Stimulating Language Development in the First 1000 Days: A Scoping Review

Abstract

Acquiring basic language skills is one of the key developmental milestones a child must reach in its early years. Failing to do so can be a sign of language disorders and can lead to problems in later life that can impede all other domains of child development, including socio-emotional development, cognitive development, and later academic achievement. Since parents play a crucial role in early language development, it is important to support them with best practices and provide them with evidence-informed knowledge on language development of their infant. In this scoping review, we narratively synthesized the current scientific literature on stimulating language development in the first 1000 days of life, including during pregnancy. Our synthesis of the current literature emphasizes that the first 1000 days are an extremely important period for language development and that stimulating language development should already start during pregnancy. Importantly, many factors that are central for language development are intervenable and therefore useful targets for public health policy and early prevention. This review can be used to provide professionals and policy makers with better evidence-informed tools and knowledge to support families. Increased parental knowledge may, in turn, improve language development of young children, and subsequently lead to less children starting school with language deficits at later ages and related problems later in life.