How we know what they know

Where are we …• Coming attraction: experiments, results, etc.

• But: these need to be placed in perspective, to see what is needed to understand child language learning

• We want to understand what inferences children must make in order to arrive at mature language state

– Evidence from cross-language typology– Evidence from observations/guesses about learner’s experience– Evidence from stages of child development – do children ‘overgenerate’ or

‘undergenerate’

Asking children about grammar

Stephen Crain, Macquarie U, Sydney

You can’t ask a child: “What interpretations do you accept for …?”

“Some animal ate every piece of food” OR“He thinks that John is the winner”

Clever strategies can be used

Simple/indirect dependent measures carry risks

Crain & Thornton, 1998

Truth Value Judgment Task

“I know what happened in this story…”

Principle C

a. While John was reading the book, he ate an apple

b. While he was reading the book, John ate an apple

c. John ate an apple while he was reading the book

d. *He ate an apple while John was reading the book

Truth Value Judgment Task

Principle C in children: English - Crain & McKee (1985)

Russian - Kazanina & Phillips (2001), etc.

“Hello, Eeyore! I see that you’re reading a book.”

“What a fine-looking apple.”

“No, Pooh. You can’t eat the apple - that’s my apple.”

“Ok, I’ll have to eat a banana instead.”

“Ok, Pooh. I’ve finished reading. Now you can read the book.”

“Great. Now that Pooh is reading the book, I can eat this delicious apple.”

“I shouldn’t be such a greedy donkey - I should let Pooh eat the apple.”

“I suppose I have to eat a banana instead.”

“Here you are, Pooh. You can have the apple.”

“Oh, I’m such a lucky bear! I can read the book, and I can eat the apple, at the same time.”

Apple is eaten up.

OK, that was a story about Eeyore and Winnie-the-Pooh. First Eeyore was reading the book and then Winnie-the-Pooh was reading the book. I know one thing that happened...

While Pooh was reading the book, he ate the apple.

OK, that was a story about Eeyore and Winnie-the-Pooh. First Eeyore was reading the book and then Winnie-the-Pooh was reading the book. I know one thing that happened...

While he was reading the book, Pooh ate the apple.

OK, that was a story about Eeyore and Winnie-the-Pooh. First Eeyore was reading the book and then Winnie-the-Pooh was reading the book. I know one thing that happened...

Pooh ate the apple while he was reading the book.

OK, that was a story about Eeyore and Winnie-the-Pooh. First Eeyore was reading the book and then Winnie-the-Pooh was reading the book. I know one thing that happened...

He ate the apple while Pooh was reading the book.

How 3-4 Year Olds Perform

a. While Pooh was reading the book, he ate an apple

b. While he was reading the book, Pooh ate an apple

c. Pooh ate an apple while he was reading the book

d. *He ate an apple while Pooh was reading the book

yes!

yes!

yes!

no!

Works for English, Italian, Russian etc.

How the Task Works

• Child is not being judged• Identical story for all test sentences • Avoids child’s ‘yes’ bias - child shows

knowledge by answering “no”• Story favors the ungrammatical meaning• Story is set up to make “no” answer felicitous

How the Task Works

• Child is not being judged• Identical story for all test sentences • Avoids child’s ‘yes’ bias - child shows

knowledge by answering “no”• Story favors the ungrammatical meaning• Story is set up to make “no” answer felicitous

How the Task Works

• Child is not being judged– child understands that (s)he is helping the

experimenter to test a puppet (e.g. Kermit)– child does not feel that (s)he is being tested, and

so feels under less pressure– child’s response is very simple yes/no– the simplicity of the dependent measure is both a

strength and a danger

How the Task Works

• Child is not being judged• Identical story for all test sentences • Avoids child’s ‘yes’ bias - child shows

knowledge by answering “no”• Story favors the ungrammatical meaning• Story is set up to make “no” answer felicitous

How the Task Works

• Identical story for all test sentences– only difference is in the final sentence that Kermit

utters– if children respond differently to the different test

sentences, this can’t be due to any differences in the stories

How the Task Works

• Child is not being judged• Identical story for all test sentences • Avoids child’s ‘yes’ bias - child shows

knowledge by answering “no”• Story favors the ungrammatical meaning• Story is set up to make “no” answer felicitous

OK, that was a story about Eeyore and Winnie-the-Pooh. First Eeyore was reading the book and then Winnie-the-Pooh was reading the book. I know one thing that happened...

