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The structure and nature of phonological neighbourhoods in children's early lexicons*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 September 2008

TANIA S. ZAMUNER
TANIA S. ZAMUNER*
Affiliation:
Radboud University Nijmegen and University of British Columbia
*
Address for correspondence: Tania S. Zamuner, University of British Columbia, Departments of Psychology, 2136 West Mall, Vancouver, BC, CanadaV6T 1Z4. tel: (604) 822-6408; fax: (604) 822-6923; e-mail: tzamuner@psych.ubc.ca
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Abstract

This research examines phonological neighbourhoods in the lexicons of children acquiring English. Analyses of neighbourhood densities were done on children's earliest words and on a corpus of spontaneous speech, used to measure neighbours in the target language. Neighbourhood densities were analyzed for words created by changing segments in word-onset position (rhyme neighbours as in pin/bin), vowel position (consonant neighbours as in pin/pan/) and word-offset position (lead neighbours as in pin/pit). Results indicated that neighbours in children's early lexicons are significantly more often distinguished in word-onset position (rhyme neighbours) and significantly less often distinguished in word-offset position (lead neighbours). Moreover, patterns in child language are more extreme than in the target language. Findings are discussed within the PRIMIR framework (Processing Rich Information from Multidimensional Interaction Representations; Werker & Curtin, 2005). It is argued that early perceptual sensitivity aids lexical acquisition, supporting continuity across speech perception and lexical acquisition.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 36 , Issue 1 , January 2009 , pp. 3 - 21
Copyright
Copyright © 2008 Cambridge University Press

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Footnotes

[*]

This research was supported by NWO grant 275-75-001 awarded to Tania Zamuner. Thanks for assistance and comments from Judit Gervain, Elizabeth Johnson, Dennis Pasveer, Ramesh Thiruvengadaswamy, Erik Jan van der Torre and Janet Werker.

References

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