Computational complexity and learnability of two vowel harmony patterns with neutral vowels
This paper investigates the relationship between the complexity of a phonological pattern and its learnability. The Complexity Hypothesis refers to the idea that less complex patterns are easier to learn than more complex patterns. In this paper, the hypothesis is tested as the Subregular Hypothesis...
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| Published in: | 음성음운형태론연구 Vol. 26; no. 1; pp. 205 - 230 |
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| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Journal Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
한국음운론학회
01.04.2020
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| Subjects: | |
| ISSN: | 1226-8690, 2671-616X |
| Online Access: | Get full text |
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| Summary: | This paper investigates the relationship between the complexity of a phonological pattern and its learnability. The Complexity Hypothesis refers to the idea that less complex patterns are easier to learn than more complex patterns. In this paper, the hypothesis is tested as the Subregular Hypothesis, which measures computational complexity in terms of the Subregular Hierarchy. This hypothesis states that patterns in a lower class are less complex and thus easier to learn. Two artificial grammars of vowel harmony patterns with neutral vowels were tested. The two patterns differed in terms of the computational complexity and attestedness. The At Least One (ALO) pattern, the less complex pattern and the unattested vowel harmony pattern, is predicted to be easier to learn than the Rightmost pattern, the more complex pattern and the attested pattern. The results showed that the Rightmost pattern was more difficult to learn than the ALO pattern. This supports the Subregular Hypothesis and implies a learning bias toward computational complexity despite the attestedness of vowel harmony patterns. KCI Citation Count: 0 |
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| ISSN: | 1226-8690 2671-616X |
| DOI: | 10.17959/sppm.2020.26.1.205 |