Abstract
The subjects were 117 typically developing children from ages 3: 01 to 6: 01. They were divided into six groups of half-year age-sets and an object naming task involving 40 picture cards was conducted. Their performances were analyzed and comparisons were made among the six groups from the aspects of lexical form and semantic structure. The error types were semantic relation, functional factor and irrelevant answer.
The results indicated that percentages of correct answers correlated closely and increased with age. The groups from 3: 01 to 4: 05 got low scores compared with the 4: 06 and older groups. The group from 3: 01 to 3: 05 also got significantly higher scores for irrelevant answers. The groups from 3: 01 to 4: 05 used a large number of baby words and onomatopoeia. Errors were reduced in the groups from 4: 06 to 6: 01, but there were slight semantic and functional errors in all groups. In the groups 4: 06 and above, errors showed a steep decline and became consistent among all subjects. These results suggest that typically developing children grow out of their perceptual effect and at 4: 06 reach relatively stable levels in both their quantitative and qualitative aspects in the acquisition of words.
