Does young children’s interest in categories influence their familiar word-object recognition?

Over the first two years, children learn to recognize many familiar objects when hearing the label. Nonetheless, recognition is influenced by factors such as category size, frequency, and salience. Since a child’s individual interests influence word learning, we hypothesized that they might also modulate attention during recognition. 22- to 39-month-old typically developing German children’s familiar word-object recognition was measured in an intermodal preferential looking paradigm. Category interest was assessed via pupillary arousal. Additionally, interest in and familiarity with a category and category size were obtained from parents. Children looked longer to the correct target upon hearing its label, and target looking increased with age and category size. Target recognition was relatively faster compared to the not labelled object, and children’s speed to recognize the target increased with age. Overall, children's word-object recognition of familiar category members was accurate and efficient by22-39 months, with minimal influence from other factors.