Mapping Novel Labels to Actions: How the Rhythm of Words Guides Infants' Learning

Autor/inn/en	Curtin, Suzanne; Campbell, Jennifer; Hufnagle, Dan
Titel	Mapping Novel Labels to Actions: How the Rhythm of Words Guides Infants' Learning
Quelle	In: Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 112 (2012) 2, S.127-140 (14 Seiten) PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	0022-0965
DOI	10.1016/j.jecp.2012.02.007
Schlagwörter	Suprasegmentals; Nouns; Infants; Organizations (Groups); Cognitive Mapping; Correlation; Classification; Native Language; Language Patterns + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Infant; Toddler; Toddlers; Kleinkind; Korrelation; Classification system; Klassifikation; Klassifikationssystem; Sprachmodell; Sprachstruktur
Abstract	We investigated the effect of lexical stress on 16-month-olds' ability to form associations between labels and paths of motion. Disyllabic English nouns tend to have a strong-weak (trochaic) stress pattern, and verbs tend to have a weak-strong (iambic) pattern. We explored whether infants would use word stress information to guide word-action associations during learning. Infants heard two novel words with either verb-like iambic stress or noun-like trochaic stress. Each word was paired with a single novel object performing one of two path actions and was tested using path-switch trials. Only infants in the iambic stress condition learned the association between the novel words and the path actions. To further investigate infants' difficulty in mapping the trochaic labels to the actions, we conducted an additional study in which infants were given an object switch task using the trochaic labels. In this case, infants were able to associate the trochaic labels with the objects, providing further support that infants use lexical stress to guide label-referent associations. This study demonstrates that by 16 months, English-learning infants have developed a bias to expect disyllabic action labels to have iambic stress patterns, consistent with native language stress patterns. (Contains 3 tables and 5 figures.) (As Provided).
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Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2017/4/10