CHILDREN'S UNDERSTANDING
OF RELATIO‘NAL TERMS

Dissertation for the Degree of Ph. D.
MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY
ELISSA LYNN GATLIN 7
I 1976

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This is to certify that the

thesis entitled

CHILDREN'S UNDERSTANDING OF RELATIONAL TERMS

presented by

Elissa Lynn Gatlin

has been accepted towards fulfillment
of the requirements for

Ph.D. degree in Audiology 8 Speech
Sciences

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Major professor

 

Date II‘IZ' 6

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ABSTRACT
CHILDREN'S UNDERSTANDING OF RELATIONAL TERMS

By
Elissa Lynn Gatlin

The focus of this investigation was to study the
development of children's understanding of the relational
terms classified as spatial terms. Additionally, this
study sought to identify the terms that children produce
to express the relationships implied by the relational
terms and to identify nonlinguistic strategies that children
use in early language acquisition.

Relational terms is a broad category which indicates
particular ways in which objects, events, and actions
relate to each other. Spatial terms are a special subset
of this broad category which more specifically indicate the
ways in which, under the conditions of this study, objects
relate to each other. E. Clark (1973) pr0posed a theory
that applies to spatial terms. According to her, children's
apparent comprehension of certain words is at first combina-
tion of their linguistic knoWledge about a word's meaning
and certain nonlinguistic strategies which are based on
their perceptual knowledge of objects and events and con-

ceptual knowledge about relations.

Elissa Lynn Gatlin

The terms studied were: in, on, under, ahead of,
beside, behind, into, onto, underneath, in front of, along
side of, and in back of. The subjects were sixty Black
and sixty White girls ages 2.5-4.11. There were two
experimental tasks. In the first experimental situation--
labeled the comprehension task--the child was asked to
manipulate six reference point objects and six toy animals
with respect to instructions given by the experimenter for
a total of thirty-six instructions. In the second experi—
mental situation--labe1ed the production task-—the child
was asked to verbally describe the researcher's object
manipulations for a total of twelve instructions. Bach
response was tape recorded.

The results of Task I were analyzed by the variables
of race, age, spatial terms, and reference point objects.
The results showed that the variable of age was the signi-
ficant effect. The developmental pattern of the terms was
under, underneath, in front of, in back of, behind, along
side of, beside, and ahead of from early to later developing
terms. In, into, on and onto appeared to develop earliest.

The terms were divided into two groups--primary set
and secondary set. The primary set was the terms which
were thought to be less complex--semantically and
perceptually--than the terms in the secondary set, which
was composed of terms similar in meaning. The results
showed the primary set to be in front of, along side of,
and in back of and the secondary set to be ahead of,

beside, and behind. In, into, on and onto were all

 

Elissa Lynn Gatlin
comprehended equally. Under and underneath were responded
to as the same term with only a small difference in means.

The results of Task II showed that the children used
terms in the primary set to describe the object relation-
ships demonstrated. In this study, once the children
comprehended a term tested, they had a term to express
the relationship indicated.

Analyses of data revealed the kinds of errors children
made relative to the reference point objects with respect
to in and on. Additional nonlinguistic strategies, for
the terms studied, were also suggested from the analyses.

Suggestions were made for language assessment and
therapy. In therapy, it was suggested that the least
complex terms be used. Implications for further research
were also indicated. Among them were that more spatial
terms be tested to determine if the developmental pattern
suggested would hold true and that the influence of birth
order be researched for possible influence on the develop-

ment of comprehension of spatial terms.

CHILDREN'S UNDERSTANDING OF RELATIONAL TERMS

BY
Elissa Lynn Gatlin

A DISSERTATION

Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

Department of Audiology and Speech Sciences

1976

 

To Mother. Thanks.

ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I wish to thank Dr. Linda Gillum for untold hours of
help and uncountable amounts of support given during the
various stages of my research. Thanks, also, to Dr. Helen
Benedict, Dr. Leo Deal and Dr. Ervin Bettinghouse for
their guidance, direction and support.

To the directors, teachers, parents and, of course,
the children, my heartfelt appreciation for your time,
help and consideration during the data gathering stages
of my study.

To David Ruppert, Mark Williamson, and Tina Mitchell,
thank you for making sense out of the statistical data
gathered and, especially to David, for help from the
beginning to the end.

Special thanks to my family and friends, who tolerated
my erratic behavior and gave me much needed kindness, love,

'and encouragement.

iii

fiv‘fie

 

Chapter

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION.

I

II

III
IV

THEORIES OF THE RELATIONSHIP OF COGNITION
AND LANGUAGE . . . . . . . . . . . .

Relational Terms .

Summary Of Review Of Literature and Impli-
cations for Research .

Purpose Of Investigation and Research
Questions.

Definitions. . . .

Factors to be Considered .

EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURES.

Subjects

Equipment. . . .
Procedures with Children .
Analysis Of Data .

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION .

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS.

Implications for Therapy . .

Questions Related to Perceptually Based

Strategies .
Implications for Future Research .

APPENDICES.

A
B

ANALYSIS OF VARIANCE, AGE BY RACE.

CORRELATIONS OF RELATIONAL TERMS

PRINCIPAL COMPONENTS OF RELATIONAL TERMS
CORRELATIONS OF RELATIONAL TERMS . .
PRINCIPAL COMPONENTS OF RELATIONAL TERMS

TASK I, TASK II.
TASK I .
TASK II.
OUTLINE OF RESEARCH STUDY
PARENT INFORMATION AND PERMISSION LETTERS.

iv

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14
16
16
20
20
21
22
24
26
45
47

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52
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56
58
59

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65

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Chapter Page

D OUTLINE OF RESEARCH STUDY
PARENT INFORMATION AND PERMISSION LETTERS. . 67
OUTLINE OF RESEARCH STUDY. . . 68

PARENT INFORMATION AND PERMISSION LETTERS. 70
BIBLIOGRAPHY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72

Table

LIST OF TABLES

Mean percentages of correct responses to
the relational terms . .

Analysis Of variance by age.

Analysis Of variance by race

Errors made relative to reference point
Objects: indicated by percentage and type
Of error response. . . . . . . . .
Comprehension and production Of relational
terms by children: reported by age groups
and percentages. . . . . . . . . . . . .

Varimax rotation Of factors associated with
relational terms . . . . . . . . . . . .

vi

Page

28
29
34

36

37

41

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure Page
1 Developmental pattern Of comprehension Of
relational terms across all subjects by
mean percentage Of correct responses . . . . 32

vii

INTRODUCTION

Children's Understanding Of Relational Terms

 

Language is symbolic behavior and, consequently,
requires concepts, abstractions, logic and other internal
representations for meaning. Chomsky (1965) used the
terms "deep structure Of language" and "the competence
for language performance" tO identify the internal repre-
sentations Of language. Psychologists used the term
conceptual formation tO refer to events inside the language
user which enable, control and specify language.

In the process Of language acquisition, semantic and
syntactic information about relationships between words
must be learned. Until recently, most studies Of language
acquisition dealt with children's language output (speech
production). The primary focus of these studies was
centered on the child's syntactic knowledge as reflected
in the production Of defined categories and relationships
(Brown and Bellugi, 1964; Bloom, 1970). Greater interest
has been focused on the child's comprehension Of language.
Comprehension is defined as an Operational process whereby
the child actively attends tO verbal language not only to
acquire the meaning Of what is heard, but also to become

acquainted with aSpects Of language that he will eventually

2
use. For example, the child hears the upward voice
inflection which comes to indicate a question. MacNamara
(1972) and Others have proposed that infants learn their
language by first determining, independent of language,
the meaning which a speaker intends to convey and then by
working out the relationship between meaning and what is
heard.

