Presents an outline for a theory of syntax acquisition, surveys other approaches to language acquisition, and addresses the following methodological issues: (1) the relevance of linguistic theory to the model; (2) how the model is tested; and (3) the domain of the theory. (Author/AM)

The present study is an attempt to apply a paradigm to the shift of verbal behavior before and after the age of seven in order to see if linguistic contexts affect verbal behavior differentially before seven or after seven. (Author/CFM)

When 20 highly talkative and 20 much less talkative preschool children were measured for articulation, grammar, receptive syntax, and sentence repetition, the performances of the highly talkative children were significantly superior on all measures. (Author/RL)

Discusses the possible contribution of linguistics to the legal field, and cautions about the limitations of this contribution. (AM)

The purpose of this study was to attempt to verify the theory of Taeschner and Volterra (1976) that bilingual children pass through three distinct phases while becoming perfectly bilingual. The 12 subjects were English-Italian bilingual children between the ages of 1.6 and 4.6. (CFM)

Article deals with the Osgood model of sign learning...and the Chomskian approach. Both...approaches are discussed in terms of their appropriateness with respect to teachers' questions about language development and language stimulation. (Author)

This article discusses the section of the final examination used at a regional training center in French language and literature in Morocco. The linguistics task is in the form of two tests containing language errors which an examination candidate is required to find, correct, and explain. (Text is in French.) (CLK)

Inferences about linguistic competence in children are typically based on spontaneous speech. Children's use of complex object and adverbial noun phrase is seen as a reflection of pragmatic factors. Similar adult patterns indicate children's lack of subject clauses may be due to the nature of spontaneous speech. (CHK)

Presents an account of a study of the role played by a dictionary in the completion of written (encoding) tasks by students of English as a foreign language. The study uses an introspective methodology based on the completion of flowcharts. Results indicate the importance of information on spelling and meanings and the neglect of coded syntactic…

Shows how one teacher skillfully integrates vocabulary instruction with his subject matter teaching. The teacher links the target vocabulary to the students' experiences and concentrates on word meanings and their written and oral forms and syntactic behavior, pushing students to accurate use of the words in context. (12 references) (Author/CK)

Reports on research consisting of compiling a contrastive verb valency dictionary of Dutch, French, and English whose main strength lies in depicting semantic differences between its entries and conceptual differences between languages. Using these analyses, one can start to discern nuclear and peripheral meanings, analyze possible meaning…

Examines quantitative data concerning hesitation phenomena in relation to the subjective perceptions of listeners of nonnative English. Findings reveal that subjective judgments of the number of hesitations or pauses in nonnative speech derive from total pausing time, percentage of pause time, and the length of the longest pause in discourse. (30…

Reviews the syntactic priming task, a paradigm involving the presentation of a phrasal or clausal context, followed by the presentation of a target item for lexical decision or naming. Notes that response times are faster for targets syntactically congruent with the preceding context than for incongruent targets. Outlines how to administer this…

Responds to Major's (1996) and Ioup's (1996) criticism of this author's theory of language acquisition. The author agrees with both critics that abstract systems of phonology are acquired. He concludes that the proper study of language acquisition is to chart the course by which perceptual, motoric, and cognitive functions induce structure. (31…

Illustrates the interdependence between theory and method by showing how the methods underling even a relatively simple analysis of discourse are imbued with theoretical import. Focuses on two methodological decisions that are a standard part of the set of discourse analytic tools: what is context and what is the unit of analysis? (39 references)…