The book was a bestseller that taught parents to “tune in,” “talk more,” and “take turns,” but its publication didn’t result in widespread change. (The idea of a word gap comes from a 1995 study by Betty Hart and Todd R. Risley, which was found to be problematic in its research and design; Dr. Suskind, in a Brookings Institution 2019 article, acknowledged this but credited the study with “helping me—and many others—begin to understand not just the role of language in child development, but the power of parents and environments to help shape child development in profound ways.”)
Explore This Issue
July 2022Social determinants of health affect parents’ ability to interact with their kids, so Dr. Suskind worked with experienced science journalist Lydia Denworth to publish her second book, Parent Nation, earlier this year. Publisher’s Weekly says Parent Nation “makes an impassioned case for family-focused policy to support brain development in young children,” and the book and its ideas have been shared in Scientific American, NPR’s Planet Money, and Good Housekeeping.
Dr. Suskind encourages other physicians to pick up the pen. “So often we keep things in the academic sphere when those ideas are supposed to be doing good out in the real world,” she said. “My work as a social scientist and an author really came out of my work in the operating room. One of the most powerful ways to share the science is through parent and family stories.”
Read more: www.ParentNation.org
Gayle Woodson, MD
Author, After Kilimanjaro and Ear, Nose and Throat Disorders for Primary Care Providers
Professor Emerita and Former Chair of Otolaryngology, Southern Illinois University School of Medicine
Visiting Professor, Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Center in Tanzania
Dr. Woodson, one of the inaugural members of The American Academy of Otolaryngology–Head and Neck Surgery and Foundation’s Hall of Distinction, didn’t initially intend to become a physician. “I thought I was going to be a writer when I went to college,” she said. It was the late 1960s, and medicine wasn’t considered a suitable career for women. Writing, on the other hand, “was something a housewife could do.”
Meeting a female pediatrician changed the course of her life. Dr. Woodson subspecialized in laryngology, building her career and eventually serving as president of the American Laryngological Association from 2006 to 2007 and the American Academy of Otolaryngology–Head and Neck Surgery from 2014 to 2015.