Item-based Learning Research Articles

Subject-verb agreement marking by Ghanaian learners of French

In learning French as a foreign language, mastery of agreement marking is indicative of learner progression. In this article, I focus on how subject-verb agreement markers are acquired by Ghanaian learners of French. Based on written data collected from examination scripts, I attempt to present a coherent explanation for the trends noted. The results show that allomorphy that characterises the verb stem influences the production of agreement markers. While verbs with a single stem are strongly associated with first person singular marking, verbs without an identifiable stem are more strongly associated with third person singular marking. Interpreting this within the item-learning/rule-learning dichotomy, it is argued that both strategies are simultaneously deployed. Consequently, it is suggested that the dichotomy between rule-based versus item-based learning can be impacted by the modality of language.

Mastering the Grammar of Complex Events: Evidence from Mandarin Resultative Verb Compounds

ABSTRACTThe Mandarin resultative verb compound (RVC; e.g., tui dao “push fall” and pa shang “climb ascend”) encodes complex events composed of an initiating action and resulting activity or state. This study investigated when Mandarin-speaking children acquired this language-specific device. Specifically, we focused on children’s production of RVCs with two infixes, -bu- “not able” and -de- “be able.” Because the infixes intervene between the two verbs of RVC (e.g., tui -bu- dao “push -not able- fall” and tui -de- dao “push -be able- fall”), being able to produce RVC infixation indicates that children have a morphological separation between the action and the result verbs. Two studies were conducted. Study 1 is a corpus analysis. We examined the use of plain RVCs versus RVCs with infixes in parent input and children’s spontaneous speech using a cross-sectional corpus and a longitudinal corpus. RVCs with infixes were found to be very rare in both parent input and child production. Study 2 is an experimental elicitation task targeting RVC infixation. Children between 3;0 and 5;0 performed exceptionally well, producing target responses when primed with structurally related probes in discourse-appropriate contexts. There was no difference in children’s performance related to age or the type of infix (i.e., -bu- vs -de-). Children’s early competence with RVC infixation, which is infrequent in input, runs counter to the usage-based approach that emphasizes item-based learning. Rather, by age three, Mandarin-speaking children have developed a representation of the RVC as two distinct morphemes for encoding complex event structure. This representation facilitates acquisition of the infixes with very little input data.

Language learning as language use: A cross-linguistic model of child language development.

While usage-based approaches to language development enjoy considerable support from computational studies, there have been few attempts to answer a key computational challenge posed by usage-based theory: the successful modeling of language learning as language use. We present a usage-based computational model of language acquisition which learns in a purely incremental fashion, through online processing based on chunking, and which offers broad, cross-linguistic coverage while uniting key aspects of comprehension and production within a single framework. The model's design reflects memory constraints imposed by the real-time nature of language processing, and is inspired by psycholinguistic evidence for children's sensitivity to the distributional properties of multiword sequences and for shallow language comprehension based on local information. It learns from corpora of child-directed speech, chunking incoming words together to incrementally build an item-based "shallow parse." When the model encounters an utterance made by the target child, it attempts to generate an identical utterance using the same chunks and statistics involved during comprehension. High performance is achieved on both comprehension- and production-related tasks: the model's shallow parsing is evaluated across 79 single-child corpora spanning English, French, and German, while its production performance is evaluated across over 200 single-child corpora representing 29 languages from the CHILDES database. The model also succeeds in capturing findings from children's production of complex sentence types. Together, our modeling results suggest that much of children's early linguistic behavior may be supported by item-based learning through online processing of simple distributional cues, consistent with the notion that acquisition can be understood as learning to process language. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Creating Units of Better Linkage between Elementary School and Junior High School on English Education： Focusing on the Relation between Item-Based Learning and Rule-Based Learning

Creating Units of Better Linkage between Elementary School and Junior High School on English Education： Focusing on the Relation between Item-Based Learning and Rule-Based Learning

Moving in small steps towards verb second: A case study

This paper examines rule-based learning and item-based learning in relation to a Swedish child's acquisition of verb second in main clauses. While rule-based accounts assert that young children have access to syntactic structure and acquire a rule of generalized verb second, item-based accounts claim that young children are reproducing frequent word combinations in the input. The paper provides new and important data from one Swedish child, concluding that the acquisition of verb second is the result of rule-based learning.

Brain Dynamics Sustaining Rapid Rule Extraction from Speech

Language acquisition is a complex process that requires the synergic involvement of different cognitive functions, which include extracting and storing the words of the language and their embedded rules for progressive acquisition of grammatical information. As has been shown in other fields that study learning processes, synchronization mechanisms between neuronal assemblies might have a key role during language learning. In particular, studying these dynamics may help uncover whether different oscillatory patterns sustain more item-based learning of words and rule-based learning from speech input. Therefore, we tracked the modulation of oscillatory neural activity during the initial exposure to an artificial language, which contained embedded rules. We analyzed both spectral power variations, as a measure of local neuronal ensemble synchronization, as well as phase coherence patterns, as an index of the long-range coordination of these local groups of neurons. Synchronized activity in the gamma band (20-40 Hz), previously reported to be related to the engagement of selective attention, showed a clear dissociation of local power and phase coherence between distant regions. In this frequency range, local synchrony characterized the subjects who were focused on word identification and was accompanied by increased coherence in the theta band (4-8 Hz). Only those subjects who were able to learn the embedded rules showed increased gamma band phase coherence between frontal, temporal, and parietal regions.

