Rights statement: © 2016 American Psychological Association. This article may not exactly replicate the final version published in the APA journal. It is not the copy of record.
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Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Children's processing and comprehension of complex sentences containing temporal connectives
T2 - the influence of memory on the time course of accurate responses
AU - Blything, Liam Peter
AU - Cain, Katherine Elizabeth
N1 - © 2016 American Psychological Association. This article may not exactly replicate the final version published in the APA journal. It is not the copy of record.
PY - 2016/10/1
Y1 - 2016/10/1
N2 - In a touch screen paradigm, we recorded 3- to 7-year-olds’ (N = 108) accuracy and response times to assess their comprehension of two-clause sentences containing before and after. Children were influenced by order: performance was most accurate when the presentation order of the two clauses matched the chronological order of events: ‘She drank the juice, before she walked in the park’ (chronological order) vs ‘Before she walked in the park, she drank the juice’ (reverse order). Differences in response times for correct responses varied by sentence type: accurate responses were made more speedily for sentences that afforded an incremental processing of meaning. An independent measure of memory predicted this pattern of performance. We discuss these findings in relation to children’s knowledge of connective meaning and the processing requirements of sentences containing temporal connectives.
AB - In a touch screen paradigm, we recorded 3- to 7-year-olds’ (N = 108) accuracy and response times to assess their comprehension of two-clause sentences containing before and after. Children were influenced by order: performance was most accurate when the presentation order of the two clauses matched the chronological order of events: ‘She drank the juice, before she walked in the park’ (chronological order) vs ‘Before she walked in the park, she drank the juice’ (reverse order). Differences in response times for correct responses varied by sentence type: accurate responses were made more speedily for sentences that afforded an incremental processing of meaning. An independent measure of memory predicted this pattern of performance. We discuss these findings in relation to children’s knowledge of connective meaning and the processing requirements of sentences containing temporal connectives.
KW - temporal connectives
KW - incremental processing
KW - memory
KW - language acquisition
KW - response times
U2 - 10.1037/dev0000201
DO - 10.1037/dev0000201
M3 - Journal article
VL - 52
SP - 1517
EP - 1529
JO - Developmental Psychology
JF - Developmental Psychology
SN - 0012-1649
IS - 10
ER -