Validity of a parent-report measure of vocabulary and grammar for Spanish-speaking toddlers

The validity of the Fundacion MacArthur Inventario det Desarrollo de Habili dades Comunicativas: Palabras y Enunciados (IDHC:PE) was examined with twen ty 20- and nineteen 28-month-old, typically developing, monolingual, Spanis h-speaking children living in Mexico. One measure of vocabulary (number of words) and two measures of grammar (mean of the three longest utterances an d grammatical complexity score) from the IDHC:PE were compared to behaviora l measures of vocabulary (number of different words from a language sample and number of objects named in a confrontation naming task) and one behavio ral measure of grammar (mean length of utterance from a language sample). O nly vocabulary measures were assessed in the 20-month-olds because of floor effects on the grammar measures. Results indicated validity for assessing expressive vocabulary in 20-month-olds and expressive vocabulary and gramma r in 28-month-olds.