Maternal gestures with 20‐month‐old infants in two contexts

O'Neill, Maria; Bard, Kim A.; Linnell, Maggie; Fluck, Michael

doi:10.1111/j.1467-7687.2005.00423.x

Cited by 89 publications

(92 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…Maternal gestures were examined with mothers of 20-month-old infants in both a free-play task and a count task (O'Neill, Bard, Linnell, & Fluck, 2005). Findings are consistent with past research in that mothers most often employed deictic gestures, with the most frequently used gesture being pointing.…”

supporting

confidence: 73%

Examining the role of social cues in early word learning

Briganti¹,

Cohen²

2011

Infant Behavior and Development

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Infant word learning has become a popular field of study over the past decade.Research during this time has shown that infants can learn, in a short period of time, to attach words to objects. Two experiments on the role of social cues in early word learning are reported using tightly controlled conditions. Fourteen-and 18-month-old infants were trained by viewing a video of an adult pointing and nodding towards one of two different novel objects appearing on a screen simultaneously, while novel labels were emitted through a speaker. Infants' looking times to each object were recorded both during training and test trials. Our analyses indicated that both 14-and 18-month-olds looked significantly longer at the object that the adult pointed to in the training trials.However, only 18-month-olds showed any evidence of looking longer at the target object during the test in the consistent condition than in the inconsistent (control) condition.These studies are important because they show, in a controlled laboratory study of infant word learning, that different types of social cues are available at different ages. Fourteenmonth-olds are aware of adult pointing and head turning and can follow those cues to an object during training. However, it isn't until 18 months of age that infants seem able to use those cues in the service of actual word learning. Infant word learning has become a popular field of study over the past decade.Research during this time has shown that infants as young as 14 months can learn, in a short period of time, to attach words to objects (e.g., Werker, Cohen, Lloyd, Casasola, and Stager, 1998;Shafer & Plunkett, 1998). By 18 months of age, infants are using a number of assumptions to aid them in the process of linking words to objects. Three of the assumptions infants use to organize their linguistic world are the "whole object" assumption, "mutual exclusivity," and the "taxonomic" assumption. According to the whole object assumption, early word learners will attach a new label to a whole object, rather than to a part of that object (Markman, 1990); mutual exclusivity is the assumption that a child will assign a novel label to an object that the child does not already have a label for, rather than to an object for which the child has a label (Markman & Wachtel, 1988). Lastly, the taxonomic assumption is the notion that children will extend a new label to objects of the same kind, rather than objects that are thematically related to the known object (Markman, 1990). Children use these constraints as a way of minimizing the number of possible meanings for a given word. As Quine (1960) has pointed out in his gavagai example, there is an indefinite number of possible interpretations for any one item given the presentation of a label and it's referent. In order for children to learn language, they must be able to pick out the correct interpretations for new words that they encounter when listening to others' speech.However, these cognitive constraints thought to be used by early word learners are not ...

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supporting

confidence: 73%

Examining the role of social cues in early word learning

Briganti¹,

Cohen²

2011

Infant Behavior and Development

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“…This is one instance of audience design (Clark & Carlson, 1982), in which utterances are constructed according to what others in the communicative exchange know and believe (Clark, 1996). Audience design has been reported in speech and actions in both naturalistic and experimental settings (Holler & Stevens, 2007;Jacobs & Garnham, 2007;O'Neill, Bard, Linnell, & Fluck, 2005;Ozyurek, 2002), but there is still considerable debate over when, how, and why it is used. An outstanding issue is whether audience design is structurally linked to initial attempts to communicate, or whether it is used parsimoniously to repair erroneous attempts.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In this study, we exploit the naturally occurring communicative adaptations observed when adult communicators direct their speech, gestures, and accompanying motions towards child addressees (Brand, Baldwin, & Ashburn, 2002;Brodsky, Waterfall, & Edelman, 2007;Grieser & Kuhl, 1988;O'Neill et al, 2005;Warren-Leubecker & Bohannon, 1984). To this end, we test whether the mere belief that one is communicating with either a child or an adult addressee is sufficient to induce communicative adaptations in adults.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Recipient design in tacit communication

et al. 2009

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a b s t r a c tThe ability to design tailored messages for specific listeners is an important aspect of human communication. The present study investigates whether a mere belief about an addressee's identity influences the generation and production of a communicative message in a novel, non-verbal communication task. Participants were made to believe they were playing a game with a child or an adult partner, while a confederate acted as both child and adult partners with matched performance and response times. The participants' belief influenced their behavior, spending longer when interacting with the presumed child addressee, but only during communicative portions of the game, i.e. using time as a tool to place emphasis on target information. This communicative adaptation attenuated with experience, and it was related to personality traits, namely Empathy and Need for Cognition measures. Overall, these findings indicate that novel nonverbal communicative interactions are selected according to a socio-centric perspective, and they are strongly influenced by participants' traits.

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“…For instance, adults tend to modify their speech, gestures, and accompanying body motions when addressing a child (Brand, Baldwin, & Ashburn, 2002;Brodsky, Waterfall, & Edelman, 2007;Grieser & Kuhl, 1988;O'Neill, et al, 2005;Warrenleubecker & Bohannon, 1984). Even the mere belief of interacting with a child leads us to produce more emphatic communicative actions ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…It has been repeatedly shown that our communicative actions are selected according to what we believe addressees of a communicative interaction know and believe [audience design, (Clark, 1996;Holler & Stevens, 2007;Jacobs & Garnham, 2007;O'Neill, Bard, Linnell, & Fluck, 2005)]. For instance, adults tend to modify their speech, gestures, and accompanying body motions when addressing a child (Brand, Baldwin, & Ashburn, 2002;Brodsky, Waterfall, & Edelman, 2007;Grieser & Kuhl, 1988;O'Neill, et al, 2005;Warrenleubecker & Bohannon, 1984).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%