ERIC Number: EJ1315033
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2021-Dec
Pages: 15
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0142-7237
EISSN: N/A
The Effect of Phonological Complexity on the Order in Which Words Are Acquired in Early Childhood
Gendler-Shalev, Hila; Ben-David, Avivit; Novogrodsky, Rama
First Language, v41 n6 p779-793 Dec 2021
During the second year of life, children acquire words and expand their receptive and expressive vocabularies at a rapid pace. At this age, toddlers' phonological abilities are also developing rapidly. The current study investigated the effect of phonological complexity of words on the order in which they are acquired, receptively and expressively. Data were collected from Hebrew-speaking parents of 881 typically developing toddlers: 417 girls and 464 boys, aged 1;0 to 2;0 years old. Parents reported on their child's receptive and expressive vocabularies by completing a computerized version of the Hebrew adaptation of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories. Phonological complexity scores of the target words were calculated using the Phonological Mean Length of Utterances measure. The proportion of children who were reported to understand and produce each word at each age was calculated. Results showed that phonological complexity affected the acquisition of word comprehension and word production. Words that are less phonologically complex were acquired earlier, representing a process of subconscious selection of words that are easier to produce.
Descriptors: Phonology, Difficulty Level, Toddlers, Semitic Languages, Language Acquisition, Receptive Language, Expressive Language, Parents, Comprehension, Vocabulary
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Assessments and Surveys: MacArthur Communicative Development Inventory; Mean Length of Utterance
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A