English- and Chinese-Learning Infants Map Novel Labels to Objects and Actions Differently

Developmental Psychology

Volumn 47, Issue 5, 2011, Pages 1459-1471

  Chan, Cheri C Y ^a   Tardif, Twila ^a   Chen, Jie ^a   Pulverman, Rachel B ^a   Zhu, Liqi ^b   Meng, Xiangzhi ^c  

^a UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN   (United States)

^b INSTITUTE OF GEOLOGY AND GEOPHYSICS   (China)

^c PEKING UNIVERSITY   (China)

Author keywords

English; Infant word learning; Language; Mandarin; Nouns and verbs

Indexed keywords

ANALYSIS OF VARIANCE; ARTICLE; ATTENTION; AUDITORY STIMULATION; CLINICAL TRIAL; CONCEPT FORMATION; CONTROLLED CLINICAL TRIAL; CONTROLLED STUDY; CULTURAL FACTOR; EYE FIXATION; FEMALE; HUMAN; INFANT; LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT; LEARNING; LINGUISTICS; MALE; METHODOLOGY; PHOTOSTIMULATION; PHYSIOLOGY; PSYCHOPHYSICS; RANDOMIZED CONTROLLED TRIAL; TIME;

ACOUSTIC STIMULATION; ANALYSIS OF VARIANCE; ATTENTION; CONCEPT FORMATION; CROSS-CULTURAL COMPARISON; FEMALE; FIXATION, OCULAR; HUMANS; INFANT; LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT; MALE; PHOTIC STIMULATION; PSYCHOPHYSICS; TIME FACTORS; VERBAL LEARNING; VOCABULARY;

EID: 80052857943     PISSN: 00121649     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1037/a0024049     Document Type: Article

References (54)

