The Signal in the Noise: The Visual Ecology of Parents' Object Naming

The uncertainty of reference has long been considered a key challenge for young word learners. Recent studies of head-camera wearing toddlers and their parents during object play have revealed that from toddlers' views the referents of parents' object naming are often visually quite clear. Although these studies have promising theoretical implications, they were all conducted in stripped-down laboratory contexts. The current study examines the visual referential clarity of parents' object naming during play in the home. Results revealed patterns of visual referential clarity that resembled previous laboratory studies. Furthermore, context analyses show that such clarity is largely a product of manual activity rather than the object-naming context. Implications for the mechanisms of early word learning are discussed.