Television as a talking picture book: a prop for language acquisition.
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Child, Preschool↗
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Reanalysing rote-learned phrases: individual differences in the transition to multi-word speech.
The present study investigates the possibility that the previously documented relationship between referential-expressive and nominal-pronominal styles (Nelson, 1975) may be best explained not so much in terms of 'object-orientation' or 'noun-preference', as in terms of the direction from which different children break into structure, with some children tending to construct patterns by combining two or more items from their single-word vocabularies and others tending to develop patterns by gaining productive control over 'slots' in previously unanalysed phrases. In order to do so it makes use of a methodology for distinguishing between productive and unanalysed multi-word speech proposed in Lieven, Pine & Dresner-Barnes (1992) which is applied to observational and maternal-report data from a longitudinal study of seven children between the ages of 0;11 and 1;8. The results suggest not only that variation in children's early word combinations can indeed be explained in terms of different routes to multi-word speech, but also that, far from being atypical, a strategy involving the breaking down of originally unanalysed phrases may be used by all children, though to varying degrees.
Child Development↗
Pronoun reversals: who, when, and why?
Seventeen of a sample of 30 precocious talkers aged 1;8 produced at least one pronoun reversal (I/you) during unstructured play. This finding led to an examination of the role of cognitive and linguistic individual differences as well as contextual factors and processing complexity as determinants of pronoun reversal. Contrary to predictions derived from previous hypotheses, there were few differences between reversers and non-reversers, other than higher use of second person forms by reversers. Reversals were more likely to occur in certain contexts: semantically reversible predicates with two noun phrases, and in imitations (though the rate of imitation was lower overall in reversers). We propose that pronoun reversals commonly result from a failure to perform a deictic shift, which is especially likely when children's psycholinguistic processing resources are taxed. Children who did not produce any pronoun reversals tended to avoid pronoun use, especially second person forms. Overt reversal may thus reflect a risk-taking approach to language acquisition, which may be particularly characteristic of precocious children.
Child Development↗
Event knowledge and early language acquisition.
The role of event knowledge in early language acquisition was investigated. Thirteen two-year-olds were observed interacting with their mothers over a five-week period. During weekly observational sessions, dyads interacted in both a familiar-event context and an unfamiliar-event context. Events were represented by complex toys (e.g. airport, marina, etc.). In the familiar-event, dyads interacted with the same event-toy during each observation period. In the unfamiliar-event, these same dyads interacted with a different novel toy during each observation period. The results indicated that children's increasing event knowledge facilitated their language development. Specifically, children's lexical type use, action verb use, and MLU increased in the familiar-event, but remained unchanged in the unfamiliar-event. Event knowledge also facilitated children's lexical token use. Results are discussed in terms of the role of event knowledge in language acquisition.
Child Development↗
On the origins of denial negation.
These are the principal questions of this study: are the early functions of negation, such as REJECTION, and the later emerging DENIAL no developmentally related? And when do children start to deny? So far, evidence for the questions at hand has been almost exclusively observational. We decided on a simple elicitation procedure instead, asking 48 children (ages between 1;1 and 2;7) easy yes/no-questions. The most likely age range for the appearance of denial no was 1;8-2;1. Its error-free acquisition supports the continuity theory of negation development, which holds that essentials of denial no carry over from the earlier functions of no. Finally an attempt is made to account for the beginnings of denial in terms of semantics and the representational theory of child cognition.
Child Development↗
Marking of verb transitivity by Hebrew-speaking children.
The study examines children's command of transitivity permutations in Hebrew, where a change in verb-argument syntax entails a change in verb-morphology. 30 children aged two, three and eight were required to produce existing and novel Hebrew verbs differing in transitivity. Younger children showed a good grasp of the syntax and semantics, but not the morphological marking of transitivity, three-year-olds did much better, and eight-year-olds produced mainly adult-like responses. Results were higher on existing verbs than on novel forms. Direction of change had little effect with existing verbs, but with novel verbs success was much higher in changing intransitive to transitive forms than the converse. Some alternations proved easier than others, e.g. intransitive activity verbs in the basic pa'al verb-pattern yielded more causative hif'il forms than intransitive inchoative verbs in the nif'al pattern. Findings throw light on the development of derivational morphology, item-based versus class-based learning, and the impact of lexical productivity and language-particular properties on acquisition.
Child↗
Lexical segmentation and vocabulary growth in early language acquisition.
