The acquisition of time talk: relations between child and adult grammars

1980 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 263-278 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlota S. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Type Theory ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Experimental Results ◽  
Temporal Reference ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Temporal Ordering

ABSTRACTA Reichenbach-type theory is proposed that accounts for a child's early system of temporal reference and relates it directly to the adult system. This theory makes predictions different from those of a competing theory, a strong decentring hypothesis. Experimental results and data from spontaneous speech are examined, and the predictions of the first theory are borne out: young English-speaking children express notions of temporal ordering as well as aspectual notions.

Abstract categories or limited-scope formulae? The case of children's determiners

2009 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 743-778 ◽  
Author(s):  
VIRGINIA VALIAN ◽  
STEPHANIE SOLT ◽  
JOHN STEWART
Keyword(s):  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Syntactic Category ◽  
Limited Role ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Abstract Categories ◽  
Limited Scope

ABSTRACTSix tests of the spontaneous speech of twenty-one English-speaking children (1 ; 10 to 2 ; 8; MLUs 1·53 to 4·38) demonstrate the presence of the syntactic category determiner from the start of combinatorial speech, supporting nativist accounts. Children use multiple determiners before a noun to the same extent as their mothers (1) when only a and the or (2) all determiners are analyzed, or (3) when children and mothers are matched on determiner and noun types and determiner+noun tokens. (4) Overlap increases as opportunity for overlap increases: children use multiple determiners with more than 50% of nouns used at least twice with a determiner and with 80% of nouns used at least six times with a determiner. (5) Formulae play a limited role in low-MLU children's determiner usage, increasing with MLU. (6) Less than 1% of determiner uses are errors. Prior results showing no overlap are likely a sampling artifact.

scholarly journals Musical Sophistication and Speech Auditory-Motor Coupling: Easy Tests for Quick Answers

2022 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johanna M. Rimmele ◽  
Pius Kern ◽  
Christina Lubinus ◽  
Klaus Frieler ◽  
David Poeppel ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Motor Cortex ◽  
Coupling Strength ◽  
Music Perception ◽  
Musical Training ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Indirect Measure ◽  
Musical Perception ◽  
German Speaking ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Highly Correlated

Musical training enhances auditory-motor cortex coupling, which in turn facilitates music and speech perception. How tightly the temporal processing of music and speech are intertwined is a topic of current research. We investigated the relationship between musical sophistication (Goldsmiths Musical Sophistication index, Gold-MSI) and spontaneous speech-to-speech synchronization behavior as an indirect measure of speech auditory-motor cortex coupling strength. In a group of participants (n = 196), we tested whether the outcome of the spontaneous speech-to-speech synchronization test (SSS-test) can be inferred from self-reported musical sophistication. Participants were classified as high (HIGHs) or low (LOWs) synchronizers according to the SSS-test. HIGHs scored higher than LOWs on all Gold-MSI subscales (General Score, Active Engagement, Musical Perception, Musical Training, Singing Skills), but the Emotional Attachment scale. More specifically, compared to a previously reported German-speaking sample, HIGHs overall scored higher and LOWs lower. Compared to an estimated distribution of the English-speaking general population, our sample overall scored lower, with the scores of LOWs significantly differing from the normal distribution, with scores in the ∼30th percentile. While HIGHs more often reported musical training compared to LOWs, the distribution of training instruments did not vary across groups. Importantly, even after the highly correlated subscores of the Gold-MSI were decorrelated, particularly the subscales Musical Perception and Musical Training allowed to infer the speech-to-speech synchronization behavior. The differential effects of musical perception and training were observed, with training predicting audio-motor synchronization in both groups, but perception only in the HIGHs. Our findings suggest that speech auditory-motor cortex coupling strength can be inferred from training and perceptual aspects of musical sophistication, suggesting shared mechanisms involved in speech and music perception.

Using clausal embedding to identify language impairment in sequential bilinguals

2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (5) ◽  
pp. 949-967 ◽  
Author(s):  
MAUREEN SCHEIDNES ◽  
LAURICE TULLER
Keyword(s):  
Longitudinal Study ◽  
Language Impairment ◽  
Test Scores ◽  
Standardized Test ◽  
Developmental Trajectories ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Standardized Test Scores ◽  
Typical Development ◽  
French Speaking ◽  
English Speaking

Assessing language in sequential bilinguals (L2 children) for the identification of language impairment suffers from lack of appropriate standardized tools and from limited understanding of the developmental trajectories of these learners. This longitudinal study compares L2 children to children with SLI in order to better understand where these groups have overlapping performance and where they differ. An analysis of standardized test scores as well as frequency of clausal embedding and morphosyntactic errors in spontaneous speech was conducted with 22 English-speaking children (aged 6;9-12;7) acquiring French as an L2 in France and 19 monolingual French-speaking children with SLI (aged 6;5–12;11). The results revealed that L2 children used clausal embedding more often than the children with SLI, but both groups had similar rates of morphosyntactic accuracy. Facility with clausal embedding from early stages of development and continuing difficulty with morphosyntactic accuracy are argued to be characteristic of typical development in L2 children.

