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What hinders child semantic computation: children's universal quantification and the development of cognitive control*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 December 2011

UTAKO MINAI ,
NOBUYUKI JINCHO ,
NAOTO YAMANE  and
REIKO MAZUKA
UTAKO MINAI*
Affiliation:
University of Kansas, Department of Linguistics and RIKEN Brain Science Institute, Laboratory for Language Development
NOBUYUKI JINCHO
Affiliation:
RIKEN Brain Science Institute, Laboratory for Language Development
NAOTO YAMANE
Affiliation:
RIKEN Brain Science Institute, Laboratory for Language Development
REIKO MAZUKA
Affiliation:
RIKEN Brain Science Institute, Laboratory for Language Development and Duke University, Department of Psychology & Neuroscience
*
Address for correspondence: Utako Minai, Department of Linguistics, University of Kansas, Blake Hall Rm. 427, 1541 Lilac Lane, Lawrence, KS 66045, USA. e-mail: minai@ku.edu
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Abstract

Recent studies on the acquisition of semantics have argued that knowledge of the universal quantifier is adult-like throughout development. However, there are domains where children still exhibit non-adult-like universal quantification, and arguments for the early mastery of relevant semantic knowledge do not explain what causes such non-adult-like interpretations. The present study investigates Japanese four- and five-year-old children's atypical universal quantification in light of the development of cognitive control. We hypothesized that children's still-developing cognitive control contributes to their atypical universal quantification. Using a combined eye-tracking and interpretation task together with a non-linguistic measure of cognitive control, we revealed a link between the achievement of adult-like universal quantification and the development of flexible perspective-switch. We argue that the development of cognitive control is one of the factors that contribute to children's processing of semantics.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 39 , Issue 5 , November 2012 , pp. 919 - 956
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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Footnotes

[*]

We gratefully acknowledge Koji Sugisaki, Miwa Isobe, Takuya Goro, Edson Miyamoto and Robert Fiorentino for their fruitful feedback regarding the current study, and Kiwako Ito and Akitoshi Ogawa for their advice and comments on the design and analysis of the experiment.

References

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