to hate the traits they grow up with
         | and to which they're continuously exposed, as I hear often "Who
         | did he take it from?"
        
       | onyxringer wrote:
       | I noticed that taller parents have taller kids, which is similar.
       | I wonder if there's some kind of mechanism underneath both
       | correlations.
        
         | drewcoo wrote:
         | I'd never thought of "tall" as a behavior.
        
           | afandian wrote:
           | There's a behavioural component.
           | 
           | https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/apr/08/scientists-
           | try...
        
             | runsWphotons wrote:
             | I like that this article has a wrong conversion in the
             | first sentence.
        
               | sWW26 wrote:
               | If you're referring to the 1.71m = 5.6 feet. It's
               | technically correct but confusing, 5.6' != 5'6".
        
               | whelp_24 wrote:
               | 5.6feet =5'7"
        
           | scotty79 wrote:
           | That's the point of the comment. That behavior is as likely
           | to be shaped by genetics as any other trait. There's not as
           | much unique stuff about behavior as people usually think.
        
         | baz00 wrote:
         | Myself and my ex wife are quite tall. All my kids are short.
         | YMMV.
        
           | doubled112 wrote:
           | What about the mail man?
        
             | paulryanrogers wrote:
             | IME one only has to worry about the taller and more
             | handsome ones. (Being a shorter person that's usually all
             | of them in my case.)
        
           | boringuser2 wrote:
           | You might want to get a DNA test.
        
           | cbsks wrote:
           | Ah, that's a common problem with children. You need to wait a
           | few years. They'll grow out of it.
        
         | Dolototo wrote:
         | Behavior patterns are patterns you learn because you just see
         | it every day.
         | 
         | You can already see this in a lot of kids and recognize their
         | parents through it.
        
           | scotty79 wrote:
           | Behavior can be genetic. Sometimes at wedding you can see
           | which part is the brides (or grooms) family bacause they all
           | have the same worried look and wrinkles shaped by it.
        
             | Dolototo wrote:
             | I don't think so.
             | 
             | There are probably plenty of examples of kids in foster
             | care who do not share those behavior patterns
        
         | sumedh wrote:
         | > I noticed that taller parents have taller kids,
         | 
         | Probably because of genes and access to nutritious food.
        
         | jareklupinski wrote:
         | as a tall parent, I am able to pick up my offspring by the
         | arms, and let them 'grow down' until they reach their full
         | length
        
           | toast0 wrote:
           | It's also important to install shower heads at a tall height.
           | Children prefer to be watered from above.
        
       | supersparrow wrote:
       | Incredible scientific breakthrough here. Kids may speak sooner
       | and have a better vocabulary if their parents talk more. Almost
       | as if they learn from us. Amazing!
        
         | 6nf wrote:
         | Could be genetic too, at least in part
        
         | wkjagt wrote:
         | It is isn't true until it's science.
        
         | wkipling wrote:
         | If you read the study they were trying to see if class had
         | anything to do with it.
        
       | throwaway743 wrote:
       | Idk I have a mother who legit never stops talking and I'm the
       | complete opposite. My brother and I play a game when we're all
       | together where we see if we can count to 30 without her talking.
       | Never once hit 30, closest was like 22.
       | 
       | The study was with kids, so maybe that changes as they get older?
        
         | logtempo wrote:
         | It's an interesting question. Maybe a parent that monopolize
         | the conversation impact negatively.
         | 
         | As for your experience, keep in mind that with statistics comes
         | distribution of outcomes, you could be on that small % where
         | things didn't work as observed in the article.
        
         | hydrok9 wrote:
         | my mom is like this too and i have a really strong negative
         | reaction towards anyone who dominates a conversation or talks
         | too much as a result
        
       | logtempo wrote:
       | I think comments here don't focus on the most important point of
       | this study, and article:
       | 
       | - citation: But the findings don't necessarily mean kids speak
       | more because they hear more speech, he says: Instead, "Adults
       | [might] talk back more to kids who produce more language."
       | 
       | - article show no evidence of socio-economic difference contrary
       | to what was claimed before
       | 
       | - article have a huge database over the world, which makes it a
       | strong study.
       | 
       | - article is a baby step: the next step are to know if it's
       | talking to the child or if it's talking beside the child, for
       | example.
        
         | leosanchez wrote:
         | Not a native English speaker. can you explain what do mean by
         | "if it's talking beside the child" ?
        
           | erulabs wrote:
           | Not the parent but I take it to mean speaking directly to the
           | child versus the child being in the same room as people who
           | are talking.
        
             | leosanchez wrote:
             | Thanks:)
        
       | dustedcodes wrote:
       | Personal anecdote, since day one me and my wife have been
       | speaking to our baby girl like she is our best friend. For
       | example in the mornings I'd never let my daughter just mong out
       | in front of the TV while making breakfast. I bought a montessori
       | step so she can climb up and stand next to me as I wash
       | vegetables, cut bread, fry eggs, brew coffee, etc. and I talk to
       | her non stop. I name everything I touch, I involve her by making
       | her hold items, press buttons etc and her speech development is
       | phenomenal for her age. She is 17 months now and speaks German to
       | me, English to my wife and Gujarati to her grandmother. She can't
       | speak normally yet but she picked up in all three languages
       | enough vocabulary already to say exactly what she wants or if
       | something is not right. She counts beyond 10 in two languages and
       | knows to say words in German to me and in English to my wife. We
       | can point at an item in succession and she'd say it in the
       | correct language depending on who pointed to it. It's amazing, I
       | see other kids at her age and they literally can barely say 5
       | words.
        
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       (page generated 2023-12-24 23:02 UTC)