Recent studies on the acquisition of semantics have argued that knowledge of the universal quantifier is adult-like throughout development. However, there are domains where children still exhibit non-adult-like universal quantification, and arguments for the early mastery of relevant semantic knowledge do not explain what causes such…

Examines the relationship between children's attribute saliency and metaphor interpretation. Findings indicate that attribute saliency for the individual perceiving the metaphor plays a key role in the interpretation process. (Author/CB)

Children aged 3, 6, 9 and 12 years were asked to name and sort 25 different drinking vessels. Results showed three stages: (1) they ove rextend the term "cup"; (2) they focus only on certain perceptual properties; (3) they show growing awareness of functional properties and hence the vagueness of the boundary. (Author/RM)

Three experiments with children between 5 and 7 years are described. It is shown that nominal predication of an unknown word by a superordinate term enables young children to make appropriate inferences concerning its attributes. The results are discussed in relation to semantic development and reasoning in the young child. (Author/RM)

Discusses the audio and video-recorded longitudinal data from six infants with varying degrees of vision. The findings indicate that there are basic differences in early language, which appear to reflect differences in cognitive development. (SL)

This article discusses a study designed to determine the order of acquisition of the two expressions "in front of" and "behind," using two featureless objects. (CFM)

This article clarifies the position taken in the Greenfield and Smith book (1976), including relation to speech act theory, and elucidates some general theoretical issues in early language development. (Author/NCR)

Investigates the extent to which a representation of relative force can account for children's understanding of epistemic modals when their logical meaning is considered. Results confirm the influence of relative force and suggest that deductive inference is an early semantic component of modal terms. (29 references) (Author/CK)

Three investigations of preschool children's comprehension of "younger" and "older" are discussed. Results suggest children focus on height in their initial hypotheses about meanings of the terms, ignoring age or function cues. These and findings about acquisition of antonyms are discussed in terms of recent theorizing about lexical-meaning…

Children's understanding of the nature of polar terms and comparative terms between the polar opposites is discussed. (CHK)

Expands on study by Brown and Hanlon which showed that parents seemed more attuned to semantic value of their child's speech rather than grammatical form. However, this more recent study suggests that language learning environment presents subtle cues, distinguishing between well-formed and ill-formed sentences, evidenced by mothers' inclinations…

Investigates expression of part-whole semantic relation by children 3 to 12 years old and indicates that older children prefer its use significantly more often. The part-whole semantic relation was also observed to take several linguistic forms, such as partitive, spatial, and possessive. Age, experimental task format, or type of experimental…

Analyzes mother and child speech in free play conversation for different semantic and syntactic categories. Based on the study of changes taking place over time in children's use of semantic categories, argues against the hypothesis that the mother's speech is gradually adjusted to the child's performance. (Author/MES)

A case study of a native-English-speaking child's acquisition of Hebrew through immersion in daycare found that a period of silence was followed by a rapid onset of second-language production. Eight types of language awareness were identified, with conclusions drawn about their role as prerequisites for starting second-language production. (58…

This study of the acquisition of kinship terms in English is a test of the hypothesis that lexical items are learned in their order of complexity and of the validity of relational analysis in predicting the order of the acquisition of kinship terms. Earlier studies of kinship terms, Piaget's in particular, are first discussed, as well as the…