Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-r5fsc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T15:16:07.711Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The development of vocabulary and grammar: a longitudinal study of European Portuguese-speaking toddlers

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2019

Irene CADIME Open the ORCID record for Irene CADIME [Opens in a new window] ,
Célia S. MOREIRA Open the ORCID record for Célia S. MOREIRA [Opens in a new window] ,
Ana Lúcia SANTOS Open the ORCID record for Ana Lúcia SANTOS [Opens in a new window] ,
Carla SILVA ,
Iolanda RIBEIRO  and
Fernanda Leopoldina VIANA
Irene CADIME*
Affiliation:
Research Centre on Child Studies, University of Minho, Portugal
Célia S. MOREIRA
Affiliation:
Psychology Research Center (CIPsi), University of Minho, Portugal
Ana Lúcia SANTOS
Affiliation:
Centre of Linguistics of the University of Lisbon (CLUL), Portugal
Carla SILVA
Affiliation:
Research Centre on Child Studies, University of Minho, Portugal
Iolanda RIBEIRO
Affiliation:
Psychology Research Center (CIPsi), University of Minho, Portugal
Fernanda Leopoldina VIANA
Affiliation:
Research Centre on Child Studies, University of Minho, Portugal
*
*Corresponding author: Research Centre on Child Studies, University of Minho, Gualtar Campus, 4710-057 Braga, Portugal. E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The goals of this study were to analyze the growth and stability of vocabulary, mean length of the three longest utterances (MLLUw), and sentence complexity in European Portuguese-speaking children aged 1;4–2;6, to explore differences in growth as a function of personal and family-related variables, and to investigate the inter-relationships among the three language dimensions. Fifty-one European Portuguese-speaking toddlers were longitudinally assessed at 1;4, 1;9, 2;1, and 2;6, through parent reports. Exponential growth models best described acquisition patterns during this period, but the vocabulary growth accelerated across the full age-range, whereas the growth of grammar dimensions accelerated mainly after 1;9. High variability was observed in the scores, but the toddlers’ relative positions were mostly stable over time. Gender approached significance as a predictor of vocabulary growth. Maternal educational level did not predict the growth of any of the three language dimensions. Both vocabulary and MLLUw predicted sentence complexity.

Keywords

vocabularysentence complexitymean length of utterance
Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 46 , Issue 4 , July 2019 , pp. 653 - 681
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2019 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anderson, C. J. (2004). Saturated model. In Lewis-Beck, M. S., Bryman, A., & Liao, T. F. (Eds.), The SAGE encyclopedia of social science research methods, Vol. 1 (pp. 997–8). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.Google Scholar
Andonova, E. (2015). Parental report evidence for toddlers’ grammar and vocabulary in Bulgarian. First Language, 35(2), 126–36.Google Scholar
Bates, D., Mächler, M., Bolker, B., & Walker, S. (2015). Fitting linear mixed-effects models using lme4. Journal of Statistical Software, 67(1), 1–48.Google Scholar
Bates, E., Dale, P. S., & Thal, D. (1995). Individual differences and their implications for theories of language development. In Fletcher, P. & MacWhinney, B. (Eds.), Handbook of child language (pp. 96–151). Oxford: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Bates, E., & Goodman, J. C. (1997). On the inseparability of grammar and the lexicon: evidence from acquisition, aphasia and real-time processing. Language and Cognitive Processes, 12(5/6), 507–84.Google Scholar
Bates, E., & Goodman, J. C. (1999). On the emergence of grammar from the lexicon. In MacWhinney, B. (Ed.), The emergence of language (pp. 29–70). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Bauer, D. J., Goldfield, B. A., & Reznick, J. S. (2002). Alternative approaches to analyzing individual differences in the rate of early vocabulary development. Applied Psycholinguistics, 23(3), 313–35.Google Scholar
Bleses, D., Vach, W., Slott, M., Wehberg, S., Thomsen, P., Madsen, T. O., & Basbøll, H. (2008). The Danish Communicative Developmental Inventories: validity and main developmental trends. Journal of Child Language, 35(3), 651–69.Google Scholar
Bornstein, M. H., & Putnick, D. L. (2012). Stability of language in childhood: a multi-age, -domain, -measure, and -source study. Developmental Psychology, 48(2), 477–91.Google Scholar
