Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Adjective acquisition'

The main results of the PhD thesis are described in the summary. The main objective of the thesis is to define the acquisition of lexical and morphosyntactic features of Lithuanian adjective. The analysis is based on the large quantity of linguistic data (~ 400 000 words), which is the corpus of four children compiled according the method of longitudinal observation. The study has interchangeably applied several methods of analysis: longitudinal observation, corpus linguistics, error analysis and comparative method. Statements to be Defended 1. Lexical features of adjectives are acquired by children with difficulties: they often confuse adjectives of a single semantic group and make many errors. 2. Children easily acquire morphosyntactic features of adjectives: they do not make many errors. Some errors may be observed only in cases, when adjective paradigms do not coincide with noun paradigms. 3. Lexical and morphosyntactic features of adjectives are acquired simultaneously. The meaning of adjective is realised only when multi-word combinations and morphosyntactic features have been acquired. 4. The acquisition of adjectives correlates with the individual language development. Bigger lexical variety of adjectives is more characteristic to children with early and late language development, if compared to children with typical language development. Morphosyntactic features of adjectives do not pose problems to children with late language development. 5. The acquisition of... [to full text]<br>Santraukoje pateikiami pagrindiniai disertacinio tyrimo metu gauti rezultatai. Aprašomo tyrimo tikslas – išanalizuoti leksines ir morfosintaksines lietuvių kalbos būdvardžio įsisavinimo ypatybes. Tyrimui pasirinktas didelės apimties šaltinis – keturių vaikų kalbos tekstynas (~ 400 000 žodžių), sukauptas ilgalaikio stebėjimo metodu. Tyrimas atliktas taikant ir derinant kelis metodus: ilgalaikio stebėjimo, tekstynų lingvistikos, klaidų analizės ir lyginamąjį. Atlikus tyrimą darbe pagrindžiami šie ginamieji teiginiai: 1. Vaikams sudėtinga įsisavinti būdvardžio leksines ypatybes: dažnai painiojami vienos leksinės semantinės grupės būdvardžiai, daroma daug klaidų. 2. Vaikai lengvai įsisavina morfosintaksines būdvardžio ypatybes: klaidų nėra daug, dažniau klystama tik retų paradigmų būdvardžius derinant su daiktavardžiais. 3. Būdvardžio leksinės ir morfosintaksinės ypatybės įsisavinamos drauge. Būdvardžio reikšmė suvokiama tik pradėjus vartoti keliažodžius pasakymus, įsisavinus gramatines ypatybes. 4. Būdvardžio įsisavinimas susijęs su individualia vaiko kalbos raida. Ankstyvajai ir vėlyvajai kalbos raidai būdinga didesnė būdvardžių leksinė įvairovė nei įprastai kalbos raidai, o vaikams, kurių kalbos raida vėlyva, nesudėtinga įsisavinti būdvardžio morfosintaksinius požymius. 5. Būdvardžio įsisavinimą veikia ne tik aplinkos veiksniai (vaikiškoji kalba), bet ir kalbos sistema. Kaip ir įsisavinant kitas kalbos dalis, vaikų kalboje vyrauja vaikiškojoje kalboje dažniausiai vartojamos... [toliau žr. visą tekstą]

Aquesta tesi tracta l'adquisició automàtica de classes semàntiques per a adjectius. La tesi es basa en dues hipòtesis. La primera, que alguns aspectes de la semàntica dels adjectius no són totalment impredictibles, sinó que corresponen a un conjunt de tipus denotacionals, o classes semàntiques. En conseqüència, els adjectius es poden agrupar en funció de la seva classe semàntica. La segona hipòtesi de treball és que la classe semàntica es reflecteix en més d'un nivell de descripció lingüística. Les interfícies entre morfologia i semàntica i entre sintaxi i semàntica són les que s'exploren en detall a la tesi. <br/><br/>Com que no ens podíem basar en una classificació establerta prèviament, bona part dels esforços van dirigits precisament a definir una classificació adequada. La proposta de classificació s'assoleix mitjançant una metodologia iterativa. Es combinen aproximacions deductives i inductives, cosa que permet evolucionar d'una classificació inicial basada en la bibliografia teòrica a una classificació final que té en compte els resultats empírics dels diversos experiments.<br>Esta tesis versa sobre la adquisición automática de clases semánticas para adjetivos. La tesis se basa en dos hipótesis. La primera, que algunos aspectos de la semántica de los adjetivos no son totalmente impredecibles, sino que corresponden a un conjunto de tipos denotacionales, o clases semánticas. En consecuencia, los adjetivos se pueden agrupar en función de su clase semántica. La segunda hipótesis de trabajo es que la clase semántica se refleja en más de un nivel de descripción lingüística. Las interfaces entre morfología y semántica y entre sintaxis y semántica son las que se exploran en detalle en la tesis. <br/><br/>Dado que no nos podíamos basar en una clasificación establecida previamente, buena parte de los esfuerzos van dirigidos precisamente a definir una clasificación adecuada. La propuesta de clasificación se logra mediante una metodología iterativa. Se combinan aproximaciones deductivas e inductivas, cosa que permite evolucionar de una clasificación inicial basada en la bibliografía teórica a una clasificación final que tiene en cuenta los resultados empíricos de los diversos experimentos.<br>This thesis concerns the automatic acquisition of semantic classes for adjectives. Our work builds on two hypotheses: first, that some aspects of the semantics of adjectives are not totally unpredictable, but correspond to a set of denotational types (semantic classes). Therefore, adjectives can be grouped together according to their semantic class. Second, that the semantic class of an adjective can be traced in more than one linguistic level. In particular, the morphology-semantics and syntax-semantics interfaces are explored for clues that lead to the acquisition of the targeted semantic classes.<br/><br/>Since we could not rely on a previously established classification, a major effort is devoted to defining an adequate classification. The classification proposal is reached through an iterative methodology. By combining deductive and inductive approaches, we evolve from an initial classification based on literature review to a final classification proposal that takes advantage of the insight gained through a set of experiments.

