Young Children's Idiom Comprehension

Abstract
Young children (3.5–6.5 years of age) were tested for their comprehension of 10 common idioms in context and no-context conditions. Results revealed a significant linear trend for children to make more literal responses with increasing age. Children of this age did not find the story contexts helpful in interpreting the idioms. A range of comprehension scores was found among the individual idioms, but semantic transparency (as judged by adults) was not related to comprehension. Child-internal and methodologic variables influencing idiom comprehension are discussed.

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