UC Irvine

Parents vary in conversational goals and style when discussing events with their children-two aspects of parent socialization that may be related, or exert opposing influence on the development of young childrens report accuracy (a critical factor in childrens eyewitness reports). In a sample of 116 parent-child dyads (M age = 53.17 months, range: 36-72 months), we examined the roles of parent social conversation goals (parent-reported and experimentally manipulated) and parent cognitive elaboration in childrens ability to accurately report about a laboratory event. Parent cognitive elaboration varied by conversation goal and was positively associated with child accuracy across age but only when parents strongly endorsed social conversation goals. Parent questioning strategies and childrens response accuracy varied with age. This work has implications for how we understand short- and long-term impacts caregivers exert on childrens event reporting and suggests that even very young children are sensitive to variations in parent questioning practices.