Child Grammar Research Articles

Language therapy outcomes in deaf children with cochlear implant using a new developed program: A pilot study

BackgroundCochlear implanted (CI) children have problems in most aspects of language and in particular with regards to grammar. Considering the lack of studies in the field of grammar treatment in CI children and bearing in the mind that CI children have the potential to develop language, the aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of treating grammar in CI children using a treatment grammar program. Methodologyfirst, the literature related to grammar were reviewed so as to extract different grammatical components for developing grammar treatment program and to make sentences for each element as well as to compile a manual for its implementation. Second, the validity of the sentences was examined using the Delphi method. Third, grammar treatment was performed on five CI children. Persian Developmental Sentence Scoring(PDSS) and Mean Length of Utterance(MLU) were used to evaluate them before and after treatment. ResultsFive grammatical classes were extracted, and the grammatical elements were classified in each category according to age. For all of the grammatical items, 2076 sentences were constructed. After applying the Delphi method, a total of 1936 sentences with Kendall's coefficient of concordance (W) of 71%, remained. Using this program, grammar treatment was effective in all five children. The PDSS and MLU increased in all five children during the treatment phase, which was confirmed by Percentage of Non-overlapping Data (PND), Improvement Rate Difference (IRD). During the follow-up period, the children showed that they were able to maintain the trained components. ConclusionCochlear implants have the potential to learn language skills, and the present study confirms their ability to learn grammar, using a comprehensive grammar treatment program.

Parameterization in labeling: Evidence from child language

AbstractThis paper examines very early child grammars from the minimalist perspective. It discusses the well-known erroneous strings very young children produce such as Root Infinitives in English and their Japanese counterparts, preverbal object sentences in English, and sentences without Case markers in Japanese. The main question to be addressed is whether those sentences children produce are labeled, and if so, how the labeling takes place. Assuming that ϕ-feature agreement and suffixal Case markers play crucial roles for labeling in English and Japanese respectively (Chomsky 2013; Saito 2016), I consider two possibilities. One is that children are equipped with those almost from the outset although they are not phonetically realized. This means that even the erroneous strings children produced are properly labeled. The other is that those strings are not labeled in the adult way and that children at the relevant stage are still in the process of figuring out how the {XP, YP} structure is labeled in their respective languages. I argue that the latter is a viable possibility, given the parameterization in the labeling mechanism, and receives support from the child data as well. This conclusion implies that a main part of the acquisition of syntax is for a child to discover how her/his target language labels the {XP, YP} structure.

An Optimality Analysis of the Morphophonemic Development of Triconsonantal Verbs of Normal Jordanian Speaking Children

This study carries out an analysis using the framework of Optimality Theory to investigate the acquisition of the morphophonemics of JA triconsonantal verbs. The analyzed data consist of speech samples obtained from a picture/action naming task as well as spontaneous speech collection. The sample of the study consists of 64 normally developing children who are acquiring spoken Jordanian Arabic as their mother tongue. The participants whose ages range from 2;1 to 6 years are selected randomly from different preschools in two Jordanian cities. The major findings of the study suggest that children overcome the morphological complexity of Arabic verbs by applying a number of processes, including: cluster simplification, glottalization, and truncation. The OT analysis indicates that these processes are associated with highly-ranked markedness constraints and lower-ranked faithfulness constraints in child grammar. In addition, the root/affix asymmetry triggers unmarked patterns to emerge in the affix. Finally, the results display that children’s morphophonological abilities improve with age and that the majority of children’s morphophonological processes disappear at age six years.

What We Know about the Acquisition of Russian Aspect as a First, Second, and Heritage Language: State of the Art

This paper offers a state of the art review of the available linguistic scholarship on the acquisition of Russian aspect in various acquisition scenarios. While the studies reviewed here differ in their analyses of Russian verbal aspect, specific research questions, acquisition context, and research methodology, a common observation is that Russian aspectual contrasts are not easily acquired and that some may be more difficult to master than others. The review shows that some of these asymmetries are not unique to child grammars or to bilingual acquisition, but hold in all the acquisition contexts and may be determined by the complexity of the category itself, while others reflect developmental trends and effects of context and timing of acquisition. The paper starts with an overview of Russian aspect and the associated learning tasks, which is followed by the review of patterns emerging from studies on the acquisition of aspect by children, adult foreign language learners, and adult heritage speakers of Russian. The paper concludes with a discussion of the way these empirical findings can be connected to classroom contexts.

