This study examined effects of lexical status and neighborhood density of constituent syllables on children's nonword repetition and interactions with nonword length. Lexical status of the target syllable impacted repetition accuracy for the longest nonwords. In addition, children made more errors that changed a nonword syllable to a word syllable…

What makes a child's language development trajectory have the patterns that it has, and what causes differences across children in those patterns? These fundamental questions have for over half a century been at the heart of research on language development in monolingual children, on the cross-linguistic development of language in children from…

This study examined effects of lexical factors on children's spoken word recognition across a 1-year time span, and contributions to phonological awareness and nonword repetition. Across the year, children identified words based on less input on a speech-gating task. For word repetition, older children improved for the most familiar words. There…

Segalowitz and Segalowitz distinguish between "speedup" (mean reaction time [RT] and mean standard deviation of responses in an RT task decrease to the same degree) and "automatization" (mean standard deviation decreases more than mean RT). The coefficient of variation, which is the standard deviation divided by the mean RT, decreases in the case…

Susan Gathercole's Keynote Article (2006) is an impressive summary of the literature on nonword repetition and its relationship to word learning and vocabulary size. When considering research by Mary Beckman, Jan Edwards, and myself, Gathercole speculates that our finding of a stronger relationship between vocabulary measures and repetition…

In the current study, we explore the influence of orthographic knowledge on phonological awareness in children with cochlear implants and compare developmental associations to those found for hearing children matched for word reading level or chronological age. We show an influence of orthographic knowledge on syllable and phoneme awareness in…

In her Keynote Article, Gathercole (2006) presents a theoretical framework intended to account for evidence regarding the relation between nonword repetition and word learning. This framework stems from an impressive amount and breadth of research on this topic, including findings from adults and children with typical language abilities as well as…

Our understanding the relationship between verbal short-term memory as indexed by nonword repetition and word learning must now incorporate myriad factors that were not as apparent 17 years ago when Gathercole and Baddeley (1989) proposed that "the phonological memory skills tapped by nonword repetition play a causal role in vocabulary…

This study examined the role of phonological memory in second language (L2) grammar learning in a group of native French-speaking children undergoing a 5-month intensive English program. Phonological memory (as referenced by Arabic [ANWR] and English [ENWR] nonword repetition tasks), L2 vocabulary (receptive and productive vocabulary knowledge),…

This article presents a theoretical framework designed to accommodate core evidence that the abilities to repeat nonwords and to learn the phonological forms of new words are closely linked. Basic findings relating nonword repetition and word learning both in typical samples of children and adults and in individuals with disorders of language…

Gathercole's (2006) comprehensive and interesting Keynote Article on the nature of the relations between nonword repetition and word learning highlights the complex number of interacting factors that affect this relation through development. In this Commentary we focus on the impact of higher level cognition, particularly linguistic…

The assessment of nonword repetition in children goes back at least to 1974, when the Goldman-Fristoe-Woodcock Auditory Skills Battery was published, including a subtest (Sound Mimicry) assessing nonword repetition (Goldman, Fristoe, & Woodcock, 1974). Nevertheless, it was not until 20 years later, when Gathercole and Baddeley (1990) reported a…

Investigates developmental association between nonword repetition performance and vocabulary knowledge by evaluating the role of phonological memory and linguistic factors in nonword repetition. (29 references) (GLR)

Individual differences in nonword repetition (NWR) show a particularly strong association with vocabulary acquisition for both first- (L1) and second-language (L2) learners, and they serve as a behavioral marker for specific language impairment (SLI) in children (Gathercole, 2006). However, this association is susceptible to alternative…

Reports on two studies that examined the natural process of word learning in children 4-11 years old. The children hear the new words in a conversation, a story, and paired with a definition. Results indicate that children at all ages could acquire a partial semantic representation from a single exposure. (SED)