“Whatdunit?” Developmental changes in children's syntactically based sentence interpretation abilities and sensitivity to word order

Abstract

Aim 1 of this study was to examine the developmental changes in typically developing English-speaking children's syntactically based sentence interpretation abilities and sensitivity to word order. Aim 2 was to determine the psychometric standing of the novel sentence interpretation task developed for this study, because we wish to use it later with children with specific language impairment. Children listened to semantically implausible sentences in which noun animacy and the natural affordance between the nouns were removed, thus controlling for event probability. Using this novel “whatdunit?” agent selection task, 256 children 7–11 years old listened to two structures with canonical word order and two with noncanonical word order. After each sentence, children selected as quickly as possible the picture of the noun they believed was “doing the action.” Children interpreted sentences with canonical word order with greater accuracy and speed than those with noncanonical word order. Older children (mean age = 10 years, 8 months) were more accurate and faster than younger children (mean age = 8 years, 1 month) across all sentence forms. Both older and younger children demonstrated similar error patterns across sentence type. The “whatdunit?” task also proved to have strong validity and reliability, making it suitable for studies with children with specific language impairment.

Syntactic Versus Memory Accounts of the Sentence Comprehension Deficits of Specific Language Impairment: Looking Back, Looking Ahead

“…Initial efforts should use sentences that are carefully controlled for semantic influences. For example, using semantically implausible, length-controlled sentences that violate typical predicate-argument expectations and natural affordances between NPs (The train that the knife had helped under the square was cold) would illuminate children's syntactic processing abilities (Montgomery, Evans, Gillam, Sergeev, & Finney, 2016). More important, such sentences would provide the strongest comparative test of the syntax-specific deficit account versus the memorybased account.…”

“Whatdunit?” Sentence Comprehension Abilities of Children With SLI: Sensitivity to Word Order in Canonical and Noncanonical Structures

“…The "Whatdunit" task has strong validity and reliability (Montgomery et al, 2016). On the basis of a large sample (N = 256) of 7-to 11-year-old TD children, internal construct validity of the canonical structures was .84 and .89 for the noncanonical structures.…”

“…To examine developmental changes in children's sentence comprehension, children in each group were divided into two age bands (Montgomery, Evans, Gillam, Sergeev, & Finney, 2016). The younger band had a mean age of 8:1 years (7:0-9:3), and the older had a mean age of 10:8 years (9:4-11:11).…”

“…The younger band had a mean age of 8:1 years (7:0-9:3), and the older had a mean age of 10:8 years (9:4-11:11). These age bands were motivated on the findings of Montgomery et al (2016), who observed age-related improvement in a large sample of TD children (N = 256) for the same sentences used here.…”

“…Children's comprehension of canonical (SVO, SR) and noncanonical (passive, OR) structures was assessed using our "Whatdunit" agent selection task (Montgomery et al, 2016).…”