The identification of appropriate lexical segmentations of the speech signal constitutes a problem for the language learner and the child language researcher alike. Articulatory precision and fluency criteria for identifying formulaic expressions, sub-lexical forms and target lexemes in linguistic productions are defined and applied to the analysis of two Danish children's language development between the ages of 1;0 and 2;0. The results of this analysis are compared to the results of applying standard distributional and frequency criteria in the tabulation of mean length of utterance and vocabulary profiles for both standard and non-standard lexical segmentations. It is argued that although the two methods yield converging profiles of development during the latter part of the period studied, articulatory precision and fluency criteria offer a more powerful tool for identifying alternative segmentation strategies in early language acquisition. Profiles of vocabulary development for these two children suggest that the solution to the segmentation problem may be an important trigger for their vocabulary spurts.
Child Language↗
Interactive influences on phonological behaviour: a case study.
An infant girl's unusual phonological behaviour was evaluated in the light of a maternal model which appeared to exaggerate features of normal conversational speech. It is suggested that parental responses to immature speech patterns may account for selected case study behaviours which have been reported in both the child phonology and child fluency literatures. It appears that evaluation of phonological development within an interactive framework may allow a more accurate picture of the conditions under which children learn speech skills. To this end, further study of the phonetic characteristics of input language and patterns of parental feedback to early articulatory attempts is desirable.
Female↗
Words in discourse: a dialectical approach to the acquisition of meaning and use.
Word learning by young children is viewed as a problem of deriving meaning from the use of forms in discourse contexts. Uses of causal and temporal terms in private speech by a child studied longitudinally from 1;9 to 3;0 are analysed from this perspective. Evidence is presented that words are first constrained to uses in specific discourse contexts, and later used more flexibly and with greater control over the semantics of the terms. Derivation of meaning from discourse is described as a dialectical process, and as such it is claimed to be more consistent with the full range of observational data, and with theories of word learning applicable to older children and adults, than other current theories of lexical acquisition in early childhood.
Child, Preschool↗
When is a word a word?
Although adult-based words co-occur in the period of transition to speech with a variety of non-word vocalizations, little attention has been given to the formidable problem of identifying these earliest words. This paper specifies explicit, maximally 'inclusive' identification procedures, with criteria based on both phonetic and contextual parameters. A formal system for evaluating phonetic match is suggested, as well as a set of child-derived functional categories reflecting use in context. Analysis of word use across two samples of 10 children each, followed from 0;9 to 1;4, provides evidence to suggest that context-bound words can be 'trained' by focusing on eliciting language, but that the timing of context-flexible word use remains independent of such training.
Child Language↗
The development of segmental phonological production in a bilingual child.
A longitudinal diary-and-videotape study of the production of phonological segments by a Spanish-English bilingual child, age I; I-3; 9, revealed four stages in consonantal acquisition: presystematic variation, formation of a single system, separation into two systems corresponding to the two languages, and achievement of adult target values with later interference of one language in the other. Vocalic acquisition proceeded with widespread variation, followed by stabilization at target adult values, without any apparent intermediate unitary-system stage. Relevance of the data adduced here to the issue of whether bilingual children first function with a single system before acquiring two discrete languages is discussed. The issue of what it may mean to have one or two systems of phonology is addressed.
Child Development↗
Early grammatical and prosodic marking of utterance modality in French: a longitudinal case study.
The study investigates how basic communicative functions expressed by utterance modalities (declarative, exclamative, injunctive, interrogative) emerged in the early language of a French child, and examines whether and how morphosyntactic and prosodic devices were used to mark these contrasts. A longitudinal corpus of naturalistic productions was collected between the ages of 1; 2 and 1; 9, and 960 utterances were subjected to functional, prosodic and grammatical analyses. Declarative, exclamative and injunctive utterances were found from 1; 2, and first interrogatives appeared at 1; 6. Intonation contours varied as a function of utterance modality and were largely in accordance with the patterns in French: declaratives and exclamatives were falling, interrogatives rising and injunctives split between falling and rising contours depending on their specific functions. A quarter of the productions involved an elementary grammatical marking of utterance modality such as interjections, imperative or indicative verbal forms, or interrogative morphemes. These findings indicate an early and complementary use of prosodic and grammatical devices in the child's construction of the linguistic system.
Child Development↗
Addressee co-operation and request reformulation in young children.
