An investigation of response associations to 100 structural and lexical words was conducted in such a way as to observe commonalities of responses to the words, effects of sex differences on the commonalities, and effects of word learnability on the commonalities. Subjects were 80 white urban disadvantaged children, all 5 years old, divided into four random groups. Each subject was required to respond to 25 words and responses were recorded on cards. Commonalities, representing about 25 percent of the responses, were classified as syntactic, paradigmatic, phonological, and indeterminate and were analyzed descriptively. Phonological commonalities were most common, monosyllables produced more common responses than did polysyllables, and syntactical commonalities seemed more common than did paradigmatic. It was suggested that greater attention be paid to syntactical development in children and to the inverse relationship between syntax and syllable length. The essentially idiosyncratic nature of the responses given (75 percent) implies that these children may have been making immature associations which could later produce reading difficulties. References are included. (MS)