Search

Background: One of the most consistent findings reported in the paediatric cochlear implant (CI) literature is the heterogeneity of language performance observed more in grammatical morphology than in lexicon or pragmatics. As most of the corpus studies addressing these issues have been conducted in English, it is unclear whether their results can be generalized to other languages. In particular, little is known about languages known for their grammatical complexity, such as French. Aims: The aim of this corpus study was to compare the productive use of function words (FWs) and some agreement features (AGRs) in children with CIs and children with typical development (TD) matched for mean length of utterance in words (MLUwords), a general index of grammatical complexity, and auditory experience, as measured by hearing age (HA) and chronological age (CA), respectively. Methods & Procedures: Natural speech samples from 116 monolingual French‐speaking children, including 40 children with CIs followed longitudinally and 76 TD children, were collected. FWs and AGRs were analysed using a Part of Speech Tagger (POS‐T) from the Child Language Data Exchange System (CHILDES). Outcomes & Results: The two groups differed by 3 years for HA and CA. No effect of family socio‐economic status (SES) was found in the CI group. Stepwise regression analyses showed that the two groups did not share the same predictors of MLUwords: plurals and determiners predicted MLUwords in children with CIs, at 2 and 3 years of HA, whereas feminine markers and subject‐pronouns were found to best predict MLUwords in TD children at 2 and 3 years of CA. Structural equation models (SEMs), a combination of confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and path analysis, yielded a different hierarchical structure of grammatical relations (GRs). Selective difficulties affecting verbal clitics and other pronominal forms were found specifically in the CI group (object‐pronouns, reflexive, relative and past participles). Dependency grammar analysis confirmed these contrasting developmental profiles in multiword utterances, such as preposition/nouns, subject/verbs, and verb/determiner/nouns. Conclusions & Implications: Atypical grammatical patterns in children with CIs reflect a specific architecture of syntactic dependencies of FWs underpinning morphological complexity and syntactic connectivity. Clinical implications are discussed for assessment and intervention planning. What This Paper Adds: What is already known on this subject: The productive use of FWs has been identified as a particular area of weakness in children with CIs compared with TD children. In addition, heterogenous grammatical performance has often been found after 1–3 years of CI use, regardless of demographic factors such as age at implantation, duration of deafness or SES. What this paper adds to existing knowledge: Assessing the early building of FWs and AGRs in children with CIs helps to understand the syntactic complexity and hierarchical structure of their language. Since most corpus studies on grammatical morphology have been conducted in English, it is not clear whether their difficulties can be generalized to other languages. The French language has a system of FWs and inflections that determine the morphophonological properties of nominal and verbal forms. Early grammar learning in children with CIs born with profound deafness were compared with the two groups of TD children matched both for duration of auditory experience (i.e., HA of CI children, CA of TD children) and for MLUwords. We found a similar profile between groups at 2 years but not at 3 years for HA and CA. The two groups do not share the same predictors of MLUwords: namely, plurals and determiners for CI children versus feminine markers and subject pronouns for TD children. They show a different syntactic organization of GRs. Children with CIs struggle with selective difficulties affecting verbal clitics and pronominal forms (object‐pronouns, reflexive, relative and past participles). Consistent with theories of morphophonological richness and syntactic connectivity, our results support the distributional learning hypothesis of language acquisition that infants and toddlers are sensitive to FWs and AGRs at an early age. Specific components of syntactic organization are disrupted in children with CIs. What are the potential or actual clinical implications of this work?: This work has potential clinical implications because it unravels the limitations of morphophonological processing in children with CIs. Its results highlight a specific difficulty in learning FWs and AGRs in a verbal inflectional morphology context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores how a new French law incorporating a new conceptualization of disability formulated at the international level by the WHO is appropriated at the local level by multidisciplinary teams of professionals in charge of the assessment of disability. Drawing on social representations theory, its concept of cognitive polyphasia and its conceptualization of legal innovation, the paper specifically examines how the teams deal with the tensions between the old and the new models of disability and how the group dynamic is associated with how they do this: by hybridization of old and new models, by selective prevalence according to context, or by displacement of one model. Focus groups with the teams (n = 65 from 10 groups), analysed with indicators of interaction, bring evidence of the three forms. They show how different groups, by drawing differently, depending on their relational dynamics, from a variety of meaning systems circulating at the cultural level, reach different decisions that may lead to different practices in the local implementation of the same laws. We finish by discussing how social representations theory, linking the cultural/global and the interactional/local levels, can enhance our understanding of how socio‐psychological processes intervening in the appropriation of legal innovations may produce different practical implementations of the same new laws. