scholarly journals Are donkey sentences and bare conditionals family or friends?

2020 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 66-94
Author(s):  
Wei-ling Eileen Lin ◽  
Chun-yin Doris Chen ◽  
Gerardo Fernandez-Salgueiro
Keyword(s):  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Mandarin Chinese ◽  
First Language ◽  
Contextual Effects ◽  
Developmental Pattern ◽  
Control Group ◽  
First Language Acquisition ◽  
Value Judgment ◽  
Truth Value

Abstract The present study investigates children’s first language acquisition of donkey sentences and bare conditionals in Mandarin Chinese, both of which are concerned with quantification. Kindergarteners, Grade 2 and Grade 4 were recruited for experimental groups, each group consisting of 18 subjects, and 18 adults comprised a control group against which to compare their interpretations. Each subject finished two Truth-Value Judgment tasks, which were sentences in isolation and sentences in context. The results of this research identified a developmental pattern regarding the acquisition of donkey sentences and bare conditionals in Mandarin Chinese. It was found that overall children under seven years of age had difficulty interpreting quantificational sentences. First, concerning the relatedness of the two constructions, all four groups showed a tendency to find donkey sentences easier to interpret than bare conditionals. With respect to contextual effects, by Grade 2, children could obtain adult-like interpretations of donkey sentences in a biasing context, but it was not until they were in Grade 4 that they could interpret both donkey sentences and bare conditionals in their supporting context with adult-like readings. As a result, the subjects’ interpretations were greatly affected by context, but the two constructions were affected in different ways.

scholarly journals The four tones of Mandarin Chinese

2014 ◽  
Vol 31 ◽  
pp. 180-191 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeroen van de Weijer ◽  
Marjoleine Sloos
Keyword(s):  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Mandarin Chinese ◽  
Relative Frequency ◽  
Early Stage ◽  
First Language ◽  
Phonological Representation ◽  
First Language Acquisition ◽  
Beijing Mandarin

In this paper we discuss the four tones of Standard (Beijing) Mandarin Chinese. First, we will suggest a proposal for their phonological representation. Then, we discuss the order in which they are acquired in first language acquisition, relating this both to the representations we propose and to the relative frequency with which these tones appear in the most frequently used Chinese words. It turns out that the former predicts the order of acquisition more closely than the latter: We provide an explanation for this based on the early stage at which the tones are acquired.

Infant-Directed Speech Effects in Adult Artificial Grammar Learning

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Krisztina Sára Lukics ◽  
Ágnes Lukács
Keyword(s):  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Natural Language ◽  
First Language ◽  
Higher Learning ◽  
Artificial Grammar ◽  
Combined Effect ◽  
First Language Acquisition ◽  
Relative Contribution ◽  
Grammar Learning ◽  
Learning Rates

First language acquisition is facilitated by several characteristics of infant-directed speech, but we know little about their relative contribution to learning different aspects of language. We investigated infant-directed speech effects on the acquisition of a linear artificial grammar in two experiments. We examined the effect of incremental presentation of strings (starting small) and prosody (comparing monotonous, arbitrary and phrase prosody). Presenting shorter strings before longer ones led to higher learning rates compared to random presentation. Prosody marking phrases had a similar effect, yet, prosody without marking syntactic units did not facilitate learning. These studies were the first to test the starting small effect with a linear artificial grammar, and also the first to investigate the combined effect of starting small and prosody. Our results suggest that starting small and prosody facilitate the extraction of regularities from artificial linguistic stimuli, indicating they may play an important role in natural language acquisition.

Acquiring “Knowledge”—An Alternative Model

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Avner Baz
Keyword(s):  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Alternative Model ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
First Language ◽  
Analytic Philosophy ◽  
Empirical Science ◽  
First Language Acquisition ◽  
Method Of Cases ◽  
Striking Fact

The chapter argues that empirical studies of first-language acquisition lend support to the Wittgensteinian-Merleau-Pontian conception of language as against the prevailing conception that underwrites the method of cases in either its armchair or experimental version. It offers a non-representationalist model, inspired by the work of Michael Tomasello, for the acquisition of “knowledge,” with the aim of showing that we could fully account for the acquisition of this and other philosophically troublesome words without positing independently existing “items” to which these words refer. The chapter also aims at bringing out and underscoring the striking fact that, whereas many in contemporary analytic philosophy regard and present themselves as open and attentive to empirical science, they have often relied on a conception of language that has been supported by no empirical evidence.

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