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Mutual exclusivity and phonological novelty constrain word learning at 16 months*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 November 2010

EMILY MATHER  and
KIM PLUNKETT
EMILY MATHER*
Affiliation:
Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford
KIM PLUNKETT
Affiliation:
Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford
*
Address for correspondence: Emily Mather, Department of Experimental Psychology, South Parks Road, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK. OX1 3UD. tel: +44(0)1865 271522; e-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

Studies report that infants as young as 1 ; 3 to 1 ; 5 will seek out a novel object in response to hearing a novel label (e.g. Halberda, 2003; Markman, Wasow & Hansen, 2003). This behaviour is commonly known as the ‘mutual exclusivity’ response (Markman, 1989; 1990). However, evidence for mutual exclusivity does not imply that the infant has associated a novel label with a novel object. We used an intermodal preferential looking task to investigate whether infants aged 1 ; 4 could use mutual exclusivity to guide their association of novel labels with novel objects. The results show that infants can successfully map a novel label onto a novel object, provided that the novel label has no familiar phonological neighbours. Therefore, as early as 1 ; 4, infants can use mutual exclusivity to form novel word–object associations, although this process is constrained by the phonological novelty of a label.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 38 , Issue 5 , November 2011 , pp. 933 - 950
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2010

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Footnotes

[*]

This research was supported by a Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council grant (BBE0074061). We thank Lucy Holdstock, Rosie Minnigin and Emily Ruzich for their assistance, and all the parents and infants who made this research possible.

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