Betty Hart (born Bettie Mackenzie Farnsworth, July 15, 1927 – September 28, 2012) was an American education researcher, known for her work on the relation between vocabulary learning and social inequality, in particular the "word gap".
[1][2] In 1995 she and her former graduate adviser Todd Risley published the book Meaningful Differences in the Everyday Experience of Young American Children, based on a longitudinal study of parent-child interactions in 42 families of varying socio-economic class.
The study concerned not only the quantity, but also the nature, of the verbal interactions between children and parents.
[5] Differences in early language experience were argued to be an important factor in lower educational achievement and the perpetuation of socio-economic disparities between generations.
The study was widely influential and inspired the establishment of many government programs aimed at changing the linguistic practices of low income parents.