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Developmental Psycholinguistics Laboratory (DPL)

 Overview

 

  • We are interested in young children’s first language acquisition and language processing. In particular, our lab investigates how children acquire and use the knowledge of meaning.
  • We assess children’s semantic knowledge and processing by utilizing behavioral tasks, including various linguistic comprehension tasks and cognitive tasks.
  • We also adopt the visual-world eye tracking paradigm, with an eye-tracking system designed specifically for children’s participation.
  • We actively collaborate with members of the Second Language Acquisition Lab and the Neurolinguistics and Language Processing Lab. We have a weekly joint project development seminar, LING851: Research in Acquisition and Processing (RAP), in which graduate students of the three labs informally discuss research progress and exchange research interests with each other.

 

More about our research

 

 

 

Recent Lab Events

  • Allison Monteleone has received an Undergraduate Research Award (UGRA) for the Spring 2025 semester. This recognition is offered by KU Center for Undergraduate Research & Fellowship, providing support for undergraduate students pursuing original research. Allison will conduct a study on quantifier comprehension utilizing a new experimental method 'Coloring Book' Test. (December, 2024)
  • Utako Minai co-published an article titled "Examining how topicality impacts pronoun resolution in second language processing" in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience. (November, 2024)
  • Xuan Wang and Utako Minai co-presented a poster titled "The role of discourse in Mandarin-speaking children's comprehension of ambiguous wh-adjuncts" at the 49th Boston University Conference on Language Development. (November, 2024)
  • Münir Özturhan and Utako Minai co-presented a talk titled "Pragmatic factors facilitating children’s universal quantification: Evidence from child Turkish" at the 49th Boston University Conference on Language Development. (November, 2024)
  • Utako Minai co-presented a study on Japanese-speaking children's meaning comprehension and grammatical judgment at the IASCL 2023 (July, 2024).
  • Ayumi Nobuki, Megumi Ishikawa and Utako Minai co-presented their work on Japanese-speaking children's comprehension of negative sentences at the 48th BUCLD (November, 2023).
  • Utako Minai published a co-authored article in Journal of Child Language titled Comprehension and processing of the universal quantifier in children, adolescents and adults. (November, 2023)
  • Amaya Madden and Utako Minai published an article titled "Acquisition of Japanese Negative Polarity Item Licensing by English-speaking Second Language Learners" in Japanese/Korean Linguistics 30. (March, 2023)
  • Amaya Madden and Utako Minai presented work on acquisition of Japanese NPI by English-speaking L2 learners at the 30th Japanese/Korean Linguistics Conference (March 2023).
  • Ayumi Nobuki, Megumi Ishikawa and Utako Minai presented the work on Japanese-speaking children's comprehension of negative sentences at the 2023 SRCD Biennial Meeting (March, 2023).