© University of Kent - Contact | Feedback | Legal | Cookies
The University of Kent, Canterbury, Kent, CT2 7NZ, T +44 (0)1227 764000
Dr Kirsten Abbot-SmithLecturer in Psychology |
 |
Research interests
My research focus is on child language development, although I have also started to look at how this intersects with how children perceive events. Some recent questions I have investigated are:
- How do children work out which aspect of an event a particular word refers to?
- Do Italian and German preschool children use the most valid cue or the most ‘salient’ cue to work out how their language tells the listener who is doing what?
- Do bilingual 2½-year-olds lag behind their monolingual peers on scores for English? Does the difference remain once bilinguals' scores are adjusted for percentage everyday exposure to English?
- Can children use semantic analogy to generalize grammar?
- Do preschool children use eye-gaze cues to help comprehend sentences?
I am currently involved in studies looking at:
- Pragmatic language development (how children how to give sufficient information to the person they are talking to)
- Language intervention with preschoolers and primary school children with developmental language disorders (Specific Language Impairment, Autism Spectrum Disorders)
Key publications
Stoll, S., Abbot-Smith, K., & Lieven, E.V.M. (2009). Lexically restricted utterances in Russian, German and English child directed speech. Cognitive Science, 33, 75-103.
Abbot-Smith, K., Lieven, E.V.M., & Tomasello, M. (2008). Graded representations in the acquisition of English and German transitive constructions. Cognitive Development, 23, 48-66.
Dittmar, M., Abbot-Smith, K., Lieven, E.V.M., & Tomasello, M. (2008). German children's comprehension of word order and case marking in causative sentences. Child Development,79(4), 1152-1167.
Dittmar, M., Abbot-Smith, K., Lieven, E.V. M. , & Tomasello, M. (2008). Young German children's early syntactic competence: a preferential-looking study. Developmental Science, 11(4), 575-582.
Abbot-Smith, K. & Behrens, H. (2006). How known constructions influence the acquisition of other constructions: the German passive and future constructions. Cognitive Science 30 (6), 995-1026.
Also view these in the Kent Academic Repository
Articles
Dittmar, M. and Abbot-Smith, K. and Lieven, E. et al. (2011)
Children aged 2;1 use transitive syntax to make a semantic-role interpretation in a pointing task.
Journal of Child Language, 38 (5). pp. 1-15. ISSN 0305-0009.
Abstract
The current study used a forced choice pointing paradigm to examine whether English children aged 2;1 can use abstract knowledge of the relationship between word order position and semantic roles to make an active behavioural decision when interpreting active transitive sentences with novel verbs, when the actions are identical in the target and foil video clips. The children pointed significantly above chance with novel verbs but only if the final trial was excluded. With familiar verbs the children pointed consistently above chance. Children aged 2;7 did not show these tiring effects and their performance in the familiar and novel verb conditions was always equivalent.
Abbot-Smith, K. and Tomasello, M. (2010)
The Influence of Frequency and Semantic Similarity on How Children Learn Grammar.
First Language, 30 (1). pp. 79-101. ISSN 0142-7237.
Abstract
Lexically based learning and semantic analogy may both play a role in the learning of
grammar. To investigate this, 5-year-old German children were trained on a miniature
language (nominally English) involving two grammatical constructions, each of which was
associated with a different semantic verb class. Training was followed by elicited production
and grammaticality judgement tests with trained verbs and a generalization test, involving
untrained verbs. In the trained verbs judgement test the children were above chance at
associating particular verbs with the constructions in which they had heard them. They
did this significantly more often with verbs which they had heard especially frequently in
particular constructions, indicating lexically based learning. There was also an interaction
between frequency and semantic class (or the particular verbs). In the generalization
judgement test the children were at chance overall. In the elicited production generalization
test 75% of the children used the same construction for all items.
Stoll, S. and Abbot-Smith, K. and Lieven, E. (2009)
Lexically Restricted Utterances in Russian, German, and English Child-Directed Speech.
Cognitive Science, 33 (1). pp. 75-103. ISSN 0364-0213.
Abstract
This study investigates the child-directed speech (CDS) of four Russian-, six German, and six English-speaking mothers to their 2-year-old children. Typologically Russian has considerably less restricted word order than either German or English, with German showing more word-order variants than English. This could lead to the prediction that the lexical restrictiveness previously found in the initial strings of English CDS by Cameron-Faulkner, Lieven, and Tomasello (2003) would not be found in Russian or German CDS. However, despite differences between the three corpora that clearly derive from typological differences between the languages, the most significant finding of this study is a high degree of lexical restrictiveness at the beginnings of CDS utterances in all three languages.
