The distribution of these properties in children’s definitions across testing is presented in
Figure 7.10. Children’s performance for all the target words together is presented, since their
performance did not differ by the target item

Figure 7.10 Total number of properties mentioned on the definition task across testing

j Descriptive ^ I Semantic
B Functional    H Contextual

Figure 7.10 demonstrates that the “semanticproperties'" were mainly mentioned in children’s
definitions. A series of Friedman Two-Way Anovas revealed significant differences among
the properties across testing (Pl: X² = 27.4, df=3, p<.000; P2: X² = 50.2, df=3, p<.000 P3:
X² = 112.3, df=3, p<.000). Particularly, during post test 1 “semantic" properties were
mentioned significantly more times than “descriptive" (Wilcoxon: Z=3.7, p<.0005),
“functional" (Wilcoxon: Z=2.2, p<.05) and “contextual" properties (Wilcoxon: Z=5.06,
p<.0000). “Functional" properties were also mentioned significantly more than “contextual"
properties (Wilcoxon: Z=3.2, p<.005). During post test 2 “semantic" properties were
mentioned significantly more times than “descriptive" (Wilcoxon: Z=5.2, p<.0000) and
“contextual" properties (Wilcoxon: Z=5.9, p<.0000). In addition “functional" properties
were mentioned significantly more than descriptive (Wilcoxon: Z=4.4, p<.0009) and
“contextual" properties (Wilcoxon: Z=5.2, p<.0000).

During post test 3 “semantic" properties were mentioned significantly more than
“descriptive" (Wilcoxon: Z=5.8, p<.0000), “functional" (Wilcoxon: Z=5.1, p<.0000) and
“contextual" properties (Wilcoxon: Z=8.1, p<.0000). “Descriptive" and “functional"
properties were also mentioned significantly more times than “contextual" properties

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