Lexical and grammatical development in children at family risk of dyslexia from early childhood to school entry: a cross-lagged analysis.

The aim of this study was to examine (a) the development of vocabulary and grammar in children with family-risk (FR) of dyslexia and their peers with no such risk (NoFR) between ages 1;6 and 6;0, and (b) whether FR-status exerted an effect on the direction of temporal relationships between these two constructs. Groups were assessed at seven time-points using standardised tests and parental reports. Results indicated that although FR and NoFR children had a similar development in the earlier years, the FR group appeared to perform significantly more poorly on vocabulary at the end of the preschool period. Results showed no significant effect of FR status on the cross-lagged relations between lexical and grammatical skills, suggesting a similar developmental pattern of cross-domain relations in both groups. However, FR status seemed to have a significantly negative association with vocabulary and grammar scores at age 6;0, resulting in language outcomes in favour of NoFR children.

Characteristics of Grammar in Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Narrative Review of Evidence

Characteristics of Grammar in Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Narrative Review of Evidence

The acquisition of tense and aspect: Evidence from Portuguese and Spanish

This paper seeks to understand how the categories tense and aspect are represented in the mental grammars of typically-developing children. Past work has found that English- and French-learning children as old as 6 years of age often use tense marking to convey aspect, conflating the two categories. In contrast, young Spanish speakers appear to treat the two categories as distinct by age 3. We confirm that native learners of Spanish dissociate tense and aspect by 3 years of age and suggest that they may even do so as early as 2;5 or before. We find similar results in Portuguese. We further demonstrate, in line with past work, that the use of aspect marking at this young age might be driven, in part, by differences in lexical telicity.

Current Practice of Child Grammar Intervention: A Survey of Speech-Language Pathologists.

The aim of this study was to better understand current grammatical intervention approaches. Despite grammatical language being a common weakness among children with language impairment, relatively little is known about current grammatical intervention practices of speech-language pathologists (SLPs). Such information is needed to guide the development and evaluation of grammatical interventions and to identify areas in which the current practice is not empirically supported. Participants included 338 SLPs working primarily with children. Participants completed an online survey regarding their implementation of nine different grammatical intervention components, including goals, procedures, dosage, agents, contexts, goal attack strategies, service delivery models, activities, and outcome measurements. Participants also indicated how they would alter the intervention setting and dosage if resources were unlimited. We grouped participants based on the ages of children that represent the largest percentage of their caseload resulting in an early education group (n = 114) and an elementary group (n = 224). We aggregated responses from each question to gain an estimate of current implementation practices associated with each intervention component queried. This study provides general guidelines of current clinical practices to help guide research on grammatical interventions for children and to promote successful translation and implementations of evidence-based treatment approaches. Results may also help clinicians and researchers better understand misalignments between empirically supported intervention approaches and current approaches for treating grammatical weaknesses.

Relationship between working memory and comprehension and expression of grammar in Farsi-speaking children with cochlear implants

ObjectivesGrammar is one of the most fundamental components of language and working memory (WM) is one of the most important cognitive features. These two skills play a vital role in learning, literacy and communication. Children with cochlear implants (CIs) experience delays in both of these skills. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between these two skills in children with CIs. Subjects and methodsThe sample consisted of 20 Farsi-speaking children with CIs. WM was estimated by forward and backward auditory digit spans (FBS and BDS) from the Persian (Farsi) version of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children, 4th edition. The comprehension of grammar by participants was evaluated using the Persian Syntax Comprehension Test. Grammar expression was assessed using the Photographic Expressive Persian Grammar Test. Pearson's correlation and simple linear regression were used for data analysis. ResultsThe results of linear regression and correlation showed a strong correlation between comprehension of grammar and FDS (r = 0.61; p = 0.004) was obtained, between BDS and comprehension of grammar (r = 0.161; p = 0.080). FDS and expression of grammar (r = 0.163; p = 0.222) showed a positive but insignificant correlation. ConclusionThe results indicate that WM decisively effects grammar. Enhancement of the phonological loop can improve grammar, especially comprehension of grammar. The effect of the central executive in grammar requires further research.

