The role of language in memory for actions

Languages differ with respect to how aspects of motion events tend to be lexicalized. English typically conflates MOTION with MANNER, but Japanese and Spanish typically do not. We report a set of experiments that assessed the effect of this cross-linguistic difference on participants' decisions in a similarity-judgment task about scenes containing novel animations as stimuli. In Experiment 1, which required participants to encode the stimuli briefly into memory, we observed a language effect; in Experiment 2, which required participants to analyze the same stimuli, but not remember them, the language effect disappeared. Hence, these experiments reveal a task-dependent effect, which, we argue, points to working memory as the source of the language effect observed in Experiment 1 and, potentially, other experiments that have shown a linguistic relativity effect.     

The role of functional information for infant categorization

This report examines whether knowledge about function influences the formation of artifact categories in 11-12- month old infants. Using an object-examination task, a set of artificial stimuli was presented that could either be grouped according to overall similarity or according to similarity in one functionally relevant part. Experiment 1 revealed that infants categorized the objects according to overall similarity but not part similarity under control conditions. Experiment 2 showed that after having seen the experimenter demonstrating the functional use of the critical part, infants later categorized the stimuli according to part similarity. When the same actions were performed without producing any effect, infants failed to categorize according to the critical part. This set of findings suggests that 11-12-month old infants use functional information as a cue to categorization.     

Incidental teaching of language in the preschool

"Incidental teaching" denotes a process whereby language skills of labelling and describing are learned in naturally occurring adult-child interactions. In the present study, 15-min daily samples of the spontaneous speech of 11 children were recorded during free play over eight months of preschool. After incidental teaching of compound sentences, increases in unprompted use of compound sentences were seen for all the children, first directed to teachers, and then to children, in accordance with who attended to the children's requests for play materials. The incidental teaching procedure also stimulated spontaneous variety in speech, and appears to have general applicability to child learning settings.     

Emergent verbal behavior in preschool children learning a second language

We evaluated the emergence of untaught second‐language skills following directly taught listener and intraverbal responses. Three preschool children were taught first‐language (English) listener responses (e.g., “Point to the horse”) and second‐language (Welsh) intraverbal responses (e.g., “What is horse in Welsh?” [ceffyl]). After intervention, increases in untaught second‐language tacts (e.g., “What is this in Welsh?” [ceffyl]) and listener responses (e.g., “Point to the ceffyl”) were observed for all 3 participants.     

Supporting early oral language skills for English language learners in inner city preschool provision

Background. A significant number of children now enter formal education in England with reduced levels of proficiency in oral language. Children who come from disadvantaged backgrounds and who are English language learners (ELL) are at risk of limited oral language skills in English which impacts on later educational achievement. Aims. This paper reports the development of a theoretically motivated oral language intervention, Talking Time, designed to meet the needs of preschool children with poor language skills in typical preschool provision. Sample. One hundred and forty‐two 4‐year‐old children attending three inner city preschools in a disadvantaged area of London, England. Method. This is a quasi‐experimental intervention study comparing children exposed to Talking Time with children exposed to a contrast intervention and children receiving the statutory early years curriculum. Measures were taken of both targeted and non‐targeted language and cognitive skills. Results. Data were analysed for the ELL. The intervention had a significant effect on vocabulary, oral comprehension, and sentence repetition but not narrative skills. As predicted, there were no effects on the skills which were not targeted. Conclusions. Regular evidence‐based oral language interactions can make significant improvements in children's oral language. There is a need to examine the efficacy of more intensive interventions to raise language skills to allow learners to access the curriculum.     

A method for eliciting scale errors in preschool classrooms

Six preschool classrooms, containing children between the ages of 4.0 and 40.0 months, were seeded with miniature items to examine how easily scale errors could be elicited. Observations occurred over a period of 3 months, with a total of 280 min of observations per classroom. A concealed observer documented all interactions with the miniature items. A total of 93 scale errors occurred, with a higher frequency committed by the younger children. These results confirm findings from previous research and suggest that scale errors can be effectively elicited in a preschool classroom. Our approach may provide a useful method for systematically studying the factors that influence scale errors.     

The infant and preschool psychiatry clinic: A model of evaluation and treatment

The Infant and Preschool Psychiatry Clinic is an outpatient, subspecialty clinic that serves young children with significant emotional and behavioral problems, in addition to disorders of learning and language. The clinic provides for the psychiatric needs of young children, birth to 5 years of age, and their families. The mission of the clinic is to (1) provide comprehensive diagnostic evaluation, treatment, and advocacy services by an interdisciplinary team; (2) use systematic data collection for empirical research; and (3) provide training in infant psychiatry. The clinic's evaluation process and wide-ranging treatment services are described in detail, along with two clinical case examples that help to illustrate the integration of varied services. Additionally, a critique of the clinic's strengths and weaknesses is presented. © 1997 Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health     

The language environment of the young infant: implications for early perceptual development

The purpose of this article is to review recent research on the young infant's use of voice-specific as well as voice-nonspecific auditory information during early language processing, to suggest a possible mechanism that biases the young infant towards this information, and to discuss potential implications of the early saliency of this information for later language development. Auditory preferences expressed by young infants are of interest because they demonstrate which properties of complex auditory events are effective in capturing the infant's attention. Moreover, the presence of such auditory preferences has led to speculations about their possible origins in both pre- and postnatal auditory experience. Research examining the role of early auditory experience in the formation of preferences is presented, along with a discussion of how the constrained nature of early auditory experience (particularly prenatal) may bias the young infant towards specific features of maternal as well as nonmaternal speech.     

