Kristina Nilsson Björkenstam

Modelling the informativeness and timing of non-verbal cues in parent–child interaction

How do infants learn the meanings of their first words? This study investigates the informativeness and temporal dynamics of non-verbal cues that signal the speakers referent in a model of early w ...

Frequency filter: an open access tool for analysing language development

ABSTRACT We present an open-access analytic tool, which allows researchers to simultaneously control for and combine language data from the child, the caregiver, multiple languages, and across multiple time points to make inferences about the social and cognitive factors driving the shape of language development. We demonstrate how the tool works in three domains of language learning and across six languages. The results demonstrate the usefulness of this approach as well as providing deeper insight into three areas of language production and acquisition: egocentric language use, the learnability of nouns versus verbs, and imageability. We have made the Frequency Filter tool freely available as an R-package for other researchers to use at https://github.com/rosemm/FrequencyFilter.

Longitudinal Studies of Variation Sets in Child-directed Speech

One of the characteristics of child-directed speech is its high degree of repetitiousness. Sequences of repetitious utterances with a constant intention, variation sets, have been shown to be corre ...