Prosodic and segmental aspects of nonword repetition in 4- to 6-year-old children who are deaf and hard of hearing compared to controls with normal hearing

ABSTRACTChildren who are deaf or hard of hearing (DHH) are at an increased risk of speech and language deficits. Nonword repetition (NWR) is a potential predictor of problems with phonology, grammar and lexicon in DHH children. The aim of the present study was to examine repetition of prosodic features and segments in nonwords by DHH children compared to children with normal hearing (NH) and to relate NWR performance to measures of language ability and background variables. In this cross-sectional study, 14 Swedish-speaking children with mild–profound sensorineural hearing loss, aged 4–6 years, and 29 age-matched controls with NH and typical language development participated. The DHH children used cochlear implants (CI), hearing aids or a combination of both. The assessment materials included a prosodically controlled NWR task, as well as tests of phonological production, expressive grammar and receptive vocabulary. The DHH children performed below the children with NH on the repetition of tonal word accents, stress patterns, vowels and consonants, with consonants being hardest, and tonal word accents easiest, to repeat. NWR performance was also correlated with language ability, and to hearing level, in the DHH children. Both prosodic and segmental features of nonwords are problematic for Swedish-speaking DHH children compared to children with NH, but performance on tonal word accent repetition is comparably high. NWR may have potential as a clinically useful tool for identification of children who are in need of speech and language intervention.

Chinese Children\u2019s Knowledge of Topicalization: Experimental Evidence from a Comprehension Study

There is a debate as to whether topic structures in Chinese involve A’-movement or result from base-generation of the topic in the left periphery. If Chinese topicalization was derived by movement, under the assumptions of Friedmann et al.’s Relativized Minimality (Lingua 119:67–88, 2009), we would expect children’s comprehension of object topicalization (with OSV order) to be worse than their comprehension of subject topicalization (with SVO order). This study examined 146 Mandarin-speaking children from age three to age six by means of a picture-sentence matching task with an appropriate context. The results showed a subject/object asymmetry when the topic marker is overt, and no asymmetry when the topic marker is covert. This suggests that the presence or absence of topic markers play an important role in children’s comprehension of topicalization. We propose that both structures involve movement in the adult grammar, but not in the child grammar, at least initially. Sentences without overt topic markers are base-generated on a par with gapless sentences with a topic, and the base-generation analysis is abandoned as soon as children learn the syntax and semantics of topic markers, which function as attractors of topics.

Acquisition of core Chinese grammar in preschool children with autism spectrum disorders

Acquisition of core Chinese grammar in preschool children with autism spectrum disorders

Acquisition of the Dutch NPI Hoeven ‘Need’: From Lexical Frames to Abstract Knowledge

ABSTRACTThis article aims to investigate how Dutch children may eventually converge on a targetlike distribution of hoeven ‘need,’ a modal verbal NPI (Negative Polarity Item), based on its appearance in the scope of merely some but not all of its possible licensers in the language input (i.e., the induction problem). Imitation performance was obtained from 106 monolingual Dutch children (2;09–5;10; mean = 4;04; SD = 8.5 months) using an elicited imitation task. Results suggest that before age 3, children only accept hoeven to appear with either the sentential negation niet ‘not’ or the negative quantifier geen ‘no.’ After age 3, children start developing their knowledge of the licensing of hoeven in other negative expressions as well—namely niemand ‘nobody,’ weinig ‘few,’ and alleen ‘only’—and eventually allow hoeven in the scope of these negative words after age 5. Based on these developmental patterns, we assume that children initially analyze hoeven as bearing a lexical dependency with either niet or geen, represented by two lexical frames [hoef niet] ‘need not’ and [hoef geen] ‘need no’ and that they develop a dependency relationship between the NPI and an abstract negator neg later on, which is realized by an abstract analysis [hoef neg] ‘need neg.’ Adopting a distribution-based learning approach, we show that the two lexical frames are established based on hoeven’s overwhelming occurrence with either niet or geen in the input. As for the development of the abstract analysis, we argue that children’s knowledge of syntactic decomposition of negation is of crucial importance. Since [hoef neg] turns out to be the representation of the NPI in late child grammar, we moreover argue that hoeven is an NPI, due to its lexical dependency with the abstract negator neg

