Seamus Donnelly
Biographic Data
| ID | 6773206 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Seamus Donnelly |
| GIVEN NAMES | Seamus |
| FAMILY NAME | Donnelly |
| SIGNATURE | DONNELLY S |
| AFFILIATIONS | Australian National University |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-3019-6633 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 11 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 3 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 11 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2018 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
The separability of early vocabulary and grammar knowledge
We use novel statistical methods to study the separability of vocabulary and grammar. • Vocabulary and grammar are partially separable by two years of age. • This is an important developmental benchmark for models of language acquisition. A long-standing question in language development concerns the nature of the relationship between early lexical and grammatical knowledge. The very strong correlation between the two has led some to argue that le…
A meta-analysis of syntactic priming experiments in children
A substantial literature exists using the syntactic priming methodology with children to test hypotheses regarding the acquisition of syntax, under the assumption that priming effects reveal both the presence of syntactic knowledge and the underlying nature of learning mechanisms supporting the acquisition of grammar. Here we present the first meta-analysis of syntactic priming studies in children. We identified 37 eligible studies and extracted …
Learning to generalise but not segment an artificial language at 17 months predicts children’s language skills 3 years later
We investigated whether learning an artificial language at 17 months was predictive of children's natural language vocabulary and grammar skills at 54 months. Children at 17 months listened to an artificial language containing non-adjacent dependencies, and were then tested on their learning to segment and to generalise the structure of the language. At 54 months, children were then tested on a range of standardised natural language tasks that as…
Implicit learning of structure across time
The relationship between infant pointing and language development
Infant pointing has long been identified as an important precursor and predictor of language development. Infants typically begin to produce index finger pointing around the time of their first birthday and previous research has shown that both the onset and the frequency of pointing can predict aspects of productive and receptive language. The current study used a multivariate meta-analytic approach to estimate the strength of the relationship b…
The Longitudinal Relationship Between Conversational Turn-Taking and Vocabulary Growth in Early Language Development
Children acquire language embedded within the rich social context of interaction. This paper reports on a longitudinal study investigating the developmental relationship between conversational turn-taking and vocabulary growth in English-acquiring children (N = 122) followed between 9 and 24 months. Daylong audio recordings obtained every 3 months provided several indices of the language environment, including the number of adult words children h…
Individual Differences in First Language Acquisition
Humans vary in almost every dimension imaginable, and language is no exception. In this article, we review the past research that has focused on individual differences (IDs) in first language acquisition. We first consider how different theoretical traditions in language acquisition treat IDs, and we argue that a focus on IDs is important given its potential to reveal the developmental dynamics and architectural constraints of the linguistic syst…
Individual Differences in Language Acquisition and Processing
Humans differ in innumerable ways, with considerable variation observable at every level of description, from the molecular to the social. Traditionally, linguistic and psycholinguistic theory has downplayed the possibility of meaningful differences in language across individuals. However, it is becoming increasingly evident that there is significant variation among speakers at any age as well as across the lifespan. Here, we review recent resear…
Assessing the impact of conversational overlap in content on child language growth
When engaged in conversation, both parents and children tend to re-use words that their partner has just said. This study explored whether proportions of maternal and/or child utterances that overlapped in content with what their partner had just said contributed to growth in mean length of utterance (MLU), developmental sentence score, and vocabulary diversity over time. We analyzed the New England longitudinal corpus from the CHILDES database, …
The relationship between symbolic play and language acquisition
Socioeconomic Differences in Parental Communication About Location
This study explored whether parental directions about location differ by socioeconomic status ( SES ) and whether children’s performance is associated with parental spatial directions. We designed a task in which parents hid a toy in one of five identical boxes in a small-scale space, and then verbally guided their children’s search. Middle- SES ( MSES ) parents employed more language in general than low- SES ( LSES ) parents. However, groups use…
Individual Differences in First Language Acquisition
