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Verbs and attention to relational roles in English and Tamil*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 January 2012

NITYA SETHURAMAN  and
LINDA B. SMITH
NITYA SETHURAMAN*
Affiliation:
University of Michigan-Dearborn
LINDA B. SMITH*
Affiliation:
Indiana University
*
Address for correspondence: Nitya Sethuraman, Department of Behavioral Sciences, University of Michigan-Dearborn, 4901 Evergreen Rd, 4012 CB, Dearborn, MI 48128, USA. tel: (313) − 593-5139 (office); e-mail: [email protected].
Address for correspondence: Linda B. Smith, Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Indiana University, 1101 E. 10th Street, Bloomington, IN 47405, USA. tel: (812) − 855-8256 (lab); fax: (812) − 855-4691; e-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

English-learning children have been shown to reliably use cues from argument structure in learning verbs. However, languages pair overtly expressed arguments with verbs to varying extents, raising the question of whether children learning all languages expect the same, universal mapping between arguments and relational roles. Three experiments examined this question by asking how strongly early-learned verbs by themselves, without their corresponding explicitly expressed arguments, point to ‘conceptual arguments’ – the relational roles in a scene. Children aged two to four years and adult speakers of two languages that differ structurally in terms of whether the arguments of a verb are explicitly expressed more (English) or less (Tamil) frequently were compared in their mapping of verbs, presented without any overtly expressed arguments, to a range of scenes. The results suggest different developmental trajectories for language learners, as well as different patterns of adult interpretation, and offer new ways of thinking about the nature of verbs cross-linguistically.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 40 , Issue 2 , March 2013 , pp. 358 - 390
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

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Footnotes

[*]

This research is supported by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development National Institute of Health grant T32 HD07475 and NIMH grant R01 MH 60200 to Linda B. Smith. We thank the members of the IU Cognitive Development Lab for helpful comments and assistance with preparations for data collection in India. Additionally, we thank J. and Brinda Sethuraman for their continued encouragement for this project; Dr Indira Sridharan and Mrs Prabha Venugopal at Sree Vignesh Creche and Pre School, Sri K. S. and Smt Bhanu Srinivasan, Smt Rukmini and Smt Sujata Krishnan for their assistance with data collection in India; Natsuki Atagi, Monica Ferro, Nicole Gealy and Sarah Hampel for their assistance with data collection in the USA; Alfredo Pereira and Dana Schuller Smith for their generous contribution of time and excellent acting talents for the experiment stimuli; Aarre Laakso for assistance with various aspects of this project; the reviewers and editors for their invaluable feedback; and most importantly, all the parents, children and adults who kindly participated in our studies. This article is dedicated to Adithya and Ravi.

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