Of increasing interest is the idea of the c0gnitive
basis for the development Of language, in general, and Of
comprehension, in particular (Schlesinger, 1973; SlObin,
1973). According to Slobin (1973), "the pacesetter in
linguistic growth is the child's cognitive growth as
Opposed to an autonomous linguistic development which can
reflect back on cognition." There is considerable evidence
that the child's productive language development is closely
related to the mastery Of certain conceptual relationships.
These relationships are encoded in the child's syntax as
language develops (Huttenlocher, 1971).

From the research Of Vygotsky (1963) and Piaget (1962),
it has been proposed that infants' thoughts are more
developed than their language and, consequently, that they
use meaning as a key to the linguistic code. These
researchers emphasized that when the infant begins to
understand language, he has already made Observations about
the world around him, including himself and his activities.
These Observations are based on the infant's interactions
with the environment and himself. Therein is the connec—

tion between cognition and language.

3

The interaction Of cognition and linguistic develop-
ment is constant in the process Of language development.
In E. Clark's view (1973), much Of the cognitive basis for
early language acquisition consists of perceptual informa-
tion which the child has "successfully interpreted and
organized by the time he starts to work on language." Of
particular interest is word meanings. Clark (1973) pro-
posed that, in acquiring the adult meanings Of words,
children employ strategies based on their perceptual under-
standing Of the world.

This study will focus on the acquisition Of meaning
Of relational terms. The terms used in E. Clark's (1973)
study will be included, as well as other similar terms.
The terms used are those designated as relational terms
and are further classified as spatial terms. Relational
terms is defined as a broad category Of words that indi-
cated the particular manner in which Objects, events, and
actions relate to each other. The spatial terms in this
study are prepositions that serve to show the relation-

ship between Objects.

CHAPTER I
THEORIES OF THE RELATIONSHIP OF COGNITION AND LANGUAGE

There has been much research in an attempt to determine
the relationship between language and the better under-
stood aspects of cognition. Along a Paigetian sensori—
motor line, Sinclair (1973a) reports that during the first
two years Of life, children establish "very general cogni-
tive structures composed of systems Of action.” These
systems constitute the basis for many different types of
specific cognitive structures. Sinclair proposed that
certain abilities, which are achieved by the end of the
sensorimotor period, are reflected in Chomskian deep
structures. One example is the ability to comprehend
relations among objects and actions. This ability parallels
the comprehension of basic subject-verb grammatical rela-
tions. Another example is the ability to embed action
patterns into each other and this parallels the rules for
sentence embedding in deep structure. Along that line,
the research of Greenfield, Nelson, and Saltzman (1972)
showed that certain strategies children used with manipu-
lations Of cups and strategies used in the acquisition of
some grammatical structures appeared to be ordered—-

developmentally-—in the same manner. For example, the

 

5
children treated a cup as an acted—upon object and then as
an actor in the same structure. This strategy developed
later than the strategy of the child making multi—cup
constructions in which each cup played a single role. This
pattern is similar to the ability to form relative clauses
in which a single noun phrase functions in two grammatical
roles-—object and subject. This follows the ability to
use and coordinate noun phrases within sentences.

Nelson's (1974) research stressed the importance of
an action strategy in language acquisition; however, she
and others (Benedict, 1976) go one step further by incor-
porating the object into the strategy proposed. Nelson's
model emphasized that first an object is identified by its
functional relations. These relate the object to the
child's self and to other people through a set of acts.
The perceptual analysis, then, is derived from the func-
tional concept. For example, the total picture of the
concept "ball" developed from interactions over time with
the child's self and Others might be as follows:

Functional core relationships:
rolls, bounces

Non—core implicit relationships:
actor, action, location

BALL Optional relationships: possessor
Descriptive features: shape
(round), rigidity (....), color

NamOSi. ”ball", "baseball"

The research of Benedict (1976) supports Nelson's action-

object thesis. Benedict states that "in many senses,

 

6
comprehension is an action-dominated mode, in the sense
that the child's words trigger an action response."

Answers to questions about the specific ways in which
cognition and language are related have led to applications,
with respect to "prerequisites to the teaching of language",
which could help in the learning of language--particularly
for the language disordered child. Inhelder (1966) reported
on the operational assessment method in which the develop—
ment of some cognitive functions, as outlined by Piaget
(1954), were incorporated into a diagnostic method for some
mental disorders. It was shown, for example with the "pre-
psychotic child" (Inhelder, 1966), that in some cases
impairment in reality testing showed an impairment Of
operational activity.

As cognitively based diagnostic methods have been
proposed, so have methods Of therapy. Miller and Yoder
(1972) have developed a cognitively based syntax teaching
program. Their program emphasizes that 1) before the
child becomes a language user, he needs something to say
(concepts), 3 reason for saying it(semantic intent), and
a way to say it (linguistic structure); 2) there are four
critical developmental stages-~single words, word strings,
syntactic constructions, and three word sentences; 3)
throughout the program the clinician works from comprehension
to production; 4) new words and syntactic relationships are
established by supplying the underlying concepts through

environmental manipulations and experiences. Manipulation

7
of the child's environment allows him to experience the
underlying concepts necessary for the comprehension and

expression of words and syntactic relationships.

Relational Terms

 

Relational terms are a specialized subset of language
with Specialized properties. As defined, they are a broad
set of terms that indicate particular manners in which
Objects, events, and actions relate to each other. The
previous theories reviewed established the importance of
underlying cognitive structures. B. Clark and H. Clark
(1973) begin with this basis to propose a theory that
applies specifically to relational terms. H. Clark (1973)
has argued that there is a parallel between linguistic and
cognitive structures in another domain for these terms.
According to him, the properties of spatial terms, in
English and probably in all languages, correspond directly
to man's nonlinguistic structuring of the space around him.
He theorizes that the child acquires spatial terms by
learning how to apply them to prior understanding of per-
ceptual space. More specifically, man's biological endowment,
including in particular his perceptual apparatus, leads him
to develop a particular kind of "perceptual space" which
is characterized by--among other things--a concept Of man's
canonical or normal position, three reference places and
several associated directions which have naturally defined
positive and negative values. These planes are l) a plane

at ground level with upward positive; 2) a vertical left

8
to right plane through the body with forward from the body
positive; 3) a vertical front-to—back plane with leftward
and rightward both positive. He proposed that the proper—
ties of nonlinguistic structuring of perceptual space
coincides with the properties of English spatial terms.
He hypothesized that the child acquires spatial terms by
learning how to apply them to his prior understanding of
perceptual space.

E. Clark (1973) has incorporated H. Clark's basic
hypothesis into investigations of how children use cogni-
tively based strategies in acquiring the meaning of rela-
tional terms. According to E. Clark, children's apparent
comprehension of certain words is at first dependent on
a combination of their linguistic knowledge about a word's
meaning and certain nonlinguistic strategies which are
based on their perceptual knowledge of Objects and events
and conceptual knowledge about relations. From her
research with the spatial prepositions in, on and under,
she identified two nonlinguistic rules that the children
appeared to use in tasks involving manipulations of objects
with respect to each other. For example, the child was
asked to place Object X (a small toy animal) in a reference
point Object Y (a crib). The rules identified were as
follows: Rule l——if the reference point object is a con-
tainer, the child must put the object to be placed in the
reference point object; Rule 2--if the reference point

object has a horizontal surface, the child must put the

 

 

 

IIIIIIIIIIIII::T___________________________________________"r"W

9
object to be placed on the reference point Object. Rule
2 is to be used when Rule 1 does not fit.