Some influences on the grammar of English- and Italian-speaking children with specific language impairment

1988 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 39-57 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurence B. Leonard ◽  
Letizia Sabbadini ◽  
Virginia Volterra ◽  
Jeanette S. Leonard
Keyword(s):  
Speech Production ◽  
Language Impairment ◽  
Specific Language Impairment ◽  
Surface Characteristics ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
Specific Effects ◽  
Grammatical Morphemes ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Syntactic Differences

ABSTRACTThe spontaneous speech of both English-speaking (E) and Italian-speaking (I) children with specific language impairment (SLI) was examined to determine (a) whether phonological factors influence the grammatical morpheme use of ISLI children, as has been found for ESLI children, and (b) whether ESLI and ISLI children show similar syntactic abilities at the same level of mean utterance length as measured in words. The results indicated that word-final consonants adversely influenced the ISLI children's tendency to use articles – the only Italian grammatical morphemes in which word-final consonants are required. There was no evidence of syntactic differences between the ESLI and ISLI children. However, both groups of children seemed to have a problem using morphemes that constituted unstressed elements in a sentence even though the grammatical and semantic function of these elements varied across the two languages. The findings suggest that a speech production or perception component may be playing a greater role than previously believed in contributing to SLI children's well-documented expressive grammatical difficulties, though the specific effects of this factor will vary as a function of the surface characteristics of the language being acquired.

Mental state verbs used by mother–child dyads in Japanese and English: Implications for the development of Theory of Mind

2019 ◽  
Vol 40 (1) ◽  
pp. 84-106
Author(s):  
Takaaki Suzuki ◽  
Jun Nomura
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Developmental Delay ◽  
Mental State ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Mental State Terms ◽  
Syntactic Properties

Mental state terms are believed to be closely related to the development of Theory of Mind (ToM). This study focuses on mental state verbs (MSVs) and investigates how they are used by Japanese-speaking mother–child dyads compared to their English-speaking counterparts. Analyses of their spontaneous speech from the CHILDES archives show that children’s production of MSVs is greatly influenced by the mothers’ input in both languages and that Japanese MSVs are used less frequently than English MSVs in both the children’s and mothers’ utterances. In addition, the syntactic properties of MSVs show that complements under MSVs tend to be null in Japanese, whereas those in English are more likely to be overtly expressed. This difference observed in the mothers’ input and children’s production can be a contributing factor underlying the developmental delay of ToM in Japanese.

scholarly journals Utilizing Classroom Action Research in Indonesian Tertiary Students’ English Speaking Class

JET ADI BUANA ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (01) ◽  
pp. 17-30
Author(s):  
Imelda Gozali
Keyword(s):  
Action Research ◽  
Error Analysis ◽  
Research Methodology ◽  
Corrective Feedback ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
English Department ◽  
Learning To Read ◽  
Different Types ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Classroom Action Research

Proficiency in productive skills, most notably speaking, has been commonly regarded as a gauge of success in learning English. It is of no surprise that many non-English department colleges include English speaking classes, apart from general, grammar-based lessons, in the list of their general basic subjects (mata kuliah dasar umum). The writer has been teaching such English speaking class for three years in a tertiary institute in Indonesia. In the course of it, she noted several frequently-committed errors of her students, and was therefore interested in analyzing them and to study the most appropriate way to address them. There has been scant literature available on Error Analysis (EA) on spontaneous English speech of Indonesian students, let alone the ways to improve the speech through Corrective Feedback (CF). To address this gap, the writer used Error Analysis to group and classify the errors committed, and then gave Corrective Feedback during free, spontaneous speech of the students, in order to try to remedy the errors committed during the speaking classes. The CF was further divided into peer- and teacher-correction, who in turn used different types of feedback (recast, repetition, direct and indirect). The study was carried out using Classroom Action Research methodology, with 80 students as the subjects. The ‘plan’ stage comprised the EA execution, and the CF constituted the ‘act’ stage. In the ‘observe’ and ‘result’ stage, the writer concluded that teaching Basic Phonics, which is usually taught to children when learning to read, might be necessary to improve students’ pronunciation. Students were also receptive to CF from the teacher and could retain some feedback given by their peers.