He ate the apple while Pooh was reading the book.

How the Task Works

• Child is not being judged• Identical story for all test sentences • Avoids child’s ‘yes’ bias - child shows

knowledge by answering “no”• Story favors the ungrammatical meaning• Story is set up to make “no” answer felicitous

OK, that was a story about Eeyore and Winnie-the-Pooh. First Eeyore was reading the book and then Winnie-the-Pooh was reading the book. I know one thing that happened...

He ate the apple while Pooh was reading the book.

OK, that was a story about Eeyore and Winnie-the-Pooh. First Eeyore was reading the book and then Winnie-the-Pooh was reading the book. I know one thing that happened...

He ate the apple while Pooh was reading the book.

How the Task Works

• Child is not being judged• Identical story for all test sentences • Avoids child’s ‘yes’ bias - child shows

knowledge by answering “no”• Story favors the ungrammatical meaning• Story is set up to make “no” answer felicitous

Making “no” answers possible

He ate the apple while Pooh was reading the book.

Plausible Denial

He ate the apple while Pooh was reading the book.

TRUE - but ungrammatical

He ate the apple while Pooh was reading the book.

Grammatical - but FALSE

clearly FALSE, since it almost happened, but then didn’t

Eeyore

“Great. Now that Pooh is reading the book, I can eat this delicious apple.”

“I shouldn’t be such a greedy donkey - I should let Pooh eat the apple.”

“I suppose I have to eat a banana instead.”

Takuya Goro, UMd 2002-7, Asst. Prof. Ibaraki U., Japan

Tests of interpretations that involve uncertainty

I.Japanese disjunctionII.Scope flexibility (we saw this already)

English vs. Japanese (1)(1) John speaks Icelandic or Swahili.

(but I’m not sure which language he can actually speak…)

(2) John-wa Icelandic ka Swahili-wo hanas-u.John-TOP or -ACC speak-pres.

(but I’m not sure which language he can actually speak…)

The interpretations of disjunctions are more or less same in both languages.

English vs. Japanese (2)(3) John doesn’t speak Icelandic or Swahili.

John doesn’t speak Icelandic AND he doesn’t speak Swahili.

(4) John-wa Icelandic ka Swahili-wo hanasa-na-iJohn-TOP or -ACC speak-neg-pres.

John doesn’t speak Icelandic ORhe doesn’t speak Swahili.

(I know it is either one of those languages that John cannot speak, but I’m not sure which one…)

‘Neither’ interpretation in Japanese

(5) John-wa Icelandic mo Swahili mo hanas-u.John-TOP also also speak-pres.

“John speaks both Icelandic and Swahili”

(5) John-wa Icelandic mo Swahili mo hanase-na-iJohn-TOP also also speak-neg-pres. John speaks neither Icelandic nor Swahili.

Disjunction and parameter• Let’s say that UG provides the universal disjunction operator OR,

associated with a parameter={+PPI, -PPI}

• OR(+PPI) disjunctions in Japanese / Hungarian / Russian / Italian…• OR(-PPI) disjunctions in English / German / Korean…

(cf. Szabolcsi 2002)

Question about children• Can Japanese children accept the wide-scope reading of ka

in (4)?

(4) John-wa Icelandic ka Swahili-wo hanasa-na-iJohn-TOP or -ACC speak-neg-pres.

Can they accept (4) in the situation where John cannot speak Icelandic but he can speak Swahili?

If they have the –PPI setting, they should say “No”

Experimental conditions and the felicity of test sentences

(4) John-wa Icelandic ka Swahili-wo hanasa-na-iJohn-TOP or -ACC speak-neg-pres.