Young children fail to fully generalize a novel argument structure construction when exposed to the same input as older learners

The present study exposed five-year-olds (M=5 ; 2), seven-year-olds (M=7 ; 6) and adults (M=22 ; 4) to instances of a novel phrasal construction, then used a forced choice comprehension task to evaluate their learning of the construction. The abstractness of participants' acquired representations of the novel construction was evaluated by varying the degree of lexical overlap that test items had with exposure items. We found that both child groups were less proficient than adults, but seven-year-olds showed evidence of across-the-board generalization whereas five-year-olds were sensitive to lexical overlap at test. This outcome is consistent with more conservative, item-based learning of syntactic patterns in younger children. Additionally, unlike adults and seven-year-olds, five-year-olds showed no evidence of having mastered the novel construction's linking rules. Thus, younger learners are less likely to generalize abstract argument structure constructions when exposed to the same systematic input as older learners.

Logically Speaking: Evidence for Item-Based Acquisition of the Connectives AND & OR

Why is it that young children use connectives correctly in conversation, yet frequently err when asked to use the same connectives in formal reasoning? One possibility is that connective acquisition is item-based in which usage rules are induced from natural language input. This possibility was evaluated by examining the correspondence between the structure of children's natural language environment and their own productions. AND and OR use was coded within 100,626 turns between parents and children between 2.0 and 5.0 for (a) frequency, (b) meanings, (c) syntactic frames, and (d) formal or informal use. The results are consistent with item-based learning in that children's initial productions were very similar to those of adults on each dimension investigated. AND was produced significantly more frequently than OR, meaning and syntactic frame use were highly consistent across ages and producers, and use was nearly always informal.

Screening for Secondary Intervention

The article by Speece (in this issue) underscores the disappointing accuracy results of early screening for reading difficulties and argues that development conceptualized as rate of learning matters. We respond by emphasizing three points. First, the purpose of early screening could be identifying students not at risk so that instructional objectives can be established for students potentially at risk. Second, monitoring progress in mastering the alphabetic principle is reflected in item-based learning. Third, response to instruction is multilevel and contextualized. These points are illustrated with data from an early reading assessment used widely in Texas and from high-performing/high-poverty schools in Texas that serve as models of multitiered instruction.

The Multiple Processes Approach: reply to commentaries on ‘A multiple process solution to the logical problem of language acquisition’ by Brian MacWhinney

These twelve thoughtful commentaries demonstrate interesting shifts in our collective understanding of the ‘logical problem of language acquisition.’ The bulk of the commentary supports the multiple process approach to the logical problem. At the same time, there is strong and productive disagreement regarding the ways in which conservatism, competition, probabilistic identification, indirect negative evidence, item-based learning, cue construction, monitoring, and constraints make their separate and related contributions to the learning of specific target structures.

A multiple process solution to the logical problem of language acquisition

Many researchers believe that there is a logical problem at the centre of language acquisition theory. According to this analysis, the input to the learner is too inconsistent and incomplete to determine the acquisition of grammar. Moreover, when corrective feedback is provided, children tend to ignore it. As a result, language learning must rely on additional constraints from universal grammar. To solve this logical problem, theorists have proposed a series of constraints and parameterizations on the form of universal grammar. Plausible alternatives to these constraints include: conservatism, item-based learning, indirect negative evidence, competition, cue construction, and monitoring. Careful analysis of child language corpora has cast doubt on claims regarding the absence of positive exemplars. Using demonstrably available positive data, simple learning procedures can be formulated for each of the syntactic structures that have traditionally motivated invocation of the logical problem. Within the perspective of emergentist theory (MacWhinney, 2001), the operation of a set of mutually supportive processes is viewed as providing multiple buffering for developmental outcomes. However, the fact that some syntactic structures are more difficult to learn than others can be used to highlight areas of intense grammatical competition and processing load.

Negative commands in Spanish-speaking children: no need for recourse to relativized minimality (a reply to Grinstead, 2000).

In a recent commentary, Grinstead (2000) argues against Bates & Goodman's (1999) claims that the development of grammar is contingent on developments in the lexicon, and that, therefore, there is no need for an independent grammar domain. Citing data on the acquisition of negative commands in Catalan and Spanish, Grinstead argues that beyond grammatical elements that are linked with lexical items, there must also exist independently a computational component, which includes grammatical constraints. He argues further that these constraints are observed from the beginning of acquisition. The purpose of this note is, first, to challenge the evidence Grinstead brings to bear in support of this position and, second, to argue further that the acquisition of negative commands in Spanish is better understood in terms of item-based learning combined with low functional load.