experimental groups. During post test 3 the Definition group used significantly more
“semantic” properties than all the other groups.

Does children ^,s provision of semantic properties increase with increased exposure to the
lexical items?

• All the children provided significantly more “semantic” than other properties in their
definitions across testing. The same pattern was evident for each experimental group.

Does the children ^,s prior knowledge of the lexical items influence the provision of semantic
properties!

• No significant differences were found by the children’s prior knowledge of the lexical
items.

Is the provision of semantic properties influenced by the semantic domain of the lexical
items?

* The children provided more “semantic” properties for the words describing artifacts
than for the words describing animals across testing, however the differences were
not significant. The same pattern was found for each group.

Functional properties:

Is there a differential impact of the type of exposure to new lexical items that the children
receive to the provision of functional properties ?

• No significant differences were found for post test 1, while, significant differences
were found for post test 2 and post test 3. During post test 2 the Definition group
provided significantly more “functional” properties than the Ostensive definition and
Lexical contrast group. During post test 3 the Definition group provided significantly
more “functional” properties than the other groups.

Does children ^,s provision of functional properties increase with increased exposure to the
lexical items?

• All the children provided significantly more “functional” properties during post test
2 and 3 than post test 1.

• Separate analysis per group revealed the same pattern. Significant differences were
found for the Definition group.

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