Moving Beyond Size: Word Meanings Underlying Children's Productive Vocabulary

超越大小：儿童有效词汇的词义

• 批准号: 2318033
• 负责人: Haley Vlach
• 金额: $ 71.12万
• 依托单位: University of Wisconsin-Madison
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2023-08-15 至 2026-07-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2318033&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Moving; Beyond; Size; Word; Meanings

Language acquisition largely occurs during the first few years of life. A common measurement of children’s language development is their productive vocabulary size, which is highly predictive of later academic achievement, social-emotional functioning, economic prosperity, and more. However, why vocabulary size predicts life outcomes remains unclear. The proposed research advances science and understanding of children’s long-term health, prosperity and welfare by examining whether use of children’s word meanings predicts vocabulary growth. The investigators predict that vocabulary size is simply a coarse measurement of children’s word meanings, and that word meanings shape how children learn; that is, using one word meaning can help children to acquire new meanings for the same word, which in turn helps children learn more words and word meanings. The investigators create a database by collecting data from a large sample of parents, which report children’s use of word meanings over a 9-month period. This database is likely to lead to new insights into developmental trajectories of vocabulary use and growth, and thus afford myriad secondary data analyses and research opportunities for the field. The diverse group of student researchers working on this project receives interdisciplinary training on how to study children’s language development.Why children’s early vocabulary size predicts late life outcomes remains unclear. The investigators’ primary hypothesis is that word knowledge serves as the basis for inferences about words and word meanings (i.e., word knowledge serves as categorical inductive priors). That is, using one word meaning can help children to acquire new meanings for the same word, which in turn helps children learn more words and word meanings. To directly test their hypothesis, the investigators develop a new measure of vocabulary development that goes beyond productive vocabulary size, and measures factors including the meaning(s), activities, social partner(s), spatial location(s), and timing/frequency of children’s word production. In collaboration with other researchers in the field, the investigators have selected variables to measure children’s general language, cognitive, motor, social-emotional, and adaptive behavior, to provide a holistic assessment of children’s development in relation to their word meaning use. After refining and validating the measure, the PI and team create a database by collecting data from a large sample of parents, which report children’s use of word meanings over a 9-month period. The data are analyzed to determine whether the quantity and/or diversity of word meanings measured at Time 1 (a) predict later learning of words and word meanings at Time 2 and (b) predict developmental outcomes beyond language (measured during study and at Time 2) to a greater degree than vocabulary size.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

语言习得主要发生在生命的最初几年。衡量儿童语言发展的一个常见指标是他们的生产性词汇量，这是高度预测以后的学业成绩，社会情感功能，经济繁荣，等等。然而，为什么词汇量的大小预测生活结果仍然不清楚。这项拟议中的研究通过研究儿童词义的使用是否能预测词汇量的增长，推进了对儿童长期健康、繁荣和福利的科学和理解。研究人员预测，词汇量只是对儿童词义的粗略测量，词义塑造了儿童的学习方式;也就是说，使用一个词义可以帮助儿童获得同一个单词的新含义，这反过来又有助于儿童学习更多的单词和词义。研究人员通过从大量父母样本中收集数据创建了一个数据库，这些父母报告了孩子在9个月内使用单词含义的情况。这个数据库可能会导致新的见解词汇使用和增长的发展轨迹，从而提供无数的二手数据分析和研究的领域的机会。从事该项目的学生研究人员接受了关于如何研究儿童语言发展的跨学科培训。为什么儿童早期的词汇量预测了晚年的生活结果仍然不清楚。研究者的主要假设是，单词知识是推断单词和单词含义的基础（即，词知识充当分类归纳先验）。也就是说，使用一个单词的含义可以帮助孩子获得相同单词的新含义，这反过来又有助于孩子学习更多的单词和单词含义。为了直接验证他们的假设，研究人员开发了一种新的词汇发展衡量标准，超越了生产性词汇量，并衡量了包括意义，活动，社会伙伴，空间位置和儿童词汇生产的时间/频率等因素。与该领域的其他研究人员合作，研究人员选择了一些变量来测量儿童的一般语言，认知，运动，社会情感和适应行为，以提供儿童发展的整体评估。在改进和验证该措施后，PI和团队通过从大量父母样本中收集数据创建了一个数据库，这些父母报告了儿童在9个月内使用单词含义的情况。分析数据以确定在时间1测量的词义的数量和/或多样性是否（a）预测在时间2的单词和词义的后期学习和（B）预测语言以外的发展结果（研究期间和时间2测量）该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准。