ABSTRACT
The initial memory representations of name-object associations that children form are often too fragile to support reliable recall in new contexts, especially after a delay. Traditionally, the difficulty of mapping words to objects has been discussed in terms of the disambiguation problem. The number of category members presented in experimental word learning tasks influences the number of words children learn, and the number of words presented influences the number of categories children form. Word learning is a gradual process and slow word learning is actually a huge benefit. Non-verbal cues aside, many scholars have argued that children have at their disposal several biases that can help them narrow down the large number of possibilities to just a few likely options. The fast mapping literature focuses so on learning the correct name-object association that the other objects present are often overlooked.
