The Efficacy of Early Language Intervention in a Community-Based Parent Education Program: Isolating the Key Components in LENA StartTM

LENA StartTM is a group program designed to educate parents about early childhood language development to increase language input for children aged 0 to 3. This community-based study evaluated key program components – recordings, training, and feedback – over 10-weeks across three groups: full LENA StartTM program (n= 347), recordings and feedback (n= 66), and recordings only (n= 51). Overall, growth curve analyses revealed significant variability in all six outcome measures, emphasizing the complex factors influencing child and parent communication. Effects of time were significant, particularly on adult word count, conversational turns, and developmental snapshot scores. However, non-linear trends for adult words and conversational turns revealed an initial increase that levelled off across recording sessions. There were no significant group differences across time on any recording measures. Families who received feedback (LENA StartTM and Recordings + Feedback groups) increased the amount of family reading time, and families who received programming showed significantly greater increases in parent surveys measuring knowledge and confidence in parenting. Reported reading time was positively associated with the number of adult words and conversational turns measured by LENA recordings, as well as developmental snapshot scores. In contrast, electronic noise was negatively associated with the number of adult words, conversational turns, and child vocalizations. Implications for using the LENA StartTM program to increase language input to children are discussed.