E. Clark's (1973) theory also applies to children's
overextensions. The child first acquires the very broad,
general features in learning word meanings. These per-
ceptually based features, for example size and shape, are
coupled with the child's linguistic hypothesis that "a
word refers to some identifiable (perceptual) attribute
of the object pointed to" (Clark, 1974). These linguistic
hypotheses then lead the child to act on the assumption
that the feature he has selected is whatthatparticular
word designates. For example, the child may call all
objects that are round--door knobs, light bulbs, paper-
weights--"ball" because of the feature of roundness
(Clark, 1974).

The child also acquires a notion of dimensionality.
The dimension acquired may appear through direct encoding
of a spatial dimension (high-low on the dimension of
height) or through an abstraction of perceptual space
(like-dislike on the dimension of like). The dimensions
have two ends with the name of the dimension coming from
the positive end. The positive end of the dimension is
the more extended one and the Opposite end is termed the
negative or less extended end of the dimension.

In learning language, the child typically learns to
use and understand the positive, or more extended, end of
a dimension. Donaldson and Wales (1970) reported on the

over-extensions children make to the relative terms "more

10

and less." Wales and Campbell (1970) also reported over~
extensions in children's responses to terms like "tall-
short" and "thick-thin." E. Clark (1973) explained the
children's behavior by saying that, since children do not
have complete meanings for the words, they rely on partial
meanings in combination with certain nonlinguistic strate-
gies. Thus, the children responded with their knowledge
that, for example with more and less, these terms both
refer to amounts (+AMOUNT). The strategies that children
use not only provide information about particular words
but also form the basis for their hypotheses about the
meanings Of new words. As children acquire more features
of a word, they exhibit full semantic knowledge of the word.

Though Clark's theory has been accepted by some, there
are those who Offer alternative suggestions tO perceptually
based strategies. As reported in Bowerman's (1973) summary
of the development Of concepts underlying language, Menyuk
(1973) suggested that the perceptual cues children use in
classifying are hierarchially organized such that children
may initially tend to use color or shape cues as a basis
for responding. Mehler and Bever (1967) suggested that
motivation or reinforcement of the children's responses
may influence the way they respond. Another alternative
suggested was that children have no such strategies and
will manipulate Objects based on personal preferences.
Responses will actually reflect a shift in preference

rather than acquisition or comprehension Of word meanings.

11

Summary Of Review of Literature and
Implications fOr ResearEh

 

 

As summarized by Bowerman (1973), research has sug-
gested that the following kinds of nonlinguistic knowledge
and skills are necessary for language acquisition: the
general ability to represent or symbolize experiences
which may not be perceptually present; the ability to use
consistent and rule-governed strategies in processing
language to arrive at the relationships between meanings
and the linguistic structures by which meanings are
expressed. These rule—governed strategies, in many
instances, derive from the child's nonlinguistic inter-
actions and understanding of the world. Also needed is
the ability to derive appropriate concepts and categories
which are functional in the child's early language rule
system. The child must have, in addition to control of
cognitive structures or basic meanings, methods Of
determining the relationships between meanings and linguis-
tic structures by which meanings are encoded in language.
As stated by Huttenlocher and Higgins (1972), the child
must have first stored a particular type Of perceptual
relation between objects--e.g., above/verticality--termed
perceptual relation schema. There must also be stored an
ordered relation among words in a sentence (termed syntactic
schema) and then the child must have stored a mapping Of
the ordered relation among words into the ordered relation

among Objects.

12

Relational terms, especially spatio-temporal terms,
are used in language diagnostic and intervention methods
with, particularly, the language disordered child who is
beyond the prelanguage age but who does not have the same
ability as the normal language developer. In assessment
and in therapy, children are Often asked to perform a
variety Of relational manipulations. Children are asked
to demonstrate that they understand the relationships
stated. For example, a child might be asked to place a
ball in a cup, in a box, and in a truck. Children are
also asked to identify Objects by responding to statements
with spatio-temporal terms in a stimulus function. A
child might be asked to put a block in a crib where the
child's task is to identify the crib from an array Of
Objects. Incorrect or inappropriate responses are con-
sidered evidence that the child either did not understand
the task or, more commonly, that the child did not under—
stand the relationship stated or did not have the names
for the Objects used. The research of E. Clark (1973) and
Huttenlocher (1968) suggested that the relational terms
used may not be consistent with respect to the development
of the meaning of these terms. That is, the child does
not have the linguistic strategy to make assumptions as
to the meanings of the terms responded to incorrectly.

There is a small amount of information available about
the development Of spatio-temporal terms. Children learn
spatio-temporal terms in a highly ordered fashion based on

complexity of meaning of the terms, and it appears that

13

the terms relating to space are acquired before those
relating to time (Wood, 1976). According to Wood (1976),
the development of some of the more frequently used spatio-
temporal terms is as follows: up-down, in-out, on-off,
above-below, over-under, in front of—in back of, ahead of-
behind, first-last, early-late, befbre-after. The simplest
relationship understood would be up-down, a relationship
which relates an object's position on a vertical axis and
does not involve reference points. As relationships become
more complex, with respect to additional dimensions of
space and time, the relational terms become more difficult
to understand. For example, when reference points are
included, relations like in and on come into play.

Diagnosticians and clinicians frequently interchange
similar relational terms which might be well understood by
the mature language user but which, with the language
learner and disordered child, might be less well under-
stood and, consequently, could result in incorrect or
inappropriate responses to directions for manipulations
of Objects. It is not uncommon, for example, that in/into
or on/onto would be used interchangeably. H. Clark (1973)
suggested that these terms develop at different times with
in having meaning before into. This order is determined
by the cumulative complexity of the incoming spatial infor-
mation and, to some extent, by the order in which the child
learns the properties of perceptual space. From E. Clark's
investigations with antonyms (1972), it has been shown that

the order of acquisition of relational terms will be from

14
the semantically less complex to the more complex where

complexity relates to added dimensions of time and space.

Purpose of Investigation and
Research Questions

 

 

The purpose of this investigation was to study the
development of meanings of the spatial terms in, on, under,
ahead of, beside, and behind; to study the development of
meaning of similar terms--into, onto, underneath, in front
of, along side of, and in back of; to identify the terms
that children have in their productive vocabularies to
express the relationships implied by the relational terms
used; to identify additional strategies that children use
in early language acquisition of relational terms and,
consequently, tO expand the understanding of how the
strategies might work with a broad range of terms.

The following questions were posed for investigation:

1. Can children, ages 2.5-4.11, relate Objects with
respect to the prepositional relationships Of in, on,
under, ahead of, beside, and behind better than chance?

2. Can children, ages 2.5-4.11, relate objects with
respect to prepositions similar to the terms previously
listed--termed the primary set-~better than chance? These
terms-~int0, onto, underneath, in front of, along side of,
and in back of--are designated the secondary set. The
primary set of terms is considered to be less complex and
would be acquired first by children. The secondary set of
terms is considered to be more complex and would be

acquired later.

15

3. Is there a difference, in responding to these
terms, as a function Of race?

4. What is the developmental pattern of the rela-
tional terms labeled the primary set?

5. What is the developmental pattern of the rela—
tional terms labeled the secondary set?

6. Is there a difference in the children's produc-
tion of the primary and secondary sets Of relational
terms?

Null hypotheses are stated as follows:

1. The children will not be able to relate objects
with respect to the prepositional relationships of in, on,
under, ahead of, beside, and behind better than chance.

2. The children will not be able to relate Objects
with respect to the prepositional relationships Of into,
onto, underneath, in front of, along side of, and in back
of better than chance.

