This article considers the comprehension of tense-aspect markers remote past BIN and habitual be by 3- to 5-year-old developing African American English (AAE)-speaking children and their Southwest Louisiana Vernacular English (SwLVE)-speaking peers. Overall both groups of children associated BIN with the distant past; however, the AAE-speaking…

Spanish-speaking (SS) children with language impairment (LI) present with deficits in morphology and verb argument structure. These language areas may be useful for clinical identification of affected children. This study aimed to evaluate the discrimination accuracy of spontaneous language measures with SS preschoolers to tease out what…

This study investigated the nature and extent of differences in young children's talk when they interact with mothers and peers. Sixteen girls between 2.5 and 3.5 years of age played twice with their mothers and twice with a peer. Play sessions were videotaped and coded according to measures of quantity and quality of talk. Results of measures of…

A study investigating the acquisition of empty categories (ECs) in Sinhala, a language of the Indo-Aryan family spoken in Sri Lanka, is reported in part. The results examined here concern ECs occurring in a subset of adverbial clause types differing with regard to the kinds of null subjects they permit, including those obligatorily coindexed,…

Dialogues of sets of socially similar twins are studied. The opinion that twins have slower syntactic development than non-twins is seriously questioned. Dialogues with twins saying the same utterance together, correcting each other, quarreling, playing verbal games, etc. are analyzed in their deep structure. (SCC)

Through discussion and illustrative events, an evolving segment of communication is described during the course of transition of one child's total communication system from the sensorimotor or gestural level at 12 months into the level of use of the adult words "more" and "mine," and associated utterances, at 24 months. (Author/RM)

A phonological and syntactic study of a small important group of nonarbitrary terms in Pomo baby talk that are concerned with elemental body needs. A progression is shown from sound images closely associated with the action state or object denoted to the phonological patterns of adult languages. (SCC)

This article discusses the relationship between the linguistic description of language and the speaker's acquisition and use of language, with specific reference to the role of paradigmatic and syntagmatic relationships in the acquisition of definition as a linguistic behavior. (Text is in French.) (AM)

A syntactic density instrument was devised to determine how children use specific syntactic structures in their oral and written language. (JH)

The existence of a developmental sequence for the acquisition of specific complex syntactic structures in English was investigated through an analysis of eight studies of Danish subjects. The studies involved Danish speaking subjects acquiring English as a second language at ages 7-10, 13, and 18. The evidence from these studies demonstrate a…

This study looked at the period when language development overlaps the early years of reading, to see how children read and comprehend complex syntactic structures. Thirty-six second, third, and fourth graders, who were considered average readers, were tested in the first experiment using a reading test to determine comprehension of individual…

In a study extending and refining Carol Chomsky's research, 48 Arabic speaking children aged six, eight, and ten were tested for their comprehension of imperatives using the complement-requiring verbs Ask, Tell, and Promise. Clear support for children's overgeneralization of the minimal distance principle was found only with Promise constructions.…

This study examined the use of directive speech forms by 46 children 2-, 3-, 4-, and 5-years of age as a function of different tasks (play with dolls versus play with colored stickers) and of the presence versus absence of a peer partner. Directive utterances were stimultaneously categorized according to structure, form and the person they…

Two groups of preschoolers and one of young grade-schoolers were tested for their comprehension of presuppositions and negation in complex syntax. Four types of sentences were presented: affirmative and negative versions of sentences with factive main predicates (which presuppose the truth of the proposition of the complement clause) and with…

To measure the effectiveness of an intervention program of language development, it is necessary to understand childrens' knowledge and use of grammatical structures. In both standard and dialectal English, grammar rules are learned without formal instruction for forming the negative, interrogative, and other parts of speech. A mental…