Semantic acquisition in language impaired and normal speaking four year old children

Abstract

For the purpose of assessing a semantic feature theory of semantic acquisition in language impaired and normal pre-schoolers, semantic feature manipulation tests were administered to two language-impaired and two matched normal speaking four-year olds. Results support Clark's hypothesis that lexical acquisition proceeds from over-extended quasi-superordinate terms with few semantic features to more differentiated subordinate terms with a greater number of features. Language impaired and normal children did not seem to be differentiated on these results.