Fun Facts

Did You Know?

Fun facts from our word surveys...

The word understood by the largest number of 18-month-olds is "No!" although "naughty" and "bad" are not understood by the majority of toddlers

More than 50% of our 18-month-olds can say the word "baby"

"Mummy" and "Daddy" are the words said by the most babies

 "Dog", "duck" and "cat" are understood by more babies than "woof", "quack" and "meow", although "moo" and "cow" are the other way round!

Words and the visual world...

 Some researchers believe that by the end of the first year of life, infants can use language to form expectations about objects in the world. For example, if an infant hears two different words, they expect to see two different objects. But if they hear one word uttered twice, they only expect to see one object.

When infants first learn to organize objects into categories, they sometimes make mistakes. The ‘cat’ category is organized to include cats but exclude dogs. However, the ‘dog’ category is organized to include both dogs and cats. With age, infants learn to exclude the wrong members of a category.

From just a few months of age, infants are able to detect visual similarities across different objects. This information allows them to group these objects into a category. For example, infants can recognize how different cats look similar to each other, allowing them to form a ‘cat category’!