Experiments were conducted to examine the influence of syntactic boundaries on the operation of a phonological rule in speech production. Results indicate that traditional metrics of boundary strength, as well as linguistic formulations of phonological rules, must be elaborated to recognize the special status of clause boundaries and deletion…

The study examines the question of whether or not a teacher of black and white fourth graders faces two distinct groups in regard to the syntactic maturity of their speech. (RB)

This paper represents an effort to explain the language development of the child within the analytic frame of overtly observable data and without recourse either to mathematical models or to postulating hypothetical underlying forms. From longitudinal studies of two-year old children conducted by the author as well as from similar data reported in…

A brief study of terms of address and reference in three examples of regional French of the departments of Sarthe and Mayenne. The questions raised in the study deal with ethnology, ethnolinguistics, popular or familiar French and traits of spoken French. (Text is in French.) (AMH)

Discusses a quantitative study of the use of Australian Questioning Intonation (AQI) in Sydney, which reveals that it has the social distribution characteristic of a language change in progress. The social motivations of AQI are examined in terms of local identity and the entry of new ethnic groups into the community. (Author/SED)

Five experiments examined how the duration of a word spoken in a sentence is influenced by the grammatical category to which it belongs, and the position of the word in a constituent. The findings indicated that a binary distinction between major and minor categories is sufficient for a theory of speech timing and synthesis. (Author/JAC)

Examines grammatically the hesitation pauses in the spontaneous narrative speech of 48 6 1/2-7 years olds. (MB)

Several types of narrative errors are discussed that were found in the course of an analysis of stories collected in casual settings from a number of American speakers in undirected conversation. The approach to the question of error correction is sociocultural; the emphasis is on the motivation for the error correction. This paper explores the…

A STUDY WAS DESIGNED TO EXAMINE THE LINGUISTICS STRUCTURE OF SECOND- AND FIFTH-GRADE TEACHERS' CLASSROOM LANGUAGE USING PROCEDURES THAT HAVE BEEN APPLIED IN RECENT STUDIES OF CHILDREN'S LANGUAGE (LOBAN, 1963 "THE LANGUAGE OF ELEMENTARY SCHOOL CHILDREN" ED 001 875). TEN SECOND-GRADE AND 11 FIFTH-GRADE TEACHERS IN A LARGE, SUBURBAN, PUBLIC SCHOOL…

Discusses the literature on interference as the cause of errors in second language speech. A study is reported which shows that interference by the native language is most often the factor responsible for the largest number of mistakes in grammar and vocabulary. (Author/AMH)

A study of overregularized use of verbs by two children over a period when they were 2 1/2 to 5 years of age shows overregularizations in two directions: non-causative verbs were used as causatives; and causative verbs were used non-causatively. According to terminology from logic, predicates were classified according to the number of noun-phrase…

This investigation studied the development of the form and function of negative sentences, and how it relates to the input on negation that children receive from their parents. The data came from three children: two from a previous study (Bellugi) and one the son of the investigators. A detailed analysis was carried out of the syntactic form and…

This study considers the interaction of syntactic and pragmatic factors (social and cognitive) in children's production of coordinate structures involving conjunction reduction. Two aspects of pragmatic context were considered: (1) the pattern of uncertainty or redundancy in a complex action sequence, and (2) the perceptual grouping of objects…

The paper focuses on the linguistic behavior of Negro children concentrated in communities where a non-standard form of English is the accepted currency. Such children are verbal, possess a language fully developed to serve the needs of their "world," and think effectively enough to survive in a sometimes hostile environment. Certain basic…