What is "Word"for the child? Metalinguistic task analysis

Abstract

Fifty children, grouped by sex and grade, were tested in order to identify which are the properties thar they to classify graphic stimuli as words. We found that not every stimulus is considered as a word and that the criteria used for its classification as words vary according to grade. In contrast with older children, the younger children mainly rely upon salient perceptual properties of the referent. Also, our findings are in agreement with those reported in the literature in that the children ignore the arbitrary relationship between sign and its referent.