Production Is Only Half the Story - First Words in Two East African Languages.

ABSTRACT: Theories of early learning of nouns in children's vocabularies divide into those that emphasize input (language and non-linguistic aspects) and those that emphasize child conceptualisation. Most data though come from production alone, assuming that learning a word equals speaking it. Methodological issues can mean production and comprehension data within or across input languages are not comparable. Early vocabulary production and comprehension were examined in children hearing two Eastern Bantu languages whose grammatical features may encourage early verb knowledge. Parents of 208 infants aged 8-20 months were interviewed using Communicative Development Inventories that assess infants' first spoken and comprehended words. Raw totals, and proportions of chances to know a word, were compare

SUBMITTER: Alcock KJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5676187 | biostudies-literature | 2017

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature