Expectancy-based localized attention has been shown to promote the formation and retrieval of multisensory memories in adults. Three experiments show that these processes also characterize attention and learning in 16- to 18-month old infants and, moreover, that these processes may play a critical role in supporting early object name learning. The…

In this article we present a neural network model of sentence generation. The network has both technical and conceptual innovations. Its main technical novelty is in its semantic representations: the messages which form the input to the network are structured as sequences, so that message elements are delivered to the network one at a time. Rather…

While content words (e.g., 'dog') tend to carry meaning, function words (e.g., 'the') mainly serve syntactic purposes. Here, we ask whether 17-month old infants can use one language-universal cue to identify function word candidates: their high frequency of occurrence. In Experiment 1, infants listened to a series of short, naturally recorded…

Perceptual grouping has traditionally been thought to be governed by innate, universal principles. However, recent work has found differences in Japanese and English speakers' non-linguistic perceptual grouping, implicating language in non-linguistic perceptual processes (Iversen, Patel, & Ohgushi, 2008). Two experiments test Japanese- and…

This study reports a shadowing experiment, in which one has to repeat a speech stimulus as fast as possible. We tested claims about a direct link between perception and production based on speech gestures, and obtained two types of counterevidence. First, shadowing is not slowed down by a gestural mismatch between stimulus and response. Second,…

Do 14- to 17-month-olds notice the paths and manners of motion events? English- and Spanish-learning infants were habituated to an animated motion event including a manner (e.g., spinning) and a path (e.g., over). They were then tested on four types of events that changed either the manner, the path, both, or neither component. Both English- and…

Fundamental questions in cognitive science concern the origins and nature of the units that compose visual experience. Here, we investigate the capacity to individuate and store information about non-solid portions, asking in particular whether free-ranging rhesus monkeys ("Macaca mulatta") quantify portions of a non-solid substance presented in…

Speakers are faster and more accurate at processing certain sound sequences within their language. Does this reflect the fact that these sequences are frequent or that they are phonetically less complex (e.g., easier to articulate)? It has been difficult to contrast these two factors given their high correlation in natural languages. In this…

Acoustic emphasis may convey a range of subtle discourse distinctions, yet little is known about how this complex ability develops in children. This paper presents a first investigation of the factors which influence the production of acoustic prominence in young children's spontaneous speech. In a production experiment, SVO sentences were…

The ability to automatically and implicitly detect complex and noisy regularities in the environment is a fundamental aspect of human cognition. Despite considerable interest in implicit processes, few researchers have conceptualized implicit learning as an ability with meaningful individual differences. Instead, various researchers (e.g., Reber,…

Human infants possess powerful learning mechanisms used for the acquisition of language. To what extent are these mechanisms domain specific? One well-known infant language learning mechanism is the ability to detect and generalize rule-like similarity patterns, such as ABA or ABB [Marcus, G. F., Vijayan, S., Rao, S. B., & Vishton, P. M. (1999).…

Recent studies reveal that naming has powerful conceptual consequences within the first year of life. Naming distinct objects with the same word highlights commonalities among the objects and promotes object categorization. In the present experiment, we pursued the origin of this link by examining the influence of words and tones on object…

In this study, participants performed a sentence-picture verification task in which they read sentences about an agent viewing an object (e.g., moose) through a differentially occlusive medium (e.g., clean vs. fogged goggles), and then verified whether a subsequently pictured object was mentioned in the previous sentence. Picture verification…

Cognitive processes are often attributed to statistical or symbolic general-purpose mechanisms. Here we show that some spontaneous generalizations are driven by specialized, highly constrained symbolic operations. We explore how two types of artificial grammars are acquired, one based on repetitions and the other on characteristic relations…

Describes the sequences of Geneva middle-class school children in a block balancing task. It attempts to pave the way towards understanding the general processes of cognitive behavior. Analysis focuses on the interplay between the child's action sequences and his implicit theories which the observer infers from the sequences rather than from his…