Which One is Dax?

For 3-year-old children who are located in the United States and who are hearing English (at least 40%) at home.

In this study, your child will hear people talk about familiar objects, like toys or furniture, and adjectives describing those objects’ properties. Some of the adjectives will be familiar English words, while others will be made-up new words. For example, your child may be asked, “Which one is dax?” while viewing two objects on the screen. Your child will then be asked to point to the object they think the new word refers to based on the information they heard. The activity includes 4 sets of objects and 4 made-up new words.

We are interested in understanding how children use sentence context to learn what new words mean. Previous research has shown that children can use information from the objects they see to help identify what a new adjective refers to, such as a color, texture, or shape. However, less is known about whether children can also use information they hear in spoken sentences to learn about a new adjective, even when the relevant objects are not visible at that moment. In this study, children will hear sentences containing made-up new adjectives and will later select the objects they think match those adjectives. By examining which object properties children connect to the new adjectives, we can better understand whether sentence context helps children learn the meanings of new descriptive words.

15 minutes

As a token of appreciation, you will receive a $5 Amazon.com e-gift card within 2 weeks. You are eligible for this payment if your child meets all the eligibility criteria, is present in the Consent Video at the start of the study and has not participated in the study before.