TY - JOUR
T1 - A new experimental paradigm to study children's processing of their parent's unscripted language input
AU - Arunachalam, Sudha
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was funded by NIH K01 DC013306 . Thanks to the reviewers for helpful comments on this manuscript, to the research assistants at the Boston University Child Language Lab for assistance with data collection, to the audience at the Symposium on Research in Child Language Disorders for helpful feedback, to the parents and children who participated, and to the family whose games of “I Spy…” during a long airplane ride inspired the task design.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 Elsevier Inc.
PY - 2016/6/1
Y1 - 2016/6/1
N2 - This paper introduces a new experimental paradigm for studying children's real-time language processing of their parents' unscripted speech. Focusing on children's processing of referential expressions, or the phrases that parents used to label particular objects, we engaged dyads in a game in which parents labeled one of several objects displayed on a screen, and the child was to quickly identify it as their eye gaze was tracked. There were two conditions; one included a competitor object (e.g., the target was a striped umbrella and the display also included an umbrella with polka dots), while the other one did not (e.g., only one umbrella was present). The results revealed evidence of children's incremental processing of their parents' referential expressions. They also showed faster processing of postnominally-modified as compared to prenominally-modified referential expressions. Parents tended to produce postnominally-modified referential expressions in the more difficult experimental condition in which there was a competitor object, suggesting either that these expressions are also easier for them to produce, or that they accommodate their children by producing more easily processed expressions. We discuss the potential of this paradigm for advancing theories of the relationship between child-directed language input and children's language processing.
AB - This paper introduces a new experimental paradigm for studying children's real-time language processing of their parents' unscripted speech. Focusing on children's processing of referential expressions, or the phrases that parents used to label particular objects, we engaged dyads in a game in which parents labeled one of several objects displayed on a screen, and the child was to quickly identify it as their eye gaze was tracked. There were two conditions; one included a competitor object (e.g., the target was a striped umbrella and the display also included an umbrella with polka dots), while the other one did not (e.g., only one umbrella was present). The results revealed evidence of children's incremental processing of their parents' referential expressions. They also showed faster processing of postnominally-modified as compared to prenominally-modified referential expressions. Parents tended to produce postnominally-modified referential expressions in the more difficult experimental condition in which there was a competitor object, suggesting either that these expressions are also easier for them to produce, or that they accommodate their children by producing more easily processed expressions. We discuss the potential of this paradigm for advancing theories of the relationship between child-directed language input and children's language processing.
KW - Children
KW - Eye-tracking
KW - Language acquisition
KW - Language processing
KW - Methodology
KW - Referential expressions
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U2 - 10.1016/j.jml.2016.02.001
DO - 10.1016/j.jml.2016.02.001
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84957883828
SN - 0749-596X
VL - 88
SP - 104
EP - 116
JO - Journal of Memory and Language
JF - Journal of Memory and Language
ER -