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Assumptions about Word Meaning: Individuation and Basic‐Level Kinds
Author(s) -
Hall D. Geoffrey,
Waxman Sandra R.
Publication year - 1993
Publication title -
child development
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.103
H-Index - 257
eISSN - 1467-8624
pISSN - 0009-3920
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-8624.1993.tb02970.x
Subject(s) - psychology , individuation , meaning (existential) , word (group theory) , linguistics , cognitive psychology , developmental psychology , communication , cognitive science , psychoanalysis , psychotherapist , philosophy
In 2 experiments, 3 1/2‐year‐old children interpreted a novel count noun (e.g., “This is a murvil”) applied to an unfamiliar stuffed animal as referring to a basic‐level kind, rather than to a kind that individuates its members by type of situation (context or life‐phase). For example, children made interpretations akin to PERSON (a basic‐level kind) rather than PASSENGER (a context‐restricted kind), and DOG (a basic‐level kind) rather than PUPPY (a life‐phase‐restricted kind). These experiments also document the role of object familiarity (previous knowledge of a basic‐level count noun for the animal) and explicit information (about the relevance of the animal's situation) in the learning of count nouns for situation‐restricted kinds. We note that children readily learn the meanings of basic‐level count nouns through ostensive definitions (e.g., “This is an X”), although ostensive definitions do not distinguish basic‐level kinds from situation‐restricted kinds. Therefore, we suggest that children make an implicit assumption that a count noun applied to an unfamiliar solid object refers to a basic‐level kind of object, and not to a kind that individuates its members by type of situation. We illustrate the importance of this assumption by showing how it bears directly on individuation, and therefore, on quantification (e.g., counting).