2-074 - Object Labeling From the Infant’s Perspective: Which Infant Behaviors Elicit Labels From Caregivers?

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

The importance of caregiver responsiveness to infant behavior for language development is well established. However, language development is embedded in a social feedback loop; caregivers and infants exert bidirectional influence on one another. To advance our understanding of how word-learning mechanisms develop, this symposium examines infant behaviors that affect caregiver labeling and the assumptions infants might then infer from that labeling input. Papers 1-3 investigate when parents provide labels relative to infant behaviors (e.g. vocalizations, gaze, and object manipulation), while paper 4 considers how prior linguistic experience influences infant word learning assumptions. Paper 1 considers how the acoustic and contextual characteristics of 9-month-old infant vocalizations change the likelihood of mothers responding with a label. Paper 2 investigates characteristics of infant object manipulation between 10-14 months that influence caregiver labeling. Paper 3 explores maternal and paternal labeling surrounding 12-month-old infants’ object manipulation, gaze, and vocalizations. Together, these papers suggest that infants receive different opportunities to learn object labels depending on the cues they produce. Over time, infants develop expectations or biases from these labeling instances that will aid them in learning novel words. For instance, paper 4 demonstrates how 18-month-old bilingual infants develop different assumptions about how novel words apply to known objects than monolingual infants, presumably due to experience hearing objects labeled with multiple words. By considering the relative influences of infant cues on eliciting caregiver labels, this symposium will increase our understanding of how caregiver-infant interactions organize opportunities for word learning and thereby influence early world learning biases.

Sub Unit

• Language, Communication

Chairs

• Rachel Albert, Lebanon Valley College

• Jennifer Miller, Illinois Institute of Technology

Individual Presentations

• All Babbles are Not Created Equal: Mothers Differentially Label Objects Based on Infant Vocal Cues - Presenting Author: Rachel Albert, Lebanon Valley College

• Characteristics of Infant Object Manipulation Relate to Caregiver Labeling - Presenting Author: Kelsey West, University of Pittsburgh; Jana Iverson, University of Pittsburgh

• Cues Associated with Labeling in Parent-Infant Interactions - Amber Dewey, University at Buffalo; Presenting Author: Julie J Gros-Louis, University of Iowa

• The Role of Linguistic Experience in Shaping Word-Learning Biases - Presenting Author: Padmapriya Kandhadai, University of British Columbia; Geoffrey Hall, University of British Columbia; Janet Werker, University of British Columbia