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Conspiracy Beliefs (CB) are a key vector of violent extremism, radicalism and unconventional political events. So far, social‐psychological research has extensively documented how cognitive, emotional and intergroup factors can promote CB. Evidence also suggests that adherence to CB moves along social class lines: low‐income and low‐education are among the most robust predictors of CB. Yet, the potential role of precarity—the subjective experience of permanent insecurity stemming from objective material strain—in shaping CB remains largely unexplored. In this paper, we propose for the first time a socio‐functional model of CB. We test the hypothesis that precarity could foster increased CB because it undermines trust in government and the broader political 'elites'. Data from the World Value Survey (n = 21,650; Study 1, electoral CB) and from representative samples from polls conducted in France (n = 1760, Study 2a, conspiracy mentality) and Italy (n = 2196, Study 2b, COVID‐19 CB), corroborate a mediation model whereby precarity is directly and indirectly associated with lower trust in authorities and higher CB. In addition, these links are robust to adjustment on income, self‐reported SES and education. Considering precarity allows for a truly social‐psychological understanding of CB as the by‐product of structural issues (e.g. growing inequalities). Results from our socio‐functional model suggest that implementing solutions at the socio‐economic level could prove efficient in fighting CB. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and aims: Among European countries, France is particularly concerned by adolescent tobacco smoking, especially in disadvantaged socio‐economic backgrounds (SES). We measured the respective contributions of parental smoking and family living arrangement to social disparities in smoking during adolescence. Design: Secondary analysis of survey data. Setting: A cross‐sectional nation‐wide exhaustive 12‐day survey in March 2017 of French youth aged 17–18.5 years participating in the national mandatory civic information day. Participants: A total of 13 314 adolescents answering a pen‐and‐paper questionnaire about their own tobacco consumption and the smoking of their parents. Measurements Risk ratios (RRs) were computed using modified Poisson regressions, and population‐attributable fraction (PAF) was used as a measure of the explanatory roles of the different factors as mediators of SES. Findings Adolescents living within very privileged and privileged SES were significantly less likely to report daily tobacco smoking (20.4 and 22.7%, respectively) than those within modest and disadvantaged ones (26.0 and 28.6%, respectively). Parental smoking and family living arrangement independently explained the smoking inequalities among adolescents. After adjusting for schooling factors, the risks associated with parental smoking ranged between RR = 1.64 [95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.50–1.79] when the father only smoked and RR = 2.17 (95% CI = 1.99–2.36) when both parents smoked, compared with non‐smoking parents; the risk associated with living in a non‐intact family was 1.35 (95% CI = 1.26–1.43) and that of living outside the parental home was 1.20 (95% CI = 1.10–1.30). Apprentices and adolescents out of school had higher risks than those at school (RR = 1.82, 95% CI = 1.68–1.98) and RR = 2.10, 95% CI = 1.92–2.29). The contribution of parental smoking to adolescent smoking (PAF = 32%) was greater than that of SES (PAF = 9%), family living arrangement (PAF = 17%) or schooling factors (14%). The share of SES decreased from 18 to 9% when considering these mediating factors. Conclusion: In France, parental smoking appears to be the factor that most influences adolescent smoking, followed by family living arrangement; the role of family socio‐economic status is small in comparison. