The Acquisition of Ergativity

Abstract

This paper reports a miniature language study conducted to examine the acquisition of an ergative verb system. The study is designed to allow the learner the choice of creating either a natural or unnatural system. The study uses a new approach to teaching miniature languages in which the learner is exposed to the language while playing a computer adventure game. The learner acquires the miniature language by determining its properties while seeing words used in context. After learning a set of transitive and intransitive verbs, each with its own set of subject clitics, the learner is required to create new words with object clitics. The situation is set up in such a way that the learner has three options: 1. Respond randomly, 2. use the subject clitics of intransitive verbs, creating a system typical of ergative languages, or 3. use the subject clitics of transitive verbs, a pattern not found in natural language. It was found that most subjects (93%) did either 2 or 3, demonstrating that they were performing language learning by forming two classes of subject clitics. Most subjects (78%) used the third option, the unnatural one. This result is interpreted as evidence against a modularity driven universal grammar view of language learning. Instead it supports a cognitive account in that the unnatural pattern required less cognitive processing.