Remembering new words: integrating early memory development into word learning.

Erica H Wojcik

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00151

Abstract

In order to successfully acquire a new word, young children must learn the correct associations between labels and their referents. For decades, word-learning researchers have explored how young children are able to form these associations. However, in addition to learning label-referent mappings, children must also remember them. Despite the importance of memory processes in forming a stable lexicon, there has been little integration of early memory research into the study of early word learning. After discussing what we know about how young children remember words over time, this paper reviews the infant memory development literature as it relates to early word learning, focusing on changes in retention duration, encoding, consolidation, and retrieval across the first 2 years of life. A third section applies this review to word learning and presents future directions, arguing that the integration of memory processes into the study of word learning will provide researchers with novel, useful insights into how young children acquire new words.

Highlights

What do children have to do to learn a new word? First, they must attend to and encode information about the referent, the label, and the association between the two
By reviewing what we know about early memory development and presenting several examples of how this literature is applicable to word learning research, this paper provides a new perspective that can be used to better understand the full process of how young children learn, and retain, new words
While encoding differences have been studied in the context of word learning (e.g., Booth, 2009; Vlach and Sandhofer, 2012), researchers have not yet examined how consolidation affects whether retrieval is successful for young children

Summary

Introduction

What do children have to do to learn a new word? First, they must attend to and encode information about the referent, the label, and the association between the two. Because the operant conditioning paradigm has been used to rigorously test various components of long-term memory in children under 2 years of age (see Rovee-Collier et al, 2001), the body of work can be helpful in shedding light on how memory development might influence early word learning.

Results

Conclusion