Twenty children aged 3;0 to 3;10 were studied for behavior related to the acquisition of a single new word ("chromium," which was presented as designating the color olive green). The research was conducted in three cycles: prior to exposure to "chromium," at the time of a single encounter with that word, and about a week after the first encounter.…

This study focuses on the development of the ability to talk about events in time -- to specify occurrence in time with reference to the present as well as to locate events in time with reference to each other. The child's learning of how to mark the different kinds of relationships between two events is discussed. This study of current relevance…

The count/mass disinction is often considered to be a semantic one because it distinguishes those nouns that refer to countable things from those that refer to non-countable things. However, exceptions indicate that semantic properties alone are not sufficient to determine noun sub-categorization. Therefore, such sub-categorization must be defined…

The problems with using Piagetian theory to explore language-thought relationships are two-fold. First there are methodological problems, including the lack of experimental controls and the lack of uniform criteria by which cognitive operations are identified. A second difficulty is the questionable practice of interpreting child language…

The orthographic compounds (two or more words written as one word) in M. Rhode and B. Cronnell's lexicon of words used by elementary school children are categorized in this paper, primarily in terms of related semantic/syntactic structures. Following a discussion of orthographic compounds, the paper mentions procedures used by Rhode and Cronnell…

Jean Piaget's ideas regarding symbolic function are expanded in this paper to provide a model to use in distinguishing between general symbolic versus specific linguistic deficits in language disordered children (whose disorders are not due primarily to intellectual, sensory, motor, or social-emotional deficits). In applying this model to the…

This paper suggests that language study focus its attention more on the pedagogical needs of educators by offering them a more comprehensive dialectical and unifying theory of language development that could then present the process as a holistic endeavor instead of as a set of separate linguistic acquisitions. Specifically, it suggests the use…

The speech of three Quiche Mayan children aged 2;1, 2;9, and 3;0 was monitored for the acquisition of the distinction between ergative and absolutive person markers. The children were found not to confuse markers, but to use either the appropriate one or none at all. The one exception to this rule, when analyzed, indicates that children grasp the…

The adjacent utterances of three mothers and their children, aged 22.5 to 26.5 months, were recorded and analyzed. Each mother was found most frequently to express the same semantic-syntactic relation as did her child in the preceding utterance. This correspondence appeared to be independent of the parent utterance which preceded the matching…

Children aged three to six were shown drawings of three objects that were identical except for differences in size in one or both dimensions. Each child was asked to determine if one object was the tallest. A missing feature model was not supported, since a child was often correct for some items and incorrect for others. Errors were partially…

The spontaneous speech of seven children was monitored for "wh" questions. The children were observed longitudinally from about age 24 to 36 months. The pattern of development with regard to the deletion of non-obligatory verbs revealed that "what,""where," and "who" questions presented increasing verb…

This study documents the emerging ability of children to use demonstrative expressions and definite and indefinite articles in order to establish a clear reference for the hearer in a natural discourse situation. The analysis is based primarily on transcripts of twins recorded over a period of nine months when they were 33 to 42 months old.…

This paper reports on an investigation of the voice-onset-time (VOT) characteristics of word-initial stops produced by four four-year-old children. Instrumental analysis of the children's spontaneous speech showed that they had distinct distributions for voiced and voiceless stops at all three places of articulation and that there was very little…

In the current debate about the development of language in children, the author agrees with those psycholinguists who emphasize the role of "imitation followed by analogical extension." That is to say, that if there are inborn discovery procedures for the acquisition of language, they are distributional rather than transformational in nature. On…

The author raises the question of what one can say about the structure of a person's language from a sample of his speech production and urges the calculating of information theory parameters for grammatical constructions. What has to be done is to decide what construction to focus on and what types to recognize as exemplifying that construction.…