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Object word learning can be based on infant-related factors such as their manual actions and socio-linguistic factors such as parental input. Specific input for spatial features (i.e., size, shape, features of objects) can be related to object word comprehension in early vocabulary development. In a longitudinal study, we investigated whether fine motor abilities at 14 months and parental input for spatial features at 19 months predicted object word comprehension at 25 months. Twenty-seven Turkish-learning children were tested at three time points (Time 1: M[subscript age] = 14.4 months, Time 2: M[subscript age] = 18.6 months, Time 3: M[subscript age] = 25 months). We measured word comprehension through the parental report and fine motor abilities with Mullen at Time 1. We used a puzzle play session to assess parental input for spatial features at Time 2 and a standardized receptive vocabulary test at Time 3. We found that fine motor abilities were related to object word comprehension. However, parental input for spatial features at 19 months predicted object word comprehension at 25 months beyond fine motor abilities at 14 months. Early fine motor abilities and using different words for spatial features may foster infants' visual experiences in play and exploration episodes, leading to better object word learning.

Before infants produce words, they can discriminate changes in motion event components such as manner (how an action is performed) and path (trajectory of an action). Individual differences in nonlinguistic event categorization are related to children's later verb comprehension (Konishi, Stahl, Golinkoff, & Hirsh-Pasek, 2016). We asked: (a) Do infants learning Turkish, a verb-framed language, attend to both manner and path changes in motion events? (b) Is early detection of path and manner related to children's later verb comprehension and (c) how they describe motion events? Thirty-two Turkish-reared children were tested at three time points. At Time 1, infants (M[subscript age] = 14.5 months) were tested on their detection of changes in path and manner using the Preferential Looking Paradigm. At Time 2, children were tested on their receptive language skills (M[subscript age] = 22.07 months). At Time 3, children performed 3 tasks (M[subscript age] = 35.05 months): a verb comprehension task, an event description task depicting motion events with different path and manner combinations, and an expressive language task. The ability to detect changes in event components at Time 1 predicted verb comprehension abilities at Time 3, beyond general receptive and expressive vocabulary skills at Times 2 and 3. Infants who noticed changes in path and manner at Time 1 used fewer manner-only descriptions and more path-any descriptions (i.e., descriptions that included a path component with or without manner) in their speech at Time 3. These findings suggest that early detection of event components is associated not only with verb comprehension, but also with how children lexicalize event components in line with their native language.

