Our studies are conducted by Dr Horst and her team. The team includes project students who are university students completing their final year research projects, master's students completing their dissertations and research students who are working toward their doctorates.

The procedures that we use have been used by many children's research labs for over 20 years. We strive to make each visit to the WORD Laboratory an enjoyable experience for you and your child.

Typically we will send you a letter by post or email and then ring you at a time that is convenient to discuss a visit to the laboratory, which is also made at your convenience. You will be with your child during the entire visit. You will be reimbursed for travel costs and your child will receive a small gift for participating, e.g., a storybook.

We currently have a word learing studies for 1-year-olds; 2-year-olds; 2.5-year-olds and 3.5-year-olds as well as a special storybook study for 3.5-year-olds. We also have a verbs study for 2-year-olds and an adjectives study for 3-year-olds and 4-year-olds. There is also a study about coins for 4-year-olds. We can often run two studies in the same visit.

In this series of studies, we are learning more about how young children learn names (words) for objects by using what they know about other objects that are around. Children are presented with multiple objects at once. For example, a child might see a cow, a block and a pom-pom. Then, they are asked to get one of these objects, e.g., the cow or the pom-pom. We are running a version of this study with 2-year-old children; a version with 2.5-year-old children and a version with 3.5-year-old children.

This study lasts approximately 35 minutes for the entire visit to the laboratory. During the visit you will remain with your child the whole time. During the experiment, you and your child will sit with the experimenter at a table. The experimenter will ask your child to pick objects. Your child can pick up objects or point. Your child will not need to talk during the session. Generally, our word learning procedures are designed to be similar to a sharing game and young children find it quite enjoyable. If you are interested in participating or learning more about this study, please complete this form.

this study will resume in Autumn 2010

In this study, we are exploring how children are able to learn words from storybooks. We will first read a book to your child and then we will give your child pictures from the book and see if your child can point to the picture that goes with a word from the story. For example, one story is about baking. We might show your child pictures of a spoon, a biscuit/cookie, a bowl and a whisk and ask your child to point to the whisk. We are running this study with 3.5-year-old children.

Again, during the visit you will remain with your child the whole time. During the experiment, you and your child will sit with the experimenter in our reception area and at a table. The experimenter will ask your child to point to pictures. Your child will not need to talk during the session. Generally, this study is fairly similar to other situations your child may have encountered when you or a babysitter has read stories and talked about them. If you are interested in participating or learning more about this study, please complete this form.

The verbs study is exploring how children learn names for actions. In this study your child will sit on your lap and watch video clips of a member of the lab doing different actions (e.g., starjumps and lunges). When it is time for the test, we will show your child one video but play sounds from the wrong video (e.g., show lunges but play "look she is starjumping. The girl is starjumping, see her starjumping"). These will not match. If your child has learned the words for the different actions, then your child should look longer (puzzled?) when the sound and video don't match.

This study lasts approximately 35 minutes for the entire visit to the laboratory. During the visit you will remain with your child the whole time. During the experiment, you and your child will sit in a room with a large tv and watch the videos. Your child just has to look at the videos. We will record how long your child looks. The actions we have recorded are sillier than the examples above and children have been enjoying these videos. If you are interested in participating or learning more about this study, please complete this form.

this study will resume in Autumn 2010

The adjective study is exploring how children use adjectives. This study is in collaboration with Dr Lynne Murphy in the linguistics department. We have designed this study to be like a find-and-seek game for you and your child. We will introduce your child to Nessie the green dinosaur who has several eggs. But Nessie's eggs are hidden under cups and in little drawers! For example, one egg could be behind the drawer with the blue star or the one with the purple star. We will ask you and your child to take turns helping each other find eggs by talking about the hiding places ("it's behind the glittery blue star!"). We are running this study with both 3- and 4-year-old children.

During the visit you will remain with your child the whole time and you and your child will sit with the experimenter at a table. The experimenter will ask you and your child to describe shapes and small pictures (e.g., glittery blue star). Because of the game-like nature, children have been having a particularly great time in this study! If you are interested in participating or learning more about this study, please complete this form.

this study will resume in Autumn 2010

In this study, we are exploring how well children do/do not understand that coins have values that are different from the size of coins. We will introduce your child to a plush dog and a cat. Then, the experimenter will give different amounts of coins to the animals. For example, the dog might have two 2p coins and the cat might have five 1p coins. Then, the experimenter will ask your child who has more money, the dog? the cat? do they have the same? We are running this study with 4-year-old children.

During the visit you will remain with your child the whole time and you and your child will sit with the experimenter at a table. The experimenter will ask your child to choose between the dog and the cat, like in the example above. Your child can point, so your child will not need to talk during the session. If you are interested in participating or learning more about this study, please complete this form.