Knowledge of structural constraints on the dative alternation in children's pronoun interpretation

Abstract

Previous studies on the acquisition of English double object construction find that preschool children have more difficulty comprehending double object than to-dative sentences. In addition, it has also been documented that children acquiring English make overgeneralization errors of dative alternation. The goal of this study is to investigate whether English-speaking preschool children possess the knowledge of the structural constraints governing the pronoun interpretation in double object sentences like “The old lady threw Winnie the Pooh i his i chair” and “*The Smurf brought his i brother Tigger i ”. The hypotheses are that if children adopt the linear order strategy or if they convert the double object sentences to the corresponding to-dative construction for interpretation, they will assign a wrong antecedent for the pronoun. The results from two truth value judgment experiments showed that 4–6-year-old children performed like adults in interpreting the two types of double object sentences. The finding clearly demonstrates that although young children at this age range make overgeneralization errors regarding dative alternation, they have an abstract understanding of the structural constraints when they are computing the interpretations of pronouns in double object sentences.