Expression of Superordinates in Children's Word Definitions

This study investigated developmental changes in the expression of superordinates in children's word definitions. Children in Grades 1, 3, and 5 attempted to define words from 3 parts of speech (i.e., nouns, verbs, and adjectives) and 4 morphologically defined word types (i.e., compound, root, inflected, and derived words). Superordination increased significantly and changed qualitatively with age, but across grades children produced greater proportions of superordinates for nouns than adjectives and verbs, and for compound and root words than inflected and derived words. These findings may be accounted for by increases in the size or changes in the organization of the mental lexicon with grade, children's increasing awareness that superordinates are conventionally used in definitions, and the differential organization of concepts in the mental lexicon for different kinds of words.