The Validity of the Probe-Latency Technique for Assessing Structure in Language

Abstract

The probe-latency technique for assessing how language is structured by a hearer was evaluated for children and adults against syntactic criteria and found to validly separate noun and verb phrases. The technique also appears sensitive to structural variations within phrases. Structure was found relatively invariant over changes in length and in meaningfulness for adults. Children showed structural change as a function of length of input. The findings regarding length and meaningfulness were regarded as very tentative due to large individual differences between subjects, especially with children, on all tasks.