1. Bassano D. Early development of nouns and verbs in French: Exploring the interface between lexicon and grammar. Journal of Child Language 2000, 27:521-559. 10.1017/S0305000900004396.
2. Bates E., Marchman V., Thal D., Fenson L., Dale P., Reznick J.S., Hartung J. Developmental and stylistic variation in the composition of early vocabulary. Journal of Child Language 1994, 21:85-123. 10.1017/S0305000900008680.
3. Bloom L. The transition from infancy to language: Acquiring the power of expression 1993, Cambridge University Press, New York, NY. 10.1017/CBO9780511752797.
4. Bloom P. How children learn the meanings of words 2000, The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA.
5. Bornstein M.H., Cote L., Maital S., Painter K., Park S.Y., Pascual L., Vyt A. Cross-linguistic analysis of vocabulary in young children: Spanish, Dutch, French, Hebrew, Italian, Korean, and American English. Child Development 2004, 75:1115-1139. 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2004.00729.x.
6. Brandone A.C., Pence K.L., Golinkoff R.M., Hirsh-Pasek K. Action speaks louder than words: Young children differentially weight perceptual, social, and linguistic cues to learn verbs. Child Development 2007, 78:1322-1342. 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2007.01068.x.
7. Brown P. Children's first verbs in Tzeltal: Evidence for an early verb category. Linguistics 1998, 36:713-754. 10.1515/ling.1998.36.4.713.
8. Camarata S., Leonard L.B. Young children pronounce object words more accurately than action words. Journal of Child Language 1986, 13:51-65. 10.1017/S0305000900000295.
9. Camarata S.M., Schwartz R.G. Production of object words and action words: Evidence for a relationship between phonology and semantics. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research 1985, 28:323-330.
10. Casasola M., Cohen L.B. Infants' association of linguistic labels with causal actions. Developmental Psychology 2000, 36:155-168. 10.1037/0012-1649.36.2.155.
11. Caselli C., Bates E., Casadio P., Fenson J., Fenson L., Sanded L., Weir J. A cross-linguistic study of early lexical development. Cognitive Development 1995, 10:159-199. 10.1016/0885-2014(95)90008-X.
12. Caselli C., Casadio P., Bates E. A comparison of the transition from first words to grammar in English and Italian. Journal of Child Language 1999, 26:69-111. 10.1017/S0305000998003687.
13. Chan C.C.Y., Brandone A.C., Tardif T. Culture, context, or behavioral control? English- and Mandarin-speaking mothers' use of nouns and verbs in joint book reading. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology 2009, 40:584-602. 10.1177/0022022109335184.
14. Childers J.B., Tomasello M. Two-year-olds learn novel nouns, verbs, and conventional actions from massed or distributed exposures. Developmental Psychology 2002, 38:967-978. 10.1037/0012-1649.38.6.967.
15. Choi S., Gopnik A. Early acquisition of verbs in Korean: A cross-linguistic study. Journal of Child Language 1995, 22:497-529. 10.1017/S0305000900009934.
16. Cohen L.B. Uses and misuses of habituation and related preference paradigms. Infant and Child Development 2004, 13:349-352. 10.1002/icd.355.
17. Cohen L.B., Atkinson D.J., Chaput H.H. A new program for obtaining and organizing data in infant perception and cognition studies 2004, University of Texas, Austin, TX, (Version 1.0) [Software].
18. D'Odorico L., Fasolo M. Nouns and verbs in the vocabulary acquisition of Italian children. Journal of Child Language 2007, 34:891-907.
19. Dromi E. Early lexical development 1987, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, England.
20. Estes K.G., Evans J.L., Alibali M.W., Saffran J.R. Can infants map meaning to newly segmented words? Statistical segmentation and word learning. Psychological Science 2007, 18:254-260. 10.1111/j.1467-9280.2007.01885.x.
21. Fenson L., Dale P.S., Reznick J.S., Bates E., Thal D.J., Pethick S.J. Variability in early communicative development. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development 1994, 59(5). Serial No. 242.
22. Fenson L., Pethick S., Renda C., Cox J.L., Dale P.S., Reznick J.S. Short-form versions of the MacArthur Communicative Development Inventories. Applied Psycholinguistics 2000, 21:95-116. 10.1017/S0142716400001053.
23. Gentner D. Why nouns are learned before verbs: Linguistic relativity versus natural partitioning. Language development: Language, cognition and culture 1982, 301-334. Erlbaum, Hillsdale, NJ. S. Kuczaj (Ed.).
24. Gentner D., Boroditsky L. Individuation, relativity, and early word learning. Language acquisition and conceptual development 2001, 215-256. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, England. 10.1017/CBO9780511620669.010. M. Bowerman, S.C. Levinson (Eds.).
25. Gleitman L. The structural sources of verb meanings. Language Acquisition: A Journal of Developmental Linguistics 1990, 1:3-55.
26. Goldin-Meadow S., Seligman M.E.P., Gelman R. Language in the two-year-old. Cognition 1976, 4:189-202. 10.1016/0010-0277(76)90004-4.
27. Golinkoff R.M., Mervis C., Hirsh-Pasek K. Early object labels: The case for lexical principles. Journal of Child Language 1994, 21:125-155. 10.1017/S0305000900008692.
28. Hirsh-Pasek K., Golinkoff R.M., Hollich G. An emergentist coalition model for word learning. Becoming a word learner: A debate on lexical acquisition 2000, 136-164. Oxford University Press, New York, NY. 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195130324.003.006. R.M. Golinkoff, K. Hirsh-Pasek (Eds.).
