title: Nine-month-old infants generalize object labels, but not object preferences across individuals.
abstract: As with all culturally relevant human behaviours, words are meaningful because they are shared by the members of a community. This research investigates whether 9-month-old infants understand this fundamental fact about language. Experiment 1 examined whether infants who are trained on, and subsequently habituated to, a new word-referent link expect the link to be consistent across a second speaker. Experiment 2 examined whether 9-month-old infants distinguish between behaviours that are shared across individuals (i.e. words) from those that are not (i.e. object preferences). The present findings indicate that infants as young as 9 months of age expect new word-referent links, but not object preferences, to be consistent across individuals. Thus, by 9 months, infants have identified at least one of the aspects of human behaviour that is shared across individuals within a community. The implications for children's acquisition of language and culture are discussed.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, The University of Auckland, New Zealand. a.henderson@auckland.ac.nz
authors.forename: Annette M E
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Henderson
authors.forename: Amanda L
authors.initials: AL
authors.lastname: Woodward
mesh_terms: D001519:Behavior; D003210:Concept Formation; D003469:Culture; D005260:Female; D006185:Habituation, Psychophysiologic; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007802:Language; D007804:Language Development; D008297:Male