Child-directed speech has long been known to influence children's vocabulary learning. However, while we know that caregiver utterances differ from those directed at adults in various ways, little is known about any differences in the lexical properties of child-directed and adult-directed utterances. We compare over half a million word tokens…

Toddlers with smaller vocabulary than expected for their age are considered late talkers (LT). This study explored the effects of characteristics of words on vocabulary acquisition of 12- to 24-month-old LT children compared with an age matched (AM) and a vocabulary matched (VM) group of typically developing peers. Using the…

The Mayan language Mam uses complex predicates to express events. Complex predicates map multiple semantic elements onto a single word, and consequently have a blend of lexical and phrasal features. The chameleon-like nature of complex predicates provides a window on children's ability to express phrasal combinations at the one-word stage of…

While it is established that parental "wh"-questions, as a high-quality language input, are associated with child language outcome, less is known about the role of children's "wh"-questions in their language development. This study examines whether children's "wh"-questions during a dinnertime conversation are…

In this corpus study, it is asked whether young children speaking European French build their early syntax around grammatical or lexical words. Specifically, the study examines the relationship of grammatical and lexical words in three types of syntactic structures (determiner--noun, pronoun--verb and subject pronoun--verb). The corpus included…

Ambridge argues that there is widespread agreement among child language researchers that learners store linguistic abstractions. In this commentary the authors first argue that this assumption is incorrect; anti-representationalist/exemplar views are pervasive in theories of child language. Next, the authors outline what has been learned from this…

Individuals with sex chromosome trisomies (SCTs) have an increased risk of language delays and impairments. However, there are only a few data relative to their language development in early childhood. The present study aimed to investigate the preverbal skills shown by a group of 8-month-old children with SCTs to assess the presence of a possible…

The growth rate and the composition of expressive lexicon was studied in a sample of 903 infants between the age of 0;8 and 1;4 whose parents completed the Estonian adaptation of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory-Words and Gestures. As expected, older children had on average larger vocabularies compared to younger children.…

Research on immediate effects of background television during mother-infant toy play shows that an operating television in the room disrupts maternal communicative behaviors crucial for infants' vocabulary acquisition. This study is the first to examine associations between frequent background TV/video exposure during mother-infant toy play at…

Investigations of early vocabulary production often employ a single method to measure children's word use. This study examined expressive vocabulary development in children aged 1;0-2;6 years through a combination of picture naming, caregiver report and language sampling. The participants were predominantly exposed to Maltese at home, with…

The MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory (short form) was adapted for Samoan and Tongan speakers in New Zealand. The adaptation process drew upon language samples from Samoan and Tongan parent-child dyads with 20- and 26-month-old children and adult informants. The resulting 100-word language inventories in Samoan and Tongan, plus a…