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: As educational digital technologies are increasingly being used in schools, past research left unanswered the question of these technologies' impact on the socioeconomic achievement gap even when equal access is guaranteed. Objectives: The objectives of the present study are to examine whether and how the socioeconomic achievement gap can be reduced through the use of computer‐assisted instruction (CAI). Methods: We addressed this issue experimentally by comparing CAI to conventional teacher‐led classroom instruction with more than 800 middle and high school students from disadvantaged and highly privileged socioeconomic backgrounds in a range of topics. Results and Conclusions: Both disadvantaged and highly privileged students taught with CAI outperformed those taught with conventional instruction, thus maintaining the socioeconomic achievement gap constant. However, we also found that disadvantaged students receiving CAI performed as well as highly privileged students receiving conventional teacher‐led instruction. Takeaways: The positive effects associated with CAI may therefore help compensate the difficulties of students with a disadvantaged background, a still neglected possibility. Lay Description: What is already known about this topic?: Socioeconomic status affects academic achievement especially in students from disadvantaged backgrounds.Inequal access to digital learning is a by‐product of socioeconomic status.Computer‐assisted instruction is known to yield positive effects on learning. What this paper adds?: It examines the effectiveness of computer‐assisted instruction on reducing the socioeconomic achievement gap when equal access to digital education is guaranteed at the school level.It shows that computer‐assisted instruction (relative to teacher‐led conventional instruction) benefited disadvantaged students and their highly privileged counterparts equally, shifting the socioeconomic achievement gap upward.However, disadvantaged students receiving CAI may reach similar performance level as their highly privileged counterparts receiving conventional instruction, thus compensating the socioeconomic achievement gap. Implications for practice and/or policy: This finding strengthens the importance of targeting teaching methods depending on students' socioeconomic characteristics to allow disadvantaged students to maximize their learning potential and chances to access to higher education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The objectives of this study were to estimate the age of complementary feeding introduction (CFI) and investigate the related health, demographic, and socio‐economic factors. Analyses were based on 10,931 infants from the French national birth cohort ELFE, born in 2011. Health, demographic, and socio‐economic data concerning infants and parents were collected at birth (face‐to‐face interviews and medical records) and 2 months (telephone interviews). Data on milk feeding and CFI practices were collected at birth and 2 months then monthly from 3 to 10 months using online or paper questionnaires. The associations between both health and social factors and CFI age were tested by multivariable multinomial logistic regressions. The mean CFI age was 5.2 ± 1.2 months; 26% of the infants started complementary feeding before 4 months of age (CF < 4 months), 62% between 4 and 6 months of age, and 12% after 6 months of age (CF > 6 months). CF < 4 months was more likely when mothers smoked, were overweight/obese, younger (<29 years), and used their personal experience as an information source in child caregiving and when both parents were not born in France. CF < 4 months was less likely when the infant was a girl, second‐born, when the mother breastfed longer, and had attended at least one birth preparation class. Mothers of second‐born infants and who breastfed their child longer were more likely to introduce CF > 6 months. Couples in which fathers were born in France and mothers were not born in France were less likely to introduce CF > 6 months. CF < 4 months occurred in more than 25% of the cases. It is important to continue promoting clear CFI recommendations, especially in smoking, overweight, young, not born in France, and nonbreastfeeding mothers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Breastfeeding is recommended until 6 months of age, but a wide range of infant formula is available for nonbreastfed or partially breastfed infants. Our aim was to describe infant formula selection and to examine social- and health-related factors associated with this selection. Analyses were based on 13,291 infants from the French national birth cohort Etude Longitudinale Française depuis l'Enfance. Infant diet was assessed at Month 2 by phone interview and monthly from Months 3 to 10 via internet/paper questionnaires. Infant formulas were categorized in 6 groups: extensively or partially hydrolysed, regular with or without prebiotics/probiotics, and thickened with or without prebiotics/probiotics. Associations between type of infant formula used at 2 months and family or infant characteristics were assessed by multinomial logistic regressions. At Month 2, 58.1% of formula-fed infants were fed with formula enriched in prebiotics/probiotics, 31.5% with thickened formula, and 1.4% with extensively hydrolysed formula. The proportion of formula-fed infants increased regularly, but the type of infant formula used was fairly stable between 2 and 10 months. At Month 2, extensively hydrolysed formulas were more likely to be used in infants with diarrhoea or regurgitation problems. Partially hydrolysed formulas were more often used in families with high income, with a history of allergy, or with infants with regurgitation issues. Thickened formulas were used more with boys, preterm infants, infants with regurgitation issues, or in cases of early maternal return to work. The main factors related to the selection of infant formula were family and infant health-related ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]