Ratings of age of acquisition of 299 words across 25 languages: Is there a cross-linguistic order of words?
We present a new set of subjective age-of-acquisition (AoA) ratings for 299 words (158 nouns, 141 verbs) in 25 languages from five language families (Afro-Asiatic: Semitic languages; Altaic: one Turkic language: Indo-European: Baltic, Celtic, Germanic, Hellenic, Slavic, and Romance languages; Niger-Congo: one Bantu language; Uralic: Finnic and Ugric languages). Adult native speakers reported the age at which they had learned each word. We present a comparison of the AoA ratings across all languages by contrasting them in pairs. This comparison shows a consistency in the orders of ratings across the 25 languages. The data were then analyzed (1) to ascertain how the demographic characteristics of the participants influenced AoA estimations and (2) to assess differences caused by the exact form of the target question (when did you learn vs. when do children learn this word); (3) to compare the ratings obtained in our study to those of previous studies; and (4) to assess the validity of our study by comparison with quasi-objective AoA norms derived from the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories (MB-CDI). All 299 words were judged as being acquired early (mostly before the age of 6 years). AoA ratings were associated with the raters' social or language status, but not with the raters' age or education. Parents reported words as being learned earlier, and bilinguals reported learning them later. Estimations of the age at which children learn the words revealed significantly lower ratings of AoA. Finally, comparisons with previous AoA and MB-CDI norms support the validity of the present estimations. Our AoA ratings are available for research or other purposes.
University of Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland. magdalena.luniewska@psych.uw.edu.pl.|, ul. Stawki 5/7, 00-183, Warsaw, Poland. magdalena.luniewska@psych.uw.edu.pl.
Magdalena
M
Łuniewska
University of Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland.
Ewa
E
Haman
Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel.
Sharon
S
Armon-Lotem
, Warsaw, Poland.
Bartłomiej
B
Etenkowski
Stellenbosch University, Stellenbosch, South Africa.
Frenette
F
Southwood
University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia.
Darinka
D
Anđelković
University of Utrecht, Utrecht, Netherlands.
Elma
E
Blom
University of Utrecht, Utrecht, Netherlands.
Tessel
T
Boerma
City University London, London, UK.
Shula
S
Chiat
University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg City, Luxembourg.
Pascale Engel
PE
de Abreu
Zentrum für Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft, Berlin, Germany.
Natalia
N
Gagarina
Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain.
Anna
A
Gavarró
Lund University, Lund, Sweden.
Gisela
G
Håkansson
University College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland.
Tina
T
Hickey
Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark.
Kristine Jensen
KJ
de López
University of Reading, Reading, UK.
Theodoros
T
Marinis
University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia.
Maša
M
Popović
McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
Elin
E
Thordardottir
Vytautas Magnus University, Kaunas, Lithuania.
Agnė
A
Blažienė
Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain.
Myriam Cantú
MC
Sánchez
Vytautas Magnus University, Kaunas, Lithuania.
Ineta
I
Dabašinskienė
Anadolu University, Eskişehir, Turkey.
Pınar
P
Ege
University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway.
Inger-Anne
IA
Ehret
University of Konstanz, Konstanz, Germany.
Nelly-Ann
NA
Fritsche
University of Malta, Msida, Malta.
Daniela
D
Gatt
University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Bibi
B
Janssen
Cyprus University of Technology, Limassol, Cyprus.
Maria
M
Kambanaros
Comenius University, Bratislava, Slovakia.
Svetlana
S
Kapalková
Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark.
Bjarke
B
Kronqvist
University of Oulu, Oulu, Finland.
Sari
S
Kunnari
University of Padua, Padua, Italy.
Chiara
C
Levorato
University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland.
Olga
O
Nenonen
University College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland.
Siobhán Nic
SN
Fhlannchadha
University College Cork, Cork, Ireland.
Ciara
C
O'Toole
University of Manchester, Manchester, UK.
Kamila
K
Polišenská
Birkbeck College, University of London, London, UK.
Barbara
B
Pomiechowska
Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden.
Natalia
N
Ringblom
University of Konstanz, Konstanz, Germany.
Tanja
T
Rinker
University of Padua, Padua, Italy.
Maja
M
Roch
University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia.
Maja
M
Savić
Prešov University, Prešov, Slovakia.
Daniela
D
Slančová
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece.
Ianthi Maria
IM
Tsimpli
Anadolu University, Eskişehir, Turkey.
Özlem
Ö
Ünal-Logacev
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000375:Aging / Q000523:psychology*; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D007804:Language Development; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D019303:Multilingualism; D010290:Parents; D011578:Psycholinguistics; D014825:Vocabulary; D055815:Young Adult
Age of acquisition; AoA; Cross-linguistic comparison; Subjective ratings; Words