The Early Development of zai4 in Mandarin-Speaking Children
Date Issued
2009
Date
2009
Author(s)
Yao, Yu-Fen
Abstract
This study aims to investigate children’s developmental path in the uses of four types of zai4 as: (1) a verb, (2) a progressive aspect marker, (3) a secondary verb, and (4) a locative marker. Since these functions of zai4 can be viewed as special kind of polysemies or homonyms, we want to examine in what order do Mandarin-speaking children acquire these four different types of zai4. Among the four varieties of zai4, the use of the main verb zai4 and the progressive aspect marker zai4 may be acquired earlier than the others, according to the consideration of structural complexity and frequency. The main verb zai4 is constructed in the form [zai4(V) + N(location)] while the progressive aspect marker zai4 [zai4(progressive aspect marker) + V(action)]. Two hypothetical developmental paths are examined: (1) Overlapping Distribution－there is initially only one zai4 in children’s language system, and they interchangeably use zai4 as a verb and as a progressive aspect marker at the early stage. (2) Complementary distribution－there are initially two types of zai4, and children use zai4 as a verb and as a progressive aspect marker. For the purpose of unveiling the developmental path of zai4 in Mandarin-speaking children, two methods are used in this study: (1) analysis of children’s spontaneous speech, and (2) comprehension of zai4 by using Intermodal Preferential Looking. The result in the language sample shows supports that the main verb zai4 and the progressive aspect marker zai4 are first produced at the age of 1; 9, which is earlier than the secondary verb zai4 at the age of 2;0 and the locative marker zai4 at the age of 2;1. The synchronic development of these two functions suggested that both should be equally salient for children to capture at the same time. In addition, the main verb zai4 and the progressive zai4 are used in separate linguistic contexts and are found no overlapping in the use of these two functions by children. Results of the comprehension test on children at age two show that the function associated with progressive zai4 is slightly more salient, as reflected by a longer fixation time in the test conditions of zai4 used as a progressive aspect marker. Despite the minute advantage of progressive zai4 in the experimental tasks, zai4 as a main verb and as a progressive aspect marker show equal footing in children’s production and comprehension at around two years old.
Subjects
locative constructions
aspect marker
acquisition of verbs
learning mechanism
homonyms
IPL experiment
language acquisition
File(s)![Thumbnail Image]()
Loading...
Name
ntu-98-R94142010-1.pdf
Size
23.53 KB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum
(MD5):a59b9d9aa17507311c62dbf24c3e5a3d