1. How Known Constructions Influence the Acquisition of Other Constructions: The German Passive and Future Constructions.
- Author
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Abbot-Smith, Kirsten and Behrens, Heike
- Subjects
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CONSTRUCTION grammar , *SENTENCES (Grammar) , *PASSIVE voice , *VERBS , *COPULA (Grammar) , *VERB phrases , *SYNTAX (Grammar) , *LANGUAGE acquisition , *LINGUISTIC analysis - Abstract
This article suggests evidence for and reasons why prior acquisition may either facilitate or inhibit acquisition of a new construction. It investigates acquisition of the German passive and future constructions which contain a lexical verb with either the auxiliary sein "to be" or werden "to become," and are related through these to potential supporting constructions. We predicted that a supported construction should be acquired earlier, faster, and unusually rapidly. An inhibited construction should show an extended depressed usage. We analyzed a dense corpus of a German boy between 2;0 and 5;0. He acquired the sein- before the werden-passive. The former was supported by his prior acquisition of the sein copula, whereas the werden-passive itself supported one werden copula construction. He acquired the werden-future extremely slowly due to the hindrance of a semantically identical construction. These results fit with an emergentist approach in which apparently "sudden" acquisition is still due to gradual learning mechanisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2006
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