Multiunit Sequences in First Language Acquisition.

Theoretical and empirical reasons suggest that children build their language not only out of individual words but also out of multiunit strings. These are the basis for the development of schemas containing slots. The slots are putative categories that build in abstraction while the schemas eventually connect to other schemas in terms of both meaning and form. Evidence comes from the nature of the input, the ways in which children construct novel utterances, the systematic errors that children make, and the computational modeling of children's grammars. However, much of this research is on English, which is unusual in its rigid word order and impoverished inflectional morphology. We summarize these results and explore their implications for languages with more flexible word order and/or much richer inflectional morphology.

Morpho-syntactic properties of simultaneous bilingualism: Evidence from bilingual English-Turkish

Aims and Objectives/Purpose/Research Questions: A number of studies on the acquisition of non-null subject languages in child grammars have suggested that while overt subjects are mainly used with finite forms, null subjects co-occur with non-finite forms. The purpose of this study is to explore the proposed relationship between subject realization and verbal morphology in a simultaneous bilingual context. Design/Methodology/Approach: Longitudinal case study Data and Analysis: The present study analyses longitudinal data from an English-Turkish bilingual child (2;4–3;9), with special reference to the distribution of finite forms and the suppliance of overt subjects on the one hand, and subject drop and the use of non-finite forms, on the other. The English/Turkish data comprise 37 recordings collected regularly for nearly 18 months. Findings/Conclusions: English-Turkish bilingual data show that the majority of the overt subjects in the English language of the bilingual child occur both with inflected and uninflected verb forms. At a time the child has consistent and productive suppliance of overt subjects in his English, he uses uninflected verb forms with overt subjects, suggesting that the proposed association discussed in the literature does not necessarily hold. Moreover, around the same time the bilingual child’s Turkish presents robust evidence for the productive and systematic use of inflected forms as well as omission of subjects. Originality and significance/implications: These data, based on a less commonly studied language pair, English-Turkish, challenge previous research that postulates an association between overt subjects and finite forms versus null subjects and non-finite root forms. Overall, there appears to be a relationship between the acquisition of subject–verb agreement in the bilingual child’s Turkish and the correct suppliance of overt subjects in his English, suggesting language-particular devices for the realization of person deixis.

Amy Pierce, Language Acquisition and Syntactic Theory: A Comparative Analysis of French and English Child Grammars, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1992, xi+173 pp.

Amy Pierce, Language Acquisition and Syntactic Theory: A Comparative Analysis of French and English Child Grammars, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1992, xi+173 pp.

C-Command in the Grammars of Children with High Functioning Autism

A recent study questioned the adherence of children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) to a linguistic constraint on the use of reflexive pronouns (Principle A) in sentences like Bart's dad is touching himself. This led researchers to question whether children with ASD are able to compute the hierarchical structural relationship of c-command, and raised the possibility that the children rely on a linear strategy for reference assignment. The current study investigates the status of c-command in children with ASD by testing their interpretation of sentences like (1) and (2) that tease apart use of c-command and a linear strategy for reference assignment. The girl who stayed up late will not get a dime or a jewel (C-command)The girl who didn't go to sleep will get a dime or a jewel (Non C-command) These examples both contain negation (not or didn't) and disjunction (or). In (1), negation c-commands the disjunction phrase, yielding a conjunctive entailment. This gives rise to the meaning that the girl who stayed up late won't get a dime and she won't get a jewel. In (2), negation is positioned inside a relative clause and it does not c-command disjunction. Therefore, no conjunctive entailment follows. Thus, (2) is true if the girl just gets a dime or just a jewel, or possibly both. If children with ASD lack c-command, then (1) will not give rise to a conjunctive entailment. In this case, children might rely on a linear strategy for reference assignment. Since negation precedes disjunction in both (1) and (2), they might be interpreted in a similar manner. Likewise, children who show knowledge of c-command should perform well on sentences governed by Principle A. These hypotheses were tested in experiments with 12 Australian children with HFA, aged 5;4 to 12;7, and 12 typically-developing controls, matched on non-verbal IQ. There was no significant difference in the pattern of responses by children with HFA and the control children on either (1) and (2) or the Principle A sentences. The findings provide preliminary support for the proposal that knowledge of c-command and Principle A is intact in HFA children.