Abbot-Smith, K. and Lieven, E. and Tomasello, M. (2008)
Graded representations in the acquisition of English and German transitive constructions.
Cognitive Development, 23 (1). pp. 48-66. ISSN 0885-2014.
Abstract
English and German children aged 2 years 4 months and 4 years heard both novel and familiar verbs in sentences whose form was grammatical, but which mismatched the event they were watching (e.g., 'The frog is pushing the lion', when the lion was actually the 'agent' or 'doer' of the pushing). These verbs were then elicited in new sentences. All children mostly corrected the familiar verb (i.e., they used the agent as the grammatical subject), but there were cross-linguistic differences among the two-year-olds concerning the novel verb. When English 2-year-olds used the novel verb they mostly corrected. However, their most frequent response was to avoid using the novel verb altogether. German 2-year-olds corrected the novel verb significantly more often than their English counterparts, demonstrating more robust verb-general representations of agent- and patient-marking. These findings provide support for a 'graded representations' view of development, which proposes that grammatical representations may be simultaneously abstract but 'weak'. (C) 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Dittmar, M. and Abbot-Smith, K. and Lieven, E. et al. (2008)
German children's comprehension of word order and case marking in causative sentences.
Child Development, 79 (4). pp. 1152-1167. ISSN 0009-3920.
Abstract
Two comprehension experiments were conducted to investigate whether German children are able to use the grammatical cues of word order and word endings (case markers) to identify agents and patients in a causative sentence and whether they weigh these two cues differently across development. Two-year-olds correctly understood only sentences with both cues supporting each other-the prototypical form. Five-year-olds were able to use word order by itself but not case markers. Only 7-year-olds behaved like adults by relying on case markers over word order when the two cues conflicted. These findings suggest that prototypical instances of linguistic constructions with redundant grammatical marking play a special role in early acquisition, and only later do children isolate and weigh individual grammatical cues appropriately.
Dittmar, M. and Abbot-Smith, K. and Lieven, E. et al. (2008)
Young German children's early syntactic competence: a preferential looking study.
Developmental Science, 11 (4). pp. 575-582. ISSN 1363-755X.
Abstract
Using a preferential looking methodology with novel verbs, Gertner, Fisher and Eisengart (2006) found that 21-month-old English children seemed to understand the syntactic marking of transitive word order in an abstract, verb-general way. In the current study we tested whether young German children of this same age have this same understanding. Following Gertner et al. (2006), one group of German children was tested only after they had received a training/practice phase containing transitive sentences with familiar verbs and the exact same nouns as those used at test. A second group was tested after a training/practice phase consisting only of familiar verbs, without the nouns used at test. Only the group of children with the training on full transitive sentences was successful in the test. These findings suggest that for children this young to succeed in this test of syntactic understanding, they must first have some kind of relevant linguistic experience immediately prior to testing - which raises the question of the nature of children's linguistic representations at this early point in development.
Abbot-Smith, K. and Tomasello, M. (2006)
Exemplar-learning and schematization in a usage-based account of syntactic acquisition.
Linguistic Review, 23 (3). pp. 275-290. ISSN 0167-6318.
Abstract
The early phases of syntactic acquisition are characterized by many input frequency and item effects, which argue against theories assuming innate access to classical syntactic categories. In formulating an alternative view, we consider both prototype and exemplar-learning models of categorization. We argue for a 'hybrid' usage-based view in which acquisition depends on exemplar learning and retention, out of which permanent abstract schemas gradually emerge and are immanent across the summed similarity of exemplar collections. These schemas are graded in strength depending on the number of exemplars and the degree to which semantic similarity is reinforced by phonological, lexical, and distributional similarity.
Abbot-Smith, Kirsten F and Behrens, Heike (2006)
How Known Constructions Influence the Acquisition ofOther Constructions: The German Passive and FutureConstructions.
Cognitive Science: A Multidisciplinary Journal, 30 (6). pp. 995-1026. ISSN 0364-0213.
Abstract
This article suggests evidence for and reasons why prior acquisition may either facilitate or inhibit
acquisition of a new construction. It investigates acquisition of the German passive and future constructions
which contain a lexical verb with either the auxiliary sein to be or werden to become, and are
related through these to potential supporting constructions. We predicted that a supported construction
should be acquired earlier, faster, and unusually rapidly. An inhibited construction should show an extended
depressed usage.We analyzed a dense corpus of a German boy between 2;0 and 5;0. He acquired
the sein- before the werden-passive. The former was supported by his prior acquisition of the sein copula,
whereas the werden-passive itself supported one werden copula construction. He acquired the
werden-future extremely slowly due to the hindrance of a semantically identical construction. These results
fit with an emergentist approach in which apparently sudden acquisition is still due to gradual
learning mechanisms.