Acquérir l’adjectif épithète pose deux problèmes majeurs en français. D’abord, l’adjectif dénote une propriété à propos d’un nom, les enfants doivent donc pouvoir concevoir un objet comme un tout et comme un ensemble de propriétés pour manier un SN avec épithète. Ensuite, l’alternance est un trait définitoire de l’adjectif du français, mais son placement n’est pas aléatoire et les contraintes en jeu sont multiples et d’ordre tendanciel. De plus, bien que les locuteurs connaissent cette possibilité, ils optent plutôt pour un placement fixe en usage. Ces faits nous ont amenée à nous demander si l’input permet à l’enfant de se construire la notion d’adjectif épithète sans avoir recours à des connaissances langagières innées. Pour y répondre, nous proposons une étude comparant les usages de trois enfants à ceux de leur famille à deux temps de leur acquisition (T1 : 3 ;8, T2 : 4 ;6). Nous étudions quatre aspects de l’usage de l’épithète (lexique, placement, combinaison avec d’autres modifieurs ou un dépendant adjectival) et nous confrontons l’adjectif aux autres modifieurs nominaux. Ces phénomènes montrent tous la même évolution. À T1, les enfants emploient la construction la plus fréquente des adultes, avec un fort degré de spécificité lexicale. À T2, d’autres constructions émergent selon leur ordre de fréquence chez les adultes. Le lexique de la construction de T1 s’est en outre élargi dans le champ de la classe sémantique des usages de T1. Les enfants montrent ainsi une sensibilité aux informations quantitatives et une abstraction graduelle des structures par analogie sémantique, qui plaident pour une construction progressive de la notion d’adjectif épithète à partir de l’input<br>The acquisition of attributive adjectives is subject to two major difficulties in French. First, adjectives express a property of a larger unit : children must be able to conceive an object as a whole and as a set of properties to use a NP with an adjective. Second, adjectives in French may occur before or after the noun. Alternation is a defining feature of the category but it is not random, and the constraints at play are numerous and preferential in nature. Also, although speakers are aware of this possibility, they tend to choose a fixed position in usage. These facts raise the question of whether the input allows children to construct the notion of attributive adjectives without a resort to innate linguistic knowledge. To answer this, I propose a comparative study of the productions of three children interacting with their family at two times of their development (T1 : 3 ;8, T2 : 4 ;6). I examine four phenomena concerning attributive adjectives (lexicon, placement, combination with other modifiers or adjectival dependents), and I compare adjectives with other nominal modifiers. All of these phenomena show the same evolution. At T1, the children use the most frequent construction in the adult data, with a high degree of lexical specificity. T2 shows the appearance of other constructions according to their order of frequency in the adult data. The construction from T1 is also used with a greater choice of lexical units, but within the same semantic classes. The children thus show sensitivity to quantitative information and a gradual abstraction of constructions by semantic analogy, which pleads for a progressive construction of the knowledge of adjectives based on the input data

Submitted by isabela.moljf@hotmail.com (isabela.moljf@hotmail.com) on 2017-02-22T11:54:05Z No. of bitstreams: 1 cristianopereiradealmeida.pdf: 1470118 bytes, checksum: 522a21d105ff4f78a62d83e79c30931c (MD5)<br>Approved for entry into archive by Adriana Oliveira (adriana.oliveira@ufjf.edu.br) on 2017-02-22T14:52:08Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 cristianopereiradealmeida.pdf: 1470118 bytes, checksum: 522a21d105ff4f78a62d83e79c30931c (MD5)<br>Made available in DSpace on 2017-02-22T14:52:08Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 cristianopereiradealmeida.pdf: 1470118 bytes, checksum: 522a21d105ff4f78a62d83e79c30931c (MD5) Previous issue date: 2007-08-29<br>Esta dissertação diz respeito ao processo de identificação dos elementos das categorias lexicais Nome e Adjetivo no Português do Brasil, buscando dar conta de especificidades do PB, como a variação possível de ordem dos elementos constituintes do DP complexo e a ausência de marcas morfofonológicas que distingam adjetivos de nomes A hipótese de trabalho assumida é a de que, em um primeiro momento da aquisição da linguagem, a informação estrutural disponibilizada pela ordem preferencial de ocorrência destes elementos no PB atua como uma pista robusta da qual a criança faz uso. A abordagem teórica adotada busca conciliar um modelo de língua que trate do fenômeno de aquisição (Programa Minimalista: Chomsky, 1995), com modelos de processamento voltados para a aquisição da linguagem (modelos de bootstrapping). Foram desenvolvidas atividades experimentais cujos resultados apontam para a importância da informação estrutural, em um primeiro momento, e da informação semântica em etapas posteriores do processo de identificação de nomes e adjetivos.<br>This dissertation aims at the identification process of elements in the lexical categories of Name and Adjectives in Brazilian Portuguese trying to treat the specificities of the BP such as the possible variation of the complex DP constituent elements order and the absence of morphophonological marks that distinguish adjectives and names. The working hypothesis assumed is that in a first moment of the language acquisition the structural information made available by the preferential order of occurrence of that elements in BP acts as a powerful clue of which the child makes use of. The theoretical approach adopted tries to conciliate a language model that treats the phenomenon of acquisition (Minimalist Program: Chomsky, 1995) and processing models for the language acquisition (bootstrapping models). Experimental activities were developed and the results point to the importance of the structural information in a first moment and the semantic information in posterior stages of the identification process of names and adjectives.

