Smith College Lab (Smith College)
Who Can Participate |
For 4,5,6,7 and 8-year-olds |
What Happens |
After a few brief training examples, your child will see five short pictured stories and be encouraged to speak the answer to a question at the end of each. Four more questions will just involve clicking picture choices. This should take less than 15 minutes. At the end, we will direct you to an external URL where your child will take a 15-minute language comprehension screener that will provide a personalized report on their language skill. |
What We're Studying |
We are interested in how children find answers to complex questions after listening to stories. Stories contain a lot of information: how does a child figure out what is being asked? Some questions are ambiguous, but for adults, certain readings of the question are ruled out. How soon do children know what is an appropriate answer? The findings will help us understand the process and timing by which children acquire the grammar of questions. |
Duration |
15 minutes |
Compensation |
There is no compensation except for free access to a language screener that will provide a report on your child's language comprehension relative to other children their age. |
This study is conducted by Jill de Villiers (jdevilli@smith.edu).