language , Play , and Attention at One Year

Relotions omong longuoge production, language comprehension, ploy competence, ond attention spon were exomined in 43 13-month-old toddlers. Flexible longuoge production ond flexible longuoge comprehension covoried, and ploy competence covoried with flexible longuoge comprehension ond with ottention spon. In contrast, neither language production nor longuoge comprehension reloted positively to attention spon. Relotions betweet) production ond comprehension, between comprehension ond ploy, ond between ploy ond ottention were mointoined even when concurrent level of moternol stimulotion wos portiolled, suggesting that these ossociotions ore not solely medioted by mothers’ didactics. Structural equotion modeling showed that the common vorionce underlying longuoge comprehension ond ploy competence differed from vorionce underlying ploy competence ond attention span. This suggests that o ploy-longuoge factor ond o ploy-ottention factor reflect different underlying mentol capacities in the young child, ond that ploy con be partitioned into at least two independent components.