Teaching & Learning<br>Ed.D.<br>The purpose of this experimental study is to examine the effects of recasts on narrowing overgeneralized grammar in the second language (L2). The study involved testing three major hypotheses of the mechanisms underlying recasts: the direct contrast hypothesis (Saxton, 1997, 2000), the additional input hypothesis (Gass, 1997; Gass & Mackey, 2007; Long, 1996, 2007), and the enhanced salience hypothesis (Leeman, 2003). Two structures (adjective ordering and indirect passives) were selected for this study, mainly because it was assumed that Japanese learners of English might produce overgeneralized rules that allow incorrect structures because of their first language (L1) influence. The participants were 97 Japanese university students learning English as a foreign language in Japan. They were randomly assigned to four treatment groups: recast (the REC Group), non-contingent positive evidence (the POS Group), recast plus additional input (the REC+ Group), and input with enhanced salience (the SAL Group). A pretest, posttest, and delayed-posttest design were employed. The measurement instruments were an oral production task, elicited imitation task, and untimed grammaticality judgment task, each of which was designed to elicit participants’ implicit and explicit knowledge about adjective ordering and indirect passives. Thus, the independent variable was the treatment conditions, and the dependent variable were the test scores regarding ungrammaticality of the overgeneralized rules of the target structures. After data screening, the data from 75 of the 97 participants were analyzed for adjective ordering, and the data from 90 participants were analyzed for indirect passives. The results showed that the POS Group did not improve on all the measures for adjective ordering and indirect passives; thus, it was suggested that positive evidence was not sufficient for the participants to narrow overgeneralized rules for the target structures. The findings indicated that for adjective ordering, medium effect sizes for the comparison of the POS and REC Groups were obtained on the grammaticality judgment tests for the pretest-posttest and pretest-delayed posttest comparisons. Thus, based on these effect sizes, the direct contrast hypothesis was partially supported (i.e., for one of the two structures and one measure of the three tests). Furthermore, on the basis of the results that the REC and REC+ Groups did not differ significantly on any measure and that on the adjective-ordering grammaticality judgment tests, the comparison between the REC+ Group and the POS Group obtained a medium effect size for the pretest-delayed posttest comparison, the provision of recasts in the REC and REC+ Groups was effective at least for the adjective-ordering grammaticality judgment tests; however, additional input alone did not have an impact on L2 learners’ retreat from the overgeneralized rules. Finally, the results showed that the POS and SAL Groups did not differ significantly and that there existed a difference in the performance on the adjective-ordering grammaticality judgment tests between the REC Group and the SAL Groups. Salience might not be effective in helping L2 learners retreat from overgeneralized rules, and the enhanced salience hypothesis can be interpreted as being limited to learning some linguistic structures. In conclusion, the present study provides empirical evidence that L2 learners can persist in using incorrect overgeneralized rules due to L1 rules and that ten tokens of the target structures are not effective for L2 learners to retreat from the overgeneralized rules. Furthermore, the findings lend support to the direct contrast hypothesis as a mechanism underlying recasts for one of the two target structures.<br>Temple University--Theses

Les adjectifs n’ont pas toujours eu bonne presse chez les grammairiens et les gens de lettre. Leur caractère facultatif a peut-être aussi rebuté les auteurs intéressés par les premiers développements des répertoires de l’enfant, conscients de leur probable rareté à ces stades précoces. C’est pourtant justement leur inscription sur ce versant optionnel et en outre souvent assez subjectif qui leur confère, à notre sens, tout leur intérêt. Leur choix n’étant contraint ni sur l’axe paradigmatique (lorsqu’ils sont épithètes) ni sur l’axe syntagmatique (fonctions déterminative et classifiante exclues), ces marqueurs seront des révélateurs privilégiés des mondes sensoriels, perceptuels et psychiques des locuteurs. Dans un cadre théorique souple et syncrétique, à la croisée des théories énonciatives françaises et des approches anglo-saxonnes dites basées sur l’usage, nous retracerons le développement des répertoires adjectivaux de trois enfants, francophone, anglophone et bilingue français anglais, jusqu’à leur quatrième anniversaire, période généralement admise comme la plus propice aux variations. Nous élargirons ensuite les perspectives aux autres classes de mots constitutives de ces premiers inventaires, afin de percevoir comment la catégorie des adjectifs se développe dans ce système global. Une attention particulière sera accordée aux propriétés de l’environnement susceptibles d’influencer les comportements des enfants. Les résultats montrent que les enfants se saisissent d’abord de propriétés concrètes et perceptuellement saillantes, souvent assez descriptives. Leurs parents utilisent dans le même temps des propriétés plutôt évaluatives, qui traduisent l’affect. La dyade anglophone utilise significativement plus de propriétés évaluatives que les autres dyades. Les adjectifs émergent quelques mois après les premiers mots conventionnels, et restent une catégorie somme toute assez peu fréquente (4 % du lexique total en moyenne)<br>Adjectives have not always had good press among writers, as they may reflect a distorted prose. Researchers in early lexical development currently regard adjectives as problematic: they may well emerge late in child language, and comprise a small portion of the lexicon. However, we argue that it is precisely this property, along with their subjective stance, which makes adjectives relevant for research. Given that their choice is non obligatory, both on the paradigmatic axis (for attributive adjectives) and on the syntagmatic one (determinative and classifying functions excluded), these markers may help reveal the speaker’s sensory, perceptual and mental worlds. Using a theoretical approach at the crossroads of the French enunciative and the Anglo-Saxon usage-based theories, the data of three children speaking French, English, and bilingual French English, were analysed. We first tracked how their inventories developed until their fourth birthday, the range during which considerable variations occur. These perspectives were then broadened to encompass other categories so as to further understand how the adjectival category develops within this larger system. The environmental properties that might have an impact on the children’s behaviour were examined in detail. The results show that children first use properties anchored in immediate perceptions, while their parents favour more abstract properties, often expressing affect. The English speaking dyad uses significantly more affective adjectives than the other dyads. Adjectives emerge a few months after the first conventional words, and remain a low frequency category (4% of the lexicon in average)

