Baby media products don't instill reading skills in infants

Even though parents use DVDs and other media in an attempt to teach their kids to read, these tools don't instill reading skills in babies, a new study has revealed.

"While we cannot say with full assurance that infants at this age cannot learn printed words, our results make clear they did not learn printed words from the baby media product that was tested," Susan Neuman, a professor in New York University Steinhardt's Department of Teaching and Learning and the study's senior author, said.

However, Neuman added that there was one undeniable effect of these products-on parents.

In exit interviews, there was the belief among parents that their babies were learning to read and that their children had benefited from the program in some areas of vocabulary development.

"It's clear that parents have great confidence in the impact of these products on their children," Neuman said.

"However, our study indicates this sentiment is misplaced," she asserted.

The study is published in the Journal of Educational Psychology.