Combining statistics: the role of phonotactics on cross-situational word learning

• Published in: Psicologia, reflexão e crítica Vol. 35; no. 1; p. 30
• Main Authors: Dal Ben, Rodrigo, Souza, Débora de Hollanda, Hay, Jessica F.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cham Springer International Publishing 28.09.2022; Springer Nature B.V; Curso de Pós-Graduação em Psicologia da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul; SpringerOpen
• Subjects: Ambiguity; Behavioral Science and Psychology; Biological Psychology; Cross-situational word learning; Developmental Psychology; Feedback; Health Psychology; Hypothesis testing; Language; Language learning; Phonology; Phonotactic probability; Phonotactics; PHYSICS, MULTIDISCIPLINARY; Portuguese language; Probability; Psychological Methods/Evaluation; Psychology; Psychology Research; Psychometrics; Semantics; Statistical learning; Vocabulary development; Vocabulary learning; Word learning; Cross-situational word learning; Word learning; Statistical learning; Phonotactic probability; Language learning
• ISSN: 1678-7153; 0102-7972; 1678-7153
• DOI: 10.1186/s41155-022-00234-y

Language learners can rely on phonological and semantic information to learn novel words. Using a cross-situational word learning paradigm, we explored the role of phonotactic probabilities on word learning in ambiguous contexts. Brazilian-Portuguese speaking adults ( N = 30) were exposed to two sets of word-object pairs. Words from one set of labels had slightly higher phonotactic probabilities than words from the other set. By tracking co-occurrences of words and objects, participants were able to learn word-object mappings similarly across both sets. Our findings contrast with studies showing a facilitative effect of phonotactic probability on word learning in non-ambiguous contexts.