Malik is playing with a red triangular toy. He hears an adult use the novel word block. Malik is likely to think this new word refers to the toy, rather than its shape, it's color, or some other characteristic of it. This illustrates the concept of

Question

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The whole object assumption is the tendency to assume that a novel word refers to the entire object rather than its parts, color, or other properties.

Malik Is Playing with a Red Triangular Toy