Future temporal reference in French and Gascon

2020 ◽  
pp. 258-278
Author(s):  
Damien Mooney
Keyword(s):  
Mental Representation ◽  
Language Contact ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Social Constraints ◽  
Temporal Reference ◽  
Speech Data ◽  
Future Temporal Reference

This study presents a variationist sociolinguistic analysis of the expression of future temporal reference (FTR) in two related varieties of Gallo-Romance, French and Gascon, that find themselves in a situation of long-term language contact. In both languages, the inflected and periphrastic futures are used as alternative ways of expressing FTR; this study identifies the linguistic and social constraints that condition variability between the two forms in spontaneous speech data, with the aim of investigating bilateral grammatical transfer between French and Gascon. The discussion considers the ongoing grammaticalization of periphrastic constructions in both languages, as well as evidence for the existence of a bilingual grammatical system in which cognate variables in each language and constraints on variability are stored in the same abstract mental representation.

Functional Categories in the Grammars of Children With Specific Language Impairment

1995 ◽  
Vol 38 (6) ◽  
pp. 1270-1283 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurence B. Leonard
Keyword(s):  
Language Impairment ◽  
Specific Language Impairment ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Functional Categories ◽  
Free Standing ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
Closed Class ◽  
Grammatical Morphemes ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Verb Inflections

Children with specific language impairment often show a serious limitation in their use of grammatical morphemes such as verb inflections and free-standing closed-class forms. The purpose of this study was to determine whether such difficulty constitutes a problem with entire functional categories. Examination of the spontaneous speech of a group of 10 English-speaking children with specific language impairment revealed clear evidence of each of the functional categories examined: Determiner, Inflection, and Complementizer. However, relative to younger normally developing children with comparable mean utterance lengths, these children showed lower percentages of use of many of the grammatical elements associated with these functional categories. The utility of employing a functional category framework in the study of specific language impairment and the implications of the findings for other accounts of this disorder are discussed.

The development of syntactic subjects in Portuguese-speaking children

1996 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-128 ◽  
Author(s):  
Virginia Valian ◽  
Zena Eisenberg
Keyword(s):  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Performance Factors ◽  
The Status ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Natural Conversation ◽  
Performance Limitations ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Mean Length Of Utterance ◽  
Development Proceeds

ABSTRACTIn order to separate competence and performance factors in acquisition of knowledge of syntactic subjects, we audiotaped and analysed the spontaneous speech of 20 Portuguese-speaking two-year-olds in natural conversation with Portuguese-speaking adults. We separated the children into three groups based on Mean Length of Utterance in Words: 1·5–1·99; 2·0–2·99; 3·0–4·99. Our cross-sectional data demonstrated that Portuguese-speaking children increased their use of subjects from 28% in the lowest-MLUW group to 57% in the highest-MLUW group. The children in the highest-MLUW group almost perfectly matched the adult speakers in the study on every measure. The increase in children's use of subjects was primarily due to an increase in the use of pronominal subjects. A comparison between Portuguese- and English-speaking children suggests that adult competence about the status of subjects is present at the onset of combinatorial speech, as shown by differential production of subjects. Each group also experiences performance limitations, as shown by the increase in subject use as development proceeds.

Grammatical Characteristics of Swedish Children With SLI

1995 ◽  
Vol 38 (3) ◽  
pp. 589-598 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristina Hansson ◽  
Ulrika Nettelbladt
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Grammatical Development ◽  
Grammatical Morphemes ◽  
Grammatical Errors ◽  
English Speaking

Spontaneous speech samples from 10 Swedish children were collected and analyzed grammatically. The subjects consisted of 5 children with SLI and 5 MLU matched controls with normal grammatical development. The children with SLI differed significantly from the controls in their more restricted usage of word order patterns and in number of grammatical errors. As in studies on English-speaking children with SLI, the Swedish children with SLI had a large number of omissions of grammatical morphemes. Verb-related errors were more common than noun-related errors. Contrary to reports on children with SLI acquiring other languages, however, word order errors were also very common in the Swedish children with SLI. A restricted usage of word order patterns in combination with errors of word order indicates that not only morphological deficits but also syntactic difficulties can be found in children with SLI relative to MLU controls, depending on the target language. The findings show the importance of cross-linguistic comparisons of children with SLI.

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