Existing work on the acquisition of syntax has been concerned mainly with the early stages of syntactic development. In the present study we examine later syntactic development in children. Also, existing work has focused on commonalities in the emergence of syntax. Here we explore individual differences among children and their relation to…

This study investigated whether mothers' responses to their infants' gestures play a role in their infants' vocabulary development. Eight infants were observed interacting at home with their mothers on 2 occasions, when the infants were 10 to 12 months old, and 16 to 18 months old. Videotapes of the observations were transcribed and coded for…

Data drawn from videotapes of children aged 20 to 32 months were analyzed for patterns in the use of various self-reference forms at an age when children rarely refer to others compared to their use at an age when children more regularly refer to others as main participants. First, the distribution of the forms…

In an examination of the acquisition of the spatial syntax of American Sign Language (ASL), 43 children aged 3-10 years were given a range of comprehension and elicitation tests designed to analyze the subsystems involved in the corrrect use of ASL syntax. The subsystems were nominal establishment, verb agreement, and consistency of reference. The…

A study of data on Japanese children shows that the development of verbs occurs at the same time as the development of nouns and may even precede it. The subjects for the study were two children who were learning Japanese as their first language. Four speech samples, taken between the ages of 22 and 28 months, were audiotaped and supplemented by…

The spontaneous speech of a Mohawk-speaking boy was recorded from age 2;10 to 4;1. Analysis of this speech indicated that certain verbal prefixes are acquired earlier than suffixes. The pronominal prefix of nouns, on the other hand, enters late. Yet, before the appearance of any nominal affix, the child already uses a pronominal possessive as a…

This paper, based on Rosenbaum's (1967) grammar of adult English, attempts to apply ideas of deep structure and transformations to child grammar. The main rules predicated include phrase structure rules, segment structure rules, contextual features, and transformational rules. In this approach, the role of transformations is to segment and place…

When lexical availability was manipulated through discourse support and word frequency for 40 target nouns, measurement of effects on length, complexity, order of mention, and fluency of 4- to 8-year-olds' utterances showed that the number and length of responses containing the target word varied with age, word frequency, and discourse support…

This article discusses a study by Segalowitz and Galang that reports results showing better mastery of patient-focus sentences than agent-focus sentences for Tagalog children. (CFM)

Inferences about linguistic competence in children are typically based on spontaneous speech. Children's use of complex object and adverbial noun phrase is seen as a reflection of pragmatic factors. Similar adult patterns indicate children's lack of subject clauses may be due to the nature of spontaneous speech. (CHK)

A study investigated the first words produced by 17 bilingual children (ages 1-4) speaking English and Mandarin Chinese from environments where both languages were spoken. A greater number of nouns than verbs were produced as first words in both English and Mandarin Chinese. Verbs were produced only in Mandarin Chinese. (Contains references.)…

Explored relation between infants' early spontaneous imitation of novel and familiar words and subsequent lexicons in longitudinal sample between 13 and 21 months. Found marked contrasts in quantity and proportions of nouns between reported and observed lexicons. When earlier vocabulary levels were controlled, infants' early replication of novel…

Examined how Hebrew-speaking children acquired Hebrew-derived nominals (HDNs) of two types (action nominals and deverbal nouns). Child and adult native Hebrew speakers were tested on comprehension and production of HDNs. Acquisition of HDNs began at age 8 and was not complete by age 15. Task type, binyan patterns, and morphological regularity all…

Examined how Japanese 2- and 4-year-olds assigned meaning to novel nouns associated with familiar and unfamiliar animals and inanimate objects. Found that in the absence of useful information from syntax, the 2-year-olds were able to fast map a noun to its meaning by elegantly coordinating word-learning biases and other available sources of…

Examined in six experiments toddlers' use of syntactic cues to learn proper names and count nouns. Found that by 24 months, both girls and boys were significantly more likely to select a labeled object if they had heard a proper name than if they had heard a count noun. At 20 months, neither girls nor boys demonstrated this effect. (Author/KB)