Note to users. If you're seeing this message, it means that your browser cannot find this page's style/presentation instructions -- or possibly that you are using a browser that does not support current Web standards. Find out more about why this message is appearing, and what you can do to make your experience of our site the best it can be.

Science 1 January 1999:
Vol. 283. no. 5398, pp. 77 - 80
DOI: 10.1126/science.283.5398.77
Prev | Table of Contents | Next

Reports

Rule Learning by Seven-Month-Old Infants

G. F. Marcus, * S. Vijayan, S. Bandi Rao, P. M. Vishton

A fundamental task of language acquisition is to extract abstract algebraic rules. Three experiments show that 7-month-old infants attend longer to sentences with unfamiliar structures than to sentences with familiar structures. The design of the artificial language task used in these experiments ensured that this discrimination could not be performed by counting, by a system that is sensitive only to transitional probabilities, or by a popular class of simple neural network models. Instead, these results suggest that infants can represent, extract, and generalize abstract algebraic rules.

G. F. Marcus, S. Vijayan, S. Bandi Rao, Department of Psychology, New York University, 6 Washington Place, New York, NY 10003, USA. P. M. Vishton, Department of Psychology, Amherst College, Amherst, MA 01002, USA.
*   To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: gary.marcus{at}nyu.edu.

Read the Full Text


THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
Flexible Learning of Multiple Speech Structures in Bilingual Infants.
A. M. Kovacs and J. Mehler (2009)
Science 325, 611-612
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Cognitive gains in 7-month-old bilingual infants.
A. M. Kovacs and J. Mehler (2009)
PNAS 106, 6556-6560
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Statistical Learning in Children With Specific Language Impairment.
J. L. Evans, J. R. Saffran, and K. Robe-Torres (2009)
J Speech Lang Hear Res 52, 321-335
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
The effect of repetition and similarity on sequence learning.
P. Monaghan and C. Rowson (2008)
Mem Cognit 36, 1509-1514
   Abstract »    PDF »
The neonate brain detects speech structure.
J. Gervain, F. Macagno, S. Cogoi, M. Pena, and J. Mehler (2008)
PNAS 105, 14222-14227
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Rule Learning by Rats.
R. A. Murphy, E. Mondragon, and V. A. Murphy (2008)
Science 319, 1849-1851
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Phonetic learning as a pathway to language: new data and native language magnet theory expanded (NLM-e).
P. K Kuhl, B. T Conboy, S. Coffey-Corina, D. Padden, M. Rivera-Gaxiola, and T. Nelson (2008)
Phil Trans R Soc B 363, 979-1000
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Bayesian learning of visual chunks by human observers.
G. Orban, J. Fiser, R. N. Aslin, and M. Lengyel (2008)
PNAS 105, 2745-2750
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
The ordering of milestones in language development for children from 1 to 6 years of age..
M. R. Luinge, W. J. Post, H. P. Wit, and S. M. Goorhuis-Brouwer (2006)
J Speech Lang Hear Res 49, 923-940
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
From Sensorimotor Sequence to Grammatical Construction: Evidence from Simulation and Neurophysiology.
P. F. Dominey (2005)
Adaptive Behavior 13, 347-361
   Abstract »    PDF »
Unsupervised learning of natural languages.
Z. Solan, D. Horn, E. Ruppin, and S. Edelman (2005)
PNAS 102, 11629-11634
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Foreign-language experience in infancy: Effects of short-term exposure and social interaction on phonetic learning.
P. K. Kuhl, F.-M. Tsao, and H.-M. Liu (2003)
PNAS 100, 9096-9101
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Learning Foreign Vowels.
J. Kingston (2003)
Language and Speech 46, 295-348
   Abstract »    PDF »
Statistical learning in infants.
G. T. M. Altmann (2002)
PNAS 99, 15250-15251
   Full Text »    PDF »
The Faculty of Language: What Is It, Who Has It, and How Did It Evolve?.
M. D. Hauser, N. Chomsky, and W. T. Fitch (2002)
Science 298, 1569-1579
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Signal-Driven Computations in Speech Processing.
M. Pena, L. L. Bonatti, M. Nespor, and J. Mehler (2002)
Science 298, 604-607
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Conscious and Unconscious Processing of Nonverbal Predictability in Wernicke's Area.
A. Bischoff-Grethe, S. M. Proper, H. Mao, K. A. Daniels, and G. S. Berns (2000)
J. Neurosci. 20, 1975-1981
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
Rule Learning by Seven-Month-Old Infants and Neural Networks.
G. T. Altmann, Z. Dienes;, and G. F. Marcus; (1999)
Science 284, 875a-875
   Full Text »


To Advertise     Find Products

Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)