Submitted by Renata Lopes (renatasil82@gmail.com) on 2016-04-05T13:59:08Z No. of bitstreams: 1 azussamatsuoka.pdf: 3758292 bytes, checksum: 774cb991b0c5692d75381aa929113ca5 (MD5)<br>Approved for entry into archive by Adriana Oliveira (adriana.oliveira@ufjf.edu.br) on 2016-04-24T03:40:59Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 azussamatsuoka.pdf: 3758292 bytes, checksum: 774cb991b0c5692d75381aa929113ca5 (MD5)<br>Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-24T03:40:59Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 azussamatsuoka.pdf: 3758292 bytes, checksum: 774cb991b0c5692d75381aa929113ca5 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2013-12-18<br>CAPES - Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior<br>Esta tese investiga a contribuição das propriedades prosódicas da fala dirigida à criança (FDC) para a aquisição do adjetivo no Português Brasileiro (PB). No PB, os adjetivos constituem uma categoria sem marca morfológica obrigatória de gênero e sem posição sintática fixa. Além disso, adjetivos e nomes compartilham marcas morfofonológicas de gênero e número e podem aparecer imediatamente após o Determinante (DET) no DP, o que poderia dificultar a distinção entre essas duas categorias lexicais pela criança no processo de aquisição. Assim, esta tese busca, como objetivo geral, investigar o papel das pistas prosódicas de ADJ(etivo) na fala dirigida à criança brasileira para a aquisição lexical. Assumimos a perspectiva gerativista e o modelo de língua proposto pelo Programa Minimalista (CHOMSKY, 1995 e anos seguintes). Assumimos a Hipótese do Bootstrapping Prosódico (CHRISTOPHE et al.,1997; MORGAN & DEMUTH, 1996) como explicação do modo pelo qual a criança procede à formação do seu léxico inicial e à aquisição da sintaxe de sua língua, pela exploração de habilidades perceptuais. Como objetivos específicos, a presente tese busca: (i) em situação de interação mãe-criança, caracterizar propriedades prosódicas de N(ome) e ADJ no DP pleno na FDC; (ii) investigar a sensibilidade de bebês, em seu primeiro ano de vida, a pistas prosódicas da FDC brasileira, relativas ao posicionamento de ADJ no DP pleno; (iii) verificar o papel das pistas prosódicas de ADJ no PB no mapeamento de palavras novas a propriedades de objetos por crianças em torno de 2 e 3 anos. Na primeira atividade experimental, observamos que os parâmetros prosódicos de ADJ são realçados, se comparados aos de N, em FDC produzida em situação de interação semiespontânea. Na segunda atividade experimental, bebês em seu primeiro ano de vida parecem ser sensíveis às distinções de ordem prosódica dos DPs plenos, nos quais a posição do ADJ foi manipulada. Na terceira atividade experimental, crianças de 2 e 3 anos exploraram pistas prosódicas de ADJ para o mapeamento de pseudopalavras em função de adjetivos. Em conjunto, os resultados obtidos são compatíveis com a hipótese de que as pistas prosódicas são fonte robusta para a distinção dos elementos lexicais de N e ADJ na FDC brasileira e sustentam a tese de que o uso dessas pistas pode ser relevante para a aquisição de ADJ e para o desencadeamento do processo de aquisição lexical pela criança brasileira.<br>This thesis investigates the role of prosodic properties of infant directed speech (IDS) for the acquisition of adjectives in Brazilian Portuguese (BP). In BP, adjectives constitute a category that does not present fixed morphological mark or syntactic position. Besides, adjectives and nouns share mopho-phonological morphemes, and either one can follow DET- in the DP. This study aims at investigating the role of prosodic cues of ADJ(ective) in Brazilian IDS for distinguishing lexical elements of ADJ(adjectivs) and N(ouns) and for the process of language acquisition. The generative language model proposed by Chomsky (1995, and subsequent works), Minimalism Program is assumed. We also assume the Prosodic/Phonological Bootstrapping Hypothesis (MORGAN & DEMUTH, 1996; CHRISTOPHE et al., 1997) that explains how children acquire their lexicon exploring perceptual abilities. Our specific objectives are: (i) characterize prosodic properties of N and ADJ in the DP, in a mother-child interactive situation; (ii) investigate infants sensitivity to prosodic cues of Brazilian IDS, related to the position of ADJ in the DP; (iii) verify the role of prosodic properties of the adjective in BP for the mapping of pseudo words to object properties by 2- and 3- year-old children. In the first experiment, we observed that ADJ is accented, in comparison to N, when IDS was produced in a semi-spontaneous environment. In the second experiment, infants were sensitive to prosodic distinctions in DPs, in which the position of ADJ was manipulated. In the third experiment, 2- and 3- year-old used prosodic cues of ADJ to map novel words to properties. Our results are compatible with the hypothesis that prosodic cues are reliable sources of information for the distinction of the lexical elements of N and ADJ in Brazilian IDS and indicate that prosodic cues might be relevant for the acquisition of ADJ and for the bootstrapping of the process of lexical acquisition by Brazilian children.

