Discourse coherence as a cue to reference in word learning: Evidence for discourse bootstrapping

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jess Sullivan ◽  
Juliana Boucher ◽  
Reina Kiefer ◽  
Katherine Williams ◽  
David Barner
Keyword(s):  
Word Learning ◽  
Word Meaning ◽  
Temporal Relations ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Linguistic Context ◽  
Single Word ◽  
Discourse Coherence ◽  
Coherence Relations ◽  
Meaningful Relationships ◽  
Novel Words

Word learning depends critically on the use of linguistic context to constrain the likely meanings of words. However, the mechanisms by which children infer word meaning from linguistic context are still poorly understood. In the present study, we asked whether adults (n = 58) and 2- to 6-year-old children (n = 180) use discourse coherence relations (i.e., the meaningful relationships between elements within a discourse) to constrain their interpretation of novel words. Specifically, we showed participants videos of novel animals exchanging objects. These videos were accompanied by a linguistic description of the events in which we manipulated a single word within a sentence (and vs. because) in order to alter the causal and temporal relations between the events in the discourse (e.g., “One animal handed the baby to the other animal [and/because] the baby started crying in the talfa’s arms”). We then asked participants which animal (the giver or the receiver) was the referent of the novel word. Across two experiments, we found evidence that young children used the causal and temporal relations in each discourse to constrain their interpretations of novel words.

The Type, but Not the Amount, of Information Available Influences Toddlers' Fast Mapping and Retention of New Words

2014 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 120-133 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathryn W. Brady ◽  
Judith C. Goodman
Keyword(s):  
Word Learning ◽  
Word Meaning ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Fast Mapping ◽  
New Words ◽  
Amount Of Information ◽  
Significant Rate ◽  
Mapping Task ◽  
Novel Words

Purpose The authors of this study examined whether the type and number of word-learning cues affect how children infer and retain word-meaning mappings and whether the use of these cues changes with age. Method Forty-eight 18- to 36-month-old children with typical language participated in a fast-mapping task in which 6 novel words were presented with 3 types of cues to the words' referents, either singly or in pairs. One day later, children were tested for retention of the novel words. Results By 24 months of age, children correctly inferred the referents of the novel words at a significant level. Children retained the meanings of words at a significant rate by 30 months of age. Children retained the first 3 of the 6 word-meaning mappings by 24 months of age. For both fast mapping and retention, the efficacy of different cue types changed with development, but children were equally successful whether the novel words were presented with 1 or 2 cues. Conclusion The type of information available to children at fast mapping affects their ability to both form and retain word-meaning associations. Providing children with more information in the form of paired cues had no effect on either fast mapping or retention.

Attention and word learning in toddlers who are late talkers

2015 ◽  
Vol 43 (5) ◽  
pp. 1020-1037 ◽  
Author(s):  
MICHELLE MACROY-HIGGINS ◽  
ELIZABETH A. MONTEMARANO
Keyword(s):  
Language Development ◽  
Word Learning ◽  
Learning Task ◽  
Attention Allocation ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Auditory Comprehension ◽  
Late Talkers ◽  
Novel Words

AbstractThe purpose of this study was to examine attention allocation in toddlers who were late talkers and toddlers with typical language development while they were engaged in a word-learning task in order to determine if differences exist. Two-year-olds who were late talkers (11) and typically developing toddlers (11) were taught twelve novel pseudo-words for unfamiliar objects over ten training sessions. The toddlers' attention allocation during the word-learning sessions was measured as well as their comprehension of the newly learned words. Late talkers showed reduced attention allocation to objects during word-training sessions, and also comprehended fewer of the novel words than toddlers with typical language development. Attention allocation was found to be a stronger predictor of word learning as compared to cognition and auditory comprehension. Reduced attention allocation may contribute to the early lexical delay characteristic in late talkers.

scholarly journals Non-native phonemes in adult word learning: evidence from the N400m

2009 ◽  
Vol 364 (1536) ◽  
pp. 3697-3709 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Dobel ◽  
Lothar Lagemann ◽  
Pienie Zwitserlood
Keyword(s):  
Statistical Learning ◽  
Word Learning ◽  
Native Language ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Learning Paradigm ◽  
Minimal Pairs ◽  
Lexical Activation ◽  
Semantic Access ◽  
Novel Words

