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Two-year-olds learn novel nouns, verbs, and conventional actions from massed or distributed exposures.

Publication ,  Journal Article
Childers, JB; Tomasello, M
Published in: Developmental psychology
November 2002

Two-year-old children were taught either 6 novel nouns, 6 novel verbs, or 6 novel actions over 1 month. In each condition, children were exposed to some items in massed presentations (on a single day) and some in distributed presentations (over the 2 weeks). Children's comprehension and production was tested at 3 intervals after training. In comprehension, children learned all types of items in all training conditions at all retention intervals. For production, the main findings were that (a) production was better for nonverbal actions than for either word type, (b) children produced more new nouns than verbs, (c) production of words was better following distributed than massed exposure, and (d) time to testing (immediate, 1 day, 1 week) did not affect retention. A follow-up study showed that the most important timing variable was the number of different days of exposure, with more days facilitating production. Results are discussed in terms of 2 key issues: (a) the domain-generality versus domain-specificity of processes of word learning and (b) the relative ease with which children learn nouns versus verbs.

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Published In

Developmental psychology

DOI

EISSN

1939-0599

ISSN

0012-1649

Publication Date

November 2002

Volume

38

Issue

6

Start / End Page

967 / 978

Related Subject Headings

  • Verbal Learning
  • Semantics
  • Retention, Psychology
  • Psycholinguistics
  • Practice, Psychological
  • Pattern Recognition, Visual
  • Male
  • Language Development
  • Humans
  • Female
 

Citation

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Childers, J. B., & Tomasello, M. (2002). Two-year-olds learn novel nouns, verbs, and conventional actions from massed or distributed exposures. Developmental Psychology, 38(6), 967–978. https://doi.org/10.1037/0012-1649.38.6.967
Childers, Jane B., and Michael Tomasello. “Two-year-olds learn novel nouns, verbs, and conventional actions from massed or distributed exposures.Developmental Psychology 38, no. 6 (November 2002): 967–78. https://doi.org/10.1037/0012-1649.38.6.967.
Childers JB, Tomasello M. Two-year-olds learn novel nouns, verbs, and conventional actions from massed or distributed exposures. Developmental psychology. 2002 Nov;38(6):967–78.
Childers, Jane B., and Michael Tomasello. “Two-year-olds learn novel nouns, verbs, and conventional actions from massed or distributed exposures.Developmental Psychology, vol. 38, no. 6, Nov. 2002, pp. 967–78. Epmc, doi:10.1037/0012-1649.38.6.967.
Childers JB, Tomasello M. Two-year-olds learn novel nouns, verbs, and conventional actions from massed or distributed exposures. Developmental psychology. 2002 Nov;38(6):967–978.

Published In

Developmental psychology

DOI

EISSN

1939-0599

ISSN

0012-1649

Publication Date

November 2002

Volume

38

Issue

6

Start / End Page

967 / 978

Related Subject Headings

  • Verbal Learning
  • Semantics
  • Retention, Psychology
  • Psycholinguistics
  • Practice, Psychological
  • Pattern Recognition, Visual
  • Male
  • Language Development
  • Humans
  • Female