Esdevenir parlants competents d’una llengua és un dels desenvolupaments més notables del nostre creixement com a persones. En aquesta tesi ens proposem estudiar l’adquisició del català com a primera llengua (L1), fixant-nos en el desenvolupament d’una categoria lèxica – l’adjectiu – al llarg de l’escolaritat i fins a l’edat adulta, en diferents gèneres discursius (expositiu i narratiu) i modalitats de producció (oral i escrita). Els adjectius són un dels recursos descriptius més potents de què disposa la llengua, l’aprenentatge i el perfeccionament del seu ús és un procés llarg que s’estén més enllà de l’adolescència i està íntimament lligat a l’escolaritat i l’alfabetització, per la qual cosa l’ús dels adjectius pot ser un bon indicador del desenvolupament del lèxic. Durant l’última dècada, diversos estudis han analitzat el creixement i la composició de la categoria adjectiu al llarg de l’etapa escolar, principalment en anglès (Marineille & Kneile, 2012; Nippold & Sun, 2008) i hebreu (Ravid & Levie, 2010). Estudis duts a terme en català també han mostrat els adjectius com una de les categories que més creixement experimenta amb l’edat (Cordero, 2002; Gili Gaya, 1972; Llauradó & Tolchinsky, 2013). El present treball és un estudi de l’ús dels adjectius des d’una aproximació corpus- based. Aplicarem aquesta metodologia a l’anàlisi del desenvolupament tardà del català. L’estudi es basa en el corpus GRERLI-CAT1, el qual consta de 316 textos produïts per 79 informants bilingües català/castellà, que tenen el català com a llengua d’ús habitual. Els informants pertanyen a diferents nivells educatius: Primària (9-10 anys), Secundària (12-13 anys), Batxillerat (16-18 anys) i Universitat (majors de 19 anys). Cada informant va produir quatre textos sobre els conflictes escolars: un expositiu oral, un expositiu escrit, un narratiu oral i un narratiu escrit. Compararem els textos, doncs, tenint en compte aquestes variables independents: l’edat/nivell educatiu, el gènere discursiu i la modalitat de producció. Els objectius generals són tres. En primer lloc, volem identificar quines mesures lèxiques serveixen per a diagnosticar el desenvolupament del lèxic i la diferenciació entre gèneres i modalitats. En segon lloc, volem caracteritzar l’ús dels adjectius segons l’edat i el tipus de text. Finalment, volem identificar quines característiques morfològiques i de freqüència d’ús dels adjectius expliquen millor els judicis dels parlants sobre la seva composicionalitat. Per a complir aquests objectius hem dut a terme tres estudis. El primer centrat en analitzar la diversitat i densitat lèxica, la llargada de paraula i la productivitat verbal, i la influència que hi tenen les variables independents del corpus. El segon encaminat a descriure l’ús dels adjectius segons l’edat, el gènere discursiu i la modalitat de producció; analitzant la quantitat, la freqüència i l’estructura morfològica interna dels adjectius. I el tercer dedicat a esbrinar de quina manera els parlants accedeixen al seu coneixement morfològic a l’hora de jutjar la composicionalitat dels adjectius extrets del corpus GRERLI-CAT1. Els resultats del primer estudi indiquen que la llargada de paraula és el millor diagnòstic del desenvolupament lèxic i de la diferenciació entre gèneres i modalitats. La diversitat i la densitat lèxiques també són bons indicadors evolutius. D’aquestes dues mesures, la primera serveix per a diferenciar entre modalitats i la segona és útil per a fer-ho entre gèneres. En canvi, la productivitat verbal no és apropiada per al nostre objectiu. Els resultats del segon estudi mostren que l’ús dels adjectius s’expandeix al llarg de l’escolaritat, donat que augmenta amb el nivell educatiu. També s’ha detectat un efecte del gènere discursiu i de la modalitat de producció. Els quatre tipus de text analitzats presenten una gradació en la seva complexitat, des dels expositius escrits fins als narratius orals, passant pels expositius orals i els narratius escrits. Els resultats del tercer estudi revelen que els parlants jutgen la composicionalitat dels adjectius en termes d’un contínuum i no pas en termes dicotòmics – adjectius simples vs. complexos. Els predictors més forts de la composicionalitat són la llargada de l’adjectiu, el número de morfemes comptats des del punt de vista sincrònic, la presència d’un prefix productiu i que la base sigui més freqüent que l’adjectiu derivat. En resum, l’anàlisi quantitativa del lèxic mostra que, a mesura que avancen pels nivells educatius, els informants utilitzen un lèxic més complex en els textos expositius i en la modalitat escrita. L’examen de l’ús dels adjectius ens ha permès obtenir una visió evolutiva de la riquesa lèxica i de com s’adapta el vocabulari usat a cada tipus de text. L’estudi sobre la composicionalitat dels adjectius indica que la complexitat morfològica afecta als usos lèxics, però que és un coneixement implícit dels parlants. Així doncs, el present estudi proveeix a la comunitat acadèmica d’una descripció acurada de l’ús dels adjectius al llarg del desenvolupament tardà del català.<br>Becoming proficient speakers of a language is one of the most prominent developments in our growth as people. This thesis is aimed to study Catalan acquisition as first language (L1), focusing on the development of a lexical category – the adjective – throughout school age and until adulthood, in different discourse genres (expository and narrative) and modes of production (spoken and written). Adjectives are one of the most powerful descriptive devices a language has; learning and improving its use is a long process which goes beyond adolescence and it is closely related to schooling and literacy. Therefore, the use of adjectives is a good indicator of lexical development. During the last decade, several studies have analysed the growth and composition of adjective category through the school years, mainly in English (Marineille & Kneile, 2012; Nippold & Sun, 2008) and Hebrew (Ravid & Levie, 2010). Studies which were carried out in Catalan have also shown adjectives as one of the categories which experience a higher increase with age (Cordero, 2002; Gili Gaya, 1972; Llauradó & Tolchinsky, 2013). In this thesis the study of the use of adjectives is tackled from a corpus-based approach. We apply this method to the analysis of later Catalan language development using the GRERLI-CAT1 corpus. The corpus contains 316 texts produced by 79 Spanish/Catalan bilinguals whose home language is Catalan. Subjects were from different schooling levels: Primary School (9- to 10-year-olds), Secondary School (12- to 13-year-olds), Sixth Form (16- to 18-year-olds) and University (more than 19). Every subject produced four texts about school conflicts: spoken expository, written expository, spoken narrative and written narrative. We are going to compare these texts taking into consideration the following independent variables: schooling level, discourse genre and mode of production. The general objectives are three. Firstly, to identify which lexical measures are used in order to diagnose the lexical development and the differences between discourse genres and modes of production. Secondly, to characterize the use of adjectives according to schooling level and text type. Finally, to identify which morphological features and frequency of use characteristics of adjectives explain in a better way the speakers’ judgements about their compositionality. In order to achieve these objectives we have carried out three studies. The first one is focused on the analysis of lexical diversity, lexical density, word length and productivity of verbs, and the influence of the corpus independent variables. The second one is focused on describing the use of adjectives according to schooling level, discourse genre and mode of production, analysing the amount, frequency of use and word-internal morphological structure of adjectives. And the third one is aimed to find out how speakers access to their morphological knowledge when judging the compositionality of the adjectives extracted from the GRERLI-CAT1 corpus. The results of the first study show that word length is the best diagnosis for lexical development, as well as genre and mode differentiation. The lexical diversity and density are also good evolutionary indicators. The first measurement is used to differentiate between modes of production and the second one is useful to differentiate discourse genres. However, productivity of verbs is not appropriate for our objective. The results of the second study show that the use of adjectives expands throughout school years, as it increases with school level. An effect of discourse genre and mode of production has also been detected. The analysed four text types present a complexity cline, from written expository texts to spoken narratives through spoken expository texts and written narratives. The results of the third study reveal that the speakers judge adjectives’ compositionality not in dichotomous terms – simple vs. complex adjectives – but in a continuum. The strongest compositionality predictors are adjective length, the number of morphemes counted from a synchronic point of view, the presence of a productive prefix and the relative frequency, that is, when the base is more frequent than the derived adjective. To sum up, the quantitative analysis of the lexicon shows that, as subjects move on through the different school levels, they use a more complex lexicon in expository texts and in the written mode. The analysis of the adjective usage allowed us to obtain an evolutionary vision of the lexical richness and the way how vocabulary is adapted to each text type. The study about the compositionality of adjectives indicates that the morphological complexity affects lexical usage, although it is an implicit knowledge of the speakers. So the present study provides the academic community with an accurate description of the use of adjectives throughout later Catalan language development.

