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Communicative Function in Child Directed Speech: A Cross-Cultural Analysis
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Chen Zhao; Ludovica Serratrice; Elena Lieven; Circle Steele; Nivedita Malik; Yi An; Emily Hayden; Jo Neumegen; Thea Cameron-Faulkner – First Language, 2024
Language development can be framed as the process of learning how to mean (Halliday, 1975). From this perspective, the role of communicative function is central to the language-learning process with development being guided by interaction with experienced others. In the current study, we present a detailed analysis of the communicative functions…
Descriptors: Infants, Language Acquisition, Child Development, Socialization
Text Complexity and Variety Factors in Narrative Retelling and Narrative Comprehension among Arabic-Speaking Preschool Children
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Khaloob Kawar; Elinor Saiegh-Haddad; Sharon Armon-Lotem – First Language, 2023
The current study investigates narrative retelling and comprehension among 30 native Arabic-speaking preschool children with a mean age of 5:10. Narrative features of text-complexity (less-complex and more-complex episodic structure) and language variety (Spoken Palestinian Arabic [PA] and Modern Standard Arabic [MSA]) were analyzed for their…
Descriptors: Story Telling, Preschool Children, Arabic, Language Variation
Development of Sensitivity to Beat Gesture and Contrastive Accenting in Support of Word Learning in Early Childhood in Boys and Girls
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Morett, Laura M.; Nelson, Cailee M.; Hughes-Berheim, Sarah S.; Scofield, Jason – First Language, 2023
This research investigated whether observing beat gesture and hearing contrastive accenting with novel words enhances their learning in early childhood and whether these effects differ by sex in light of sex differences in the pace of language development. Fifty-three 3- to 5-year-old boys and girls learned pairs of novel words with contrasting…
Descriptors: Language Acquisition, Gender Differences, Pronunciation, Language Variation
Children's Emerging Ability to Discriminate L1-Varieties
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Kaiser, Irmtraud; Kasberger, Gudrun – First Language, 2018
Children in Austria are exposed to a large amount of variation within the German language. Most children grow up with a local dialect, German standard language and 'intermediate' varieties summarized as 'Umgangssprache'. Using an ABX design, this study analyses when Austrian children are able to discriminate native varieties of their L1 German…
Descriptors: Native Language, Language Acquisition, Language Variation, Auditory Perception
The Importance of Flexibility of Pronunciation in Learning to Decode: A Training Study in Set for Variability
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Zipke, Marcy – First Language, 2016
The ability to flexibly approach the pronunciation of unknown words, or set "for variability", has been shown to contribute to word recognition skills. However, this is the first study that has attempted to teach students strategies for increasing their set for variability. Beginning readers (N = 15) were instructed to correct oral…
Descriptors: Pronunciation, Control Groups, Spelling, Word Recognition
Specific Linguistic Profiles in a Creole-Speaking Area: Children's Speech on Reunion Island
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Lebon-Eyquem, Mylène – First Language, 2015
Linguists use the concept of "diglossia" to describe any sociolinguistic situation where a low-prestige dialect coexists with a high-prestige one and these dialects are used in different social spheres. Recent observations on Reunion Island have challenged this view because people mix French and Creole extensively in the same utterance…
Descriptors: Surveys, Creoles, Dialects, Profiles