# Stochastic dynamics of lexicon learning in an uncertain and nonuniform world

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/1302.5526 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/1302.5526/

## Key facts

- Cited by 1 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- First posted on arXiv 22 Feb 2013.

## Built on by (most cited first, 1 of 1)

- [Exploiting individual differences to bootstrap communication](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.05211/) (2025)

## Abstract (arXiv)

We study the time taken by a language learner to correctly identify the meaning of all words in a lexicon under conditions where many plausible meanings can be inferred whenever a word is uttered. We show that the most basic form of cross-situational learning - whereby information from multiple episodes is combined to eliminate incorrect meanings - can perform badly when words are learned independently and meanings are drawn from a nonuniform distribution. If learners further assume that no two words share a common meaning, we find a phase transition between a maximally-efficient learning regime, where the learning time is reduced to the shortest it can possibly be, and a partially-efficient regime where incorrect candidate meanings for words persist at late times. We obtain exact results for the word-learning process through an equivalence to a statistical mechanical problem of enumerating loops in the space of word-meaning mappings.