3. It is not expected that there will be a difference
in response patterns as a function Of race.

4. There will not be a developmental pattern of the
primary set in, on, under, ahead of, beside, and behind.

5. There will not be a developmental pattern of the
secondary set into, onto, underneath, in front of, along
side of, and in back of. It is not expected that these
terms will develop later than the terms in the primary set.

6. There will not be a production difference between

the terms in the primary set and the secondary set of

16
relational terms. Children will use the terms in the

primary and secondary sets equally.

Definitions

 

There are terms which have specific meaning as they
relate to this study:

Perceptual cognition refers to the way in which the
child perceptually organizes the world and develops
responses based on that organization.

Relational terms is a broad category of terms which
indicates a particular manner in which Objects, events,
and actions relate to each other. The child's understand-
ing Of the terms and relationships specified will be
demonstrated by correct manipulations Of Objects by the
child and by the child's description of manipulations by
the experimenter.

Primary set is a designation Of those relational
terms which are--semantically and perceptually-~not as
complex as the secondary set of terms which here are
designated as terms whose meanings are similar to the
primary set but which are more complex.

Pattern refers to the order of development, of the

terms used in the study, as a function of age and/or race.

Factors to bg_Consider§d'

With respect to individual differences among children,
there is research evidence showing that babbling-~85 a
predictor Of future indices for higher levels of cognitive

development-~is more stable in female children than in male

17
children (Bayley and Schaefer, 1964). Bayley and Schaefer's
data showed that vocalizations and facial fixation time
were more stable in girls than in boys and that these
findings paralleled data indicating greater long term
stability for girls on a variety of cognitive dimensions.
McCarthy's (1954) research also indicated, though not
strongly, that with rate of language acquisition females
outpaced males. Nelson's (1973) research showed that when
specific types of language were considered, there were no
sex differences. Gillum (1976) also reported that, in
judgments Of grammaticality, there were no sex differences.
In view of inclusive research data, the decision was made
to include only girls in this study of cognition and
language.

Numerous researchers have shown differences in the
production patterns of Black and White children (Baratz,
1969; Williams, 1970). Some, like Engelman (1970) and
Bernstein (1970), have suggested that this difference is
indicative Of deficiency in the development of language
and cognitive skills. If Bernstein is correct, then the
White children would be expected to comprehend the rela-
tional terms studied befOre the Black children; there
would also be a difference in the productive vocabularies,
and the Black children would lag behind the White children.
Other researchers, while acknowledging a difference in
Black and White language patterns, have shown that Black
language has as.much communicative value as White language

(Labov, 1970; Baratz, 1970) and that the difference is not

18
an indication Of deficiency in the development of language
and cognitive skills. For example, Gillum's (1976) study
showed that there was no difference between races in
judgments of grammaticality. In the acquisition of
meaning of relational terms, it is expected that there
will be no effect Of race on the response patterns of the
children.

It has been proposed and recently researched that
birth order is an important component of the child's
environment and that it affects personality behavior
(Toman, 1971; Zajonc, 1975). McCarthy's (1954) research
showed a relative slowness of language learning among
younger siblings. When type Of language was considered,

a small difference was found in Nelson's (1973) research.
It is possible, then, that birth order might have an
effect on the development of meaning of the relational
terms in this study.

It had been accepted that comprehension preceded
production at every step of language development. McNeill
(1970) suggested that "children probably add new informa-
tion to their linguistic competence by comprehending
speech." There has been a growing interest in compre-
hension, and questions are being raised that challenge
the once widely held viewpoint. Bloom (1974) proposed
that a likely hypothesis about the developmental rela-
tion between comprehension and speech is that "both speak-

ing and understanding depend upon the same underlying

19
information but each manifests a different performance
mode."

One generative grammar theory is that both compre-
hension and production involve learning the same words
and linguiStic structures with the difference being that
different performance capabilities emerge at different
times. It has also been suggested that comprehension and
production are mutually dependent but have different under-
lying processes, with a resulting shift of influence
between them in the course of language development. This
view suggests that there will be a gap between compres
hension and production that varies among different children
and at different times.

Though there has been no clear resolution Of the
controversy, Bloom (1974) emphasized that the relationship
between comprehension and production is almost certainly
not a static one but shifts and varies according to the
experience of the individual child and the developing
linguistic and cognitive capabilities.

The focus of this investigation will be to study the
development of children's understanding of the relational
terms classified as spatial terms which are prepositions
that specify the ways that objects can relate to each
other. Additionally, this study will seek to identify
the terms that children produce to express the relation—
ships implied by the relational terms and to identify
nonlinguistic strategies that children use in early

language acquisition.

CHAPTER II
EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURES

Subjects
The subjects for this study were 120 preschool girls.

They were selected from the various Lansing area nursery
schools, day care centers, and Head Start programs. Each
center director was contacted, first by telephone, then

by personal visit, to explain the research purpose and
design. With approval from the center directors and
governing boards, parent permission letters were sent to

the parents of all the girls aged 2.5-4.11. The children
included in the study were those for whom parent permissions
were obtained in writing. All of the children selected
were native speakers of English with no other language
contact according to reports from the teachers. All Of the
children were Of normal intelligence as determined by infor-
mation in the school records and reported by the children's
teachers. The children were divided into five age groups
with twenty-four children (twelve Black and twelve White)

in each group. The following information was collected on
each child: age, race, birth order, and receptive vocabu—
lary level as measured by the Peabody Picture Vocabulary

Test (1959).

20

21

Prior to conducting the study, the experimenter
visited the programs from which the children were selected
in order to become acquainted with the children and in
order for the children to become acquainted with the
experimenter. A pilot study was conducted with ten
children, ages 2.5-4.11, to insure that the relational
terms and objects were appropriate. These children were

not included in the actual test population.

Equipment

The objects used in the study were toy animals and
common objects. The test objects (reference point objects)
were made of wood and plastic. All were approximately the
same size (2—1/2 x 5-1/2 inches) and were painted brown to
neutralize possible effects of color preference. These
objects were a box, truck, table, crib, bridge, and tunnel.
The toy animals used were a pig, cat, bird, horse, cow and
dog. All were approximately the same size (1-1/2 x 1 inch)
and were naturally colored. The children's responses, for
Task 1, were recorded on data sheets which specified the
relational term stimulus item; the placement of toy animal
and reference point objects (RP‘s) with respect to stimulus
item; the correct/incorrect response as indicated by animal
placement and comment section. For Task II, the children's
verbal responses were recorded on data sheets indicating
the animal and the RP combination used; the relational term
tested; and the child's verbal response. Each child's

verbal responses were tape recorded on Scotch C—90 cassette

22
tapes using a portable General Electric cassette recorder
model 3-5010 with encased condenser microphone. The tape
recorder was situated approximately one foot in front of
the child during taping. The experimenter was a Black

female native speaker of Standard American English.

Procedures with Children

 

Each child was interviewed separately by the experi—
menter. All of the children went through a two stage
screening procedure. The Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test
(1959) was administered first. The children who did not
meet the receptive vocabulary level criterion set by the
established test norms, for their respective ages, were
excluded from further testing. The experimenter next
administered a screening task to insure that the child
would follow the test instructions. The child was given
four instructions. They were as follows: ”Show me the
ball in the cup (the doll on the chair; the ball on the
chair and the doll in the cup)." The two relational terms
were selected from E. Clark's (1973) study and, from her
research, it was assumed that all of the children in this
study would comprehend those two terms. If the child did
not follow the instructions or missed both of the instruc-
tions with either term, she was excluded from further
testing. The child was asked to name each of six reference
objects (RP's—-box, truck, table, crib, bridge, and tunnel)
and each of six toy animals (cow, dog, horse, pig, bird,

and cat). When the child's names for the test objects

 

23
differed from the experimenter's, the child's names were
used throughout the testing.

