One of the most striking features of human communication is our ability to use words in flexible and creative ways: We often use the same word to mean multiple different things. For instance, we hammer using a hammer, and drink from glasses that are made of glass. These flexible uses of words provide expressive power, but seem likely to be difficult for children to learn. Hearing the same word used in multiple ways may lead to confusion and slow down the learning process. Surprisingly, recent research suggests that flexible uses of words do not impede children from learning words, but actually appear to facilitate the process. The goal of the current project is to understand how children master flexible language so easily by studying children in structured study environments and by observing how parents and children use these words in their everyday lives.
This project will involve both tightly controlled experimental approaches and annotation and analysis of transcripts of parent-child speech. First, the project will explore how children are exposed to flexibility in their conversations with parents, and how this might vary across different languages. Second, the project will assess how children between 2- and 4-years old manage to learn the different meanings of flexible words, while at the same time keeping these meanings distinct in their heads. Investigators Srinivasan and Rabagliati will also conduct experiments to explore how children learn to use flexible words in creative ways that they could not have heard before. The final series of studies will examine what the consequences of flexibility are for children's cognitive development more generally. In particular, studies will explore whether the ways that flexible words are used in a language can teach children about the world more generally. This project is being funded jointly through a partnership between the National Science Foundation and the Research Councils of the United Kingdom.