Disertacijoje aprašomo tyrimo tikslas – išanalizuoti leksines ir morfosintaksines lietuvių kalbos būdvardžio įsisavinimo ypatybes. Tyrimui pasirinktas didelės apimties šaltinis – keturių vaikų kalbos tekstynas (~ 400 000 žodžių), sukauptas ilgalaikio stebėjimo metodu. Tyrimas atliktas taikant ir derinant kelis metodus: ilgalaikio stebėjimo, tekstynų lingvistikos, klaidų analizės ir lyginamąjį. Atlikus tyrimą darbe pagrindžiami šie ginamieji teiginiai: 1. Vaikams sudėtinga įsisavinti būdvardžio leksines ypatybes: dažnai painiojami vienos leksinės semantinės grupės būdvardžiai, daroma daug klaidų. 2. Vaikai lengvai įsisavina morfosintaksines būdvardžio ypatybes: klaidų nėra daug, dažniau klystama tik retų paradigmų būdvardžius derinant su daiktavardžiais. 3. Būdvardžio leksinės ir morfosintaksinės ypatybės įsisavinamos drauge. Būdvardžio reikšmė suvokiama tik pradėjus vartoti keliažodžius pasakymus, įsisavinus gramatines ypatybes. 4. Būdvardžio įsisavinimas susijęs su individualia vaiko kalbos raida. Ankstyvajai ir vėlyvajai kalbos raidai būdinga didesnė būdvardžių leksinė įvairovė nei įprastai kalbos raidai, o vaikams, kurių kalbos raida vėlyva, nesudėtinga įsisavinti būdvardžio morfosintaksinius požymius. 5. Būdvardžio įsisavinimą veikia ne tik aplinkos veiksniai (vaikiškoji kalba), bet ir kalbos sistema. Kaip ir įsisavinant kitas kalbos dalis, vaikų kalboje vyrauja vaikiškojoje kalboje dažniausiai vartojamos būdvardžio leksemos ir gramatinės kategorijos. Kalbos sistema... [toliau žr. visą tekstą]<br>The main objective of the study is to define the acquisition of lexical and morphosyntactic features of Lithuanian adjective. The analysis is based on the large quantity of linguistic data (~ 400 000 words), which is the corpus of four children compiled according the method of longitudinal observation. The study has interchangeably applied several methods of analysis: longitudinal observation, corpus linguistics, error analysis and comparative method. Statements to be Defended 1. Lexical features of adjectives are acquired by children with difficulties: they often confuse adjectives of a single semantic group and make many errors. 2. Children easily acquire morphosyntactic features of adjectives: they do not make many errors. Some errors may be observed only in cases, when adjective paradigms do not coincide with noun paradigms. 3. Lexical and morphosyntactic features of adjectives are acquired simultaneously. The meaning of adjective is realised only when multi-word combinations and morphosyntactic features have been acquired. 4. The acquisition of adjectives correlates with the individual language development. Bigger lexical variety of adjectives is more characteristic to children with early and late language development, if compared to children with typical language development. Morphosyntactic features of adjectives do not pose problems to children with late language development. 5. The acquisition of adjective is influenced by the input, as well as by the linguistic... [to full text]