Brooks, R., & Meltzoff, A. N. (2008). Infant gaze following and pointing predict accelerated vocabulary growth through two years of age: a longitudinal, growth curve modeling study. Journal of Child Language, 35(1), 207–20.Google Scholar
Cadime, I., Silva, C., Ribeiro, I., & Viana, F. L. (2018). Early lexical development: Do day care attendance and maternal education matter? First Language, 38(5), 503–19.Google Scholar
Chomsky, N. (1995). The Minimalist Program. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Costa, A. L., Alexandre, N., Santos, A. L., & Soares, N. (2008). Efeitos de modelização no input: o caso da aquisição de conectores. In Frota, S. & Santos, A. L. (Eds.), Textos seleccionados do XXIII Encontro da Associação Portuguesa de Linguística (pp. 131–42). Lisboa: APL/Colibri.Google Scholar
Devescovi, A., Caselli, M. C., Marchione, D., Pasqualetti, P., Reilly, J., & Bates, E. (2005). A crosslinguistic study of the relationship between grammar and lexical development. Journal of Child Language, 32(4), 759–86.Google Scholar
Diessel, H. (2004). The acquisition of complex sentences. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Dionne, G., Dale, P. S., Boivin, M., & Plomin, R. (2003). Genetic evidence for bidirectional effects of early lexical and grammatical development. Child Development, 74(2), 394–412.Google Scholar
DiSciullo, A. M., & Williams, E. (1987). On the definition of word. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Dong, Y., & Peng, C.-Y. J. (2013). Principled missing data methods for researchers. SpringerPlus, 2, 222. doi.org/10.1186/2193-1801-2-222Google Scholar
Duarte, I., Santos, A. L., & Alexandre, N. (2015). How relative are purpose relatives? Probus, 27(2), 237–70.Google Scholar
Eriksson, M. (2017). The Swedish Communicative Development Inventory III: parent reports on language in preschool children. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 41(5), 647–54.Google Scholar
Eriksson, M., Marschik, P., Tulviste, T., Almgren, M., Pérez-Pereira, M., Wehberg, S., … Gallego, C. (2011). Differences between girls and boys in emerging language skills: evidence from 10 language communities. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 30(2), 326–43.Google Scholar
Feldman, H. M., Campbell, T. F., Kurs-Lasky, M., Rockette, H. E., Dale, P. S., Colborn, D. K., & Paradise, J. L. (2005). Concurrent and predictive validity of parent reports of child language at ages 2 and 3 years. Child Development, 76(4), 856–68.Google Scholar
Fenson, L., Dale, P. S., Reznick, J. S., Bates, E., Thal, D. J., & Pethick, S. J. (1994). Variability in early communicative development. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, 59(5), 1–173.Google Scholar
Fenson, L., Marchman, V., Thal, D., Dale, P. S., Reznick, J. S., & Bates, E. (2007). MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories: users guide and technical manual, 2nd ed. Baltimore, MD: Paul H Brookes.Google Scholar
Ganger, J., & Brent, M. R. (2004). Reexamining the vocabulary spurt. Developmental Psychology, 40(4), 621–32.Google Scholar
Goldfield, B. A., & Reznick, J. S. (1990). Early lexical acquisition: rate, content, and the vocabulary spurt. Journal of Child Language, 17(1), 171–83.Google Scholar
Gonçalves, F. (2004). Riqueza morfológica e aquisição da sintaxe em Português Europeu e Brasileiro [Morphology and syntax acquisition in European and Brazilian Portuguese]. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Évora, Portugal.Google Scholar
Hilbe, J. (2014). Modeling count data. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Hoff, E. (2006). How social contexts support and shape language development. Developmental Review, 26(1), 55–88.Google Scholar
Hoyle, R. H. (2012). Handbook of structural equation modeling. New York: Guilford Press.Google Scholar
Huttenlocher, J., Haight, W., Bryk, A., Seltzer, M., & Lyons, T. (1991). Early vocabulary growth: relation to language input and gender. Developmental Psychology, 27(2), 236–48.Google Scholar
Jackson-Maldonado, D., Thal, D., Marchman, V., Fenson, L., Newton, T., & Conboy, B. T. (2003). CDI Inventarios MacArthur-Bates del Desarrollo de Habilidades Comunicativas [CDI MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories]. Baltimore, MD: Brookes Publishing.Google Scholar
Klee, T., & Fitzgerald, M. D. (1985). The relation between grammatical development and mean length of utterance in morphemes. Journal of Child Language, 12(2), 251–69.Google Scholar
