Language and Cognitive Development Lab Opening Seminar

We are very much excited that Dr. Hugh Rabagliati of the University of Edinburgh will be visiting our lab next week and he will deliver a speech titled "The Development of Lexical Flexibility" next Tuesday at 11:30 at EFB23. This will be the opening seminar for our lab, please see the poster for more information.

The Development of Lexical Flexibility

A defining feature of human language is its creative capacity, allowing us to express an infinite number of different ideas. Cognitive science has made considerable strides in explaining how children master one source of linguistic creativity, i.e., grammar, but we know much less about the development of a second, subtler source of creativity: our ability to use words flexibly, to express multiple different meanings. I will present data from both experimental and typological work, which suggest that children have a sophisticated ability to learn about the flexible meanings of words and, moreover, that human languages are specifically adapted so as to facilitate lexical development in young children.