Newborns are equipped with a large phonemic inventory that becomes tuned to one's native language early in life. We review and add new data about how learning of a non-native phoneme can be accomplished in adults and how the efficiency of word learning can be assessed by neurophysiological measures. For this purpose, we studied the acquisition of the voiceless, bilabial fricative /Φ/ via a statistical-learning paradigm. Phonemes were embedded in minimal pairs of pseudowords, differing only with respect to the fricative (/aΦo/ versus /afo/). During learning, pseudowords were combined with pictures of objects with some combinations of pseudowords and pictures occurring more frequently than others. Behavioural data and the N400m component, as an index of lexical activation/semantic access, showed that participants had learned to associate the pseudowords with the pictures. However, they could not discriminate within the minimal pairs. Importantly, before learning, the novel words with the sound /Φ/ showed smaller N400 amplitudes than those with native phonemes, evidencing their non-word status. Learning abolished this difference indicating that /Φ/ had become integrated into the native category /f/, instead of establishing a novel category. Our data and review demonstrate that native phonemic categories are powerful attractors hampering the mastery of non-native contrasts.

scholarly journals Children's use of information in word learning

1990 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 393-416 ◽  
Author(s):  
Terry Kit-Fong Au
Keyword(s):  
Prior Knowledge ◽  
Word Learning ◽  
Word Meaning ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Linguistic Information ◽  
Word Meanings ◽  
Knowledge And Beliefs ◽  
Novel Material ◽  
Children's Beliefs

ABSTRACTWhenever children hear a novel word, the context supplies information about its meaning. One way children may cope with so much information is to use whatever seems to make sense, given their prior knowledge and beliefs, while ignoring or quickly forgetting the rest. This work examined if and how children's beliefs about word meanings may affect their use of contrastive linguistic information in the input in word learning. In Study 1, some 3- and 4-year-olds were introduced to a novel material or shape name and heard it contrasted with familiar words. Others merely heard the novel word used for referring to an object. These children were then tested to determine what they had learned about their new word meaning. In Study 2, another group of 3-and 4-year-olds were asked to name the materials and shapes used for introducing these novel terms. Children made use of linguistic contrast only in some situations. They benefited more when the novel term did not overlap much in denotation with any terms commonly known by 3-and 4-year-olds. These results suggest that children can use information in the input very efficiently in learning a term for an as-yet-unnamed category, but not in learning a term similar in denotation to a word they already know. Thus, the results are consistent with the claim that children believe every word has a unique denotation.

Infants' acceptance of phonotactically illegal word forms as object labels

2015 ◽  
Vol 43 (6) ◽  
pp. 1400-1411 ◽  
Author(s):  
ENA VUKATANA ◽  
SUZANNE CURTIN ◽  
SUSAN A. GRAHAM
Keyword(s):  
Word Learning ◽  
Learning Task ◽  
Training Phase ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Complex Interplay ◽  
Learning Abilities ◽  
Sound System ◽  
Word Forms ◽  
Novel Objects ◽  
Novel Words

AbstractWe investigated 16- and 20-month-olds' flexibility in mapping phonotactically illegal words to objects. Using an associative word-learning task, infants were presented with a training phase that either highlighted or did not highlight the referential status of a novel label. Infants were then habituated to two novel objects, each paired with a phonotactically illegal Czech word. When referential cues were provided, 16-, but not 20-month-olds, formed word–object mappings. In the absence of referential cues, infants of both ages failed to map the novel words. These findings illustrate the complex interplay between infants' developing sound system and their word learning abilities.

