Word learning p1

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  • Created by: BKW
  • Created on: 16-01-20 16:08
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  • l4 Word learning p1
    • WHEN do infants start learning words?
      • a lot of variability and they usually understand a word before producing them
      • at 18 months we see increases in vocab
        • as children get older they pick up words a lot faster - this is called a vocabulary spur
      • How can we investigate this?
        • lab based assessment using eye tracking to see which of the 2 images child will look at if they are told to "look at the ball"
          • Bergelson&Swingley 2012 tested food and body parts as we learn these quite early
            • found evidence of comprehension of concrete words at 6-9 months! this was a weak finding but 10-13 months were a lot better
              • so although children know words its a lot harder to learn them because the meanings aren't obvious
                • The mapping problem - Quine 1960
                  • picture of bunny in a field, if someone said "GAVAGAI" and points to thing in scene - new name could refer to an infinite no of aspects
                    • Is it the bunny itself or the ears, or they way it moves, the grass ect
                      • this is a really hard problem to solve but children are really goof at solving it
      • The mapping problem - Quine 1960
        • picture of bunny in a field, if someone said "GAVAGAI" and points to thing in scene - new name could refer to an infinite no of aspects
          • Is it the bunny itself or the ears, or they way it moves, the grass ect
            • this is a really hard problem to solve but children are really goof at solving it
    • HOW do infants/children learn words?
      • Word learning is special
        • Markman 1990 - children innately constrained to consider only some possible word meanings and there are several constraints
          • Mutual exclusivity - biased to map a new word to something we have no name for
          • Whole object constraint
          • taxonomic constraint - we extend words but only to the thing itself not related things
          • these constraints allow fast, efficient word learning called fast mapping
        • Is fast mapping specific to words?
          • Markson and bloom 1997 argue not they did a study on 48 3y/o, 47 4y/o and 48 undergrads
            • experimenter introduced pps to new unfamilliar object in 1/3 conditions: 1. word 2. fact 3. location
              • they were tested on how quickly they learn these pieces of info immediately after, 1week later and 1 mo later
                • they found children and adults fast mapped words and facts most retained for 1 mo. worse at learning location
                  • concluding fast mapping is not specific to just words - maybe there is no dedicated system for word learning?
        • Is it specific to humans?
          • No - animals can also fast map - especially doggos
            • Kaminski, Cll and Fisher 2004 - Rico the german Border collie knows 200 object names
              • Other dogs can do this too eg Chaser the dog
              • this could be because they are social creatures bred to be comminicative
            • Waxman and Booth 2000 - word learning is special for diff reasons - they are symbols and facts are not
              • 4y/o in the lab introduced them to new object in 1/2 conditions 1. fact 2. word - tested on fast mapping and generalization
                • Found they fast mapped words and facts the same but generalized them differently
                  • generalised words to objects of the same kind 100% of time but facts extended to objects of same kind less than words by 67-50% and to objects of diff kind 22-23% of the time
    • Where do these biases come from
      • Smith et al 2002 hypothesised word learning birning biases are built from experience with initial word-meaning associations - this is done in 4 steps with a DAM
        • 1. child starts to learn concrete words
        • 2. As they learn more they begin to generalize over shapes
        • 3. label these features that make the shape that shape
        • 4. generalize to other shapes
        • can get babies who are not yet showing this to show shape biases
          • 9 week longitudinal study in lab on 17month old not yet displaying whole object bias
            • taught words refering to objects of same shape (trained vs untrained condition
              • trained infants mapped words to objects and object properties even learning more object labels out the lab
      • Waxman and booth disagree with smith arguing children don't words based on perceptual info they do this based on what something is - conceptual info
        • 24 3y/os native English taught novel word Dax/Rif in 1/2 conditions 1. animate 2. artifact
          • shape change largely rejected in both conditions but texture was only rejected by animate codition
            • conceptual info dictated meaaning
        • did a second study on 12-13 /o -does conceptual info override the fact it looks animate? added eyes found adding eyes did not = rejection of texture change - more consistent acceptane of texture change than in animate condition in exp1
          • shows children can look past appearance - extending words based on info about kind rather than perceptual info
            • Smith et al argue this saying context of naming pushes child's attention to relevant feature but animacy cues push attention to texture
              • Also argue googly eyes do not display real intimacy

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