Situation: John cannot speak Icelandic but he can speak Swahili

Experimental context should make the sentence perfectly felicitous under AB (adult) interpretation; otherwise, children’s negative responses may not be counted as evidence for children’s conjunctive interpretation of ka.

Felicity conditions for AB• The speaker knows that something with affirmative expectation turned

out to be false.otherwise, he wouldn’t use negation.

• The speaker knows that it is either A or B (but not both) that is false.otherwise, he would say AB.

• The speaker doesn’t know which one is false.otherwise, he would simply say A, or B.

Creating Uncertainty• Two sub-sessions

(1) The “eating-game”12 animals try to eat 3 kinds of food. Depending of how good they did, they get a particular kind of medal as a prize.

(2) Truth Value JudgmentKermit guesses how good each animal did on the basis of the medal the animal has.

Participants• Japanese monolingual children in Sumire kindergarden, Totsuka,

Yokohama.

• N=30, Age: 3;7-6;3, Mean: 5;3

Experimenter: Look at this! There are animals going to play an “eating-game”!!

Experimenter: Here’s a piece of cake, a green pepper, and a carrot. All animals love cakes, but they don’t like vegetables. So here’s the rule: if one eats not only the cake but also the vegetables, he’ll get a better prize.

Experimenter: For example, if one eats the cake, and the pepper, and also the carrot…then he’ll get a shining gold medal!

Experimenter: If one eats the cake, and either one of the vegetables, but not both…then he’ll get a blue medal.

Experimenter: If one eats only the cake, but none of the vegetables, then he’ll get a cross…

Experimenter: Now, here comes a pig. He will play the game.

Experimenter: The pig first picked up the cake. Yes, he loves cakes and of course he ate it!

Experimenter: Then he picked up the pepper. He doesn’t like peppers…but he managed to eat it up!

Experimenter: Then he picked up the carrot…Oh no, he couldn’t eat the carrot!

Experimenter: So, the pig ate the cake, and he ate the pepper, but he didn’t eat the carrot. Which prize will he get?

Experimenter: Yes, a blue medal!

Experimenter: Now here comes another animal…(the “eating-game” goes on until all the 12 animals finish their trials. Every animal eats the cake. 4 of them eat both vegetables, other 4 eat either one of them, and other 4 eat neither)

(After the “game” phase, we move back to the first animal, the pig)Kermit: Ok, now I’m going to guess how well those animals did with this game. Umm, the pig … I don’t remember what he ate … oh, but, he has a blue medal!

Kermit: Now I know what happened. The pig ate the cake, but, he didn’t eat the pepper ka the carrot! (the test sentence)

Experimenter: Was Kermit correct?(And the truth-value judgments go on…)

Felicity of the test sentence• Kermit knows that something with affirmative expectation turned out to

be false, because it is not a gold medal that the pig has.

• Kermit knows that it is either A or B (but not both) that is false, because it is not a cross that the pig has.

• Kermit doesn’t know which one is false, because he cannot see which food is left.

Adult group (Age 29-32, N=10) accepted the sentence 100% of the time (20/20).

Result (1): the wide-scope reading of “A ka B”

• “he didn’t eat the carrot ka the pepper” for an animal with a blue medal

• The sentence is true under adult Japanese interpretation, but false under the narrow-scope, conjunctive interpretation of ka.

• The acceptance rate is 25% (15/60)

• 4 kids were adultlike: 4;11, 5;5, 5;10, 6;2.• If we exclude them from the count, then the acceptance rate is 13.46%

(7/52)

Further support: narrow-scope ka

• “he didn’t eat the carrot ka the pepper” for an animal with a cross

• The sentence is true under the narrow-scope, conjunctive interpretation of ka.

• The acceptance rate is 78.33% (47/60)

• The result makes a lot of sense given that children accepted the wide-scope ka 25% of the time.

Result (2): children’s performance on “A mo B mo”

• “he didn’t eat the carrot mo the pepper mo” He didn’t eat the carrot or the pepper

• for an animal with a cross (true under adult interpretation) 95% acceptance (57/60)

• for an animal with a blue medal (false under adult interpretation) 95% rejection (57/60)

• Children did very well with A mo B mo.

