Graham, SusanNilsen, Elizabeth S.Friesen, Chris KellandJohnson, Jennie2020-04-232020-04-232011-09Graham, S. A., Nilsen, E. S., Friesen, C. K., & Johnson, J. (2011). Examining the Role of Attention and Intention in Two-year-olds’ Acquisition of Novel Words. "Enfance", no 3 (2011). 311-328. http://dx.doi.org/10.4074/S0013754511003041http://hdl.handle.net/1880/11186210.11575/PRISM/43654Previous studies have demonstrated that infants will use an adult’s eye-gaze direction to identify the intended referent of a novel word (e.g., Baldwin, 1991). Here we examine the possibility that eye-gaze may be triggering attention to an object because of the directional nature of eye-gaze itself. In the first study, we demonstrated that 24-month-olds mapped a novel word to a novel object that had appeared at the location cued by a non-referential cue (i.e., flashing lights). The results of the second study, however, suggest that gaze direction cues do not operate in a similar fashion to non-referential cues. That is, while cueing a specific object with a gaze direction cue led infants to map a novel word to that object, cueing an object location with gaze direction did not result in meaningful word learning. These findings suggest that infants view gaze direction as a marker of intentionality.engUnless otherwise indicated, this material is protected by copyright and has been made available with authorization from the copyright owner. You may use this material in any way that is permitted by the Copyright Act or through licensing that has been assigned to the document. For uses that are not allowable under copyright legislation or licensing, you are required to seek permission.https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0journal articlehttp://dx.doi.org/10.4074/S0013754511003041