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ERIC Number: EJ936713
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2011-Sep
Pages: 30
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0305-0009
EISSN: N/A
Available Date: N/A
Learning to Liaise and Elide "Comme il Faut": Evidence from Bilingual Children
Nicoladis, Elena; Paradis, Johanne
Journal of Child Language, v38 n4 p701-730 Sep 2011
Liaison and elision in French are phonological phenomena that apply across word boundaries. French-speaking children make errors in contexts where liaison/elision typically occurs in adult speech. In this study, we asked if acquisition of French liaison/elision can be explained in a constructivist framework. We tested if children's liaison/elision was sensitive to co-occurrence and meaning. We expected children's use of liaison/elision to correlate with their experience with French (estimated by vocabulary). Thirty-one French-speaking children (twenty-five bilingual) between three and five years old produced familiar vowel-initial words, following four words: (1) "un," (2) "deux," (3) "un petit" and (4) "beaucoup de." The children with smaller French vocabularies produced many vowel-initial words and some consonant-initial chunks. The children with larger French vocabularies produced liaison/elision correctly across several frames while associating a number interpretation with liaised consonants. These results suggest that children use a variety of cues to construct the appropriate use of liaison/elision.
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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: N/A