PONTIFÍCIA UNIVERSIDADE CATÓLICA DO RIO DE JANEIRO<br>COORDENAÇÃO DE APERFEIÇOAMENTO DO PESSOAL DE ENSINO SUPERIOR<br>Este trabalho se caracteriza como um estudo experimental, cujo foco é a delimitação da categoria adjetivo por crianças adquirindo o Português Brasileiro (PB) como língua materna. Adota-se uma perspectiva psicolingüística de aquisição da linguagem, aliada a uma concepção minimalista de língua (Chomsky, 1995-2001). Assume-se que a criança é sensível às propriedades fônicas de elementos de classes fechadas, como determinantes e afixos, conforme a hipótese do bootstrapping fonológico (Morgan & Demuth, 1996; Christophe et al., 1997). Considera-se que a representação da Categoria funcional D é fundamental na distinção entre nomes e adjetivos e que sufixos derivacionais contribuem para a representação do traço categorial desses últimos no léxico. Com base na hipótese do bootstrapping sintático (Gleitman, 1990), assume-se que a análise de adjetivos no contexto sintático de DPs ou de small clauses, aliada ao pressuposto de que DPs fazem referência a objetos/entidades, possibilita a representação de adjetivos como categoria que apresenta uma propriedade ou atributo de um referente. Avalia-se, ainda, o papel da ordem canônica, na distinção entre adjetivos e nomes, na ausência de informação de natureza morfológica. Neste trabalho, uma ampla revisão da literatura lingüística acerca da categoria adjetivo é apresentada de modo a que se identifique o que é demandado da criança na delimitação dessa categoria lexical, levando-se em conta propriedades do português. Foram conduzidos quatro experimentos: três com crianças, usando-se a técnica de seleção de objetos com pseudopalavras, e um com adultos falantes do PB. Para este último, foi concebida uma tarefa de atribuição de propriedades a objetos e pessoas a serem imaginadas a partir de pseudo-adjetivos denominais, de modo a avaliar em que medida as propriedades semânticas atribuídas a sufixos derivacionais formadores de adjetivos em análises lingüísticas correspondem ao conhecimento lingüístico intuitivo do falante da língua. Os dois primeiros experimentos foram conduzidos com crianças de 12-22 meses; o último, com crianças de 2-3 anos e 4-5 anos No Experimento 1, avalia-se o papel de determinantes e sufixos derivacionais, formadores de adjetivos, na delimitação desta categoria lexical em estruturas predicativas, independentemente das propriedades semânticas dos afixos. No Experimento 2, investiga-se o papel da ordem canônica aliada ao do sufixo derivacional como desencadeadores do processo de delimitação de nomes e adjetivos no âmbito do DP. No Experimento 3, explora-se o conhecimento por parte de falantes adultos do PB acerca dos traços semânticos dos afixos derivacionais -oso e -ento, formadores de adjetivos. No Experimento 4, verifica-se se os traços semânticos desses afixos são representados pela criança de modo a ser capaz de interpretá-los na interface semântica, à semelhança do que fazem os falantes adultos da língua. Os resultados dos experimentos aqui relatados são compatíveis com a hipótese de trabalho que orienta esta tese, qual seja, a de que a criança faz uso de informação sintática e morfológica na delimitação de adjetivos, e revelam que já aos dois anos de idade propriedades semânticas de sufixos formadores de adjetivos são representadas pela criança. Este trabalho contribui para uma teoria da aquisição da linguagem fundada no processamento de informação das interfaces da língua com sistemas perceptuais e conceptuais, na qual se enfatiza o papel de categorias funcionais e de elementos de classe fechada em geral (incluindo-se os afixos derivacionais) na identificação do que há de específico na língua. Este estudo também introduz uma metodologia experimental que permite complementar o resultado de análises lingüísticas pertinentes à morfologia no que concerne o conhecimento intuitivo do falante acerca dos traços semânticos de afixos.<br>This dissertation presents an experimental study of the delimitation of adjectives as a lexical category in the acquisition of Brazilian Portuguese. It reconciles a psycholinguistic approach to language acquisition with a minimalist conception of language (Chomsky, 1995-2001). According to the phonological bootstrapping hypothesis (Morgan & Demuth, 1996; Christophe et al., 1997), it is assumed that infants are sensitive to closed class elements (as determiners and affixes) in the processing of the phonetic interface. The functional category D is considered to be fundamental to the distinction between nouns and adjectives, and derivational suffixes are viewed as contributing to the representation of the adjective as a categorical feature in the lexicon. According to the syntactic bootstrapping hypothesis (Gleitman, 1990), it is assumed that the parsing of adjectives in DP and small clause contexts, together with the assumption that DPs refer to objects/entities, allow the representation of the adjectives as words that present a property or an attribute of a given referent. And the role of the canonical word order in the distinction between nouns and adjectives, in the absence of specific morphological information, is evaluated. In this study, the linguistic literature on adjectives is extensively reviewed. This review contributes to the identification of the demands that the delimitation of adjectives present to children, taking into account the specific properties of Portuguese. Four experiments were conducted: three with children, making use of the object selection with pseudo-words paradigm, and one with adult speakers of BP. In the latter, a task was envisaged in which pseudo-adjectives were presented in order for the property of a hidden object/character to be guessed. The speaker’s intuitive knowledge of the meaning of derivational suffixes was expected to guide the accomplishment of this task. The two first experiments were conducted with 12- 22 month old children, and the last one, with 2-3 and 4-5 year olds. In Experiment 1, the role of determiners and derivational affixes (forming adjectives) in the parsing of adjectives in predicative structures was evaluated, independently of the semantic properties of those affixes. In Experiment 2, the role of the canonical word order within the DP and derivational affixes in the bootstrapping of the representation of adjectives in Portuguese was investigated. Experiment 3 explores the native speaker knowledge of the semantic features of the adjective forming derivational affixes -oso e -ento. In Experiment 4, children’s representation of these very features is assessed. The results of the experiments reported here are compatible with the working hypothesis, namely, that children make use of syntactic and morphological information in the delimitation of adjectives as a lexical category. They also reveal that the semantic properties of derivation affixes forming adjectives are already available by the age of two. This work contributes to a theory of language acquisition that explores early processing at the language interfaces with perceptual and conceptual systems, and in which the role of closed class elements (including derivational affixes) and functional categories is emphasized. It also introduces an experimental methodology that enables to access the adult speaker’s intuitive knowledge of derivational morphology.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Indiana University, Dept. of Language Education, 2006.<br>Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 67-04, Section: A, page: 1317. Advisers: Martha Nyikos; Kimberly Geeslin. "Title from dissertation home page (viewed May 14, 2007)."

This thesis investigates the developpment of gender agreement in determiners and adjectives in the spontaneous speech of L2 French by five groups of Swedish learners: beginners at the university, secondary school students, university students, teacher candidates and PhD students. Different types of determiners are examined, such as definite and the indefinite articles. Adjectival agreement is studied in different positions in relation to the noun, such as the attributive anteposition, the attributive postposition and the predicative position. The aim is to identify the developmental sequence of gender agreement through a longitudinal study of learners at different levels of acquisition. The analysis is based on spoken language, i.e. 81 interviews belonging to the InterFra-corpus, Stockholm University. Our data also includes 8 oral productions from a control group of native speakers. The study is in three parts: one for the agreement between determiners and nouns, another for the agreement between adjectives and nouns and, finally, a study considering agreement between all three items within the noun phrase, i.e. determiner, noun and adjective (Det-N-Adj). A sequence of acquisition for gender agreement on determiners and adjectives is proposed based on the productions of four learner groups and compared to the six developmental stages suggested by Bartning and Schlyter (2004). Results have showed that there is an acquisition order of gender agreement in different parts of the nominal phrase, according to the type of determiner and the positions of the adjective. A qualitative analysis has shown a random use of gender agreement on determiners and some nouns are used with both genders on the determiner. Also, the type-token ratio is very low at the beginning of the acquisition, which partly explains the high accuracy rate (100 %). The study considering agreement between all three constituents within the noun phrase revealed that advanced learners have higher accuracy rate for gender agreement on adjectives within the noun phrase with the presence of a determiner that marks gender distinction (i.e. a non-elided, singular determiner). Results also showed that the feminine form of the adjectives remains difficult at higher acquisitional levels.

