Fast mapping between a phrasal form and meaning
Abstract
This is the first study to investigate experimentally how children come to learn mappings between novel phrasal forms and novel meanings: a central task in learning a language. Two experiments are reported. In both studies 5‐ to 7‐year‐old children watched a short set of video clips depicting objects appearing in various ways. Each scene was described using a novel verb embedded in a novel construction. Children who watched the videos and heard the accompanying description were able to match new descriptions that used the novel construction with new scenes of appearance. Moreover, our results suggest a facilitative effect for the disproportionately high frequency of occurrence of a single verb in a particular construction (such as has been found to exist in naturalistic input to children). While the fast mapping might be taken as an indication of innate knowledge that is specific to language, analogous effects in non‐linguistic categorization tasks suggest that children are acquiring the new phrasal form with general cognitive skills.
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Children show an advantage for learning the meanings of 'skewed' constructions where one or two types constitute the lion's share of all constructional tokens, as compared to 'balanced' constructions where the tokens are divided more evenly amongst the types.
“Several studies (Goldberg, Casenhiser & Sethuraman, 2004; Casenhiser & Goldberg, 2005; Goldberg, Casenhiser & White, 2007) have found that children show an advantage for learning the meanings of ‘skewed’ constructions where one or two types constitute the lion's share of all constructional tokens, as compared to ‘balanced’ constructions where the tokens are divided more evenly amongst the types.”
From The ubiquity of frequency effects in first language acquisition (2015) · cites this paper as Casenhiser & Goldberg, 2005
Cites
The Structural Sources of Verb Meanings
Gleitman, L. (1990) · Language Acquisition · doi:10.1207/s15327817la0101_2 · Cited by 1,783 · see citing works
Constructing a Language: A Usage-Based Theory of Language Acquisition
TOMASELLO, M. (2005) · Harvard University Press · doi:10.2307/j.ctv26070v8 · Cited by 1,260 · cited 6× · see citing works
“It turns out that young children will use novel orders when novel verbs are modelled in those orders, but resist using the novel order for alreadyknown verbs (Abbot-Smith, Lieven & Tomasello, 2001; Akhtar, 1999).”
BackgroundInfluentialA construction based analysis of child directed speech
Cameron‐Faulkner, T., Lieven, E., & Tomasello, M. (2003) · Cognitive Science · doi:10.1207/s15516709cog2706_2 · Cited by 527 · see citing works
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The ubiquity of frequency effects in first language acquisition
AMBRIDGE, B., KIDD, E., ROWLAND, C. F., & THEAKSTON, A. L. (2015) · Journal of Child Language · doi:10.1017/s030500091400049x · Cited by 589 · see citing works
Implicit statistical learning is directly associated with the acquisition of syntax
Kidd, E. (2012) · Developmental Psychology · doi:10.1037/a0025405 · Cited by 310 · see citing works
Constructions as categories of language
Goldberg, A. E., Casenhiser, D., & White, T. R. (2007) · New Ideas in Psychology · doi:10.1016/j.newideapsych.2007.02.004 · Cited by 78 · see citing works
Self-citation
- Authors
- Casenhiser, D., & Goldberg, A. E.
- Affiliations
- York University (CA)
- Princeton University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Goldberg, Adele E.
- Venue
- Developmental Science
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2005-10-25
- Volume
- 8
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 500-508
- ISSN
- 1363-755X (ISSN-L)
- 1467-7687
- OpenAlex
- W2035673467
- Cited by
- 319
- References
- 3
- Citations by year
- 2026: 4 · 2025: 14 · 2024: 29 · 2023: 15 · 2022: 9 · 2021: 18 · 2020: 16 · 2019: 8 · 2018: 9 · 2017: 8 · 2016: 28 · 2015: 32 · 2014: 46 · 2013: 16 · 2012: 13
- FWCI
- 11.39
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Developmental Science (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- Center for Advanced Study, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Language Development and Disorders
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Child and Animal Learning Development
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Categorization, perception, and language
- Keywords
- fast mapping, novel word learning, verb acquisition, construction grammar, child language acquisition, word frequency effects, categorization
- MeSH terms
- Analysis of Variance, Association Learning, Child, Child, Preschool, Humans, Illinois, Language Development, Semantics, Verbal Learning, Videotape Recording, Vocabulary
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