The ideal control item: nanika• nani - ka “something”

whatnani - mo “anything”

John-wa nanika tabe-nakat-taJohn-TOP something eat-neg-pastThere is something that John didn’t eat

John-wa nanimo tabe-nakat-taJohn-TOP anything eat-neg-pastJohn didn’t eat anything

The control experiment• Subjects: N=30, Age: 3;7-6;3, Mean: 5;4

• A ka B is replaced with nanika; A mo B mo is replaced with nanimo

• Food: 3 different vegetables, and 4 animals don’t eat anythingget a cross

• All the other details are the same with the previous experiment.

Result (1): the wide-scope reading of nanika

• “he didn’t eat nanika” for an animal with a blue medal

• The sentence is true under adult Japanese interpretation, but false under the narrow-scope interpretation of nanika.

• The acceptance rate is 88.33% (53/60)

• They can access the wide-scope interpretation!

Result (2): children’s performance with nanimo

• “he didn’t eat nanimo” He didn’t eat anything

• for an animal with a cross (true under adult interpretation) 100% acceptance (60/60)

• for an animal with a blue medal (false under adult interpretation) 85% rejection (51/60)

• Children did fairly good with nanimo.

Why all the fuss about pronouns?• Children (age < 6) appear to allow non-adultlike interpretations for:

– Big Bird washed him.

• At least 30 papers on the ‘Delay of Principle B Effect’ (DPBE), and still counting …

Mama Beari touched heri.

Forwards Anaphora: Principle B

(Chien & Wexler 1990)

From sample of 30 studies…

Jakubowicz 1984 30%Kaufman 1988 16%Lombardi & Sarma 1989 55%Grimshaw & Rosen 1990 38%Chien & Wexler 1990 50%McKee 1992 82%McDaniel & Maxfield 1992 38% Avrutin & Wexler 1994 (Rus.) 52%Hestvik & Philip 1996 (Norw.) 10%Matsuoka 1997 70%Savarese 1999 31%Thornton & Wexler 1999 58%Varlokosta 2001 (Greek) 13%Kiguchi & Thornton 2004 27%

etc.

From sample of 30 studies…

Jakubowicz 1984 30%Kaufman 1988 16%Lombardi & Sarma 1989 55%Grimshaw & Rosen 1990 38%Chien & Wexler 1990 50%McKee 1992 82%McDaniel & Maxfield 1992 38% Avrutin & Wexler 1994 (Rus.) 52%Hestvik & Philip 1996 (Norw.) 10%Matsuoka 1997 70%Savarese 1999 31%Thornton & Wexler 1999 58%Varlokosta 2001 (Greek) 13%Kiguchi & Thornton 2004 27%

etc.

Mama Beari touched heri.

Forwards Anaphora: Principle B

Every beari touched heri.

(Chien & Wexler, 1990)

Failure Success

Noam ChomskyTanya Reinhart

The scope of binding constraints• Bill loves his mother-in-law.

• Bill loves his mother-in-law, and Tom does too.

• Every linguist loves his mother-in-law, and every philosopher does too.

• The people who work for him love Bill.The people who work for him love every department chair.

• The people who work for Bill love him, and the people who work for Tom do too.

The scope of binding constraints• Reinhart (1983 et seq.): binding constraints apply to bound variable

interpretations only

• I know what Mary, Sue, and Bill have in common. Mary likes him, Sue likes him, and Bill likes him too.

• Every student washed him.John washed him.

Mama Beari touched heri.

Forwards Anaphora: Principle B

Every beari touched heri.

(Chien & Wexler, 1990)

Failure Success

Thornton & Wexler 1999

58% 8%

Paul Elbourne, Queen Margaret, U. London

Elbourne 2005, Linguistic Inquiry

Grumpy painted him.

Every dwarf painted him.

G. painted himselfG. painted somebody else

Every d. painted himselfEvery d. painted somebody else

AvailabilityAre the referents sufficiently prominent?