The function of language in parent‐infant psychotherapy

Parent‐infant psychotherapy, a rather new field in psychoanalysis, raises questions of how to conceptualize the clinical process. Previous publications have used semiotic concepts to account for the therapist's non‐verbal communication and investigated the countertransference, including what the baby might grasp of its variations. The present paper focuses on another argument for using verbal interventions to a baby in therapy; they present him with a symbolic order that differs from that of the parent. The qualitative difference between the parent's and the analyst's address is conceptualized by Dolto's term parler vrai. The therapeutic leverage is not the analytic interventions' lexical content but their message that words can be used to expose conflicts. Thereby, one can transform warded‐off desires into demands that can be negotiated with one's objects. The reasons why this address catches the baby's attention are discussed. A prerequisite for such attention is that the infant brain is prewired for perceiving words as a special communicative mode. Relevant neuroscientific research is reviewed in regard to this question. The presentation relies on concepts by Dolto, Lacan and Winnicott and findings from neuroscience and developmental psychology. It also briefly discusses Chomsky's linguistic concepts in relation to these therapies.     

The role of television in language acquisition

The conventional view among developmental psychologists is that television viewing does not contribute to a young viewer's language acquisition. That assumption is challenged. Evidence is presented that suggests that children can learn about language as they view television: (1) From age 2, children attend to television and view in an active, purposeful manner. (2) Some programs present dialogue in an attention-getting, content-redundant context. (3) Children can learn word meanings when viewing. (4) Children draw upon television as a source of verbal routines for their own play interactions.     

The role of social and material reinforcers in increasing talking of a disadvantaged preschool child

Adult social reinforcement and access to materials in the preschool were made contingent on the verbalizations of a 4-yr-old Negro girl with an extremely low frequency of talking. Though the teachers' social attention was always given immediately for all spontaneous speech, if the child's spontaneous verbalizations were requests for materials, those materials were withheld until she had responded to the teachers' questions about those materials. When she was silent, the teachers withheld their attention and the materials. A high frequency of verbal behavior was quickly established. When both teacher attention and materials were provided only when the child was not verbalizing, the child's frequency of talking immediately decreased. When social attention and materials were again made contingent upon spontaneous speech and answering questions, the child's frequency of talking quickly increased to its previous high level. The content of the child's verbal behavior which increased was primarily a repetition of requests to the teachers with little change noted in the non-request verbalizations, or verbalizations to other children. A further experimental analysis demonstrated that social interaction per se was not the reinforcer which maintained the increased verbalization; rather, for this child, the material reinforcers which accompanied the social interaction appeared to be the effective components of teacher attention.     

The assessment of gender role stress for Chinese

The present study aimed to extend the generality of the construct of gender role stress (GRS) to Chinese samples. Specific objectives included (1) devising Chinese versions of the Masculine Gender Role Stress Scale (MGRS) and Feminine Gender Role Stress Scale (FGRS) developed by Eisler and his colleagues (2) examining the relationship between GRS and gender role orientation, and (3) evaluating the concurrent validity of GRS by correlating it with a measure of health adjustment. Fifty-one male and 58 female Chinese college students in Hong Kong participated in Study 1, which aimed to develop Chinese versions of the two GRS scales. Similar to Americans, Chinese male students scored higher on the MGRS scale, but lower on the FGRS scale than Chinese female students. Students' scores on the two GRS scales were independent from their global ratings of stereotypic masculinity and femininity. A second sample, consisting of 46 male and 73 female Chinese nurses, was recruited for Study 2, which evaluated the association between GRS and health adjustment. As hypothesized, a high level of MGRS or FGRS was positively related to a high level of health and mental health disturbances for both male and female nurses.This study was funded in part by the Asia Scholarship for Research on Women 1992/93 of the United Board for Christian Higher Education. The authors would like to thank Professor Richard M. Eisler for his permission to translate the MGRS and FGRS scales into Chinese, and the Association of Hong Kong Nurses for their assistance in data collection.     

Predictors of preschool language environments and their relations to children's vocabulary

Despite support for the importance of early language environments, little is known about the naturally occurring experiences children have in preschool settings. The current study sample included 91 children (M_age = 4.72 years; 56% male; 67% White) from 23 preschool classrooms and nearly 1500 h of language environment data from three waves throughout the preschool year. Of the sociodemographic characteristics, family income is most closely related to children's preschool language environments. A standard deviation increase in family income was related to children hearing approximately one million more adult words in their preschool classroom. However, conversational turns were the more robust predictor of vocabulary skills with effect sizes around 0.20, depending on model specification. Theoretical and policy implications of these findings are discussed.