Children’s acquisition of word order variation: A study of subject placement in embedded clauses in Norwegian

Norwegian embedded clauses give children two options for subject placement: preceding or following negation (S-Neg/Neg-S). In the adult language, S-Neg is the ‘default’ and highly frequent option, and Neg-S is infrequent in children’s input. However, Neg-S may be argued to be the structurally less c...

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Veröffentlicht in:Journal of child language Jg. 51; H. 5; S. 1109 - 1133
Hauptverfasser: RINGSTAD, Tina, WESTERGAARD, Marit
Format: Journal Article
Sprache:Englisch
Veröffentlicht: England Cambridge University Press 01.09.2024
Schlagworte:
Adult language
Adults
Child
Child development
Child Language
Child, Preschool
Children
Children & youth
Clauses
Embedded constructions
Female
Humans
Language
Language Development
Male
Native language acquisition
Negation
Norway
Norwegian
Norwegian language
Oral Language
Semantics
Speech
Syntactic complexity
Syntax
Vocabulary
Word order
Norway
economy
word order variation
First language acquisition
Norwegian
subject placement
frequency
ISSN:0305-0009, 1469-7602, 1469-7602
Online-Zugang:Volltext
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Zusammenfassung:Norwegian embedded clauses give children two options for subject placement: preceding or following negation (S-Neg/Neg-S). In the adult language, S-Neg is the ‘default’ and highly frequent option, and Neg-S is infrequent in children’s input. However, Neg-S may be argued to be the structurally less complex. We investigate whether children are aware of the existence of both subject positions, and if they prefer the more frequent or the less complex position. Through an elicited production task with monolingual Norwegian children (N=33, age 3;1-6;1) we find that children in general overuse the Neg-S option, and we suggest that children have an inherent preference for the less complex position, due to a principle of structural economy. We also find that a group of children display U-shaped development, first using only S-Neg, then only Neg-S and finally S-Neg again, and we relate this to structure building and economy of movement.
Bibliographie:ObjectType-Article-1
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-2
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ISSN:0305-0009
1469-7602
1469-7602
DOI:10.1017/S0305000923000259