1-098 - Linking verbs with events

Session Type: Paper Session

Integrative Statement

To learn the meanings of verbs, children must figure out which aspects of complex events each verb denotes. The four papers in this session examine multiple information sources that children use to solve this problem, including verb lexicalization biases, verb syntax, and learning about the action capacities of particular objects. Presentation 1 investigated children’s and adults’ biases regarding what meaning components should be linked with verbs, finding that even 2-year-olds attended more to semantic dimensions often labeled by verbs in the world’s languages, and 4-year-olds and adults were further influenced by native-language lexicalization biases. Presentation 2 examined the malleability of language-specific lexicalization biases, and showed that brief experience learning verbs encoding either manner-of-action or result meanings altered preschoolers’ verb-learning biases; this effect extended across semantic domains. Presentation 3 explored mechanisms for syntactic bootstrapping, showing that toddlers use discourse context to identify novel verbs as transitive or intransitive despite missing arguments. Presentation 4 explored the role of object variability in verb learning, and found that children and adults more readily generalize new verbs based on a restricted range of training events. Together, these findings reveal how children learn to link event components with words in the course of verb learning.

Sub Unit

• Language, Communication

Chair

• Roberta Golinkoff, University of Delaware

Individual Presentations

• The Typological Prevalence Hypothesis in Motion Verb Learning - Presenting Author: Junko Kanero, Temple University; Katherine Margulis, Temple University; Natalie Brezack, University of Chicago; Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, Temple University; Roberta Golinkoff, University of Delaware

• Do children appreciate parallels in means/ends event structure across semantic fields? - Presenting Author: Melissa Kline, Harvard University; Jesse Snedeker, Harvard University

• What’s she doing? Pilking the baby! Children exploit discourse continuity to identify the missing arguments of novel verbs - Presenting Author: Kyong-sun Jin, Yonsei University; Cynthia Fisher, University of Illinois

• Children and Adults Benefit from Object Consistency when Learning Novel Verbs - Rita M. Pruzansky, Western Michigan University; Presenting Author: Alan W Kersten, Florida Atlantic University; Julie L. Earles, Florida Atlantic University