Children's Word Learning Using Three Modes of Instruction

1996 ◽  
Vol 83 (3) ◽  
pp. 779-787 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandra L. Terrell ◽  
Raymond Daniloff
Keyword(s):  
Preschool Children ◽  
Word Recognition ◽  
Word Learning ◽  
Picture Book ◽  
Affective State ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Video Display ◽  
Sound Track ◽  
Adult Reading ◽  
Novel Words

This study compared the effectiveness of computer video display tube, videotape, and live adult reading modes of instruction in teaching children vocabulary. The same pictured story was implemented in three modes, computer VDT display of still story pictures in color with an accompanying sound track, videotape presentation of the fully animated story, and a picture book whose pictures and narrative matched those of the VDT-computer mode. 78 normal preschool children were presented the story in one of three modes of instruction. The novel words to be learned were embedded in the story as nouns, verbs, and affective state adjectives. Postexposure tests of word recognition showed a small but significant advantage for live voice reading for two of three recognition tests. The VDT and videotape modes did not differ from each other in effectiveness.

Discourse structure and word learning

2011 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 260-281 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brent Strickland ◽  
Salamatu Barrie ◽  
Rihana S. Mason
Keyword(s):  
Word Learning ◽  
Word Meaning ◽  
Situation Model ◽  
Narrative Discourse ◽  
Discourse Structure ◽  
Situation Models ◽  
Discourse Comprehension ◽  
Written Discourse ◽  
Expository Discourse ◽  
Novel Words

The extant literature on discourse comprehension distinguishes between two types of texts: narrative and expository (Steen, 1999). Narrative discourse tells readers a story by giving them an account of events; the narration informs and/or persuades the readership by using textual elements such as theme, plot, and characters. Expository discourse explains or informs the readership by using concepts and techniques such as definition, sequence, categorization, and cause-effect relations. The present study is based on two experiments. In Experiment 1, we compared the two discourse types to examine if college students would be better at extracting the meanings of novel words from one of the two types of discourse structure than from the other. The findings indicated that participants were significantly better at inferring the meaning of novel words from narrative compared to expository discourse. In Experiment 2, we examined the number of situation models that a reader is required to mentally construct, as a possible characteristic that influences the difficulty of learning new word meaning within narrative discourse. Contrary to intuition, fewer novel words were learned in a single-situation, as opposed to a multi-situation model condition, suggesting that the additional inferencing needed to construct multiple models also promotes word learning. Results are discussed with respect to how the structure of written discourse can facilitate word learning in a reader’s native language. Implications for education and assessment are also discussed.

Morphological Knowledge as an Aid to Word Learning: A Cross-Situational Word Learning Study

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sara Finley
Keyword(s):  
Word Learning ◽  
Word Meaning ◽  
Learning Task ◽  
Artificial Language ◽  
Initial Training ◽  
Experimental Conditions ◽  
Morphological Knowledge ◽  
Semantic Categories ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Morphological Cues

The present study explores morphological bootstrapping in cross-situational word learning. Adult, English-speaking participants were exposed to novel words from an artificial language from three different semantic categories: fruit, animals, and vehicles. In the Experimental conditions, the final CV syllable was consistent across categories (e.g., /-ke/ for fruits), while in the Control condition, the endings were the same, but were assigned to words randomly. After initial training on the morphology under various degrees of referential uncertainty, participants were given a cross-situational word learning task with high referential uncertainty. With poor statistical cues to learn the words across trials, participants were forced to rely on the morphological cues to word meaning. In Experiments 1-3, participants in the Experimental conditions repeatedly outperformed participants in the Control conditions. In Experiment 4, when referential uncertainty was high in both parts of the experiment, there was no evidence of learning or making use of the morphological cues. These results suggest that learners apply morphological cues to word meaning only once they are reliably available.

Children's use of lexical and non-lexical information in responding to commands

1982 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 139-150 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Wilcox ◽  
David S. Palermo
Keyword(s):  
Word Meaning ◽  
Linguistic Context ◽  
Lexical Information ◽  
Per Se

ABSTRACTTwo experiments are reported in each of which eighty children between the ages of two and six years of age were given a series of commands containing relational terms and similar commands in which the relational terms were replaced by nonsense. The results indicated that children are able to use information from a number of sources which help them to interpret such commands. Younger children, particularly, seemed to rely relatively little upon word meaning, per se. Evidence is offered that the children's responses were constrained by the non-linguistic context, by prior repetition of commands, and by information available from the linguistic context.

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