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Marking of verb transitivity by Hebrew-speaking children*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

Ruth A. Berman
Ruth A. Berman*
Affiliation:
Tel Aviv University
*
Address for correspondence: Department of Linguistics, Tel Aviv University, Ramat Aviv, Israel, 69978.
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Abstract

The study examines children's command of transitivity permutations in Hebrew, where a change in verb-argument syntax entails a change in verb-morphology. 30 children aged two, three and eight were required to produce existing and novel Hebrew verbs differing in transitivity. Younger children showed a good grasp of the syntax and semantics, but not the morphological marking of transitivity, three-year-olds did much better, and eight-year-olds produced mainly adultlike responses. Results were higher on existing verbs than on novel forms. Direction of change had little effect with existing verbs, but with novel verbs success was much higher in changing intransitive to transitive forms than the converse. Some alternations proved easier than others, e.g. intransitive activity verbs in the basic pa'al verb-pattern yielded more causative hif'il forms than intransitive inchoative verbs in the nif'al pattern. Findings throw light on the development of derivational morphology, item-based versus class-based learning, and the impact of lexical productivity and language-particular properties on acquisition.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 20 , Issue 3 , October 1993 , pp. 641 - 669
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1993

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Footnotes

[*]

The study was supported by grant No. 87-00015/1 from the United States—Israel Binational Science Foundation (BSF). Transcription of longitudinal data was aided by funding from the Child Language Data Exchange System, Carnegie-Mellon University, Pittsburgh. I am grateful to Eve Clark for her suggestions and to two anonymous journal reviewers and the journal editor for their careful and constructive comments on earlier versions. Thanks are due to Orly Guata for carrying out the pilot study, to Eia Brosh and Tsipora Segal for help in designing and conducting fieldwork, and to Yael Kfir for her contribution to data-collection and analysis.

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