Learning in Context: Attention and effects of linguistic contrast on preschoolers ’ comprehension of color terms.

Despite good color discrimination, rapid early word learning, and the ability to categorize objects by color when other dimensions are held constant (e.g. Soja, 1994), children may take up to seven years to learn the eleven basic color words of English (Roberson, Davidoff, Davies & Shapiro, 2004). Recurring naming (overextension) and comprehension errors for color terms are reported among 2-5 year olds, despite similar levels of familiarity to those for count nouns such as “ball ” which are mastered early and often from a single exposure. Learning difficulties for the color domain might arise at an attentional level (because children are biased towards attending to the shape dimension in novel word interpretation) or from adherence to the assumption of Mutual Exclusivity (that a novel term will not refer to an object / property for which they alread