Crossing to the Other Side: Language Influences Children's Perception of Event Components

Autor/inn/en	Konishi, Haruka; Brezack, Natalie; Golinkoff, Roberta Michnick; Hirsh-Pasek, Kathy
Titel	Crossing to the Other Side: Language Influences Children's Perception of Event Components
Quelle	192 (2019), Artikel 104020 (14 Seiten)Infoseite zur Zeitschrift PDF als Volltext (1); PDF als Volltext kostenfreie Datei (2) Verfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	0010-0277
Schlagwörter	Infants; Cognitive Processes; Verbs; Japanese; English; Visual Stimuli; Auditory Stimuli; Native Speakers; Recognition (Psychology); Language Processing + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Infant; Toddler; Toddlers; Kleinkind; Cognitive process; Kognitiver Prozess; Japaner; Japanisch; English language; Englisch; Auditive Stimulation; Muttersprachler; Recognition; Wiedererkennen; Sprachverarbeitung
Abstract	Infants appear to progress from universal to language-specific event perception. In Japanese, two different verbs describe a person crossing a "bounded ground" (e.g., street) versus an unbounded ground (e.g., field) while in English, the same verb -- "crossing" -- describes both events. Interestingly, Japanese "and" English 14-month-old infants form categories of Japanese ground distinctions in nonlinguistic events while by 20 months, "only" Japanese-reared infants retain this ability. Five experiments were conducted to investigate the role that language plays in children's ability to form categories of Japanese ground-path distinctions. Experiments 1a and 1b first replicated and extended prior research (Göksun et al., 2011) by showing that 14-month-old English-reared children formed categories of Japanese ground-path while 23-month-old children did not in the presence of general language. Experiment 2a paired a single novel word with different Japanese ground categories and found that language "weakened" 14-month-old infants' categorization abilities. Experiment 2b showed that labeling these event types differentially allowed 23-month-olds to "recognize" the Japanese ground-path distinctions that they otherwise would not have detected. To assess whether language uniquely encouraged categorization of Japanese ground-path in Experiment 2b, two different tones were paired with ground-path categories in Experiment 3. The results of Experiments 2b and 3 suggested that language but not tones encouraged ground-path categorization. This study is among the first to show that language can be used to heighten and weaken children's categorization of "non-native" event components. (As Provided).
Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2024/1/01