There are many postulates of a relation between quality of attachment with theory of mind and language functions (e.g., de Rosnay & Hughes, 2006). The current study examined in longitudinal design how different patterns of attachment are associated with usage of internal state language at ages 17, 23, 30 and 36 months. Transcripts of mother-child…

Preschoolers' performance on two tasks demonstrated that, given a perceptually available set of dolls, they were able to use number words to determine the quantity of a hidden or nonexistent set of items that was in a known ratio to the available set. (MM)

In a study of event knowledge, 13 2-year-olds were observed interacting with their mothers over a 5-month period. Results indicated that children's increasing event knowledge facilitated their language development (e.g., lexical type use, action verb use) and their lexical token use. (Contains 33 references.) (Author/LB)

Describes a study in which children are asked to choose the most probable or permissible of two modal propositions, a technique which assesses the children's appreciation of relative force. Results indicate that the general acquisition rule was: the greater the difference in the strength of the two modal propositions, the earlier the difference…

This study investigates the onset at periodic intervals in the age range of about two to five years of various kinds of recurrent and systematic errors in word choice and/or syntactic structure. Acquisitional processes and their implications are outlined. Sections address: (1) the kinds of processes that can be inferred to underlie errors…

Previous research has shown a similar starting time for early combinations of words and play actions in children and has suggested that similar cognitive processes underlie the transition to combining activities in language, symbolic play, and manipulative play. A study was undertaken to investigate combining activities in these three domains and…

Reports on a study of mothers' uses of nouns and pronouns and their references to objects and persons as environmental variables which might relate to children's nominal preferences. Findings suggest that environmental factors do contribute to stylistic differences in language acquisition and that the communicative functions of language are an…

This volume deals with various aspects of the relationship between linguistic ability and general cognitive development. It presents original, up-to-date research for child psychologists, linguists, psycholinguists, scholars, teachers, and students interested in this field and interprets the findings in the context of contemporary linguistic…

Critically examines papers by Wellman and Estes, Olson and Torrance, and Hall and Nagy. (AEW)

This study examined the development of causal expressions in children's discourse from two to three years of age. Linguistic, contextual, and pragmatic influences on language development were the major factors considered. (CM)

This paper describes part of a larger study dealing with syntax and semantics of the child's early speech about motion and location. It suggests that goal, defined as the point at which a motion ends and a resulting locative state begins, is the organizing principle for the semantics of motion and location. The data presented here are from two…

The present study investigates the performance of 96 Cantonese-speaking three- to five-year-old preschoolers on three false belief tasks--a deceptive object, a change of location, and an unexpected contents task encompassing a variety of task factors. Most importantly, the research examines the possibility that false belief performance depends on…

Question-answer interactions were chosen as an effective means of investigating the effect of the linguistic environment on language development. Research was reviewed indicating that the improvement in question and answer performance of a maturing child is based on the advancement of both his linguistic and cognitive abilities and that the adult…

Factor analysis accounts for most of the variance in adult ratings of concepts with adjectives. Affective reactions are present in young infants, but still to be explored is how the stable adult factor structure develops from these reactions. Three questions are investigated in this study: (1) is this factor structure present in 3- and…

To determine the relationship between oral and written language conventions at the macro and micro levels, a study analyzed various elements of stories generated by children. Subjects, nine above average readers between grades 4 and 9, were asked to tell a story and then to write a story. Sources of stories, overall plot organization, and number…