Abstract

LUCIO, Patricia Silva; SANTOS, Sérgio Luiz Evangelista  and  PINHEIRO, Ângela Maria Vieira. Effects of semantic categorization of items written by children. Arq. bras. psicol. [online]. 2016, vol.68, n.1, pp.3-18. ISSN 1809-5267.

The study of semantic categorization belongs to the area of concepts formation. This research reports the effects of item categorization by children attending the 2^nd to 5^th year of Elementary School. Students (n = 627; 53% female) from private and public schools in the city of Belo Horizonte wrote, collectively, and under a time limit, examples of 13 categories. Tokens (frequency), types (vocabulary) and precision were analyzed. Public school children produced fewer tokens and types than those of private schools, but accuracy was almost the same for both groups. Accuracy was higher for perceptual categories (e.g., colors) and smaller for artefacts (e.g., clothes). Items mentioned first (typicality) did not correlate with type of school or grades. In conclusion, categorization can be affected by the categories used in this study, but not by the school year or the school system.

Keywords : Categorization; Memory; Semantic system; Typicality.

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