Semantic Analyzability in Children’s Understanding of Idioms

Abstract

This study investigated the role of semantic analyzability in children’s understanding of idioms. Kindergartners and first, third, and fourth graders listened to idiomatic expressions either alone or at the end of short story contexts. Their task was to explain verbally the intended meanings of these phrases and then to choose their correct idiomatic interpretations. The idioms presented to the children differed in their degree of analyzability. Some idioms were highly analyzable or decomposable, with the meanings of their parts contributing independently to their overall figurative meanings. Other idioms were nondecomposable because it was difficult to see any relation between a phrase’s individual components and the idiom’s figurative meaning. The results showed that younger children (kindergartners and first graders) understood decomposable idioms better than they did nondecomposable phrases. Older children (third and fourth graders) understood both kinds of idioms equally well in supporting contexts, but were better at interpreting decomposable idioms than they were at understanding nondecomposable idioms without contextual information. These findings demonstrate that young children better understand idiomatic phrases whose individual parts independently contribute to their overall figurative meanings.

To Get Hold of the Wrong End of the Stick: Reasons for Poor Idiom Understanding in Children With Reading Comprehension Difficulties

“…In the example used above, 'wrong' provides a clue to the figurative meaning. Idioms that have a strong overlap between their literal and figurative meanings are generally easier to understand than those that do not (Gibbs, 1991;Nippold & Rudzinski, 1993;Nippold & Taylor, 1995). These idioms are commonly referred to as transparent and opaque, respectively.…”

Compreensão de expressões idiomáticas em período de aquisição da linguagem

“…Alguns autores, no entanto, trazem evidências de que a criança compreende a linguagem figurada em um período um pouco anterior àquele indicado por Levorato e Cacciari (1995 Gibbs (1991). O experimento de Gibbs já indicava que mesmo crianças pequenas, alunos da educação infantil e do primeiro ano, entendem com maior facilidade EI decomponíveis, que analisaram o significado parte a parte para determinadas expressões fazerem sentido.…”

“…Segundo Gibbs (1991), é possível que as crianças aprendam EI através da análise das partes constituintes da expressão (composicionalmente), mas também é possível que façam conexões entre mapeamentos metafóricos e o significado figurado. Nesse sentido, é razoável supor que mapeamentos altamente convencionais (tal como entre os domínios VIDA e JOGO DE FUTEBOL) podem facilitar a compreensão de expressões derivadas desses mapeamentos.…”

La Comprensión Oralde Las Frases Hechas: Un Fenómeno De Desarrollo Tardío Del Lenguaje

“…A pesar de esto, resultó más fácil que la locución un sintagma menor que opera en un contexto oracional mayor que lo contiene. Pareciera ser que el grado de dificultad de una frase hecha metafórica no está totalmente relacionado con su estructura, sino que obedece a otros factores como la familiaridad, a su nivel de analizabilidad sintáctica (Gibbs, 1991) y a la mayor opacidad o transparencia semántica de la misma . Sin embargo, la definición de conceptos como analizabilidad sintáctica y transparencia u opacidad semántica son todavía objeto de discusión y debate (Horn, 2003).…”