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ERIC Number: EJ1299122
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2021
Pages: 10
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1524-8372
EISSN: N/A
Available Date: N/A
Providing Support for 'Support': Parents' Use of Verbs and Prepositions When Describing Support Configurations to Their Children
Lakusta, Laura; Wodzinski, Alaina; Landau, Barbara
Journal of Cognition and Development, v22 n3 p491-500 2021
Support (one object preventing another from falling) is linguistically encoded by adults and children in a highly structured and differentiated way, with basic locative expressions or Light verbs (e.g., in English, the block is "on/put" on the box) encoding Support-from-Below, and lexical verbs (e.g., she "stuck" the block on the box) encoding Mechanical Support. We ask whether parents use such highly differentiated language when describing support configurations to their young children and whether the age of the child moderates this effect. We found that when parents of children 6-months to 3.5 years of age described events of Support-from-Below and Mechanical Support to their children, they did use distinct linguistic expressions, encoding Support-from-Below with Light verbs (e.g., "put on") and Mechanical Support with other lexical verbs (e.g., "stick on/to"). This differentiation was especially prominent for parents of the oldest children, who used more lexical verbs ("stick"), and fewer Light verbs ("put"), to encode Mechanical Support. These findings are the first to demonstrate that parents' spatial language to their young children distinguishes between two distinct types of support and suggest that parent input may play an important role in helping children learn to linguistically carve up the semantic domain of support. This sets the stage for future research to test the causal connection between the two.
Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 530 Walnut Street Suite 850, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Tel: 215-625-8900; Fax: 215-207-0050; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: National Science Foundation (NSF)
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: 1650861
Author Affiliations: N/A