DisputabilityAre the propositions under consideration?

The Painting Story

These are dwarves

Happy Dopey Grumpy

These are smurfs

Papa Smurf Tennis Smurf Hiking Smurf

Snow White is having a party!And she’s having a painting contest.

I’m going to be the judge!

I have my blue paint

I have my green paint

I have my black paint

I have my red paint

What can I do? I don’t have

any paint

Maybe otherswill share!

Happy - can youpaint me?Well … if I have

some extra paint

Thanks!I do havesome extra…

There you go!

But I think Ineed more paint!

Dopey! Can youpaint me?Let me get

painted first…

Thanks!OK, thereyou go …

I’m so grumpy.I don’t even want to go to the party…

Do you think I should get painted?

OK … OK …I’ll do it.

By the way …

I really want toimpress Snow White

Grumpy! Can youpaint me?I used up all

my paint.

I don’t have anymore. Sorry!

What can I do!

I have some paint.

I can paint you!

Thanks!

Now we are all painted!

Wow, this was a story about painting. Hiking Smurf

didn’t have any paint, and Grumpy almost didn’t go to

the party.

I think Grumpy painted him.

Anaphoric interpretation: trueDeictic interpretation: false

Wow, this was a story about painting. Hiking Smurf

didn’t have any paint, and all the dwarves looked

great.

I think every dwarf painted him.

Anaphoric interpretation: trueDeictic interpretation: false

Anaphoric Deictic

I think Grumpy painted him.14% ‘yes’

I think every dwarf painted him.11% ‘yes’

Anaphoric interpretation: trueDeictic interpretation: false

I think Grumpy painted his body.73% ‘yes’

I think every dwarf painted his body.80% ‘yes’

56%16%

McKee 1992• A sample story from this study involves a princess and a cabbage patch

baby.

The princess falls into a tub and gets wet. The cabbage patch baby says ‘You’re wet’ and then leaves, after which the princess dries herself. After the story children were asked to judge the target sentence The princess dried her.

Although there is a possible deictic interpretation of the pronoun in this sentence that makes the sentence false, the story does little to make that interpretation accessible. The only washing event that is ever considered in the story is the princess washing herself.

82% illicit interpretations

• But Italian children did great – 15% acceptance

Other coreference constraints• Principle A

– *John thinks Mary washed himself.

– Children do quite well (cf. Zukowski & McKeown 2008, inter alia), though expt record isn’t as clean as is sometimes reported

• Principle C

– *He thinks the Troll is the best jumper.– *He ate the apple while Pooh was reading the book.– While he ate the apple Pooh read the book.

– Fairly clear set of findings, i.e., it’s surprising when people report failure– Some early studies by Barbara Lust & colleagues suggested children were more

restrictive, disallowing backwards anaphora in general … but picture later clarified

Adult Interpretation ofBackwards Anaphora

Kazanina, Lau, Lieberman, Yoshida, & Phillips (2007, J. Mem. Lang.)

Ellen LauMaryland

Nina KazaninaU. of Bristol, UK

Immediate Constraint Application

While she was taking classes full-time, Jessica was working two jobs to pay the bills.While she was taking classes full-time, Russell was working two jobs to pay the bills.

While she …Jessica …

Russell …

Self-Paced Reading, Gender Mismatch Paradigm

(Kazanina et al., 2007)

Immediate Constraint Application

While she was taking classes full-time, Jessica was working two jobs to pay the bills.While she was taking classes full-time, Russell was working two jobs to pay the bills.

She was taking classes full-time while Jessica was working two jobs to pay the bills.She was taking classes full-time while Russell was working two jobs to pay the bills.

