Purpose: The goal of this study was to analyze verbal and nonverbal maternal response types following infant vocalizations in younger (ages 4-8 months) versus older (ages 10-14 months) infant groups and their potential implications for infant vocal development or word learning. Method: Maternal response types that occurred within 3 s of infant…

This response to Fleer, Adams & Gunstone builds upon "Transformative pedagogy: Dinka playgroups as spaces for cultural knowledge productions of Western science" by expanding conceptual understanding of the cultural practices of Dinka refugee children. Drawing upon both disciplinary literacy research and research into the role of play…

We suggest that prior to school entry, our earliest "teachers" and "learning settings" --that is, our parents, caregivers, and homes--provide signals about our environmental conditions. In turn, our brains may interpret this information as cues indicating the types of environments we will likely face and adapt accordingly. We…

Iconic and pointing gestures are important precursors of children's early language and cognitive development. While beat gestures seem to have positive effects on the recall of information by preschoolers, little is known about the potential beneficial effects of observing beat gestures on the development of children's narrative performance. We…

This study examines the nature of stop accuracy and substitute patterns of word-initial Japanese and Mandarin stops produced by Mandarin-Japanese bilingual children. The purpose of the study is to understand phonological development in bilinguals. The sample consists of 36 bilingual children between the ages of three and six, who simultaneously…

In a recent article published in this journal, Moscati and Crain (M&C) showcase the explanatory power of a learnability constraint called the Semantic Subset Principle (SSP) (Crain et al. 1994). If correct, M&C's argument would represent a compelling demonstration of the operation of an innate, domain specific, learning principle. However,…

The study asked whether Deaf mothers seek to exploit the iconicity in signed languages to facilitate their infants' word learning. Two longitudinal case studies followed modifications that 2 Deaf mothers applied to their input while interacting with their hearing infants. Both mothers were sensitive to the communicative abilities of their infants…

Associative word learning, i.e., associating a word with an object, is an important building block of early word learning for TD infants. This study investigated the development of word-I object associations by TD infants and infants and toddlers with Williams syndrome (WS), a rare genetic disorder associated with delayed language and cognitive…

Typically developing (TD) infants adapt to the social world in part by shifting the focus of their processing resources to the relevant aspects of a visual scene. Any impairment in visual orienting may therefore constrain learning and development in domains such as language. However, although something is known about visual orienting in infants at…

The initial application of evolutionary theory to the universal practice of music-making in humans was at best marginal and at worst dismissive of non-Western musics. Darwin's biography defines an agenda for musicality in the emergence of human culture that is receiving considerable attention in several disciplines, presenting a robust case for…

Mentalising has long been suggested to play an important role in irony interpretation. We hypothesised that another important cognitive underpinning of irony interpretation is likely to be children's capacity for mental set switching -- the ability to switch flexibly between different approaches to the same task. We experimentally manipulated…

This article reviews two aspects of human learning: (1) people draw inferences that appear to rely on hierarchical conceptual representations; (2) some categories are much easier to learn than others given the same number of exemplars, and some categories remain difficult despite extensive training. Both of these results are difficult to reconcile…

Humans are sensitive to the properties of individual items, and exemplar models are useful for capturing this sensitivity. I am a proponent of an extension of exemplar-based architectures that I briefly describe. However, exemplar models are very shallow architectures in which it is necessary to stipulate a set of primitive elements that make up…

The paper discussed in detail the process of language development and the process of language acquisition in early childhood. It also gave a brief overview of the theoretical frame of reference of language development. The paper included an in depth explanation of the importance and impact of overexposure for early second language acquisition and…

Global economic and societal shifts are causing movement from manufacturing economies to knowledge and information industries. As a result, learners must be equipped with the 21st century skills necessary for lifelong skill development and prosperity. Communication is identified as one of the essential 21st century skills for preparing students…