Klee, T., Schaffer, M., May, S., Membrino, I., & Mougey, K. (1989). A comparison of the age-mlu relation in normal and specifically language-impaired preschool children. Journal of Speech and Hearing Disorders, 54, 226–33.Google Scholar
Kleiber, C., & Zeileis, A. (2008). Applied econometrics with R. New York: Springer-Verlag.Google Scholar
Kuznetsova, A., Brockhoff, P. B., & Christensen, R. H. B. (2017). lmerTest package: tests in linear mixed effects models. Journal of Statistical Software, 82(13), 1–26.Google Scholar
Law, J., & Roy, P. (2008). Parental report of infant language skills: a review of the development and application of the Communicative Development Inventories. Child and Adolescent Mental Health, 13(4), 198–206.Google Scholar
Linton, T., & Kester, D. (2003). Exploring the achievement gap between white and minority students in Texas. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 11, 10. doi.org/10.14507/epaa.v11n10.2003Google Scholar
Lobo, M., Santos, A. L., & Soares-Jesel, C. (2016). Syntactic structure and information structure: the acquisition of Portuguese clefts and be-fragments. Language Acquisition, 23(2), 142–74.Google Scholar
López-Ornat, S., Gallego, C., Gallo, P., Karousou, A., Mariscal, S., & Martínez, M. (2005). Inventario de Desarrollo Comunicativo MacArthur. Madrid: TEA Ediciones, S.A.Google Scholar
Mariscal, S., López-Ornat, S., Gallego, C., Gallo, P., Karousou, A., & Martínez, M. (2007). La evaluación del desarrollo comunicativo y linguístico mediante la versión española de los inventários MacArthur-Bates. Psicothema, 19(2), 190–7.Google Scholar
Marjanovič-Umek, L., Fekonja-Peklaj, U., & Podlesek, A. (2013). Characteristics of early vocabulary and grammar development in Slovenian-speaking infants and toddlers: a CDI-adaptation study. Journal of Child Language, 40(4), 779–98.Google Scholar
Marjanovič-Umek, L., Fekonja-Peklaj, U., & Sočan, G. (2017). Early vocabulary, parental education, and the frequency of shared reading as predictors of toddler's vocabulary and grammar at age 2;7: a Slovenian longitudinal CDI study. Journal of Child Language, 44(2), 457–79.Google Scholar
Masur, E. F., Flynn, V., & Eichorst, D. L. (2005). Maternal responsive and directive behaviours and utterances as predictors of children's lexical development. Journal of Child Language, 32(1), 63–91.Google Scholar
McGillion, M., Herbert, J. S., Pine, J., Vihman, M., DePaolis, R., Keren-Portnoy, T., & Matthews, D. (2017). What paves the way to conventional language? The predictive value of babble, pointing, and socioeconomic status. Child Development, 88(1), 156–66.Google Scholar
Miller, J., & Chapman, R. (1981). The relation between age and mean length of utterance in morphemes. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research, 24, 154–61.Google Scholar
Newman, D. A. (2014). Missing data: five practical guidelines. Organizational Research Methods, 17(4), 372–411.Google Scholar
Pan, B. A., Rowe, M. L., Singer, J. D., & Snow, C. E. (2005). Maternal correlates of growth in toddler vocabulary production in low-income families. Child Development, 76(4), 763–82.Google Scholar
Parisse, C., & Le Normand, M. T. (2000). How children build their morphosyntax: the case of French. Journal of Child Language, 27(2), 267–92.Google Scholar
Pérez-Leroux, A. T., Castilla-Earls, A. P., & Brunner, J. (2012). General and specific effects of lexicon in grammar: determiner and object pronoun omissions in Child Spanish. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 55, 313–27.Google Scholar
Pérez-Pereira, M., & Resches, M. (2011). Concurrent and predictive validity of the Galician CDI. Journal of Child Language, 38(1), 121–40.Google Scholar
Pérez-Pereira, M., & Soto, X. (2003). El diagnóstico del desarrollo comunicativo en la primera infancia: Adaptación de las escalas MacArthur al gallego. Psicothema, 15(3), 352–61.Google Scholar
Reese, E., & Read, S. (2000). Predictive validity of the New Zealand MacArthur Communicative Development Inventory: Words and Sentences. Journal of Child Language, 27(2), 255–66.Google Scholar
Rice, M. L., Redmond, S. M., & Hoffman, L. (2006). Mean length of utterance in children with SLI and younger controls shows concurrent validity and stable and parallel growth trajectories. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 49, 793–809.Google Scholar
Rodrigues, S. L., Rodrigues, R. C., São-João, T., Pavan, R. B., Padilha, K. M., & Gallani, M. C. (2013). Impact of the disease: acceptability, ceiling and floor effects and reliability of an instrument on heart failure. Revista Da Escola de Enfermagem Da USP, 47(5), 1091–8.Google Scholar