The purpose of the present study was to show that children under age 3;0 are capable of reformulating requests in different ways depending on how their addressee responds to the request. This adaptive ability is considered to be an indication of the use of both communicative and conversational skills. Children from French-speaking families were observed at two developmental thresholds: the end of the prelinguistic period (1;6) and the start of the linguistic period (2;6). The verbal and nonverbal outputs of the two groups of 12 children (1;6 and 2;6) were compared in three object request situations: the adult immediately complies with the request (satisfaction), the adult asks a clarification question (clarification), and the adult refuses to comply with the request (refusal). The ways in which the children adapted to each situation were found to be similar at the two ages considered. In the clarification situation, vocal productions and their repairs were more numerous, whereas in the refusal situation, non-reformulations and gazes to and from the requested object and addressee predominated. The discussion deals with the significance of these results in the development of communicative and conversational skills in children.
Child Development↗
A developmental study of the acquisition of colour terms in Setswana.
We report a study of the acquisition of colour terms by speakers of Setswana, the language of Botswana in Southern Africa. This was carried out as a test of Berlin & Kay's theory of colour term universals, on a language with less than the maximum complement of eleven basic colour terms, and in order to document changes in Setswana under the impact of economic development. Seventy-seven five- to nine-year-olds were studied on two colour tasks: elicited lists and colour naming. In general the data were consistent with Berlin & Kay's theory: the rank order of frequency of correct use of colour terms was similar to the order of the Berlin & Kay hierarchy; and primary colour terms were offered more frequently and were more likely to be used correctly than secondary colour terms. The use of English colour terms was prevalent, especially amongst the younger groups, but they functioned as substitutes for Setswana terms, rather than as a means to fill the vacant basic colour term slots.
Age Factors↗
The development of infinitives from three to five.
This study investigated the form of infinitival sentences produced by young children and their knowledge of the control properties of this sentence form. Twenty-five children between the ages of 3;7 and 5;4 participated in a story completion task designed to elicit infinitive sentences and in an act-out comprehension task. Although the infinitive form was productive for even the youngest children in this study, development of this form was not complete even for the five-year-olds, nor did any child demonstrate adult knowledge of control. In addition, two competing claims regarding order of acquisition (that of Limber, 1973, and Hyams, 1985) were evaluated.
Age Factors↗
Morphological cues to verb meaning: verb inflections and the initial mapping of verb meanings.
The present studies investigated children's use of verb inflections to guide their initial mapping of verb meanings. Given that children initially apply the progressive -ing inflection to verbs denoting actions and the past -ed inflection to verbs denoting results of events, two studies were conducted to investigate whether children use these inflections during mapping of novel verb meanings. In both studies, subjects were taught novel verbs and were asked to extend those verbs to events in which the action or result differed from events used to teach the verbs. It was predicted that subjects would be less likely to extend verbs inflected with -ing to events with new actions and would be less likely to extend verbs inflected with -ed to events with new results. Eighteen three- and five-year-olds and 24 adults participated in Experiment 1 in a between-subjects design that produced weak effects for the youngest subjects tested. Experiment 2 tested 16 three-year-olds and 19 five-year-olds in a within-subjects design and produced the predicted effect for three-year-olds, but not for five-year-olds. The findings are discussed in terms of their implications for early verb learning and regarding the use of the bootstrapping construct in language acquisition research.
Adult↗
From one word to two words: repetition patterns on the way to structured speech.
This paper gives an account of the transition from one-word to multi-word utterances based on the productions of one child from age 1; 5.23 to 1; 8.15 in spontaneous interaction with her mother. The authors' interpretation of the observed development emphasizes: (1) the initial dissociation and later co-ordination of temporal chaining of elements on the one hand and meaning-relatedness between elements on the other; and (2) the psychological importance of repetition patterns for the change from single-word functioning to meaning-related and temporally-chained multi-word utterances, i.e. utterances that show the duality of patterning characteristic of human language.
Female↗
Phonological characteristics of words young children try to say.
To examine the possible persistence of phonological selectional constraints on young children's lexical choices, the words attempted in the conversational speech of a longitudinal sample of 12 normally-developing preschoolers from age 2;0 to 5;0 were scored for syllabic length, presence of consonant clusters, and distribution of constituent phonemes. Except at the youngest ages, few developmental changes in target word characteristics were seen, and the observed differences were largely accounted for by syntactic, lexical, and pragmatic factors. The results suggest that selectional constraints persist only briefly in the course of language acquisition.
Child Language↗