Much research has demonstrated a shape bias in categorizing and naming solid objects. This research has shown that when an entity is conceptualized as an individual object, adults and children attend to the object's shape. Separate research in the domain of numerical cognition suggest that there are distinct processes for quantifying small and…

Two experiments examined toddlers' noun vocabularies and interpretations of names for solid and non-solid items. Results indicated that one side of the solidity-syntax-category organization mapping was favored. Seventeen- to 33-month olds do not systematically generalize names for solid things by shape similarity until they already know many…