Rollins, P. R., Snow, C. E., & Willett, J. B. (1996). Predictors of MLU: semantic and morphological developments. First Language, 16, 243–59.Google Scholar
Rondal, J. A., Ghiotto, M., Bredart, S., & Bachelet, J. (1987). Age-relation, reliability and grammatical validity of measures of utterance length. Journal of Child Language, 14(3), 433–46.Google Scholar
Rosseel, Y. (2012). lavaan: an R package for structural equation modeling. Journal of Statistical Software, 48(2), 1–36.Google Scholar
Rowe, M., Raudenbusch, S., & Goldin-Meadow, S. (2012). The pace of vocabulary growth helps predict later vocabulary skill. Child Development, 83(2), 508–25.Google Scholar
Santos, A. L. (2009). Minimal answers: ellipsis, syntax and discourse in the acquisition of European Portuguese. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Santos, A. L., Rothman, J., Pires, A., & Duarte, I. (2013). Early or late acquisition of inflected infinitives in European Portuguese? Evidence from spontaneous production data. In Becker, M., Grinstead, J., & Rothman, J. (Eds.), Generative linguistics and acquisition: studies in honor of Nina M. Hyams (pp. 65–88). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Scarborough, H. S., Rescorla, L., Tager-Flusberg, H., Fowler, A. E., & Sudhalter, V. (1991). The relation of utterance lenght to grammatical complexity in normal and language-disordered groups. Applied Psycholinguistics, 12, 23–45.Google Scholar
Scarborough, H. S., Wyckoff, J., & Davidson, R. (1986). A reconsideration of the relation between age and mean length of utterance. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research, 29, 394–9.Google Scholar
Schlomer, G. L., Bauman, S., & Card, N. A. (2010). Best practices for missing data management in counseling psychology. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 57(1), 1–10.Google Scholar
Schults, A., Tulviste, T., & Konstabel, K. (2012). Early vocabulary and gestures in Estonian children. Journal of Child Language, 39(3), 664–86.Google Scholar
Shrout, P. E., & Bolger, N. (2002). Mediation in experimental and nonexperimental studies: new procedures and recommendations. Psychological Methods, 7, 422–45.Google Scholar
Silva, C., Cadime, I., Ribeiro, I., Santos, S., Santos, A. L., & Viana, F. L. (2017). Parents’ reports of lexical and grammatical aspects of toddlers’ language in European Portuguese: developmental trends, age and gender differences. First Language, 37(3), 267–84.Google Scholar
Simonsen, H. G., Kristoffersen, K. E., Bleses, D., Wehberg, S., & Jorgensen, R. N. (2014). The Norwegian Communicative Development Inventories: reliability, main developmental trends and gender differences. First Language, 34(1), 3–23.Google Scholar
Soares, C. (2006). La syntaxe de la périphérie gauche en Portugais Européen et son acquisition. Unpublished PhD thesis, Université Paris 8.Google Scholar
Stolt, S., Haataja, L., Lapinleimu, H., & Lehtonen, L. (2008). Early lexical development of Finnish children: a longitudinal study. First Language, 28(3), 259–79.Google Scholar
Szagun, G., Steinbrink, C., Franik, M., & Stumper, B. (2006). Development of vocabulary and grammar in young German-speaking children assessed with a German language development inventory. First Language, 26(3), 259–80.Google Scholar
Trudeau, N., & Sutton, A. (2011). Expressive vocabulary and early grammar of 16- to 30-month-old children acquiring Quebec French. First Language, 31(4), 480–507.Google Scholar
Uttl, B. (2005). Measurement of individual differences: lessons from memory assessment in research and clinical practice. Psychological Science, 47, 460–7.Google Scholar
Viana, F. L., Cadime, I., Silva, C., Santos, A. L., Ribeiro, I., Santos, S., … Monteiro, J. (2017). Os Inventários de Desenvolvimento Comunicativo de MacArthur-Bates: Manual técnico [The MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories: technical manual]. Maia: Lusoinfo.Google Scholar
Viana, F. L., Pérez-Pereira, M., Cadime, I., Silva, C., Santos, S., & Ribeiro, I. (2017). Lexical, morphological and syntactic development in toddlers between 16 and 30 months old: a comparison across European Portuguese and Galician. First Language, 37(3), 285–300.Google Scholar
Wang, L., Zhang, Z., McArdle, J. J., & Salthouse, T. A. (2009). Investigating ceiling effects in longitudinal data analysis. Multivariate Behavioral Research, 43(3), 476–96.Google Scholar
Warner, R. M. (2013). Applied statistics: from bivariate through multivariate techniques. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.Google Scholar