Comparing late talker and typically developing toddlers' receptive verb vocabularies

This paper is currently under review. The study assess late talkers and typically developing children’s receptive verb vocabularies. 45 toddlers (N(late talkers) = 14; N(typically developing) = 31; M(age) = 28.5 months, SD(age) = 3 months) participated in an eye tracking task in which they saw referent actions depicted as dynamic scenes and were asked which depicted the target verb. Eye gaze was analyzed to determine children’s accuracy (i.e., how many verbs the knew) and latency (i.e., how quickly they process those verbs). We conclude that eye gaze can be reliably used to assess receptive verb vocabulary in late talkers and typically developing children, but that eye gaze measures must be tailored to reflect behavioral differences on this task.

本文目前正处于审阅阶段。研究评估了迟语儿童及正常发育儿童的理解性动词词汇。共有45名幼儿（迟语儿童数量为14名，正常发育儿童数量为31名，平均年龄为28.5个月，年龄标准差为3个月）参与了眼动追踪任务，在该任务中，他们观看了以动态场景描绘的指代动作，并被要求判断哪个场景描绘了目标动词。通过分析眼动轨迹，我们确定了儿童的准确性（即他们所知动词的数量）和反应时间（即他们处理这些动词的速度）。我们得出结论，眼动追踪可以可靠地用于评估迟语儿童及正常发育儿童的理解性动词词汇，但眼动追踪的测量指标必须针对该任务中的行为差异进行定制。