In the first experimental situation, the child was
asked to manipulate the RP's and the toy animals with
respect to the instructions given by the experimenter.
The instructions contained the relational terms in, on,
under, ahead of, beside, behind, into, onto, underneath,
in front of, along side of, and in back of. There were
thirty—six instructions given to the child with each of
the twelve relational terms tested three times. The rela—
tional terms were presented in randomized order with
randomized object sets. The instruction form was ”Show
me the X in (on, under, ahead of, beside, behind, into,
onto, underneath, in front of, in back of) the Y" where
X was one of the six toy animals and Y was one of the six
reference point objects. The researcher placed the
reference point object and, after the instruction was
given, the child was given the toy animal to place. The
child's task was to locate correctly the Object X with
RP Y.

The child was then asked to describe the object
manipulations of the researcher. Twelve instructions
were prepared for testing and an additional twelve were
prepared for presentation to retest incorrect responses.
The instruction form was "I'm going to put the X and the
Y like this. What did I do?" The child's task was to
describe the manipulations. For this task no relational

terms were used in the directions as the task was designed

24
to identify the terms that the child used to describe the
relationship displayed. Each description was tape recorded.
The order Of presentation, Of the relational terms and the
Objects and animal pairs, was randomized and presented
once to the child. The individual stimulus items were
repeated twice, if needed, for the child to make a response.
After two times the relational term was tested by using
new object and animal pairs. The items for retest were
presented after the original twelve test items had been
presented. All responses were tape recorded and recorded
on data sheets.

Examples of the experimental situations were as
follows: "Show me the cow in the truck." The child's
task was to place the cow in the truck if the term in
was understood. The second situation was "I'm going tO
put the cow and the truck like this (for example, the
cow was placed in the truck). What did I do?" The
child's task was to describe the manipulation as "You
put the cow in the truck" or a similar response. Total
testing time was approximately 30 minutes per child.

Some of the younger children took a short break half-

way through Task I.

Analysis of Daga

 

The data from Task I were analyzed in terms Of how
the children carried out the instructions. Two of three
correct responses indicated that the child had acquired

the meaning of a given relational term. Raw correct scores

25
were compiled by age and race of the children. These were
converted to mean scores. An analysis of variance was
done for age and race to determine the effects of those
factors on the acquisition Of the meanings of the terms
used in the study. Mean responses were also computed by
birth order, age and race to determine whether there were
effects of the birth order factor, in combination with
age and race, on the acquisition of the terms where age
and race did not appear to have effect. In addition, mean
incorrect responses by reference point Objects were com-
puted to determine patterns of responses as indicated by
the kinds Of responses children made when they did not
have an understanding of a relational term. Varimax
rotational analysis was also conducted to identify the
factors in the relational terms. The tapes were analyzed
to determine by age and race which of the terms used were
part of the children's productive vocabulary; what terms
the children used that were socially acceptable where the
relational terms specified were not used by the children;
and what terms were used when the children did not under-
stand the relational term used and had no socially acceptable

terms in their vocabularies.

CHAPTER III
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The purpose of this investigation was to study the
development of meanings of the spatial terms in, on,
under, ahead of, beside, and behind; to study the develop-
ment Of meaning of terms that are similar-—into, onto,
underneath, in front of, along side of, and in back of;
to identify the terms that children have in their pro-
ductive vocabularies tO express the relationships implied
by the relational terms used; and to identify additional
strategies that children use in early language acquisition
of relational terms.

The following questions were suggested for
investigation:

1. Can children, ages 2.5-4.11, relate Objects with
respect to the prepositional relationships of in, on,
under, ahead of, beside, and behind better than chance?

2. Can children, ages 2.5-4.11, relate Objects with
respect to prepositions similar to the terms previously
listed--termed the primary set--better than chance? These
terms--into, onto, underneath, in front of, along side of,

and in back of—-are designated the secondary set. The

26

27

primary set Of terms is considered tO be less complex and
would be acquired later.

3. Is there a difference, in responding to these
terms, as a function Of race?

4. What is the developmental pattern of the rela-
tional terms labeled the primary set?

5. What is the developmental pattern Of the rela-
tional terms labeled the secondary set?
6. Is there a difference in the children's produc-
tion of the primary and secondary sets of relational terms?
The analysis of the means from this investigation
indicated that girls, ages 2.5-4.11, were able to relate
Objects with respect to the spatial relationships of in,
on, under, into, onto, and underneath better than chance.
The analysis for the mean percentage of correct responses
to each instruction is shown for all ages in Table 1. For
the terms behind, in front of, along side of, and in back
of, the girls ages 3.6—4.11 related the objects better than
chance. For the terms ahead of and beside, only the girls
ages 4.6-4.11 could relate Objects with respect to those
terms better than chance.

Each 2 x 5 analysis of variance was performed, for
the factor Of age, for all of the terms except in, into,
on, and onto. These four terms were excluded because all

Of the children responded with the maximum number of three

correct for each term. The analyses indicated that the
groups differed from each other significantly overall

(Table 2). Age was shown to be the significant factor in

28

 

 

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31
the development of comprehension of the terms studied.
The influence of age reflected the children's increased
experiences with language and increased cognitive develop-
ment which stimulated the development of comprehension of
the terms tested.

Analysis of mean correct responses, by age, indicated
the primary set Of relational terms to be--excluding in,
on, into, and onto--under, in front of, along side of, and
in back of. The secondary set was identified to be under-
neath, ahead of, beside, and behind. For the terms in,
into, on, and onto, the children responded with the maximum
number Of correct responses of three, indicating that by
age 2.5 the children in this study had acquired the meaning
Of those terms. The terms under and underneath were responded
to, also, as similar terms with small differences in mean
responses at all age groups except 4.6-4.11.

Figure 1 shows the developmental pattern Of compre-
hension of the relational terms studied as a function Of
age. The pattern, from most complex to least complex, as
indicated by mean percentages, was ahead of, beside, along
side of, behind, in back of, in front of, underneath, and
under. In, into, on, and onto were equally least complex
and, therefore, the most easily comprehended.

Duncan and Tukey post hoc tests were applied to the
means to identify age groups that might differ significantly
from all age groups. The results of the post hoc tests
showed that there were no groups that differed significantly

from all age groups at the 0.05 level. The results showed

 

 

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33
a linear relationship between age and correct responding
to the relational terms studied.

Eight 2 x 5 analyses Of variance were also performed
for the variable Of race (Table 3). The results showed
that there was no significant effect Of race on the develop-
ment of comprehension of the relational terms studied.

As expected, the younger children made more errors
than the Older children. An an analysis was made of the
types of error that all the children made relative to the
reference point Objects used in the study. That is, if
the child made an incorrect response in the placement of
a toy animal with a reference point Object, what response
did the child make? Table 4 shows the types of errors
made by reference point object and age group. For example,
with the object truck, of the total errors made by age
group I, 60% were the relationship in. This meant that
when the child did not understand the relational term used
or did not understand the relationship indicated, she
placed the toy animal in the truck.

