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Presentation Type

Poster

Access Type

MSU Access Only

Start Date

2020 12:00 AM

End Date

2020 12:00 AM

Description

Research suggests that children aged 3.5-4.5 may exhibit a division of labor in how they map various support configurations with language (Landau, 2017; Lakusta et al., 2019). Support from below (SFB) involves one object being supported from below by another and is typically encoded by “is on” in language (e.g., “the plate is on the table”). Mechanical support (MS) involves an object being supported by a mechanism and is typically encoded by specific, lexical verbs (e.g., “the toy sticks to the wall”). The current study explores if children from 2-3 years-old are sensitive to the mapping of “sticks” to MS. Participants were asked to play a pointing game. They were first given two practice trials asking them to point to animals (e.g., dog, cow). Then, during test trials, they were concurrently presented with a SFB event (a toy being put on top of a box) and a MS event (a toy being stuck to the side of a box) as they were told either “point to the toy that is on/sticks to the box.” Each child was presented with two test trials, resulting in two observations per child. Thus far, our sample has 14 children (seven heard “is on” and seven heard “sticks to”). The proportion of adhesion events selected for children who heard “sticks to” was .71. The proportion of SFB events selected after hearing “is on” was .57. Although preliminary, results indicate that children seem to map lexical verbs with specificity.

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Jan 1st, 12:00 AM Jan 1st, 12:00 AM

Children's Mapping of Mechanical Support Spatial Configurations to Language

Research suggests that children aged 3.5-4.5 may exhibit a division of labor in how they map various support configurations with language (Landau, 2017; Lakusta et al., 2019). Support from below (SFB) involves one object being supported from below by another and is typically encoded by “is on” in language (e.g., “the plate is on the table”). Mechanical support (MS) involves an object being supported by a mechanism and is typically encoded by specific, lexical verbs (e.g., “the toy sticks to the wall”). The current study explores if children from 2-3 years-old are sensitive to the mapping of “sticks” to MS. Participants were asked to play a pointing game. They were first given two practice trials asking them to point to animals (e.g., dog, cow). Then, during test trials, they were concurrently presented with a SFB event (a toy being put on top of a box) and a MS event (a toy being stuck to the side of a box) as they were told either “point to the toy that is on/sticks to the box.” Each child was presented with two test trials, resulting in two observations per child. Thus far, our sample has 14 children (seven heard “is on” and seven heard “sticks to”). The proportion of adhesion events selected for children who heard “sticks to” was .71. The proportion of SFB events selected after hearing “is on” was .57. Although preliminary, results indicate that children seem to map lexical verbs with specificity.