ERIC Number: EJ1485829
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2023-May
Pages: 30
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0305-0009
EISSN: EISSN-1469-7602
Available Date: 0000-00-00
Learning Speaker- and Addressee-Centered Demonstratives in Ticuna
Journal of Child Language, v50 n3 p632-661 2023
This study investigated the acquisition of demonstratives (e.g., "this/that," "here/there") by 45 children (1;0 - 4;11) learning Ticuna, an Indigenous Amazonian language with an unusually complex demonstrative system. I analyzed 89 10-minute samples from video recordings of child-caregiver interaction, examining how often children and caregivers produced each demonstrative type, as well as relationships among children's age, children's demonstrative production, and caregivers' production. Caregivers' demonstrative production displayed few relationships with children's age or production. Children produced speaker-proximal and speaker-distal demonstratives ("this near me, that far from me") earlier in developmental time than addressee-proximal demonstratives ("that near you"), and nominal ("this/that") demonstratives earlier than locative ("here/there") ones. Compared to caregivers, children overused speaker-proximal demonstratives, but used other demonstrative types with adult-like frequency beginning at 2;0. These results support the view that cognitive biases toward egocentric, proximal, and semantically simpler items substantially influence children's acquisition of demonstratives.
Descriptors: Tone Languages, Grammar, Children, Language Acquisition, Child Caregivers, Age Differences, Indigenous Populations
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: 1Department of Linguistics, Cornell University, Ithaca, United States

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