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The Influence of Exemplar Variability on Young Children's Construal of Verb Meaning
- Source :
-
Language Learning and Development . 2023 19(3):249-274. - Publication Year :
- 2023
-
Abstract
- Verbs serve as the architectural centerpiece of sentences, making verb learning pivotal for language acquisition. Verb learning requires both the formation of a verb-action mapping and the abstraction of relations between an object and its action. Two competing positions have been proposed to explain the process of verb learning: (a) seeing a highly variable range of exemplars allows children to detect and abstract the commonalities across actions--the action invariants; and (b) seeing a less variable range of exemplars enables children to focus on and extract the action invariants. Using manner--a major component of verb meaning in English--as a test case, this study addressed this debate by examining the influence of manner variability on the ability to fast-map new verbs and extend them to novel exemplars in 2-, 3-, and 4-year-old English-speaking children. Results contribute to this debate by showing that high manner variability hindered fast-mapping but facilitated extension to manner variations in the 2- and 3-year-olds. Thus, high exemplar variability may affect verb fast-mapping and extension differently. Furthermore, manner variability did not affect 4-year-olds' (or adults') fast-mapping or extension, suggesting that the influence of exemplar variability on verb learning attenuates with age. Finally, manner variability did not affect agent or object extension, revealing a component-specific effect of exemplar variability on verb extension.
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 1547-5441 and 1547-3341
- Volume :
- 19
- Issue :
- 3
- Database :
- ERIC
- Journal :
- Language Learning and Development
- Publication Type :
- Academic Journal
- Accession number :
- EJ1390765
- Document Type :
- Journal Articles<br />Reports - Research
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1080/15475441.2022.2060834