Many training programs have aimed to improve creative thinking abilities in various settings. The study of relevant literature revealed a relatively lower number of creativity programs for children than those developed for adults. The current work introduces a new and comprehensive nineweek long creativity intervention program implemented (out of school-setting) in 8- to 11-year-old children of socioeconomically disadvantaged families in Turkey. The intervention program was organized around four main themes (Persona, Object, Surrounding, Experience) and composed of nine activities: collection making, identity box, building a memory-device, designing an object, sensory mapping, designing a space, visual storytelling, exploring an imaginary planet, and solving a social conflict. Children (n = 159) were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups, and they took the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking both before and after the intervention. Results showed that children in the experimental group had significantly higher verbal fluency and originality scores at the posttest compared to the control group. These results provide further evidence for the trainability of creativity and introduce a novel, affordable creativity intervention program that is feasible enough to be implemented in and out of the school setting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Language-dependent recall refers to the language-specific retrieval of memories in which the retrieval success depends on the match between the languages of encoding and retrieval. The present study investigated language-dependent recall in terms of memory accuracy, false memory, and episodic memory characteristics in the free recall of fictional stories. We also asked how language-dependent memories were influenced by language proficiency and visual imagery. One hundred and thirty-seven native Turkish (L1) speakers who were second-language learners of English (L2) were divided into four groups in which they read fictional stories and then recalled them: (1) Turkish reading–Turkish recall, (2) English reading–English recall, (3) English reading–Turkish recall, (4) Turkish reading–English recall. Regardless of the match between L1 or L2, accuracy was higher when participants read and recalled the stories in the same language than when they did it in different languages, showing the language-dependent recall effect. Notably, the effect of match or mismatch between encoding and retrieval languages on accuracy did not depend on L2 proficiency and visual imagery. In addition, false memories were salient, particularly for participants who read the stories in L2 but retrieved them in L1. Overall, our findings suggest that accuracy-oriented memory research provides a comprehensive investigation of language-dependent recall, addressing the links of language-dependent memories with accuracy, false memory, and episodic memory characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sound symbols, such as "woof woof" for a dog's barking, imitate the physical properties of their referents. Turkish is a sound symbolically rich language that allows flexible use of such words in different linguistic forms. The current study examined Turkish‐speaking parents' use of sound symbolic words to their 14‐ and 20‐month‐olds and the concurrent and longitudinal relations between parents' sound symbolic input and infants' vocabulary knowledge. Thirty‐four (n = 34) infants were observed at Time‐1 (Mage = 14.23 months, SD = 1.11) and Time‐2 (Mage = 20.30 months, SD = 1.24) during free play sessions with their parents to examine parental input. Infants' vocabulary knowledge was assessed by a parental report. Both the quantity and quality of parental sound symbolic input changed between 14 and 20 months of age. Furthermore, infants' earlier vocabulary knowledge at 14 months negatively predicted parents' later sound symbolic input at 20 months. Last, parents' sound symbolic input was positively and concurrently associated with 14‐month‐olds' vocabulary knowledge but was negatively and concurrently associated with 20‐month‐olds' vocabulary levels. These findings suggest an early interaction between infants' exposure to sound symbolic input and their vocabulary development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Object word learning can be based on infant‐related factors such as their manual actions and socio‐linguistic factors such as parental input. Specific input for spatial features (i.e., size, shape, features of objects) can be related to object word comprehension in early vocabulary development. In a longitudinal study, we investigated whether fine motor abilities at 14 months and parental input for spatial features at 19 months predicted object word comprehension at 25 months. Twenty‐seven Turkish‐learning children were tested at three time points (Time 1: Mage = 14.4 months, Time 2: Mage = 18.6 months, Time 3: Mage = 25 months). We measured word comprehension through the parental report and fine motor abilities with Mullen at Time 1. We used a puzzle play session to assess parental input for spatial features at Time 2 and a standardized receptive vocabulary test at Time 3. We found that fine motor abilities were related to object word comprehension. However, parental input for spatial features at 19 months predicted object word comprehension at 25 months beyond fine motor abilities at 14 months. Early fine motor abilities and using different words for spatial features may foster infants' visual experiences in play and exploration episodes, leading to better object word learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST) is one of the most widely used complex EF task for various populations. However, it seems questionable to employ the task for preschool‐aged children due to their lack of numerical efficiency while sorting cards according to the number dimension. The present study aimed to examine the association of numeracy skills with different EF‐related abilities as measured by the WCST. For the assessment of numeracy skills, we used the Early Numeracy Test (ENT). One hundred and fourteen Turkish children between the ages of 5 and 8 were administered the WCST and ENT in a counterbalanced order. Results revealed a significant correlation only between the three ENT scores and the concept formation factor of the WCST, indicating a significant relationship between the WCST performance and numeracy skills in terms of concept formation. This finding highlights the specific relation between numeracy skills and subcomponents of the WCST and points to potential interfering variables that should be taken into account while evaluating the scores of the sorting tasks for children between the ages of 5 and 8. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Listeners are sensitive to speakers' co-speech iconic gestures. Concurrent visual and verbal information compete for attentional resources during multimodal comprehension. The current study examined the role of individual differences in visual-spatial vs. verbal abilities on individuals' differential sensitivity to gestural vs. spoken expressions. Turkish-speaking adults (N = 83) were tested on their sensitivity to concurrent gesture vs. speech in an online task (Kelly, S. D., Özyürek, A., & Maris, E. (2010a). Two sides of the same coin. Psychological Science, 21(2), 260–267) and were administered spatial and verbal working memory measures. Participants were slower and less accurate when gesture and speech were incongruent to one another compared to the baseline condition, in which they expressed congruent information. People with higher spatial working memory capacity were more efficient in processing gestures whereas people with higher verbal working memory capacity were more sensitive to spoken expressions. These suggest that not all people are equally sensitive to co-speech gestures and some people may benefit more from gestures during comprehension. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parents' use of spatial language and gestures is closely linked to children's spatial language development. Little is known about the quantity and quality of early spatial input and how infants' individual characteristics may be related to the spatial input they receive. Here, we examine (1) the amount and type of spatial input 16‐ to 21‐month‐old Turkish‐learning children (n = 34) received in the context of a spatial activity (puzzle play) and (2) whether parental spatial input in the form of speech and gesture varies based on children's age, sex, and early spatial vocabulary comprehension assessed in an earlier session. Results of the regression analyses showed that parents' use of spatial words was predicted by children's age over and beyond earlier spatial word comprehension and sex. In particular, parents used more spatial speech as their children got older even in this restricted age range. Children's early spatial word comprehension also correlated with parents' spatial word production. Yet, parents' overall gesture use and gestures with spatial words were not predicted by children's age, sex, or early spatial word comprehension. These findings suggest that in the spatial domain, early verbal input, but not gestural input, can change depending on children's age and children's spatial vocabulary comprehension may also be related to parental use of later spatial language. Statement of contributionWhat is already known on this subject?Parents enhance their children's spatial skills using spatial language and gestures.Parental spatial talk is related to children's later spatial skills.What does this study add?We assess both spatial talk and gesture in early childhood.We examine the children's characteristics (age, sex) in relation to spatial talk and gesture.We present how children's earlier vocabulary competence relates to parental input. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gestures help speakers and listeners during communication and thinking, particularly for visual-spatial information. Speakers tend to use gestures to complement the accompanying spoken deictic constructions, such as demonstratives, when communicating spatial information (e.g., saying "The candle is here " and gesturing to the right side to express that the candle is on the speaker's right). Visual information conveyed by gestures enhances listeners' comprehension. Whether and how listeners allocate overt visual attention to gestures in different speech contexts is mostly unknown. We asked if (a) listeners gazed at gestures more when they complement demonstratives in speech (" here ") compared to when they express redundant information to speech (e.g., " right ") and (b) gazing at gestures related to listeners' information uptake from those gestures. We demonstrated that listeners fixated gestures more when they expressed complementary than redundant information in the accompanying speech. Moreover, overt visual attention to gestures did not predict listeners' comprehension. These results suggest that the heightened communicative value of gestures as signaled by external cues, such as demonstratives, guides listeners' visual attention to gestures. However, overt visual attention does not seem to be necessary to extract the cued information from the multimodal message. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

How might syntactic bootstrapping apply in Turkish, which employs inflectional morphology to indicate grammatical relations and allows argument ellipsis? We investigated whether Turkish speakers interpret constructions differently depending on the number of NPs in the sentence, the presence of accusative case marking and the causative morpheme. Data were collected from 60 child speakers and 16 adults. In an adaptation of Naigles, Gleitman & Gleitman (1993), the participants acted out sentences (6 transitive and 6 intransitive verbs in four different frames). The enactments were coded for causativity. Causative enactments increased in two-argument frames and decreased in one-argument frames, albeit to a lesser extent than previously found in English. This effect was generally stronger in children than in adults. Causative enactments increased when the accusative case marker was present. The causative morpheme yielded no increase in causative enactments. These findings highlight roles for morphological and syntactic cues in verb learning by Turkish children.