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Related Experiment Videos

Learning words through overhearing.

N Akhtar1, J Jipson, M A Callanan

  • 1Psychology Department, University of California, Santa Cruz 95064, USA. nakhtar@cats.ucsc.edu

Child Development
|May 3, 2001
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

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Toddlers can learn new words by overhearing conversations, not just when spoken to directly. This research shows two-year-olds actively acquire vocabulary through listening to others.

Area of Science:

  • Developmental Psychology
  • Child Language Acquisition
  • Cognitive Science

Background:

  • Toddlers possess the cognitive ability to monitor conversations.
  • Previous research has primarily focused on direct address for vocabulary learning.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate if toddlers can acquire novel words from overheard speech.
  • To compare learning from overheard speech versus direct address in two-year-olds.

Main Methods:

  • Three studies involved 88 two-year-old children.
  • Participants learned novel object labels and action verbs.
  • Learning was assessed in both overheard and directly addressed conditions.

Main Results:

  • Two-year-olds (2 years, 6 months) learned novel words equally well from overheard and direct speech.

Related Experiment Videos

  • Younger toddlers (2 years, 1 month) learned object labels from overheard speech but verb acquisition was less clear.
  • Evidence supports toddlers' ability to learn vocabulary passively.

    • Conclusions:

    • Two-year-olds can acquire novel vocabulary from overheard speech.
    • Toddlers play an active role in their own vocabulary development by monitoring conversations.