Finding meaning in a noisy world: exploring the effects of referential ambiguity and competition on 2·5-year-olds’ cross-situational word learning

AbstractWhile recent studies suggest children can use cross-situational information to learn words, these studies involved minimal referential ambiguity, and the cross-situational evidence overwhelmingly favored a single referent for each word. Here we asked whether 2·5-year-olds could identify a noun's referent when the scene and cross-situational evidence were more ambiguous. Children saw four trials in which a novel word occurred with four novel objects; only one object consistently co-occurred with the word across trials. The frequency of distracter objects varied across conditions. When all distracter referents occurred only once (no-competition), children successfully identified the noun's referent. When a high-probability competitor referent occurred on three trials, children identified the target referent if the competitor was absent on the third trial (short-competition) but not if it was present until the fourth trial (long-competition). This suggests that although 2·5-year-olds’ cross-situational learning scales up to more ambiguous scenes, it is disrupted by high-probability competitor referents.

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The Role of Reference in Cross-Situational Word Learning (2018, Cognition)

10.31234/osf.io/h6gba ◽

2017 ◽

Author(s):

Felix Hao Wang ◽

Toben Herbert Mintz

Keyword(s):

Language Acquisition ◽

Word Learning ◽

Statistical Information ◽

Unlimited Number ◽

Referential Ambiguity ◽

Situational Learning

Word learning involves massive ambiguity, since in a particular encounter with a novel word, there are an unlimited number of potential referents. One proposal for how learners surmount the problem of ambiguity is that learners use cross-situational statistics to constrain the ambiguity: When a word and its referent co-occur across multiple situations, learners will associate the word with the correct referent. Yu & Smith (2007) propose that these co-occurrence statistics are sufficient for word-to-referent mapping. Alternative accounts hold that co-occurrence statistics alone are insufficient to support learning, and that learners are further guided by knowledge that words are referential (e.g., Waxman & Gelman, 2009). However, no behavioral word learning studies we are aware of explicitly manipulate subjects’ prior assumptions about the role of the words in the experiments in order to test the influence of these assumptions. In this study, we directly test whether, when faced with referential ambiguity, co-occurrence statistics are sufficient for word-to-referent mappings in adult word-learners. Across a series of cross-situational learning experiments, we varied the degree to which there was support for the notion that the words were referential. At the same time, the statistical information about the words’ meanings was held constant. When we overrode support for the notion that words were referential, subjects failed to learn the word-to-referent mappings, but otherwise they succeeded. Thus, cross-situational statistics were useful only when learners had the goal of discovering mappings between words and referents. We discuss the implications of these results for theories of word learning in children’s language acquisition.

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ABOUT THE PROBLEM OF CLASSIFICATION OF THE CONCEPTS OF INFORMATICS STUDIED AT SECONDARY SCHOOL

Informatics in school ◽

10.32517/2221-1993-2018-17-7-4-7 ◽

2018 ◽

pp. 4-7

Author(s):

S. I. Zenko

Keyword(s):

Secondary School ◽

Foreign Language ◽

Computer Science ◽

Parts Of Speech ◽

The Third ◽

The Cross ◽

Definition Of

The article raises the problem of classification of the concepts of computer science and informatics studied at secondary school. The efficiency of creation of techniques of training of pupils in these concepts depends on its solution. The author proposes to consider classifications of the concepts of school informatics from four positions: on the cross-subject basis, the content lines of the educational subject "Informatics", the logical and structural interrelations and interactions of the studied concepts, the etymology of foreign-language and translated words in the definition of the concepts of informatics. As a result of the first classification general and special concepts are allocated; the second classification — inter-content and intra-content concepts; the third classification — stable (steady), expanding, key and auxiliary concepts; the fourth classification — concepts-nouns, conceptsverbs, concepts-adjectives and concepts — combinations of parts of speech.

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C.S. Peirce: Belief, Truth, and Going from the Known to the Unknown

Canadian Journal of Philosophy Supplementary Volume ◽

10.1080/00455091.1998.10717494 ◽

1998 ◽

Vol 24 ◽

pp. 9-29 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

David Wiggins

Keyword(s):

High Probability ◽

The Other ◽

The Third ◽

P 16 ◽

Foundations Of Arithmetic

The third philosophical stratagem for cutting off inquiry consists in maintaining that this, that, or the other element of science is basic, ultimate, independent of aught else and utterly inexplicable- not so much from any defect in our knowing as because there is nothing beneath it to know. The only type of reasoning by which such a conclusion could be reached is retroduction.Now nothing justifies a retroductive inference except its affording an explanation of the facts. It is, however, no explanation at all of a fact to pronounce it inexplicable.That, therefore, is a conclusion which no reasoning can ever justify or excuse. (Peirce, Collected Papers 1.139)Abduction consists in studying facts and devising a theory to explain them. Its only justification is that, if we are ever to understand things at all, it must be in that way. (Peirce, Collected Papers, 5.145)[Scientific procedure] will at times find a high probability established by a single confirmatory instance, while at others it will dismiss a thousand as almost worthless. (Frege, Foundations of Arithmetic (1884), p. 16)

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Using Speakers' Referential Intentions to Model Early Cross-Situational Word Learning

Psychological Science ◽

10.1111/j.1467-9280.2009.02335.x ◽

2009 ◽

Vol 20 (5) ◽

pp. 578-585 ◽

Cited By ~ 120

Author(s):

Michael C. Frank ◽

Noah D. Goodman ◽

Joshua B. Tenenbaum

Keyword(s):

