Bedtime stories in the digital age: how interactive storybook apps support caregivers’ vocabulary talk

In this study, I examined how caregivers read preschool interactive storybook apps with their four- and five-year-old children. Specifically, I sought to understand: (a) the strategies caregivers used to talk about new words, (b) whether digital enhancements that aligned with new words in storybook apps encouraged caregivers to engage in more word-related talk, and (c) how different types of digital enhancements affected whether and how caregivers talked about words. Data included over 2,220 minutes of video from 37 adult–child dyads in the United States. Results indicated that caregivers engaged in relatively few conversations about vocabulary overall. However, the digital enhancements in storybook apps encouraged significantly more word-related talk than reading static text. These findings contribute new information about how families read preschool storybook apps and whether and how digital enhancements aligned with new words might affect caregivers’ extratextual conversations.