Abstract

This study explores the transition from one-word to multiword utterances, analysing the verbal productions of ten infants (5 males and 5 females) observed longitudinally in laboratory sessions during play interactions with their mothers. The beginning of observations was planned when infants' vocabulary size was about 50 words. The sessions were videorecorded and infants' verbal productions were classified, distinguishing between one-word, multi-words and transitional utterances. Results indicate that individual differences in the development of combinatorial capacity could be explained with the early production of particular types of transitional utterances, while the general increase in the production of multi-word utterances in the observed period is related to the increase in the vocabulary size.