29. Hoff-Ginsberg, E. (1993, March). Object labels in early lexicons. Paper presented at the 60th Biennial Meeting of the Society for Research in Child Development, New Orleans, LA.
30. Hollich G., Hirsh-Pasek K., Golinkoff R.M. Breaking the language barrier: An emergentist coalition model of the origins of word learning. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development 2000, 65(3). Serial No. 262.
31. Imai M., Li L., Haryu E., Okada H., Hirsh-Pasek K., Golinkoff R.M., Shigematsu J. Novel noun and verb learning in Chinese-, English-, and Japanese-speaking children. Child Development 2008, 79:979-1000. 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2008.01171.x.
32. Lee J.N., Naigles L.R. Input to verb learning in mandarin Chinese: A role for syntactic bootstrapping. Developmental Psychology 2005, 41:529-540. 10.1037/0012-1649.41.3.529.
33. Ma W., Golinkoff R.M., Hirsh-Pasek K., MacDonough C., Tardif T. Imageability predicts age of acquisition of verbs in Chinese children. Journal of Child Language 2009, 36:405-423. 10.1017/S0305000908009008.
34. Markman E.M., Wachtel G.F. Children's use of mutual exclusivity to constrain the meaning of words. Cognitive Psychology 1988, 20:121-157. 10.1016/0010-0285(88)90017-5.
35. McDonough C., Song L., Hirsh-Pasek K., Golinkoff R.M., Lannon R. An image is worth a thousand words: Why nouns tend to dominate verbs in early word learning. Developmental Science 2011, 14:181-189. 10.1111/j.1467-7687.2010.00968.x.
36. Naigles L.G., Kako E.T. First contact in verb acquisition: Defining a role for syntax. Child Development 1993, 64:1665-1687. 10.2307/1131462.
37. Pruden S.M., Hirsh-Pasek K., Golinkoff R.M., Hennon E.A. The birth of words: Ten-month-olds learn words through perceptual salience. Child Development 2006, 77:266-280. 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2006.00869.x.
38. Pulverman, R., Tardif, T., Rohrbeck, K. L., & Chen, P. (March, 2010). The effect of specificity on verb acquisition: Evidence from English and Mandarin Chinese. Poster session presented at XVIIth Biennial International Conference on Infant Studies, Baltimore, MD.
39. Saji N., Saalbach H., Imai M., Zhang Y., Shu H., Okada H. Fast-mapping and reorganization: Development of verb meanings as a system. Proceedings of the 30th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society 2008, 703-708. Erlbaum, Mahwah, NJ.
40. Schwartz R.G., Leonard L.B. Words, objects, and actions in early lexical acquisition. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research 1984, 27:119-127.
41. Snedeker, J., Li, P., & Yuan, S. (2003). Cross-cultural differences in the input to early word learning. Paper presented at the Proceedings of the XVth Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society, Mahwah, NJ.
42. Tardif T. Nouns are not always learned before verbs: Evidence from Mandarin speakers' early vocabularies. Developmental Psychology 1996, 32:492-504. 10.1037/0012-1649.32.3.492.
43. Tardif T. But are they really verbs? Chinese words for action. Action meets word: How children learn verbs 2006, 477-498. Oxford University Press, New York, NY. 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195170009.003.0019. K. Hirsh-Pasek, R. Golinkoff (Eds.).
44. Tardif, T., & Chan, C. C. Y. (2005). Comprehension and production of nouns and verbs: Data from CDI norming studies in English, Mandarin, and Cantonese. Paper presented at the 10th International Congress for the Study of Child Language, Berlin, Germany.
45. Tardif T., Fletcher P., Liang W.L., Kaciroti N. Early vocabulary development in Mandarin (Putonghua) and Cantonese. Journal of Child Language 2009, 36:1115-1144. 10.1017/S0305000908009185.
46. Tardif T., Fletcher P., Liang W.L., Zhang Z.X., Kaciroti N., Marchman V. Baby's first 10 words. Developmental Psychology 2008, 44:929-938. 10.1037/0012-1649.44.4.929.
47. Tardif T., Fletcher P., Zhang Z.X., Liang W.L., Zuo Q.H. The Chinese Communicative Development Inventory (Putonghua and Cantonese versions): Manual, Forms, and Norms 2009, Peking University Medical Press, Beijing, China.
48. Tardif T., Gelman S.A., Xu F. Putting the " noun-bias" in context: A comparison of English and Mandarin. Child Development 1999, 70:620-635. 10.1111/1467-8624.00045.
49. Tardif T., Shatz M., Naigles L. Caregiver speech and children's use of nouns versus verbs: A comparison of English, Italian, and Mandarin. Journal of Child Language 1997, 24:535-565. 10.1017/S030500099700319X.
50. Tomasello M., Akhtar N. Two-year-olds use pragmatic cues to differentiate reference to objects and actions. Cognitive Development 1995, 10:201-224. 10.1016/0885-2014(95)90009-8.
51. Waxman S.R., Lidz J. Early word learning. Handbook of child psychology: Cognition, perception, and language 2006, 299-335. Wiley, New York, NY. 6th ed. D. Kuhn, R. Siegler (Eds.).
52. Waxman S.R., Lidz J.L., Braun I.E., Lavin T. Twenty-four-month-old infants' interpretations of novel verbs and nouns in dynamic scenes. Cognitive Psychology 2009, 59:67-95. 10.1016/j.cogpsych.2009.02.001.
53. Werker J.F., Cohen L.B., Lloyd V.L., Casasola M., Stager C.L. Acquisition of word-object associations by 14-month-olds. Developmental Psychology 1998, 34:1289-1309. 10.1037/0012-1649.34.6.1289.
54. Werker J.F., Fennell C.T., Corcoran K.M., Stager C.L. Infants' ability to learn phonetically similar words: Effects of age and vocabulary. Infancy 2002, 3:1-30.