Humans vary in almost every dimension imaginable, and language is no exception. In this article, we review the past research that has focused on individual differences (IDs) in first language acquisition. We first consider how different theoretical traditions in language acquisition treat IDs, and we argue that a focus on IDs is important given its potential to reveal the developmental dynamics and architectural constraints of the linguistic syst…
Individual Differences in Language Acquisition and Processing
Humans differ in innumerable ways, with considerable variation observable at every level of description, from the molecular to the social. Traditionally, linguistic and psycholinguistic theory has downplayed the possibility of meaningful differences in language across individuals. However, it is becoming increasingly evident that there is significant variation among speakers at any age as well as across the lifespan. Here, we review recent resear…
Assessing the impact of conversational overlap in content on child language growth
When engaged in conversation, both parents and children tend to re-use words that their partner has just said. This study explored whether proportions of maternal and/or child utterances that overlapped in content with what their partner had just said contributed to growth in mean length of utterance (MLU), developmental sentence score, and vocabulary diversity over time. We analyzed the New England longitudinal corpus from the CHILDES database, …
The relationship between symbolic play and language acquisition
Socioeconomic Differences in Parental Communication About Location
This study explored whether parental directions about location differ by socioeconomic status ( SES ) and whether children’s performance is associated with parental spatial directions. We designed a task in which parents hid a toy in one of five identical boxes in a small-scale space, and then verbally guided their children’s search. Middle- SES ( MSES ) parents employed more language in general than low- SES ( LSES ) parents. However, groups use…
Individual Differences in First Language Acquisition
Humans vary in almost every dimension imaginable, and language is no exception. In this article, we review the past research that has focused on individual differences (IDs) in first language acquisition. We first consider how different theoretical traditions in language acquisition treat IDs, and we argue that a focus on IDs is important given its potential to reveal the developmental dynamics and architectural constraints of the linguistic syst…
The Longitudinal Relationship Between Conversational Turn-Taking and Vocabulary Growth in Early Language Development
Children acquire language embedded within the rich social context of interaction. This paper reports on a longitudinal study investigating the developmental relationship between conversational turn-taking and vocabulary growth in English-acquiring children (N = 122) followed between 9 and 24 months. Daylong audio recordings obtained every 3 months provided several indices of the language environment, including the number of adult words children h…
Implicit learning of structure across time
The relationship between infant pointing and language development
Infant pointing has long been identified as an important precursor and predictor of language development. Infants typically begin to produce index finger pointing around the time of their first birthday and previous research has shown that both the onset and the frequency of pointing can predict aspects of productive and receptive language. The current study used a multivariate meta-analytic approach to estimate the strength of the relationship b…
Learning to generalise but not segment an artificial language at 17 months predicts children’s language skills 3 years later
We investigated whether learning an artificial language at 17 months was predictive of children's natural language vocabulary and grammar skills at 54 months. Children at 17 months listened to an artificial language containing non-adjacent dependencies, and were then tested on their learning to segment and to generalise the structure of the language. At 54 months, children were then tested on a range of standardised natural language tasks that as…
A meta-analysis of syntactic priming experiments in children
A substantial literature exists using the syntactic priming methodology with children to test hypotheses regarding the acquisition of syntax, under the assumption that priming effects reveal both the presence of syntactic knowledge and the underlying nature of learning mechanisms supporting the acquisition of grammar. Here we present the first meta-analysis of syntactic priming studies in children. We identified 37 eligible studies and extracted …
The separability of early vocabulary and grammar knowledge
We use novel statistical methods to study the separability of vocabulary and grammar. • Vocabulary and grammar are partially separable by two years of age. • This is an important developmental benchmark for models of language acquisition. A long-standing question in language development concerns the nature of the relationship between early lexical and grammatical knowledge. The very strong correlation between the two has led some to argue that le…
Psychology (11 works) · Language Development and Disorders (10 works) · Linguistics (10 works) · Developmental psychology (9 works) · Cognitive psychology (7 works) · Language development (7 works) · Child and Animal Learning Development (6 works) · Language acquisition (6 works) · Reading and Literacy Development (6 works) · Vocabulary (6 works)