Language Development and Day-Care Experience

The effect of day care on children\u27s development is widely debated. The purpose of this study was to complement and extend the knowledge of variables moderating children\u27s language development in day care. Forty-one 30- to 36-month-old children, with varying amounts of experience in day care, were given a standardized language test. Stepwise regression analyses indicated receptive language was predicted by age of entry, chronological age, and the educational level of the parents. Expressive language was predicted by age of entry and parent\u27s rating of the language environment of the day care center. These findings suggest that early entry into day care has a positive affect on children\u27s subsequent language development. Social pressures to communicate have a significant influence on expressive and receptive language skills

Sentence Context and Meaning Frequency Effects in Children\u27s Processing of Ambiguous Words

Nine‐ and twelve‐year‐old children named target words which were preceded by sentences ending in words having more than one meaning. Sentences biased the ambiguous word toward its dominant (more frequent) or subordinate (less frequent) meaning. Targets were related to the same meaning as that biased by the sentence, the other meaning, or were unrelated. Targets were presented 0, 300, or 700 ms following the sentence. For both ages, dominant sentences facilitated responses only to the contextually appropriate target. However, subordinate sentences led to facilitation of the appropriate meaning only for the younger group. Older children showed greater facilitation for the inappropriate (but more common) meaning. These results indicate that younger children are more sensitive to the sentence context in which an ambiguous word appears, while the processing of the older children is determined more by the relative frequencies of the words meanings