Computational Model ◽

Word Learning ◽

Word Meaning ◽

Mutual Exclusivity ◽

Object Individuation ◽

Word Meanings ◽

Inference Problems ◽

Corpus Data ◽

Situational Learning

Word learning is a “chicken and egg” problem. If a child could understand speakers' utterances, it would be easy to learn the meanings of individual words, and once a child knows what many words mean, it is easy to infer speakers' intended meanings. To the beginning learner, however, both individual word meanings and speakers' intentions are unknown. We describe a computational model of word learning that solves these two inference problems in parallel, rather than relying exclusively on either the inferred meanings of utterances or cross-situational word-meaning associations. We tested our model using annotated corpus data and found that it inferred pairings between words and object concepts with higher precision than comparison models. Moreover, as the result of making probabilistic inferences about speakers' intentions, our model explains a variety of behavioral phenomena described in the word-learning literature. These phenomena include mutual exclusivity, one-trial learning, cross-situational learning, the role of words in object individuation, and the use of inferred intentions to disambiguate reference.

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The Cross and the Third Reich. By John Frain

The Heythrop Journal ◽

10.1111/j.1468-2265.2011.00663_73.x ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 52 (3) ◽

pp. 531-532

Author(s):

Patrick Madigan

Keyword(s):

Third Reich ◽

The Third ◽

The Cross ◽

The Third Reich

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NOTE ON THE STRUCTURE OF NEPHOPTERYX ZIMMERMANI

The Canadian Entomologist ◽

10.4039/ent1019-1 ◽

1878 ◽

Vol 10 (1) ◽

pp. 19-19 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

A. R. Grote

Keyword(s):

Transverse Ridge ◽

The Third ◽

Continuous Scale ◽

The Cross ◽

Cross Vein

The following note on the structure of Zimmermani is taken from a MS. paper on the N. Am. Phycidæ which I am preparing for publication. I would be glad of more material in this group from any correspondents.“Pinipestis (sub-gen. nov.).Maxillary palpi alike in both sexes, concealed by the porrect labial palpi, which have the third article erect and exceed the front. Ocelli present. Male antennæ very slightly bent at base, where they show slight continuous scale-tufts ; ciliate beneath. Fore wings with veins 4 and 5 running close together at base; these veins are seen to have a separate origin, 5 on the cross-vein close to 4, divaricating at one-third from base. Hind wings 8-veined ; vein 5 running close to 4 at base, but separate and continuous with the discal cross-vein. Head behind with a thick transverse ridge of scales; clypeus with a bunchlike projection of scales centrally.”

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1. Remembering wars

War and Religion: A Very Short Introduction ◽

10.1093/actrade/9780198803218.003.0001 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-17

Author(s):

Jolyon Mitchell ◽

Joshua Rey

Keyword(s):

Great War ◽

Dance Movement ◽

Ghost Dance ◽

War Memorials ◽

The Third ◽

Religious Resources ◽

The Cross

‘Remembering wars’ discusses how war and religion mingle and shape one another and demonstrates how religion offers to meet the need for meaning in the overwhelming catastrophe of personal and national loss that war brings. There are three interesting different situations in which religious resources have been brought to bear on the remembrance of war, and equally have been shaped by it. The first one is the depiction of martyrdom and martyrs in the commemoration of the Battle of Karbala. The second one is the use of the cross in Great War memorials, while the third one is the Ghost Dance movement

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Forming associations between language and sensorimotor traces during novel word learning

Language and Cognition ◽

10.1017/langcog.2016.5 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 9 (1) ◽

pp. 156-171 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

BIRGIT ÖTTL ◽

CAROLIN DUDSCHIG ◽

BARBARA KAUP

Keyword(s):

Language Learning ◽

Word Learning ◽

Arm Movement ◽

Learning Phase ◽

Movement Direction ◽

Lower Visual Field ◽

Adult Participants ◽

Novel Objects ◽

Multisensory Environment ◽

Novel Word Learning

abstractEmbodied models of language comprehension are based on the assumption that words become associated with sensorimotor experiences during initial word learning. To test this hypothesis, adult participants learned artificial words as labels for novel objects in a multisensory environment. In a word learning phase, novel objects were located in the participant’s upper or lower visual field and participants learned the objects’ names by interacting with them. In a test phase, participants responded to the color of the words with either an upwards or a downwards directed arm movement in a Stroop-like paradigm. Responses were fastest when the movement direction was compatible with the word’s referent location (i.e., the location of the novel object in vertical space) during the learning phase. This finding suggests that sensorimotor experiences become associated with words during initial word learning. The results of the current study and implications for language learning are discussed.

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Word learning, phonological short-term memory, phonotactic probability and long-term memory: towards an integrated framework

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences ◽

10.1098/rstb.2009.0132 ◽

2009 ◽

Vol 364 (1536) ◽

pp. 3755-3771 ◽

Cited By ~ 45

Author(s):

Prahlad Gupta ◽

Jamie Tisdale

Keyword(s):

Computational Model ◽

Word Learning ◽

Short Term Memory ◽

Long Term Memory ◽

Short Term ◽

Phonotactic Probability ◽

Term Memory ◽

The Third ◽

The Relationship

Word learning is studied in a multitude of ways, and it is often not clear what the relationship is between different phenomena. In this article, we begin by outlining a very simple functional framework that despite its simplicity can serve as a useful organizing scheme for thinking about various types of studies of word learning. We then review a number of themes that in recent years have emerged as important topics in the study of word learning, and relate them to the functional framework, noting nevertheless that these topics have tended to be somewhat separate areas of study. In the third part of the article, we describe a recent computational model and discuss how it offers a framework that can integrate and relate these various topics in word learning to each other. We conclude that issues that have typically been studied as separate topics can perhaps more fruitfully be thought of as closely integrated, with the present framework offering several suggestions about the nature of such integration.

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