A new study from the University of East Anglia reveals why some young people learn words more slowly than others. A study investigates where children look when they learn new words. This suggests that children with larger vocabularies tend to look at objects more quickly when learning new words. Meanwhile, children who knew fewer words took longer to look back and forth between objects. The research team says their findings could help identify children with language development delays at an early stage.
Importantly, this means these children can be given support to build their best vocabulary before starting school. Dr Larissa Samuelson, lead researcher from UEA’s School of Psychology, said: “At around the age of two, children start to become sharper at deciding what a new word means. We think this is because children Many of the first words learned are names for sets of things that are similar in shape — balls are round, cups are cup-shaped.”
“Children learn that if you hear a new word, other objects with a similar shape can be called by that name. This helps them learn new words quickly because they know what a new word means right away.” goes,” she said.
ALSO READ: Omicron XBB.1.16 COVID-19 increasing risk of conjunctivitis in infants: Study
“But there may be a difference in how children who struggle with language learn new words and understand what new words mean. We wanted to better understand the phenomenon that is associated with early word development,” Samuelson said. How it can help with learning. The research team studied how 66 children aged between 17 and 31 months learned new words in a simple game.
He showed the children new items made of clay, plaster, styrofoam, yarn and plastic netting. After this, the researchers gave the children the names of the new objects and asked them what other names could be given by this name.
Crucially, the team filmed where the children were watching throughout the act. They were then able to see where the children were looking before and after they were presented with a new object.
“We know that when adults and children hear a word they know, they look for things in the world that match the words they hear. We wanted to see if this depending on how many words you know,” Dr. Samuelsson said. So the researchers also asked the parents how many words their children could speak.
Dr Samuelson said: “We found that children who could speak more words quickly looked at objects that were the same size as the named object. Children who knew fewer words were more likely to move back and forth between objects Used to watch and take more time.”
Other research has shown that children with developmental language disorders do not pay the same attention to learning new words as children with normal language development.
“At the moment you can’t diagnose children with a developmental language disorder until they are three or four years old. But we hope that our findings can help determine which children are at the first stage children at risk of language delay so that they can be better supported. Our research has previously shown that we can promote word learning in children by helping them learn what to do when they hear a new word. Should pay attention.”
“If we can find out which children need this support first, we can help them build their vocabulary at their best and be ready to enter school with language skills.” The research was led by the University of East Anglia, in collaboration with Augustana. College, Illinois (US), and Durham University.