Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
A usage-based approach to grammatical development
Holger Diessel
University of Jena
http://holger-diessel.de/
Language learning
• Connectionism (Rumelhart & McClelland 1986;
Elman et al. 1996; Lewis and Elman 2001).
• Corpus studies of the ambient language (Redington
et al. 1998; Mintz et al. 2002; Monaghan et al. 2005).
• Experimental studies with infants (Saffran et al. 1996;
Saffran 2002; Newport and Aslin 2004).
Construction grammar
Form
Meaning
Form
Meaning
Form
MeaningForm
Meaning
Form
Meaning
One-word utterances / holophrases
Daddy. [Adam 1;4]
Mommy. [Adam 1;4]
Doggy. [Adam 1;5]
Milk. [Adam 1;5]
Allgone. [Adam 1;6]
Take this key off .
Take this paper off.
Take that off .
Take this dress off.
Take that belt off me.
Take it off.
More corn.
More cookies.
More mail.
More popsicle.
More jump.
More Peter water.
Block get-it.
Phone get-it.
Mama get-it.
Bottle get-it.
Towel get-it.
Books get-it.
Lexically-specific constructions
Emergence of schematic constructions
Get doggy Get milk Get him Get Billy
Get __
VERB __
Hypotheses
• Relative clauses form a network of related
constructions that children acquire in a piecemeal,
bottom-up fashion.
• The development originates from relative constructions
that are only little different from simple sentences.
• The development can be seen as an example of
‘abductive constructivist learning’.
Study 1 (Diessel 2004)
Age range Finite Nonfinite
AdamSarahNinaPeterNaomi
2;3-4;102;3-5;11;11-3;41;9-3;21;8-3;3
1783262258
12036714416
1;9-5;1 305 287
Head of the relative clause
(1) The man who we saw was reading a book. SUBJ
(2) He noticed the man who was reading a book. OBJ
(3) He saw to the man who was reading a book. OBL
(4) The man who was reading a book. NP
(5) That’s the man who was reading a book. PN
Head of relative clause (total)
48,5
23,821,5
5,6
0,70
10
20
30
40
50
60
PN NP OBJ OBL SUBJ
prop
orti
ons
Head of relative clause (earliest)
80
2,57,5
10
00
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
PN NP OBJ OBL SUBJ
prop
orti
on
Head of relative clause (development)
PN
OBJ
NP
OBL
OBL
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
3;0 4;0 5;0
age
pro
po
rtio
n
PN
OBJ
NP
OBL
SUBJ
Input frequency
PN-relatives are among the most frequent relative
clauses in the ambient language, but they are not as
frequent in the ambient language as in the children’s
data.
Semantic complexity
(1) Here’s the tiger that’s gonna scare him.
> The tiger is gonna scare him.
(2) This is the sugar that goes in there.
> The sugar goes in there.
(3) It’s something that you eat.
> You eat something.
Semantic complexity
(1) You left this toy I’m playing with.
> You left this toy. + I’m playing with the toy.
Information structure
The information structure of PN-relative constructions
is similar to the information structure of simple
sentences, i.e. they do not include presupposed
information.
Pragmatic function
PN-relatives are pragmaticlly very useful in parent-
child speech: They occur in constructions that focus
the hearer’s attention on elements in the surrounding
situation.
Conclusion
PN-relatives are the earliest relative clauses that
children learn because:
(1) they suit the communicative needs of
young children
(2) they are semantically similar to simple
sentences.