Relationships among measures of longest utterances, MLU, age, and number of utterances in child language samples

The length of longest utterances (LLU) may offer a useful view of the upper boundaries of a child's early expressive grammar. In this study, the properties of four measures of LLU were examined in terms of their relationships to mean length of utterance (MLU) and to language sample size over the course of early development. The four measures of LLU were (1) mean length of the longest three utterances (LLU-3), (2) mean length of the longest 10% of utterances (LLU-10%), (3) MLUs over the median utterance length (LLU-M), and (4) MLUs longer than one morpheme (LLU > 1). Language samples of various sizes were created by randomly selecting subsets of 50, 100, 200, and 300 utterances from Brown's samples of Adam, Eve, and Sarah. The four calculation methods were compared in each of the sample sizes, over the course of development for each child. The results indicated that LLU-M and LLU > 1 were both close to MLU, although age differences were noted. Increases in LLU tended to outpace MLU over development in three of the four calculation methods. LLU was positively related to language sample size for one of the calculation methods, LLU-3. Overall, LLU was found to be a fairly close parallel of MLU and a good predictor of future MLU values. It was concluded that three basic properties of LLU should be taken into consideration: (1) calculation method affects LLU outcome, (2) LLU gradually increases relative to MLU throughout early development, and (3) LLU is affected by interaction of language sample size with calculation method.

No “Chinese-speaking phase” in Chinese Children's Early Grammar – A Study of the Scope between Negation and Universal Quantification in Mandarin Chinese

Based on the naturalistic data from four children (aged from 00;10 to 02;06) and experimental data from 60 children (aged from four to eight years old) and 15 adults, the study proposes that Mandarin speakers’ judgment about the scope assignment between negation and universal quantification is attributed to the interplay of several influential factors: word order, lexical semantics of logical expressions, structural complexity, conversational implicature, and felicity in the use of negation. Knowledge about the vital importance of word order in the grammar of Mandarin-speaking adults is not initially present in the grammar of children, but is gradually acquired. They initially rely excessively on lexical semantics in interpreting scope, sometimes leading to non-adult interpretations. Full mastery of scope knowledge comes when they become fully aware of the prominent role of isomorphism, at age 6 or 7.

Negative sentences in children with specific language impairment

This study used elicited production methodology to investigate the negative sentences that are produced by English-speaking children with specific language impairment (SLI). Negative sentences were elicited in contexts in which adults use the negative auxiliary verb doesn’t (e.g., It doesn’t fit). This form was targeted to see how negative markers ( not, n’t) interact with the 3rd person singular - s in the grammars of children with SLI. A robust sample of negative sentences was collected from 63 children: 21 5-year-old children with SLI, 21 language-matched typically-developing children and 21 age-matched typically-developing children. The negative sentences produced by children in the two control groups were consistently adult-like. In contrast, only 5 of the 21 children in the SLI group produced adult-like negative sentences with doesn’t. The other 16 children with SLI produced a variety of non-adult negative sentences (e.g., It not fit, It’s not fit, It not fits, It’s not fits). The study concludes that children with SLI undergo an extended period in the development of sentential negation during which they produce a range of non-adult sentences that are similar to those previously reported in younger 2- to 3-year-old typically-developing children.