Akiyama M M, Wilcox S A
Department of Behavioral Sciences, University of Michigan, Dearborn 48128.
J Child Lang. 1993 Jun;20(2):419-35. doi: 10.1017/s0305000900008357.
We examined whether children rely on linguistic information (i.e. mass vs. count nouns) or object category information (i.e. objects vs. substances) when they name things. A grinder test was used, in which substances (e.g. water) maintain identity through transformation but objects (e.g. a cup) do not. Thirty children aged three through six were asked if the same name could be used for the same item after transformation. The items included pairs of amorphous substances and discrete objects (e.g. water--a cup), perceptually similar discrete objects (e.g. chalk--a crayon), and food items (e.g. corn--a bean). Children accepted the same name for food, ignoring linguistic information, and for objects, relying on linguistic information. In Experiment 2, 32 children aged five through eight were asked if the same name could be used for unfamiliar hardware and food items after transformation when they were labelled by nonsense mass and count nouns. Children tended to use the same name for food, relying on perceptual information. These results are discussed in terms of the active conceptualization about names of objects in relation to object characteristics.
我们研究了儿童在命名事物时是依赖语言信息（即物质名词与可数名词）还是物体类别信息（即物体与物质）。我们采用了一项研磨机测试，在该测试中，物质（如水）在转变过程中保持其同一性，而物体（如杯子）则不然。我们询问了30名年龄在3至6岁的儿童，同一物品在转变后是否可以使用相同的名称。这些物品包括无定形物质与离散物体的配对（如水——杯子）、在感知上相似的离散物体（如粉笔——蜡笔）以及食品（如玉米——豆子）。儿童在给食品命名时忽略语言信息而接受相同的名称，而给物体命名时则依赖语言信息。在实验2中，我们询问了32名年龄在5至8岁的儿童，当用无意义的物质名词和可数名词对不熟悉的五金器具和食品进行标记后，同一物品在转变后是否可以使用相同的名称。儿童倾向于根据感知信息给食品使用相同的名称。我们根据与物体特征相关的关于物体名称的主动概念化来讨论这些结果。
