They might have a high neighborhood density. Neighborhood density refers to the number of different words that can be made by changing, adding, or deleting one basic unit of sound (phoneme). In linguistics, a neighborhood is made of all the words that sound similar. The words “heat,” “feat,” and “meat” are all in the same […]
All Posts By: Jing Liu
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It’s shaped like a cat, so is it a cat? Shape bias in word learning
Shape bias helps us categorize the world. Shape bias refers to the tendency of children to sort similarly-shaped objects into a category and apply the same name to them. It is an assumption that children make to help them learn. In this case, it allows children to quickly learn names by linking words to objects. […]
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Your toddler knows that new words (probably!) label things they don’t yet have a name for!
Mutual exclusivity helps babies learn about the world. Mutual exclusivity is a generally helpful assumption that young children (and adults) use as they learn a language. Under this assumption, they tend to believe an object should have just one name. This leads them to expect a new name for a new object and to avoid […]