A diverse toy environment is linked to better infant communication skills

The variety and quantity of toys available in a household can reflect more than just a family’s purchasing habits. A high number of diverse toys in the home is associated with advanced interaction abilities and early language development in infants. These behavioral patterns were recently detailed in a study published in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology.

Early childhood interactions shape how a growing brain develops. Everyday objects and play materials provide tools that parents use to interact with their young children. These tools range from items that encourage formal learning, such as books and shape sorters, to objects that prompt imaginative scenarios, like toy kitchens and dolls.

In the realm of psychology, playthings are often viewed as cultural tools. Their true developmental function does not emerge just from the objects themselves but from how caregivers present and mediate them for the child. These interactions guide a child’s attention and provide a setting where caregivers can talk, demonstrate behaviors, and teach cognitive skills.

Child development researchers contend with questions about how this physical environment relates to a young child’s internal disposition. Infants show varying temperaments right from birth. These natural dispositions result from a mix of genetic, biological, and environmental factors interacting over time.

Some temperamental traits govern an infant’s reactivity to the world, dictating how quickly and intensely they respond to specific events. Other traits relate to behavioral regulation, which focuses on the child’s ability to manage those impulses and shift their attention focus.

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One specific temperamental trait is known as low-intensity pleasure. This concept refers to an infant’s ability to find enjoyment in quiet, low-energy activities like looking at a book or listening to soft music. Children who favor these calmer states often have an easier time focusing their attention. A state of quiet alertness enables the reflective pacing required for learning, which often benefits early language acquisition and social understanding.

Researchers wanted to examine how the simple presence of household toys might relate to this specific temperament, the emotional skills of the child, and the teaching behaviors of the mother. Gabriela Kashy Rosenbaum of Ashkelon Academic College and Edna Orr of Gordon College of Education led the investigation. They sought to map out the relationships connecting a physical play environment to biological traits and eventual communication outcomes.

The researchers observed 63 infants ranging in age from 11 to 30 months. The mothers of these children filled out detailed questionnaires cataloging the types and quantities of toys in their homes. These inventories included educational games, physical activity sets, musical instruments, pretend play items, and standard building blocks.

The mothers also completed standardized assessments evaluating their children’s temperaments, focusing on their capacity for quiet enjoyment. Another set of questionnaires gauged the infants’ emotional regulation, social competence, and current communication milestones.

These communication milestones tracked how many early words and symbolic gestures the infants currently understood and used. For example, the surveys measured behaviors ranging from waving goodbye and playing routine games to imitating adult actions like pretending to talk on a telephone.

To view how the pairs actually interacted, the researchers video-recorded each mother and child playing together in their home for fifteen minutes. The researchers provided an identical set of standard objects for each session. This set included a toy jar, a pot with a lid, a baby bottle, a doll, a hairbrush, plastic cups, and soft blocks. The mothers were asked to act naturally and play as they normally would.

Trained coders then watched the recordings and scored the mothers on their teaching behaviors using a standardized observational checklist. This scoring involved logging moments when a mother explained a reason to the child, named an object, provided cognitive stimulation, or expanded on a conceptual idea.

The statistical analysis revealed a web of associations connecting the home environment to the child’s developmental progress. A richer and more varied toy environment was linked to elevated levels of maternal teaching during the recorded play sessions. Mothers from homes with many diverse toys tended to provide more supportive cognitive feedback when engaging with their infants.

The researchers also noted positive associations between toy diversity and the infants’ natural dispositions. Babies from homes with richer environments scored higher on the low-intensity pleasure temperament scale. They also displayed more advanced social and emotional regulation skills, such as empathy and self-awareness.

Those three factors (maternal teaching, a quiet and reflective temperament, and emotional regulation) all correlated with better communication and play outcomes. According to the data model, the physical presence of toys acts as a foundational layer. The tools provide a landscape for maternal guidance while accommodating infant temperaments that favor calm, focused learning.

When looking at individual toy categories, objects designed for cognitive learning, music, and motor coordination all showed positive links to socio-emotional skills and maternal teaching behaviors. The researchers also recorded a difference in household toy distribution based on the child’s sex. Toys meant for symbolic and pretend play were more commonly found in the households of girls, while toys meant for physical activity were more prevalent in the households of boys.

The study also gathered data on the economic and educational backgrounds of the families. While the association between a family’s socioeconomic level and the number of household toys was not statistically significant in this specific analysis, family background was positively associated with the mother’s teaching qualities and the infant’s socio-emotional skills. This aligns with broader sociological patterns where economic stability affords parents more time and energy to engage in structured learning behaviors with their offspring.

The study relies on an observational approach at a single point in time. This type of cross-sectional design cannot prove that buying more toys directly causes a child to develop faster. The researchers note that the sheer abundance of toys does not independently advance infant development. Instead, a home filled with educational objects likely reflects an enriched setting where parents are already inclined to interact and teach.

Much of the data came from parent-reported questionnaires. While these questionnaires are standard tools in developmental research, parental responses can sometimes carry subjective biases. The sample of 63 participants is modest and covers a broad developmental window, as children between 11 and 30 months learn language at highly variable rates. The researchers accounted for age mathematically, but the wide range means the communicative behaviors measured varied greatly from child to child.

To build on these results, researchers could conduct longitudinal studies that track children over many years. Future work might also include fathers and other caregivers to see how different family members utilize play materials. It would also be helpful to objectively measure exactly how much time children spend interacting with the toys they own, rather than just tallying the number of items available to them.

The study, “Toy richness at home and infants’ play and communication skills: The mediating roles of maternal teaching qualities, infant temperament, and socio-emotional skills,” was authored by Gabriela Kashy Rosenbaum and Edna Orr.