Samples of written language were collected from 140 congenitally deaf children at grade levels 3, 5, 7, and 9. The samples were then subjected to error, quantitative, and transformational analysis. Findings suggested a relationship between the order in which the deaf child acquires the rules of his language and the ordering of rules in a…

This dissertation is an attempt to characterize the notion "exception to a rule of grammar" within the context of Chomsky's conception of grammar as given in "Aspects of the Theory of Syntax." This notion depends on a prior notion of "rule government"--in each phrase marker on which a transformational rule may…

This project seeking to develop sound methodological research techniques for second-language is based on an initial pilot study which (1) identified and classifies the utterances of a child learning Spanish as a second language, and (2) determines whether there are any significant trends in the observed order of learning of kernels and transformed…

Broad and major concerns dealing with reading are set forth in this monograph to provoke discussion and examination by both researchers and practitioners. In Part 1, Kenneth S. Goodman presents a psycholinguistic view of language and reading (within a transformational-generative framework) as essentially a set of processes of recoding, decoding,…

Distinction is made between nonsignificant (i.e. definitional or accidental) and significant universals. Two approaches to discovering the significance of universals are characterized and evaluated: the process-state approach, which aims at "transmission-significant" universals, and the transformationalist approach, which seeks for…

THE AUTHORS HAVE CONCERNED THEMSELVES IN THIS STUDY WITH IMITATION AS A DEVICE BY WHICH THE INVESTIGATOR CAN LEARN ABOUT CHILD LANGUAGE. THE DATA EXAMINED ARE PART OF A LONGITUDINAL THREE-MONTH STUDY OF LINGUISTIC DEVELOPMENT IN A TWO-YEAR-OLD CHILD. THE REPORT IS BASED ON 1,000 ELICITED IMITATIONS. CERTAIN PHENOMONA WERE OBSERVED GENERALLY WHEN…

A discussion of the child's language acquisition including examples of syntactic development. This analysis is introduced by references to various language theories, particularly the generative and psycholinguistic theories, and to various systems of syntactic description. The examples given raise questions on the theoretic and ideological levels.…

Special issue on "Changing Linguistics." (DD)

Tests the prediction that children acquiring left-branching languages will exhibit a preference for backward patterns of anaphora by presenting data from Japanese and Korean which show the prediction to be false. Findings support the view that any directionality preference for anaphora is the same for all languages. (Author/SED)

Discusses current research in child language to help teachers understand how young children acquire language skills. (DR)

Intended as an introduction to psycholinguistics from the linguist's point of view, this book addresses itself to three main topics: the innateness of language, the relationship of linguistic knowledge to language usage, and the comprehension and production of speech. In 12 chapters, the book discusses the nature of language development, the…

Data on the complexity of relative clause formation in children indicate that right embedding precedes central embedding in development. Previous research on the subject argues that configurations where coreferential NP's function as subjects are less complex than configurations where coreferential NP's function as objects. It appears that the…

Developmental trends in the effects of expectations regarding agent/action matches on judgments of sentence acceptability were investigated. Five sentences reflected expected relations ("harmonious") and five contradicted them ("contrary"). Twelve subjects each were in grades 4 through 8 during year 1; the same 60 subjects…