Table 5 shows the children's patterns of comprehen-
sion and production. It shows the percentage of children
who comprehended the relational term presented and the
percentage of those children who used that term or a
socially acceptable equivalent in their productive vocabu-
laries. For example, 21% of the children in age group III
comprehended the term ahead of and all Of them used that
term or a socially acceptable equivalent to express that

relationship. Social acceptability Of verbal responses

34

 

 

 

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35

 

 

 

 

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36

Table 4

Errors made relative to reference point Objects:
indicated by percentage and type of error response

 

 

 

In On Under Other In On Under Other
Ag§_l_ Age IV
truck 60 6 truck 24 2
tunnel 41 27 tunnel 21 4 1
table 22 13 table 8 3
crib 9 crib 1
box 48 box 17
bridge 16 35 bridge 2 2
Age II AEE_X
truck 51 2 truck 5 1
tunnel 47 20 14 l tunnel
table 17 1 table 1
crib 2 . crib
box 42 3 Ibox 1
bridge 8 32 1 bridge
Age 111
truck 24 2
tunnel 26 3 2 1
table 6 3
crib 6 1
box 25 2
bridge 3 12 2

 

 

37

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HOOHO OOH HOOHO OOH HOOHO OOH HOOHO OOH HOOO HO HOOOOHOOOO .O
HOOHO OOH HOOHO OOH HOOHO OOH HOOHO OOH HOOHO OOH OHOO .O
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38
refers to the terms, in the child's productive vocabulary,
which imply the same relationship expressed by the rela-
tional terms used in the study. For example, some of the
children verbally responded to the relationship in as
inside where the terms are somewhat different but the
relationship expressed is the same.

There were some children who did not comprehend the
terms tested or have them in their productive vocabularies,
but they did have an understanding of the relationship
demonstrated and used an appropriate term to express that
relationship. For example, 62% of the children in age
group III responded incorrectly to beside in the compre-
hension task, but they verbally responded with "by" and
"side Of it" when the relationship beside was demonstrated
in the production task.

Between the ages of 3.5-4.5, most Of the meanings of
the terms seemed to develop. The children in this age
range, more than others, used other terms to identify the
relationships tested as indicated by taped responses.
These terms were considered to be socially acceptable
words to identify the relationship implied because, though
they were different terms, the relationship indicated was
the same. For example, for the term along side of, the
children frequently Verbalized the words "by", "next to",
and "on the side."

Those children who neither understood the term pre-
sented nor had a socially acceptable word in their vocabu-

laries to express the relationship responded with "put it

39
there", "put it like that" and the like to the stimulus
"I'm going to put the X and the Y like that. What did I
do?" The children in the younger age range, 2.5—3.5,
were the ones who most Often gave those kinds Of responses.
The children committed very few errors in the production
task. That is, if the child did not have a term for the
relationship demonstrated, for example cow behind truck,
they rarely verbalized an incorrect description Of the
relationship. They would not say cow in the truck or cow
on the truck.

Generally, once the child had an understanding Of the
terms tested, she also had a term to express the relation-
ship indicated. The terms usually verbalized were those
from the primary set. For example, the children in age
group V (4.6-4.11) comprehended ahead of but most Often
used in front of to express the relationship indicated by
ahead of.

The data, from the error analysis (Table 4), gave
support to E. Clark's (1973) rules for relating Objects
with respect to in and on. Rule 1 stated that if the
reference point Object was a container the relationship
indicated was in. Rule 2 stated that if the reference
point object was a flat surface, the relationship indi-
cated was on. It appeared that when the children, in
this study, did not comprehend the term stated they relied
on these rules to make a response.

A factor analysis was performed to group the twelve

relational terms. A Varimax rotation, the final computation

40
of the factor analysis, appears in Table 6. As suggested
by Guttman and adapted by Kaiser,1 all groupings with
latent roots of one or more were accepted as factors. Two
groupings or factors with latent roots of one or more
resulted from the analysis. As pointed out by Child
(1975), "'significant' refers to the size a loading must
attain before we have confidence that it exists at all
and the interpreter of a factor matrix should look for
'conspicuous patterns' formed by the highest correlations."

The first grouping portrayed was ahead of, beside,
behind, in front of, along side of, and in back of. The
terms in Factor I seemed to reflect a laterality or side
space dimension. The terms in Factor 2, under and under-
neath, seemed to reflect an above/below ground space
dimension.

With the terms under and underneath, strategies
appeared to develop along an above/below ground dimension.
That is, the children in this study already comprehended
in/into and on/onto establishing above ground. The next
progression then was to establish its Opposite or below
ground space. Most Of the children, in the youngest age
group (2.5-2.11), comprehended under/underneath. For those
who did not yet comprehend the terms, according to the
factor analysis, the strategy would be to extend perception

Of the above ground dimension to establish the below ground

 

1Child, D., The Essentials of Factor Analysis.
London: Holt, Rinehart and Winston (1975), p. 43.

41

Table 6

Varimax rotation of factors associated
with relational terms

 

Factors
Terms: 1 2
1. In 0.00 0.00 0.00
2. On 0.00 0.00 0.00
3 Under 0.15 0.91 0.86
4. Ahead Of 0.84 0.01 0.70
S. Beside 0.90 0.10 0.81
6. Behind 0.94 0.16 0.90
7. Into 0.00 0.00 0.00
8. Onto 0.00 0.00 0.00
9. Underneath 0.21 0.90 0.85
10. In front of 0.92 0.19 0.88
11. Along side Of 0.93 0.10 0.88
12. In back Of 0.90 0.15 0.82
4.96 1.74

 

 

42
dimension. Once below ground is established, the child
should begin to comprehend under and underneath.

With the remaining six relational terms, strategies
appeared to develop along a lateral continuum. That is,
the children responded to the dimension of sidedness.
With in front of, in the canonical space, an Object
"faces" the child. That is, front Space usually contains
the characterizing information about the Object. If the
placement Of the object showed characterizing features of
that Object, the relationship called for was in front of.
For example, if that part of the truck with the windows,
headlights, and cab faced the child, then that space was
in front of. If those characterizing features could not
be seen, and cab faced the child, then that space was in
front of. If those characterizing features could not be
seen, that space was in back of. In back of was also
indicated as the space away from the child. The mean
correct responses were very similar for these terms;
however, in front of appeared to be comprehended before
in back of. Along side of corresponded to space between
and to the sides of front and back. Here the child had
two choices--two sides. With the dimension of laterality,
the strategies seemed to generate from establishing the
various sides--side with characterizing features and
Sides without characterizing features--and sides between
them. Clark (1974) hypothesized that nonlinguistic rules
last until the child has developed full meanings Of the

terms. For this study that appeared to be age 4.6-4.11

43
when the children responded to most Of the terms with
maximum correct scores Of three.

For the terms in the primary set, the developmental
pattern was in front of, in back of, and along side of.
The developmental pattern of the secondary set of terms
did not mirror that of the primary set. The pattern was
behind, beside, and ahead of. The reason for this dif-
ference was shown to be that ahead of was the most diffi-
cult for all the children and consequently comprehension

Of that term was later than for all the others. As shown

 

in the data, the terms in/into, on/onto and--to some
extent--under/underneath could be interchanged with no
difference in responses from the children. There was,
however, a difference in the children's responses to the
other terms both in comprehension and production.

To further demonstrate the research hypotheses, the
response pattern of a typical Black subject in the 3.0-3.5
age range is described. As with the other subjects, she
responded with maximum number of correct responses (three)
for the terms in, into, on, onto. She also responded with
maximum number correct responses for under and underneath.
This was consistent with the other subjects in her age
group. Her responses to the other relational terms showed
emergence of understanding of in front of. She made one
correct response to the terms in back of and behind which
may have indicated that these terms were beginning to
develop. There was no comprehension of the terms ahead

of, beside or along side of.

