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This article examines the use of like as a discourse marker and discourse particle in the spontaneous speech of children age 3-10. Data come from recorded interactions between same-sex peers. Discourse like appeared in the speech of children as young as age 4. Young children used like primarily as a discourse particle preceding determiner phrases. Like was observed in a greater number of syntactic positions as speakers' ages increased and began to appear in different syntactic positions in approximately the order in which they developed in the language historically. Boys age 6 and younger were less likely than girls to use like and used it less frequently and in fewer syntactic positions than girls. The results suggest that boys and girls follow similar developmental trajectories but that girls become more sophisticated users of like at an earlier age than boys. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates the function of like when it occurs in numerically quantified contexts. The pragmatic literature espouses two distinct positions on this topic, though neither has yet been tested empirically. On the one hand, like is argued to be a genuine pragmatic particle, indistinguishable from other discourse uses of this lexeme. Alternatively, others argue that in numerical contexts like carries propositional content and in this respect, it functions adverbially. Quantitative analysis from a large corpus of contemporary English suggests the latter: like is an approximative adverb, alternating with the more traditional form about in the spoken vernacular. However, the perspective afforded by apparent time reveals rapid, ongoing change whereby the traditional adverb is in the process of being ousted. The pattern of change therefore suggests lexical replacement. Among older speakers the preferred form for approximation is about, while among younger speakers the form of choice is like. These results thus indicate that what has previously been treated as a single entity, discourse like, is in fact two distinct forms: like the adverb and like the particle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]