Syntactic amalgams
(1) That’s doggy turn around. [Nina 1;11]
(2) That’s a turtle swim. [Nina 2;2]
(3) Here’s a mouse go sleep. [Nina 2;3]
(4) That’s the roof go on that home. [Nina 2;4]
(5) That’s the rabbit fall off. [Nina 2;4]
Relativizsed syntactic role
(1) The man who met the woman. subj
(2) The man who the woman met. obj
(3) The man who the woman talked to. obl
(4) The man who the girl gave the book to.io
(5) The man whose dog bit the woman. gen
Relativized syntactic role (total)
57,3
37
5,7
0 00
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
subj obj obl io gen
pro
po
rtio
n
Relativized syntactic role (development)
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
>3;0 3;0-4;0 4;0-5;0
age
pro
po
rtio
n obj
subj
obl
Diessel & Tomasello (2005)
Das ist der Mann, der mich gestern gesehen hat.Das ist der Mann, den ich gestern gesehen habe.Das ist der Mann, dem ich das Buch gegeben habe.Das ist der Mann, mit dem ich gesprochen habe.Das ist der Mann, dessen Hund mich gebissen hat.
subjdoiooblgen
This is the girl who saw Peter on the bus this morning.This is the girl who the boy teased at school yesterday.This is the girl who Peter borrowed a football from.This is the girl who Peter played with in the garden.This is teh girl whose horse Peter heard on the farm.
subjdoiooblgen
Results
71,1
40,5
31 31,5
2,40
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
subj do io obl gen
subj vs. do p =. 001
do vs. io p = .173
Do vs. obl p = .169
68,5
32,8
21,4
12
0,50
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
subj do io obl gen
subj vs. do p =. 001
do vs. io p = .061
io vs. obl p = .001
English German
Subj-relatives
Do-, io-, and obl-relatives were often converted to subj- relatives.
English
ITEM: This is the girl who the boy teased at school.
CHILD: This is the girl that teased … the boy … at school.
German
ITEM: Da ist der Mann, den das Mädchen im Stall gesehen hat.
CHILD: Da ist der Mann, der das Mädchen im Stall gesehen hat.
Subj-relatives
However, children were not consistent in their performance.
In addition, they often repaired their conversion errors before they reached the end of the sentence:
(1) This is the girl who bor/ Peter borrowed a football from.
(2) Da ist der Junge, der/ dem Paul … die Mütze weggenommen hat.
Hypothesis
The conversion errors are due to the fact that subj-
relatives are more easily activated than other types of
relative clauses.
Frequency and ease of activation
The more frequently a grammatical construction occurs, the more deeply entrenched it is in mental grammar, and the easier it is to activate in language use.
Input frequency
35.6
53.8
7.7
0 00
10
20
30
40
50
60
SUBJ OBJ OBL IO GEN
(Diessel 2004)
Subj-relatives and simple sentences
AGENT VERB PATIENT. Simple clause
PRO is AGENT rel VERB PATIENT. subj
PRO is PATIENT rel AGENT VERB. do / io / obl
Children’s good performance on subject relatives can be
explained in terms of the similarity between subject
relatives and simple sentences.
Word order in English relative clauses
NP [V …] subj
NP [NP V …] do
NP [NP V …] io
NP [NP V …] obl
NP [[GEN N] V …] gen
Relative pronouns in German relative clauses
Der Mann, der … subj
Der Mann, den … do
Der Mann, dem … io
Der Mann, mit/von dem … obl
Der Mann, dessen N gen
Gen- and io-relatives
Both gen- and io-relatives are basically absent from the
ambient language.
Io-relatives caused fewer errors than gen-relatives
because they are similar to do-relatives.
Summary
Important is the similarity between constructions:
• Subj-relatives caused few problems because they are similar to simple sentences.
• English do-, io-, and obl-relatives caused basically the same amount of problems because they have the same word order.
• Io-relatives caused relatively few problems because they are similar to direct do-relatives.
• Gen-relatives and German obl-relatives caused great problems because they are dissimilar to other relative clauses.
Why does similarity matter?
Relative clauses are constructions (i.e. form-function pairings) that are related to each other in a network like lexical expressions.
Children acquire this network in a piecemeal, bottom-up fashion by relating new relative clause constructions to constructions they already know.
A network of relative constructions
Simple Sentences
That is N [subj-relative]
…-relatives
…-relatives
…-relatives
… [gen-relative]
References
Diessel, Holger. 2004. The Acquisition of Complex Sentences. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Diessel, Holger & Tomasello, Michael. (2005). A new look at the acquisition of relative clauses. Language.
