ACQUISITION OF THE STRONG AND WEAK QUANTIFIERS IN THERE -EXISTENTIALS

1. ACQUISITION OF THE STRONG AND WEAK QUANTIFIERS IN THERE-EXISTENTIALS Hsiang-Hua Chang, Karen Miller, and Cristina Schmitt Michigan State University GALANA 2004, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa RESEARCH QUESTIONS PRODUCTION DATA There is strong relationship between age and sentence preference. Significant difference is found in the preference for quantifier structure between adults and 4-5 year-olds (2= 104, p  0.001) and between adults and 3 year-olds (2= 95, p  0.001). There is no significant difference between 3 year-olds and 4-5 year-olds. Adult data are consistent with our prediction. Adults prefer weak quantifiers in existential sentences and strong quantifiers in non-existential sentences. The sentence preference for some, one and every of 4-5 year-olds lean toward the adult preference. It is unlikely that children have the adult-like grammar for these quantificational elements. Age difference: Three year-olds (3;2-4;1) only chose the correct sentences at most two times. Children who gave the correct responses three out of four times were at age 4;2 or older. Grouping for accuracy: Comparing data of the children providing three out of four adult-like answers (group A) and those who made at most two adult-like choices (group B), we found a statistically significant difference between these two groups (2= 17, p  0.025). There is strong correlation between groups with different language performance and sentence preference. A significant difference is also found in their structure preference for quantifiers between adults and group A (2= 36, p  0.001) and between adults and group B (2= 163, p  0.001). Both child groups show that the properties of all are the most difficult to acquire. Data from group A suggest that the acquiring order for these quantifiers is every - one – some – all. (Every may be acquired before one based on data from group B). • The production data of four children from CHILDES (MacWhinney 2000) reveal that the emergence order for children’s first unambiguous quantifier-NP sequences can be: • Adam and Sarah: all – one – some – every • Eve and Naomi: some – one – all – every • Do children prefer weak quantifiers in existentials and also prefer strong • quantifiers in non-existentials as adults do? • Do children learn quantifier restrictions one by one or in a more systematic way? BACKGROUND GRAMMATICALITY JUDGMENT • Why existentials The complicated structure of there-existentials. • Syntactic properties: • Expletive subject: there • No subject-verb agreement • (1) a. There are some books on the shelf. • b. There is a girl in the garden. • Semantic properties: • No individual-level predicates • (2) a. *There are some students smart. (Individual level) • b. There are some students sick. (Stage level) • No strong quantifiers • (3) a. There are some ducks swimming. (Weak quantifiers) • b. *There are all the ducks swimming. (Strong quantifiers) • Pragmatic properties: • Introducing new information • (4) a. There is a girl in the garden. • b. *There is the girl in the garden. • Why compare existentials and locatives Arguably same underlying structure. • Freeze (1992) argues that existentials and locatives are derived from the same • underlying structure as shown in (5). When it comes to expressing new information, • (5a) would be the preferred structure. • Weak and strong quantifiers crucial in differentiating existentials from locatives. • Milsark (1977) classifies quantifiers into two categories, WEAK and STRONG, • referring to the permissible and prohibited types respectively in there-constructions. • Both quantifiers are generated in the same position. Weak quantifiers stay in place • and there is inserted in the subject position to form a sentence like (6a), while strong • quantifiers move to the specifier position of IP as in (6b). • (6) a. There are a few/some/three crayons in the box. (Weak) • b. Every/All the frog(s)i is/are ti in the basket. (Strong) • Syntactic differences between weak and strong quantifiers. • (7) a. Some/Three crayons are in the box. • b. There are some/three crayons in the box. • (8) a. Every frog/All the frogs is/are in the basket. • b. *There is/are every frog/all the frogs in the basket. • Participants: 79 Undergraduate students, 28 Children (age: 3;2-5;4) • Methods: The experimenter introduces Suzi and Mary, two dolls who are from a foreign country and are learning English. Children listen to a short story acted out by props and a sentence from each doll and choose a doll who said the sentence better. Adults watch a video version of the experiment and on an answer sheet check the • doll who said the sentence better. The speaking order and sitting position of the two dolls change in different versions of the tests. Including fillers, the entire experiment takes about 15 minutes. • Pretests: Four pretests are used to help children familiarize with the task and to filter out children not understanding the task. For example: • (9) Suzi: *I are a girl. (10) Suzi: My hair is short. • Mary: I am a girl. Mary: *Hair short is my. • Children must answer at least three out of four pretests correctly (at lease two out of three in the earlier experiments) to become valid samples. Some children, who passed the pretests but obviously chose the same doll over and over again, are considered invalid samples. The results of 26 children (age: 3;0–5;3) were excluded under these criteria. The data presented here are from children who passed the pretests and understood the tasks. • Tests: Proper context is provided to provoke the expected responses. • In story (I)(II), crayons and apple are not mentioned •  Choose the existential (the felicitous sentence), conveying new information • In story (III)(IV), frogs and cookies are mentioned • Choose the non-existential (the grammatical sentence), conveying old information • (I) Suzi and Mary want to draw pictures. They need stuff to draw with. • Suzi: #Some crayons are in the box. • Mary: There are some crayons in the box. • (II) Suzi and Mary are drawing. Look! 'What's in Mary's picture?' • Suzi: There is one apple in the picture. • Mary: #One apple is in the picture. • (III) Suzi and Mary came home one day with a lot of frogs. They put frogs in a basket. • Suzi: Every frog is in the basket. • Mary: *There is every frog in the basket. • (IV) Suzi and Mary are playing cards. They become hungry and want to eat cookies. • Suzi: *There are all the cookies in the bag. • Mary: All the cookies are in the bag. • Result: CONCLUSION AND DISCUSSION . • There is significant correlation between age and the sentence preference for quantifiers. The difference in sentence preference among adults and children is highly significant. The difference between the groups of age 4-5 and age 3 exists but does not achieve statistical significance. When children are grouped according to their test result, a significant difference is found. • Children with better linguistic ability seem to know that the strong quantifier, every, is prohibited in existential sentences and the weak quantifier, one, is preferred in the non-existential in the given context. In general, children do not seem to distinguish between strong and weak quantifiers as adults do in existentials. The results may imply that children are learning quantifiers one by one. • The quantifier acquisition order in production data, some – one - all – every or all – one – some – every, is different from the order found in our experiments, every – one – some –all. The problem mainly lies in the strong quantifiers, all and every. This echoes with many quantifier studies that the acquisition of universal quantifiers, such as all and every, is a complicated task. (Brooks and Brain 1996, Crain et al 1996, Drozd 2001, to name a few). Another possibility is that the task is too difficult for children to listen to two long sentences and make a judgment. HYPOTHESIS • If children and adults have the same grammar for existentials and quantifiers, then the following patterns should be found in both the children’s and adult’s data. • Prefer existential sentences for weak quantifiers one and some. • (Given the context, the non-existential sentences are infelicitous.) • Choose non-existential sentences for strong quantifiers every and all. • (Existential sentences with strong quantifiers are unacceptable.)