Work

Unraveling the contribution of left-right language on spatial perspective taking

Year: 2020

Type: article

Abstract: We examine whether acquiring left/right language affects children's ability to take a non-egocentric left-right perspective. In Experiment 1, we tested 10-13 year-old Tseltal (Mayan) and Spanish-speaking children from the same community on a task that required they retrieve a coin they previously seen hidden in one of four boxes to the left/right/front/back of a toy sheep after the entire array was rotated out of view. Their performance on the left/right boxes correlated positively with their comprehension and use of left-right language. In Experiment 2, we found that training Tseltal-speaking children to apply left-right lexical labels to represent the location of the coin improved performance, but improvement was more robust among a second group of children trained to use gestures instead.

Source: Spatial Cognition and Computation

DOI: 10.1080/13875868.2020.1825442

Authors: Linda Abarbanell, Peggy Li

Institutions: San Diego State University, Harvard University

Language: English

Topic: Spatial Cognition and Navigation

Subfield: Automotive Engineering

Field: Engineering

Domain: Physical Sciences

Open Access status: green

Funders: Wenner-Gren Foundation, National Institutes of Health, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development

Award: Language Influence on Object-Substance Construal