While she …

She …

Jessica …

Russell …

while Jessica …

while Russell …

Self-Paced Reading, Gender Mismatch Paradigm

(Kazanina et al., 2007)

-60

-40

-20

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

because lastsemester

while-cd SHE wastaking

classes while-ab NAME wasworking

full-time to…

Residual Reading Times

nonPrC GM

nonPrc GMM

PrC GM

PrC GMM

Results

GME at the 2nd NP in non-PrC pair

while while Jessica

Russell

(Kazanina et al., 2007)

-60

-40

-20

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

because lastsemester

while-cd SHE wastaking

classes while-ab NAME wasworking

full-time to…

Residual Reading Times

nonPrC GM

nonPrc GMM

PrC GM

PrC GMM

Results

GME at the 2nd NP in non-PrC pair NO GME at the 2nd NP in PrC pair

Condition C – immediate

while while Jessica

Russell

(Kazanina et al., 2007)

Interim Conclusion

• Gender mismatch effect reflects search for antecedent for a pronoun

– No constraint conditions: gender mismatch implies expectation for antecedent in main clause subject position

– Principle C conditions: absence of gender mismatch implies no expectation for antecedent

– Therefore: Principle C applies immediately

• Possible confound…

– While she was in New York … Main subject predictable– She was in New York … Embedded subject unpredictable

– Contrast between conditions may reflect predictability, and not Principle C

Separating predictability from binding constraints…

No constraintIt seemed worrisome to his family …

Principle CIt seemed worrisome to him …

I. Extra clause equally predicted at pronoun

No constraintIt seemed worrisome to his family that John/Ruth …

Principle CIt seemed worrisome to him that John/Ruth …

I. Extra clause equally predicted at pronoun

No constraintIt seemed worrisome to his family that John/Ruth was gaining so much weight, but Ruth thought it was just a result of aging.

Principle CIt seemed worrisome to him that John/Ruth was gaining so much weight, but Matt didn't have the nerve to comment on it.

I. Extra clause equally predicted at pronoun

2 8 0

3 0 0

3 2 0

3 4 0

3 6 0

1: it

2: seemed

3: worrisome

4: to

5: him/his 6: -/family

7: that

8: John/Ruth

9: was

10: gaining

11: so

12: much weight

13: but

14: Matt

15: didn't16: have

17: the nerve…

Raw reading time, ms

P r i n c i p l e C , G M

P r i n c i p l e C , G M M

N o c o n s t r a i n t , G M

N o c o n s t r a i n t , G M M

No constraintIt seemed worrisome to his family that John/Ruth was gaining so much weight, but Ruth thought it was just a result of aging.

Principle CIt seemed worrisome to him that John/Ruth was gaining so much weight, but Matt didn't have the nerve to comment on it.

No constraintHis/Her managers chatted …

Principle CHe/She chatted …

II. Extra clause equally unpredictable at pronoun

No constraintHis/Her managers chatted amiably with some fans while the talented, young quarterback …

Principle CHe/She chatted amiably with some fans while the talented, young quarterback …

II. Extra clause equally unpredictable at pronoun

No constraintHis/Her managers chatted amiably with some fans while the talented, young quarterback signed autographs for the kids, but Carol wished the children's charity event would end soon so she could go home.

Principle CHe/She chatted amiably with some fans while the talented, young quarterback signed autographs for the kids, but Steve wished the children's charity event would end soon so he could go home.

II. Extra clause equally unpredictable at pronoun

3 0 0

3 4 0

3 8 0

4 2 0

4 6 0

1:

He/She/His/Her

2:--/managers

3: chatted 4: amiably

5: with some

fans6: while

7: the

8: talented,

9: young

10: quarterback

11: signed

12: autographs

13: for

14: the kids,

15: but

16: Carol

17: woshed

18: the

19: children's…

Raw reading time, ms

P r i n c i p l e C , G M

P r i n c i p l e C , G M M

N o c o n s t r a i n t , G M

N o c o n s t r a i n t , G M M

No constraintHis/Her managers chatted amiably with some fans while the talented, young quarterback signed autographs for the kids, but Carol wished the children's charity event would end soon so she could go home.

Principle CHe/She chatted amiably with some fans while the talented, young quarterback signed autographs for the kids, but Steve wished the children's charity event would end soon so he could go home.

F1(1,55) = 18.4, p < .001F2(1,23) = 14.0, p < .01All Fs < 1, n.s.