Proposal

What are the features of Child development speech in televised programmes for ages 2-5?

We want to research features of Child Directed Speech (CDS) in televised programmes with a demographic of 2-5 year olds. We decided on the demographic of 2-5 year olds, as children should be in the two-word stage and have a large comprehension around 24 months. Furthermore, it is theorised that on average children stop acquiring language around 60 months (5years) and start learning at this point. Therefore, this project will focus on how features of CDS affect language acquisition, as opposed to language learning, within children's programmes. This topic is very relevant to the group as we all watched similar programmes when we were acquiring our own language, which in turn will give the group intrinsic motivation. Thus we have a shared group interest in how some of our favourite programmes have contributed towards this.

As a group, we have 3 primary research objectives:

•  To analyse pitch and intonation in relation to features of CDS  

• To evaluate the usage of paralinguistic features such as body language and facial expressions in relation to features of CDS 

• To examine the use of repetition within the structure of the programme in relation to features of CDS

Literature

A significant amount of research has already been done towards televised children's programmes and their role within child language acquisition. This provides us with the following literature that we will read as a starting point to support our research:

·             Lemish, Dafnah (2006), "Television as a talking picture book: A prop for language acquisition. "Malden ; Oxford : Blackwell

·             Linebarger, Deborah L; Vaala, Sarah (2010) "Screen media and language development in infants and toddlers: An ecological perspective Developmental Review", Vol.30(2), pp.176-202 [Peer Reviewed Journal]

·             Rice, Mabel (1983) "The role of television in language acquisition": Development review, Vol.3 (2) pp.211-224 [peer reviewed journal]

·             Rice, Mabel L, and Linda Woodsmall. (1988) "Lessons from television: Children's word learning when viewing. Child Development" pp. 420-429.

·             Rolandelli, David (1989) "Children and television: The visual superiority effect reconsidered". Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic media, Vol 33(1), p.69-81: Routledge

Methodology:

Each of us will analyse two episdodes from one programme, giving us data from ten different sources. The ten selected will consist of 5 prevelant programmes from past and present years. We also want to ensure that five of the programs have a purely narrative based genre.

Taking this into account we will analyse the following programs:

• Winnie the Pooh
• In the Night Garden
• Sooty and Sweep
• Peppa Pig
• Rosie and Jim

We will then extrapolate all our data from individual analysis and present it in an analytical structure which will be the main body of the research. Due to the wide demographics, we will be able to analyse which features are more prevalent for different ages within our target audience. In this section we should find similar patterns in regards to our research objectives, and therefore conclude an answer to our question.

We plan to analyse the pitch by noting frequency of significant pitch shifts. Furthermore, we will record how many times this occurs in each programme and at what specific points. We will note obvious uses of higher pitch when addressing characters and the audience.

Furthermore, we aim to note uses of body language on screen. We will note when this happens, what is happening around the time of its usage, and what effect it is believed to have. We will research what people theorise about the use of body language in CDS and see if these match with the features found in the programmes.

Finally, we aim to examine repeated phrases and themes within the programmes. We will note at what points these happen, and what impact they have on the story. In addition to this, because these programmes are narrative, we will be able to observe where the repetition occurs in relation to the development of the story.

We realise that there may be certain copyright laws which surround the collection of data for research. Therefore, we will find episodes which either have no copyright, or apply for usage. If it is paramount and we do not receive notice back from the copyright holder, we shall analyse but reference the artists appropriately.