On the acquisition of &lt;em&gt;either&lt;/em&gt; and &lt;em&gt;too&lt;/em&gt;

Naomi Francis

doi:10.3765/elm.1.4889

Abstract

This paper presents an experimental investigation of how English-learning children acquire the additive discourse particles either and too. In the target grammar these items exhibit near-complementary distribution conditioned on the polarity of their host sentence. The path leading to that grammar appears to be rather intricate. We present comprehension data showing that for an extended period of time (3–5 ya) learners find both items acceptable in both polarity environments, exhibiting only a weak adult-like tendency of preferring either in negative and too in positive sentences. At 6 ya, their grammar appears categorical wrt. either in that they no longer tolerate it in positive sentences while still exhibiting only a weak dispreference for too in negative environments. These findings are even more striking in the context of production data. We find that child-directed speech is essentially categorical, providing unambiguous evidence for the adult grammar. Moreover, we find essentially categorical, adult-like use of either and too in child production from the earliest stage of development. These observations raise a number of challenges for theories of either and too and for approaches to learning focus particles more generally. Perhaps most strikingly, the protracted insensitivity of the learner's grammar to accumulation of unambiguous evidence constitutes a novel argument from the abundance of evidence for encapsulated learning.

Highlights

This paper presents an experimental investigation of how English-learning children acquire the additive focus particles either and too
From the ages of 3 to 5, children exhibit a non-categorical response pattern, accepting both items in both environments. Their behavior is not random; they select either more often than too in negative environments and too more often than either in positive environments. They trend toward the adult grammar
This trending pattern does not reflect a population-level split, with some children being categorical in one direction and others being categorical in the other; the non-categorical trending pattern is attested within subjects

Summary

Introduction

This paper presents an experimental investigation of how English-learning children acquire the additive focus particles either and too. Just like other non-scalar, additive discourse particles What is special about either and too is that they appear to be designated to mark, respectively, negative and positive sequences. That is, they exhibit (near) complementary distribution, which is conditioned on the polarity of the sentence they accompany. They exhibit (near) complementary distribution, which is conditioned on the polarity of the sentence they accompany

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