Young Children’s Understanding of Ordinal, Spatial, and Color Labels

• In Event: Poster Session 06
  In Poster Session: PS 06 Topic - Cognitive Processes

Abstract

Young children display rapid improvements in conceptual understanding and language comprehension. Understanding spatial and temporal ordering is necessary in everyday tasks such as following instructions and keeping track of locations in space. Foster and Hund (2012) found that children’s use of complex spatial labels increased with development and depended on prompting. Columé and Noël (2012) found that preschoolers had difficulty understanding and using ordinal labels, and their performance improved with age. Miller, Marcovitch, Boseovski, and Lewkowicz (2015) tested 4-and 5-year-old children’s ability to understand ordinal labels while searching for stickers hidden in toy train cars in comparison to color or generic labels. Ordinal labels were more difficult than color or generic labels, especially for younger children. The present study sought to replicate and extend this work by comparing complex spatial labels with ordinal and color labels in the same spatial search task, thereby providing precise details about their developmental trajectories. We tested 56 3-year-old (22 girls, 34 boys) and 73 4-year-old (32 girls, 41 boys) English-speaking children (M = 4 years 1 month, SD = 6.62 months). Parents completed a demographic survey and language checklist. Children were familiarized with the oval train track, train cars (engine, 3 identical cargo cars, caboose), and 3 identical tunnels. The researcher referred to the cars and their corresponding tunnels with ordinal (first-second-third), spatial (front-middle-back), or color (red-green-yellow) labels, depending on the experimental condition. During each of the 6 test trials, the researcher placed a sticker in one of the three identical train cars, labeled the car three times, and then drove the train under the tunnels, hiding the cars from view. The participant was asked to find the sticker following a brief delay. The researcher coded participant searches to compute proportion correct. As expected, the main effect of age on search performance was significant, F (2, 123) = 16.81, p < .001, ηp2 = .12. Four-year-old children (M = .78, SE = .03) were significantly more successful when searching for the hidden stickers than were 3-year-old children (M = .58, SE = .04). The main effect of condition also was significant, F (2, 123) = 3.43, p < .05, ηp2 = .05. Fisher’s Least Significant Difference (LSD) follow-up tests revealed that children were significantly less successful when using ordinal labels (M = .60, SE = .04) than when using color labels (M = .75, SE = .04). Spatial labels (M = .68, SE = .04) were intermediate and did not differ significantly from the other two conditions (see Figure 1). Children’s search performance was significantly positively correlated with parent reports of ordinal labels, r (111) = .20, p < .05, and spatial labels, r (111) = .25, p < .01. Moreover, parent reports of ordinal and spatial labels were highly correlated, r (111) = .50, p < .01. The correlations between search performance and spatial language and between ordinal and spatial language remained significant when controlling for age in months. These findings elucidate preschool children’s growing understanding of spatial and temporal details.

Authors

• Alycia M Hund, Illinois State University
  Presenting Author

• Kathleen Noel Kannass, Concordia University Wisconsin
  Non-Presenting Author

• Rebecca Bove, Illinois State University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Lauren Fairweather, Illinois State University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Morgan Maydew, Illinois State University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Analeese Monla, Illinois State University
  Non-Presenting Author