The disambiguation effect, also referred to as process of elimination, occurs during word learning, whereby novel words are mapped onto new referents, precluding the application of a novel label to a familiar object. Prior studies showed that the emergence and use of disambiguation can be affected by children’s vocabulary growth and linguistic experience, such as growing up with more than one language. To test this, we investigated (a) whether monolingual and multilingual children disambiguated a novel word–object mapping, (b) whether they retained a trained, previously seen word–object mapping, (c) whether they retained the novel fast-mapped word–object mapping, and (d) whether and how age, English vocabulary size, and language background modulated disambiguation and retention. Lastly, we tested (e) whether children who disambiguated also retained better. Eye-tracking data from 18- to 30-month-old monolingual children (n = 43) and multilingual children (n = 40) were collected. A looking-while-listening paradigm with two objects included two familiar items, one novel item, and one trained item. Mixed-effect models reported that vocabulary size predicted the outcome of mapping and retention better than age. Monolingual children’s accuracy on disambiguation trials was high from the start, whereas multilingual children started to disambiguate later as their vocabulary grew. Only monolingual children performed above chance level on retaining the novel label. Lastly, the use of disambiguation improved retention for monolingual children but not for multilingual children. This research corroborates that disambiguation should be regarded as a mechanism facilitating default fast mapping rather than fully fledged learning. Vocabulary growth leading to an increase in disambiguation supports the notion that the disambiguation effect stems from prior episodes of learning.

消歧效应，也称为消除过程，发生在单词学习期间，新单词被映射到新的所指对象上，从而阻止将新标签应用于熟悉的对象。先前的研究表明，消歧的出现和使用会受到儿童词汇量增长和语言经验的影响，例如在一种以上的语言中成长。为了测试这一点，我们调查了（a）单语和多语儿童是否消除了新的词-对象映射的歧义，（b）他们是否保留了经过训练的、以前见过的词-对象映射，（c）他们是否保留了新的快速映射词– 对象映射，以及 (d) 年龄、英语词汇量和语言背景是否以及如何调节消歧和保留。最后，我们测试了 (e) 消除歧义的儿童是否也能更好地保持。来自 18 至 30 个月大的单语儿童的眼动追踪数据（n  = 43) 和多语种儿童 ( n = 40) 被收集。具有两个对象的边看边听范式包括两个熟悉的项目、一个新颖的项目和一个经过培训的项目。混合效应模型报告说，词汇量比年龄更能预测映射和保留的结果。单语儿童在消歧试验中的准确性从一开始就很高，而多语儿童后来随着词汇量的增加开始消歧。只有单语儿童在保留新颖标签方面的表现高于机会水平。最后，消除歧义的使用提高了单语儿童的记忆力，但不能提高多语儿童的记忆力。这项研究证实，消歧应该被视为促进默认快速映射而不是完全成熟的学习的机制。