44

In the production task, she verbalized from the pri—
mary set for the terms she had an understanding Of. That
kind of verbal responding was shown by most of those in
her age group and across age groups. Contrary to the
others in her group, she demonstrated understanding of
the term in front of, but it did not appear in her pro-
ductive vocabulary. It is possible that there was a lag
between the comprehension of this term and the emergence
of that term in her productive vocabulary. A kind Of
reverse lag was seen in the comprehension and productive
responses Of the next Oldest group. That is, a number of
children had no comprehension Of the term ahead of, but
in the production task the relationship indicated by that
term appeared in the productive vocabulary as in front of.
Her response and that of some Of the subjects in the next
age group gives some support for Bloom's view (1974) that
the relation between comprehension and production is not
a static one. This subject's responses were, overall,
consistent with her age group and with the rest of the
subjects as well as the crisscrossing Of comprehension
and production evident in other subjects in her age group

and in other age groups.

 

CHAPTER IV
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

The focus of this study centered on the development
of children's understanding of relational terms. There
was also a comparison made of the comprehension of the
spatial terms tested and their appearance in the children's
productive vocabularies.

Age was shown to be the significant factor in the
development of the comprehension of the terms in, on,
under, ahead of, beside, behind, into, onto, underneath,
in front of, along side of, and in back of. The influence
of age reflects the children's increasing experiences with
language and increasing cognitive development. Race was
not shown to be a significant factor. The developmental
pattern shown for the comprehension of the terms was under,
underneath, in front of, in back of, along side of, behind,
beside, and ahead of. In, into, on, and onto were all
comprehended by the children at the time this study was
conducted. Under and underneath were comprehended by most
of the children at the time of testing. These two terms
were responded to as the same term with only small dif—
ferences in mean scores. The resulting primary set was

under, in front of, along side of, and in back of. The

45

46
secondary set was identified as underneath, ahead of,
beside, and behind.

In the comparison of the production and comprehension
tasks, for most of the children, once they understood a
given term, they had a corresponding term in their pro—
ductive vocabularies to express it. With some terms, most
notably ahead of, few of the children had an understanding
of that term, but some understood the relationship indi-
cated and used in front of to express the relationship.
There were instances where comprehension appeared to pre-
cede production. For example, some of the children in
age group II (3.0—3.5) demonstrated that they understood
the terms beside and along side of but had no term to
express the relationship.

Analysis of the types of errors that the children made
gave support for the strategies identified by E. Clark
(1973). When the children had no clear understanding of
a given spatial term or relationship indicated, they
appeared to apply Clark's rules (1973) for placement of
the animal Objects with respect to the reference point
objects. For example, the children in age group I (2.5—
2.11) did not comprehend ahead of. When a truck was used
as a reference point object, the animals were placed in
the truck. The rules proposed by Clark were as follows:
Rule l--if the reference point object was a container, the
relationship called for was in; Rule 2—-if the reference
point Object had a horizontal surface, the relationship

called for was on if Rule 1 did not apply.

47

Additional strategies were suggested for the other
terms studied. With under and underneath, the strategy
appeared to be generated from the development Of percep-
tion of above/below ground spaces. In, into, on, and onto
served to establish above ground (positive end) and the
extension (negative end) from that would be below ground.
With ahead of, beside, behind, in front of, along side of,
and in back of, the strategy appeared to be generated from
the development Of perception of lateral or side spaces.
For example, in front of was the space containing the
characterizing information pertaining to a particular

Object.

Implications for Therapy_

 

It is important that diagnosticians and clinicians
have information as to how children normally respond in
order to have some basis for comparison with those children
who have delayed or disordered development of language.

As stated previously, relational terms are used frequently
in diagnostics and therapy. From the research, it has
been shown that as a function of age--related to increased
language experience and cognitive development--there was

a developmental pattern to the terms studied. While this
was less evident for the Older children, it was very
evident for the younger children and did persist across
age levels to some degree. The younger children made very
differentiated responses to the primary and secondary sets

of terms. Again, the Older children responded to the terms

48
in a similar manner though the terms in the primary set
were responded to overall more correctly.

With respect to comprehension and production, it was
shown that the relationship between them was not a simple
one, nor was it a one to one relationship. For some of
the terms, comprehension seemed to precede production and
for others the reverse appeared to be true. Children
showed preferences in the production task and used the
terms (primary set) that were more common everyday terms.
These are probably also the terms that parents and Others
in the child's environment first use to specify relation-
ships for the child. Brown (1958) discussed the behavior
of parents in selecting the simplest words when talking
to children. In diagnostics and therapy, the least com-
plex terms would best be used; for example, in back of
rather than behind. If relational terms are being taught,
teaching first in a framework of perceptual awareness,
beginning with the least complex terms and building to
the more complex terms would, in all probability, result
in some measure of success. As indicated by the factor
analysis, there were two common threads that ran through
a number of the terms and revealed two factor groupings.
A number of these terms are used in language assessment
and therapy. In this study, the dimensions of laterality
and above/below ground space were shown in the terms. In
therapy, then, it might be necessary to build awareness
of these dimensions if teaching these terms and possibly

others that are similar. The developmental pattern shown

49
by the children's responses also gives indications Of what
terms might be selected for therapy--which terms seem to
be important as dictated by the order that the child learns
them.

Questions Related_to Perceptugdly_
BESed Strategies

 

 

Questions have been raised relating to the validity
Of the concept of perceptually based strategies in language
acquisition (Menyuk, 1973). To answer some Of the questions,
one of the primary factors generated from this study was
the developmental pattern Of the terms studied. The develop-
ment was consistent over the various ages--that is, as the
children were Older in age, they comprehended more of the
terms. This, as stated previously, is related to the
children's increasing cognitive development and increasing
experiences with language. There was also consistent
responding in the production task where the terms in the
primary set were the ones verbalized most Often by the
children. Additional support came from the factor analysis,
which highlighted the two perceptual dimensions that related
the terms together in groups--one based on above/below

ground space and the other based on lateral space dimension.

Implicationshfor Future Reggarch

The purpose of this study was to investigate the
development of understanding of relational terms in children.
Additionally, it was to compare their comprehension and

production voCabularies as these pertained to the

50
acquisition of the meanings of the spatial terms studied.
The data suggested that there was a developmental pattern
in the acquisition of meaning of these terms and that a
primary set (more easily understood set) and secondary
set (less well understood set) of terms could be identi-
fied. A question is raised as to whether this pattern
would hold true for other spatial terms and other types
of relational terms such as adverbs. All of the children
in this study were native speakers of English with no
other language contact. It is possible, then, that
children from a bilingual background would acquire mean-
ings of spatial terms in a different developmental pattern
as influenced by possible perceptual organization dif—
ferences. The children, too, were all in pre-school
programs where they are encouraged to be verbal and are
given many opportunities to talk and to listen, not only
to peers but to adults as well. It could be expected,
then, that the levels and types of responses given were
influenced by the verbal behavior shown in the pre-school
settings. It is possible that children who are not in
pre-school programs would show differences, perhaps in
rate of acquisition of meanings according to age.

The birth order data were not analyzed because of
unequal sample sizes within age groups; however, birth
order has been suggested as a possible influence in overall
development as well as language development (Nelson, 1973).

This, also, is an area that might be studied further as it

51
pertains to the development of comprehension of relational
terms.

A final area of suggested research is the area of
experimenter influence. Rosenthal's (1966) research
indicated that experimenter bias might influence the
responses of the subjects. According to Williams' (1970)
research, with Black children, the interviewer's expec—
tations of the child is one of nonstandardness, reticence
and uncertainty. The child's expectations of the inter—
viewer is one of dominance, confidence, and verbosity.

It is not unusual that so often they have fulfilled their
joint prophecies. With same race researcher, Gillum
(1976) reported that there was no difference in the

Black children's ability to make judgments of grammati-
cality from the White children though the experimenter
was Black. There did not appear to be an unusual
influence of the Black experimenter, in this study, on
the responses of the Black children. This is, however,
an additional area to be studied more thoroughly relative
to same race examiner and the influence that there might

be on the children's responses.

