Home Environment and Alphabetic Principle Development under Environmental Risk: Evidence from Spanish-Speaking Children in Disadvantaged Contexts
Year: 2026
Type: article
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: Early reading development is influenced by cognitive, sociocultural, and environmental factors, with the home environment playing a key role in shaping foundational literacy skills. Children from socioeconomically disadvantaged contexts, particularly those exposed to environmental risks such as lead, may be especially vulnerable during early reading acquisition. This study examined the contribution of different dimensions of the home environment to the development of the alphabetic principle in 332 first-grade Spanish-speaking children from low-income neighborhoods in Montevideo, Uruguay. The home environment was assessed using the Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment (HOME) Inventory, and alphabetic principle skills were evaluated with the Letter–Word Identification test of the Woodcock–Muñoz Battery III. Generalized linear models showed that Encouraging Maturity, Learning Materials, Parental Involvement, and Physical Environment were significantly associated with higher reading scores in unadjusted analyses and remained significant after adjusting for sociodemographic factors, school clustering, and blood lead levels. In fully adjusted models, Learning Materials showed a moderate positive association with reading performance (β = 2.96), while Parental Involvement showed a smaller but significant effect (β = 1.06). Logistic models indicated that Learning Materials had a moderate effect on the likelihood of high performance (OR = 1.48), whereas Encouraging Maturity showed a smaller effect (OR = 1.23). These findings suggest that specific features of the home environment, particularly access to learning materials, may act as protective factors for early reading development in contexts of socioeconomic and environmental adversity.
Language: English
Subfield: Developmental and Educational Psychology
Field: Psychology
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W7164801696