Does young children’s interest in categories influence their familiar word-object recognition?

By six months, children recognize many familiar objects when hearing the label. Nonetheless, recognition in young children is influenced by factors such as category size, frequency, and salience. Since category size and interests of a child influence word-object association learning, we hypothesized that a child’s interest might also modulate attention during word-object recognition. 24- to 38-month-old children’s familiar word-object recognition was measured in an intermodal preferential looking paradigm. Category interest was assessed via pupillary arousal. Additionally, interest in and familiarity with a category and category size were obtained from parents. Children looked longer to the correct target upon hearing its label, and target looking increased with age and category size. Children quickly recognised the target, and this ability was independent of other measures. Thus, by 24 to 38 months, children’s word-object recognition of well-known, familiar category members is accurate and efficient, with minimal influence from other factors.