APPENDICES

 

 

APPENDIX A
ANALYSIS OF VARIANCE, AGE BY RACE

52

 

 

 

 

53

 

 

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54

 

 

 

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moOO HO mO<

muz<Hm<> mo mHm>0<z<

APPENDIX B

CORRELATIONS OF RELATIONAL TERMS
PRINCIPAL COMPONENTS OF RELATIONAL TERMS

55

 

56

 

 

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wEMmH 0<ZOHH<0mM mo monH<0mmmou

57

 

 

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xow0 :H O0Hm mcoH< uconm :H

 

nwoznwudouV mzmmh 0<ZOHH<Hmm mo wonH<0mmmou

 

58

PRINCIPAL COMPONENTS OF RELATIONAL TERMS

 

 

 

Principal Components

Relational Terms 1 2
1. In 0.00 0.00
2. 0n 0.00 0.00
3. Under 0.38 0.84
4. Ahead of 0.81 —0.22
5. Beside 0.89 —0.14
6. Behind 0.95 —0.10
7. Into 0.00 0.00
8. Onto 0.00 0.00
9. Underneath 0.44 0.81
10. In front of 0.94 -0.07
11. Along side of 0.93 -0.15
12. In back of 0.90 —0.10
5.23 1.48

 

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APPENDIX C
TASK I, TASK II

59

60

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EOHH pmoe

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61

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62

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64

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66

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APPENDIX D

OUTLINE OF RESEARCH STUDY
PARENT INFORMATION AND PERMISSION LETTERS

 

67

 

 

Title:

68

May 4, 1976

OUTLINE OF RESEARCH STUDY

Elissa L. Gatlin

Doctoral Candidate-MSU

Department of Audiology
and Speech Sciences

CHILDREN'S UNDERSTANDING OF RELATIONAL TERMS

Purpose of the study: 1. To study the ways in which

Method:

1.

children normally develop
meanings of the relational
terms in/into, on/onto, under/
underneath, ahead of/in front
of, behind/in back of, beside/
along side of

2. To study children's comprehen-
sion and productive uses of the
relational terms

Each child will be asked to place toy objects
in different arrangements according to direc—
tions from the researcher. For example, the
child will be asked to "Put the horse in the
truck."

Each child will be asked to describe the toy
object arrangements of the researcher. For
example, the horse will be placed in the truck
by the researcher and the child will be asked
to describe what the researcher did - "You
put the horse in the truck" or something
similar would be the expected response.

Information to be
obtained on each child: 1. age, by year and month — as

determined by birthdate

race

birth order - as determined

by ages of brothers and sisters

4. vocabulary level - as indicated
by the Peabody Picture Vocabu-
lary scale

CNN
0 0

Total needed for study: 120 girls ages 2.5-4.11

 

69

Results: Results of the study will be reported in general
research form with no mention of specific children.
All information will be strictly confidential as
it relates to the individual child. Results of
the study will be available to parents and
teachers of the children who participated in the
study

Questions and concerns: Questions and concerns may be
directed to Elissa L. Gatlin
(home) 351-9129 or (campus)
353—8780 and to Dr. Linda H.
Gillum, director of the research
study, 353-8780

 

 

 

70

May 4, 1976

Dear Parent:

This letter is to ask permission for your daughter,
who attends , to participate
in a child language development study that I am conducting
at various nursery schools in the Lansing/East Lansing
area. To introduce myself, I am a doctoral candidate in
speech pathology at Michigan State University. I have
worked with children in a variety of settings including
speech therapy and classroom teaching.

The purpose of the study is to determine the ways in
which children normally develop understanding of relational
terms-like in, on, under, behind, beside, ahead of and
related terms. There are two tasks. The first is that
the child will be asked to put toy objects in various
arrangements that I will specify. For example, I will
say "Put the horse in the truck." The second task is for
the child to describe object arrangements that I will make.
For example, I will put the horse in the truck and ask the
child to tell me what I did. The verbal responses will
be tape recorded. From the children's responses, I hope
to tell the developmental patterns of the relational terms
used and to investigate the difference in comprehension
and productive uses that children have of these terms.

The time of the study will be approximately 25 minutes

per child and will be conducted during free play and free
activities times. All information about the children will
be strictly confidential and results of the study will be
reported in general terms.

 

Please indicate on the attached form if I have your
permission to include your daughter in the study. If you
have any questions or concerns, please contact me at one
of these two numbers-(home) 351-9129 or (MSU) 353-8780.
You may also put questions on the attached form and I will
contact you. Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Elissa L. Gatlin, M.A.
Doctoral Candidate

 

Linda H. Gillum, Ph.D.
Director of Research

 

71

I give my permission for my daughter to par—
ticipate in the study

I do not give permission for my daughter to
participate in the study

I need more information before making a
decision

 

Please fill out information if your daughter will be in the
study

Daughter's name:

 

 

 

 

Birthdate: Age:
Address: Phone:
Brothers and Sisters and their ages: (list below)

 

S1gnature of Parent

Please return this form to the school and I will collect
them by . THANK YOU.

 

(signed) Elissa L. Gatlin

 

 

B IBLI OGRAPHY

 

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Acheson, R. M., Maturation of the skeleton. In F. Faulkner
d.), Human Development. Phildelphia: W. .
Saunders (1966).

Antinucci, F. and Parisi, D., Early language acquisition;
a model and some data. In C. A. Ferguson and
I. Slobin (Eds.), Studies in Child Language Develop-
ment. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston (1973).

Baratz, J., Teaching reading in an urban Negro school
system. In F. Williams (Ed.), Language and Poverty:
Perspectives on a Theme. Chicago: Markham Press
(1970).

Bayley, N. and Schaefer, E. 8., Correlations of maternal
and child behaviors with the development of mental
abilities: Data from the Berkeley Growth Study.
Monograph of Social Research in Child Development,
1964, 29, No. 6, (Serial No. 97).

Benedict, H., The development of language comprehension in
9-16 month old infants. Ph.D. dissertation, Yale
University, New Haven, Conn. (1976).

Bernstein, B., A sociolinguistic approach to socialization:
With some reference to educability. In F. Williams
(Ed. ), Language and Poverty: Perspectives on a
Theme. Chicago: Markham Press (1970).

Bever, T. G., The cognitive basis for linguistic structures.
In J. R. Hayes (Ed.), Cognition and the Development
of Language. New York: Wiley (1970).

Bloom, L., One Word at a Time: The Use of Single— Word
Utterances Before Syntax. The Hague. Mouton (1973).

, Language Development: Form and Function in
Emerging Grammar. Cambridge, Mass.: M.I.T. Press
(1970)

, Talking, understanding, and thinking. In R. L.
Schieffelbush and L. L. Lloyd (Eds.), Language Per—
spectives-Acquisition, Retardation, and Intervention.
Baltimore: University Park Press (1974).

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73

Bowerman, M., Structural relationships in children‘s
utterances: Syntactic or semantic. In T. E.
Moore (Ed.), Cognitive Development and the Acqui—
sition of Language. New York: Academic Press
(1973).

, Discussion summary-development of concepts under-
lying language. In R. L. Solso (Ed.), Contemporary
Issues in Cognitive Psychology: The Loyola
Symposium. New York: Halstead Press (1973).

Brown, R., A First Language: The Early Stages. Cambridge,

Mass.: Harvard University Press (1973).
, Words and Things. Glencoe, Ill.: Free Press
(1958).

and Bellugi, U., Three processes in the child's
acquisition of syntax. Harvard Educational Review
34(2), 133-151 (1964).

, Cazden, C., and Bellugi, U., The child's grammar
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