Abbot-Smith, K. and Lieven, E. and Tomasello, M. (2004)
Training 2;6-year-olds to produce the transitive construction: the role of frequency, semantic similarity and shared syntactic distribution.
Developmental Science, 7 (1). pp. 48-55. ISSN 1363-755X.
Abstract
Childers and Tomasello (2001) found that training 21/2-year-olds on the English transitive construction greatly improves their performance on a post-test in which they must use novel verbs in that construction. In the current study, we replicated Childers and Tomasello's finding, but using a much lower frequency of transitive verbs and models in training We also used novel verbs that were of a different semantic class to our training verbs, demonstrating that semantic homogeneity is not crucial for generalization. We also replicated the finding that 4-year-olds are significantly more productive than 21/2-year-olds with the transitive construction, with the new finding that this is also true for verbs of emission. In addition, 'shared syntactic distribution' of novel verb and training verbs was found to have no observable effect on the number of 21/2-year-olds who were productive in the post-test.
Tomasello, M. and Abbot-Smith, K. (2002)
A tale of two theories: response to Fisher.
Cognition, 83 (2). pp. 207-214. ISSN 0010-0277.
Abbot-Smith, Kirsten and Lieven, E. and Tomasello, M. (2001)
What preschool children do and do not do with ungrammatical word orders.
Cognitive Development, 16 (2). pp. 679-692. ISSN 0885-2014.
Abstract
Akhtar [J. Child Lang. 26 (1999) 339.] found that when 4-year-old English-speaking children hear novel verbs in transitive utterances with ungrammatical word orders (e.g., Elmo the tree meeked), they correct them to canonical SVO order almost all of the time. However, when 3-year-olds and older 2-year-olds hear these same utterances, they waver between correcting and using the ungrammatical ordering. In the current study, we adapted this task for children at 2;4, using an intransitive construction. The major finding was that children corrected the noncanonical word order less than half as often as Akhtar's 2-year-old subjects who were approximately 4 months older. At the same time, however, children showed in several ways that they had some implicit understanding of canonical SV order; for example, they used the novel verb which they heard used in grammatical word order more often than the novel verb which they heard in ungrammatical word order, and they consistently used pronouns and the progressive -s auxiliary in appropriate ways. The current findings thus contribute to a growing body of theory and research suggesting that the ontogenetic emergence of linguistic categories and schemas is a gradual process, as is the emergence of categories in other domains of cognitive development. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved.
Book Sections
Abbot-Smith, Kirsten and Kidd, Evan (2012)
Exemplar Learning and Schematization in Language Development.
In: Seel, N. Encyclopedia of the Sciences of Learning. Springer, Heidelberg. ISBN 9781441914279. (in press)
Grants
2011 |
K Abbot-Smith |
£500 |
2010-12 |
K Abbot-Smith, C Rowland, J Pine |
£98,554 |
2010 |
K Abbot-Smith |
£7,461 |
2007-09 |
K Abbot-Smith |
£7,310 |
Postgraduates
Rebecca Croll: How preschool children learn to understand and use referentiality
Final year project supervision
I am willing to supervise projects on:
- pragmatic language development (how children how to give sufficient information to the person they are talking to)
- language development in children learning languages other than English
- eye-tracking studies of language comprehension in children and adults
- the relationship between television watching and preschool language development (questionnaires to parents)
- language intervention with preschoolers and primary school children with developmental language disorders (Specific Language Impairment, Autism Spectrum Disorders), especially if the student has access to some potential participants
- mental health of parents/siblings of children with developmental disorders (questionnaires to parents)
- a study design that you come up with if I think it has a chance of working/is a new idea
Other academic activities
- Organisation of the annual British Psychological Society Developmental Section Conference (August 29-31, 2007)
- Guest Reviewer for Cognition, Journal of Child Language, Cognitive Science, Developmental Science, Cognitive Development
Contact details
| Address: |
School of Psychology |
| Tel: | +44 (0)1227 823016 |
| Fax: | +44 (0)1227 827030 |
| Email: | K.Abbot-Smith@kent.ac.uk |
| Office: | Keynes A2.04 |
| Office Hours: | Tuesday 9.30-10.30am Wednesday 9.30-10.30am |