The Effects of Age of Acquisition and Cumulative Frequency on the Recognition of Visual Characters in Children

doi:10.12139/j.1672-0628.2024.03.002

Abstract

Abstract:

To investigate the role of age of acquisition (AoA) and cumulative frequency in children’s visual character recognition, four types of characters (early AoA - high frequency, early AoA - low frequency, medium AoA - low frequency, and late AoA - low frequency) were designed, and three types of tasks were conducted in the present study to explore the effects of AoA and cumulative frequency. The results showed that the cumulative frequency effects were present in both the semantic classification task and the immediate naming task, and the AoA effects were present in both the phonetic classification task and the immediate naming task. The regression analysis confirmed that the log-transformed reaction time of recognizing characters in the semantic classification task and the immediate naming task were both predicted by the ln(cumulative frequency), while the reaction time of recognizing characters in the phonetic classification task and the immediate naming task were both predicted by the ln(time known). The above results consistently indicate that the phonological completeness hypothesis and the network plasticity hypothesis, but not the semantic hypothesis and the cumulative frequency hypothesis, can account for AoA and cumulative frequency effects in children’s visual character recognition.

Key words: age of acquisition, cumulative frequency, children, character recognition

摘要：

考察五年级小学生在三项汉字识别任务中识别习得早−高频字、习得早−低频字、习得中−低频字和习得晚−低频字的习得年龄效应与累计频率效应。结果发现：(1)语音范畴判断任务和汉字命名任务存在习得年龄效应，ln(习得时长)能预测这两项任务的反应时；(2)语义范畴判断任务和汉字命名任务存在累计频率效应，ln(频率值)能预测这两项任务的反应时。研究结果支持语音完整性假设和网络可塑性假设，不支持累计频率假设和语义假设。

关键词: 习得年龄, 累计频率, 儿童, 汉字识别

Jingen WU, Meihua GUO, Qi YU, Bingran WANG, Xiaoyun CHENG, Guoli YAN. The Effects of Age of Acquisition and Cumulative Frequency on the Recognition of Visual Characters in Children[J]. Studies of Psychology and Behavior, 2024, 22(3): 297-304.

巫金根, 郭梅华, 于棋, 王冰然, 程小云, 闫国利. 习得年龄和累计频率对儿童汉字识别的影响[J]. 心理与行为研究, 2024, 22(3): 297-304.

Figures/Tables 5

References 0

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指标	实验条件
指标	习得早−高频字	习得早−低频字	习得中−低频字	习得晚−低频字
累计频率分布范围(次/百万)	608～3359	9～124	3～48	3～39
平均累计频率(次/百万)	1645(805)	53(29)	25(14)	18(12)
平均笔画数	8.80(1.66)	8.56(2.55)	8.92(1.44)	8.60(2.20)
左右结构汉字数量(个)	15	14	18	17

指标	实验条件
指标	习得早−高频字	习得早−低频字	习得中−低频字	习得晚−低频字
累计频率分布范围(次/百万)	608～3359	9～124	3～48	3～39
平均累计频率(次/百万)	1645(805)	53(29)	25(14)	18(12)
平均笔画数	8.80(1.66)	8.56(2.55)	8.92(1.44)	8.60(2.20)
左右结构汉字数量(个)	15	14	18	17

指标	实验任务
指标	语义范畴判断	语音范畴判断	汉字命名
汉字识别测试分数(个)	125(10)	123(9)	122(10)
词表阅读测试分数(个/分)	94(17)	88(24)	89(14)
快速命名数字时间(秒)	8.21(1.06)	8.56(1.66)	9.03(1.26)

指标	实验任务
指标	语义范畴判断	语音范畴判断	汉字命名
汉字识别测试分数(个)	125(10)	123(9)	122(10)
词表阅读测试分数(个/分)	94(17)	88(24)	89(14)
快速命名数字时间(秒)	8.21(1.06)	8.56(1.66)	9.03(1.26)

实验任务	指标	实验条件
实验任务	指标	习得早−高频字	习得早−低频字	习得中−低频字	习得晚−低频字
语义范畴判断	反应时	0.79(0.21)	0.84(0.25)	0.83(0.23)	0.84(0.24)
语义范畴判断	正确率	0.99(0.11)	0.95(0.21)	0.97(0.18)	0.95(0.22)
语音范畴判断	反应时	1.08(0.38)	1.04(0.34)	1.14(0.41)	1.16(0.40)
语音范畴判断	正确率	0.96(0.19)	0.97(0.16)	0.94(0.24)	0.95(0.22)
汉字命名	反应时	0.79(0.17)	0.87(0.20)	0.99(0.26)	0.99(0.25)
汉字命名	正确率	0.99(0.09)	0.97(0.18)	0.80(0.41)	0.74(0.44)