Children acquiring Japanese differ from those acquiring English with regard to the rate at which verbs are learned (Fernald & Morikawa, 1993). One possible explanation is that Japanese caregivers use verbs in referentially transparent contexts, which facilitate the form-meaning link. We examined this hypothesis by assessing differences in verb…

For the past 25 years, researchers have investigated language input to children from high- and low-socioeconomic status (SES) families. Hart and Risley first reported a "30 Million Word Gap" between high-SES and low-SES children. More recent studies have challenged the size or even existence of this gap. The present study is a…

This article discusses research into the role of audio-visual input for second language (L2) or foreign language learning. It also addresses questions related to the effectiveness of audio-visual input with different types of on-screen text such as subtitles (i.e., in learners' first language) and captions (i.e., subtitles in the same language as…

Spoken language outcomes after cochlear implantation are highly variable. Some variance can be attributed to individual characteristics. Research with typically hearing children suggests that the amount of language directed to children may also play a role. However, several moderating factors may complicate the association between language input…

We select three word segmentation models with psycholinguistic foundations -- transitional probabilities, the diphone-based segmenter, and PUDDLE -- which track phoneme co-occurrence and positional frequencies in input strings, and in the case of PUDDLE build lexical and diphone inventories. The models are evaluated on caregiver utterances in 132…

There is a well-documented link between bilingual language development and the relative amounts of exposure to each language. Less is known about the role of quality indicators of caregiver-child interactions in bilingual homes, including caregiver input diversity, warmth and sensitivity. This longitudinal study examines the relation between…

Research on input processing and processing instruction has often employed a scoring method known as trials to criterion to observe the effects of instruction that emerge during training. Despite its common use in this research (see Fernández, 2021) this metric has never been evaluated critically. The present study first discusses several…

Debate around inflectional morphology in language acquisition has contrasted various rule- versus analogy-based approaches. This paper tests the rule-based Tolerance Principle (TP) against a new type of pattern in the acquisition of the possessive suffix -im in Northern East Cree. When possessed, each noun type either requires or disallows the…

We provide an account of the developmental trajectory of Emirati Arabic negation particles. We treat the non-verbal predicate negator (NVPN) "mub" as a negative copula, in contrast to the verbal predicate negator (VPN) "maa," which encodes sentential negation in verbal and existential contexts. The analysis is supported by…

Based on theories on vocabulary knowledge, grammar knowledge, and reading comprehension subcomponents, ten attributes/subskills were defined for 50 items from relevant subtests of TEM4 (Band Four of Test for English Majors in China). Cognitive diagnosis was conducted on the TEM4 data of the randomly sampled 2285 examinees (roughly at the B2 level)…

Cross-situational word learning, the ability to decipher word-referent links over multiple ambiguous learning events, has been documented across development and proposed to be key to vocabulary acquisition. However, this work has largely focused on learning from one-to-one structure, where each referent is consistently linked with a single label.…

Autonomous learning strategies, supported by diverse media, have become essential tools for enhancing vocabulary acquisition. Among these, TED Talks stand out due to their accessibility, topical diversity, and authentic linguistic input. Although previous research has highlighted the educational value of TED Talks, limited attention has been given…

Effective English for Specific Purposes (ESP) training depends on coursebooks for relevant and genuine vocabulary. Corpus-based analysis is a reliable empirical technique for lexical evaluation in ESP coursebook assessment, as shown in this research. Thus, this quantitative corpus-based research focused on (1) the most common general English…

This article presents a series of three experiments investigating the processing of nested epistemic expressions, utterances containing two epistemic modals in one clause, such as "he 'certainly may' have forgotten." While some linguists claim that in a nested epistemic expression one modal is semantically embedded within the scope of…

Despite the fact that in most communities interaction occurs between the child and multiple speakers, most previous research on input to children focused on input from mothers. We annotated recordings of Sesotho-learning toddlers living in non-industrial Lesotho in South Africa, and French-learning toddlers living in urban regions in France. We…