Thematic role assignment in the L1 acquisition of Tagalog

  • It is a common finding across languages that young children have problems in understanding patient-initial sentences. We used Tagalog, a verb-initial language with a reliable voice-marking system and highly frequent patient voice constructions, to test the predictions of several accounts that have been proposed to explain this difficulty: the frequency account, the Competition Model, and the incremental processing account. Study 1 presents an analysis of Tagalog child-directed speech, which showed that the dominant argument order is agent-before-patient and that morphosyntactic markers are highly valid cues to thematic role assignment. In Study 2, we used a combined self-paced listening and picture verification task to test how Tagalog-speaking adults and 5- and 7-year-old children process reversible transitive sentences. Results showed that adults performed well in all conditions, while children's accuracy and listening times for the first noun phrase indicated more difficulty in interpreting patient-initial sentences in the agentIt is a common finding across languages that young children have problems in understanding patient-initial sentences. We used Tagalog, a verb-initial language with a reliable voice-marking system and highly frequent patient voice constructions, to test the predictions of several accounts that have been proposed to explain this difficulty: the frequency account, the Competition Model, and the incremental processing account. Study 1 presents an analysis of Tagalog child-directed speech, which showed that the dominant argument order is agent-before-patient and that morphosyntactic markers are highly valid cues to thematic role assignment. In Study 2, we used a combined self-paced listening and picture verification task to test how Tagalog-speaking adults and 5- and 7-year-old children process reversible transitive sentences. Results showed that adults performed well in all conditions, while children's accuracy and listening times for the first noun phrase indicated more difficulty in interpreting patient-initial sentences in the agent voice compared to the patient voice. The patient voice advantage is partly explained by both the frequency account and incremental processing account.show moreshow less

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Metadaten
Author details:Rowena GarciaORCiD, Jens Roeser, Barbara HöhleORCiDGND
URN:urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-420598
ISSN:1866-8364
Title of parent work (English):Postprints der Universität Potsdam : Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe
Subtitle (English):use of word order and morphosyntactic markers
Publication series (Volume number):Zweitveröffentlichungen der Universität Potsdam : Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe (491)
Publication type:Postprint
Language:English
Date of first publication:2018/12/10
Publication year:2018
Publishing institution:Universität Potsdam
Release date:2018/12/10
Issue:491
Number of pages:28
Source:Language Acquisition (2018) 10.1080/10489223.2018.1525613
Organizational units:Humanwissenschaftliche Fakultät
DDC classification:1 Philosophie und Psychologie / 15 Psychologie / 150 Psychologie
3 Sozialwissenschaften / 37 Bildung und Erziehung / 370 Bildung und Erziehung
4 Sprache / 40 Sprache / 400 Sprache
Peer review:Referiert
Publishing method:Open Access
Grantor:Taylor & Francis Open Access Agreement
License (German):License LogoCC-BY-NC-ND - Namensnennung, nicht kommerziell, keine Bearbeitungen 4.0 International
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