Phonological and Semantic Overlap Between Words: Effects on Recognition of Familiar and Recently Acquired Words in Early Childhood

Avila Varela, Daniela Susana

The development of the early mental lexicon

dc.contributor.advisor	Mani, Nivedita Prof. Dr.
dc.contributor.advisor	Schacht, Annekathrin Prof. Dr.
dc.contributor.author	Avila Varela, Daniela Susana
dc.date.accessioned	2022-04-14T11:23:10Z
dc.date.available	2023-03-19T00:50:09Z
dc.date.issued	2022-04-14
dc.identifier.uri	http://resolver.sub.uni-goettingen.de/purl?ediss-11858/13990
dc.identifier.uri	http://dx.doi.org/10.53846/goediss-9161
dc.language.iso	eng	de
dc.rights.uri	http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
dc.subject.ddc	150	de
dc.title	Phonological and Semantic Overlap Between Words: Effects on Recognition of Familiar and Recently Acquired Words in Early Childhood	de
dc.title.alternative	The development of the early mental lexicon	de
dc.type	doctoralThesis	de
dc.date.examination	2022-03-21	de
dc.description.abstracteng	Classical research on word recognition describes how when adult participants are presented with pairs of words that share phonemes or belong to the same semantic category, the processing of the second word is facilitated provided the first word is related to the second. These observations have suggested that words in the mental lexicon are connected via phonological and semantic links. However, more recently, these association rules have been found to evolve in children during the early phases of language acquisition, at the time in which their language processing skills are being developed together with a fast growth of the child’s vocabulary. The present dissertation deals with the phenomena of facilitation and interference in word recognition due to phonological and semantic similarities during early childhood. It does so through three interrelated studies. In a longitudinal design, the first study investigated whether phonological and semantic priming would be better predicted either by the infants’ vocabulary size or by their age. The second study investigated the impact of joint phonological and semantic similarities on word recognition. While past studies had investigated both factors separately, Study II investigated the impact of both factors in combination. The third and last study dived into the question of how word recognition is affected by the similarities among the novel words to learn. Therefore, the mechanisms of facilitation/interference of word recognition due to phonological and semantic overlap was again investigated in young children, but under controlled learning experimental protocol; comparing the effects of word overlap on recently acquired words. Overall, the results of this dissertation show that (i) word recognition is primarily modulated by the number of words in the mental lexicon of children, (ii) phonological interference of word recognition can be alleviated by introducing a semantic similarity, and (iii) that children recognise better recently acquired words when the novel words shared either phonological or semantic similarities. Result (i) provides the first evidence of the effect of children current vocabulary on phonological interference effects. These results align with models of spoken word recognition that suggest that during speech processing, phonologically related words are activated and compete for recognition in line with the Cohort Model and the Neighbourhood Activation Model; thus, the more words a child knows more related associates are activated. In addition, result (ii) shows that adding a similarity in meaning reduces the interference in target recognition induced by the phonological similarity between words. These results resonate with the Distributed Cohort Model, which suggests that semantic aspects of words reduce the activation of phonologically related words to the target supporting the recognition of the intended word. Finally, together the results of this dissertation highlight the differential impact of words simple vs. compound overlap on familiar and recently acquired words. Specifically, it was found that while simple phonological or semantic similarities interfered with familiar word recognition, simple similarities between novel words supported novel word recognition. These results support the hypothesis of the LEX model of word learning that predicts better learning of novel words of similar form or similar meaning than of words with similar form and meaning.	de
dc.contributor.coReferee	Mani, Nivedita Prof. Dr.
dc.contributor.thirdReferee	Behne, Tanya Dr.
dc.contributor.thirdReferee	Schroeder, Sascha Prof. Dr.
dc.contributor.thirdReferee	Waldmann, Michael Prof. Dr.
dc.contributor.thirdReferee	Mattler, Uwe Prof. Dr.
dc.subject.eng	word recognition	de
dc.subject.eng	word learning	de
dc.subject.eng	infancy	de
dc.subject.eng	toddlerhood	de
dc.subject.eng	phonological overlap	de
dc.subject.eng	semantic overlap	de
dc.subject.eng	eye-tracking	de
dc.subject.eng	longitudinal design	de
dc.identifier.urn	urn:nbn:de:gbv:7-ediss-13990-9
dc.affiliation.institute	Biologische Fakultät für Biologie und Psychologie	de
dc.subject.gokfull	Psychologie (PPN619868627)	de
dc.description.embargoed	2023-03-19	de
dc.identifier.ppn	1799695743

Dateien

Name:Avila-Varela_dissertation.pdf

Größe:4.012Mb

Format:PDF

Öffnen

Name:: Avila-Varela_dissertation.pdf
Größe:: 4.012Mb
Format:: PDF

Öffnen

Das Dokument erscheint in:

Fakultät für Biologie und Psychologie (inkl. GAUSS) [1621]

Zur Kurzanzeige