Submitted by Renata Lopes (renatasil82@gmail.com) on 2017-05-19T15:26:21Z No. of bitstreams: 1 lucianadeoliveirafariaazevedo.pdf: 2448500 bytes, checksum: eaee6df3b32bee6f42619f40a226e17f (MD5)<br>Approved for entry into archive by Adriana Oliveira (adriana.oliveira@ufjf.edu.br) on 2017-05-19T15:55:07Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 lucianadeoliveirafariaazevedo.pdf: 2448500 bytes, checksum: eaee6df3b32bee6f42619f40a226e17f (MD5)<br>Made available in DSpace on 2017-05-19T15:55:07Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 lucianadeoliveirafariaazevedo.pdf: 2448500 bytes, checksum: eaee6df3b32bee6f42619f40a226e17f (MD5) Previous issue date: 2008-08-29<br>Esta dissertação aborda o processo de aquisição lexical por crianças brasileiras e investiga, particularmente, a relação entre categoria conceitual e categoria lingüística, e propriedades morfofonológicas do adjetivo. A hipótese que orienta esta dissertação é a de que a nomeação dos objetos e a presença de morfemas característicos de adjetivos são pistas robustas usadas pelas crianças no processo de aquisição de novos adjetivos. Adota-se uma perspectiva psicolingüística da aquisição da linguagem que pretende a conciliação de um modelo de processamento lingüístico (modelos de Bootstrapping Fonológico e Sintático), com um modelo de língua proposto pela Teoria Gerativa. A conciliação entre os modelos visa a explicar, satisfatoriamente, a forma pela qual a criança se torna capaz de, uma vez exposta a uma língua natural, extrair do material lingüístico ao qual é apresentada os elementos formadores do léxico de sua língua. Foram desenvolvidas duas atividades experimentais, usando-se a técnica de identificação de objeto, com crianças de dois e três anos. A primeira avalia o reconhecimento de novos adjetivos, comparando-se a apresentação de objetos nomeados (uma flor tapoja) ou com nomes vagos (uma coisa tapoja). No segundo experimento, foram acrescentados aos pseudo-adjetivos os sufixos -oso/a e –ado/a (uma casa jufosa) / uma coisa jufosa), em vista de investigar o papel do sufixo juntamente com a nomeação dos objetos como facilitadores na identificação do adjetivo pela criança. Adjetivos acompanhados de nome (Exper. 1) são mais facilmente identificados, mas quando acrescidos de sufixo (Exper. 2) são reconhecidos mesmo na presença de nomes vagos. Os resultados são compatíveis com nossa hipótese, pois sugerem que a nomeação e a marca morfofonológica são pistas robustas usadas pelas crianças para identificar novos adjetivos.<br>This dissertation approaches the process of lexical acquisition for Brazilian children and it investigates, particularly, the relationship among conceptual category and linguistic category, and properties morphophonological of the adjective. The hypothesis that guides this dissertation is the one that the nomination of the objects and the presence of morphemes characteristic of adjectives are robust tracks used by the children in the process of acquisition of new adjectives. A perspective psycholinguistic of the acquisition of the language is adopted that intends the conciliation of a model of linguistic processing (models of Phonological and Syntactic Bootstrapping), with a language model proposed by the Generative Theory. The conciliation among the models seeks to explain, satisfactorily, the form for the which the child becomes capable of, once exposed to a natural language, to extract of the linguistic material to which is presented the elements that form the lexicon of your language. Two experimental activities were developed, being used the technique of object identification, with two three year-old children. The first evaluates the recognition of new adjectives, being compared the presentation of nominated objects (a tapoja flower) or with vague names (a tapoja thing). In the second experiment, they were increased to the pseudo-adjectives the suffixes -oso/a and -ado/a (a jufosa house) / a jufosa thing), in view of investigating the paper of the suffix together with the nomination of the objects as facilitators in the identification of the adjective for the child accompanied Adjectives of name (Exper. 1) they are more easily identified, but when added of suffix (Exper. 2) they are recognized even in the presence of vague names. The results are compatible with our hypothesis, because they suggest that the nomination and the mark morphophonological are robust tracks used by the children to identify new adjectives.

Acquérir l'adjectif épithète pose deux problèmes majeurs en français. D'abord, l'adjectif dénote une propriété à propos d'un nom, les enfants doivent donc pouvoir concevoir un objet comme un tout et comme un ensemble de propriétés pour manier un SN avec épithète. Ensuite, l'alternance est un trait définitoire de l'adjectif du français, mais son placement n'est pas aléatoire et les contraintes en jeu sont multiples et d'ordre tendanciel. De plus, bien que les locuteurs connaissent cette possibilité, ils optent plutôt pour un placement fixe en usage. Ces faits nous ont amenée à nous demander si l'input permet à l'enfant de se construire la notion d'adjectif épithète sans avoir recours à des connaissances langagières innées. Pour y répondre, nous proposons une étude comparant les usages de trois enfants à ceux de leur famille à deux temps de leur acquisition (T1 : 3 ;8, T2 : 4 ;6). Nous étudions quatre aspects de l'usage de l'épithète (lexique, placement, combinaison avec d'autres modifieurs ou un dépendant adjectival) et nous confrontons l'adjectif aux autres modifieurs nominaux. Ces phénomènes montrent tous la même évolution. À T1, les enfants emploient la construction la plus fréquente des adultes, avec un fort degré de spécificité lexicale. À T2, d'autres constructions émergent selon leur ordre de fréquence chez les adultes. Le lexique de la construction de T1 s'est en outre élargi dans le champ de la classe sémantique des usages de T1. Les enfants montrent ainsi une sensibilité aux informations quantitatives et une abstraction graduelle des structures par analogie sémantique, qui plaident pour une construction progressive de la notion d'adjectif épithète à partir de l'input.

Title: Comparison of Czech and Russian Declension of Nouns and Adjectives with a Focus on Teaching Czech for Foreigners Author: Mgr. Karel Kulich Department: Institute of Czech Language and Theory of Communication, Faculty of Arts, Charles University Supervisor: PhDr. Jiří Hasil, Ph.D. Abstract: The submitted thesis deals with Czech language as a foreign language in the field of Czech declension system of nouns and adjectives in comparison with the Russian system, and the issue of acquiring these language structures in the target group of Russian-language foreigners. This group of foreigners is a part of a large number of foreign students studying at Czech universities and other schools, so the topic of the paper is highly up-to-date. According to the findings of the linguists, the similarity of language structures may be the cause of the so-called interference errors. In a more general sense, it is the issue of homonymy, which is described, for example, by V. Skalička in connection with the development and termination of declension. In the linguistic comparison, the role of homonymity of desinential morphemes is related to their unequal functional load. The author claims to provide a thorough knowledge of Czech and Russian declension based on comparative study. The goals of the thesis include description...

This diploma thesis deals with the comparison of adjectives in Russian and English languages from a linguodidactic point of view. The theoretical part is based on the general linguistic knowledge of this particular part of speech and explains the rules for the comparison of adjectives in both languages. Furthermore, the theoretical part also provides linguodidactic context of acquiring this grammatical phenomenon. The practical part is devoted to the analysis of pedagogical documents and textbooks used for teaching Russian and English languages. The last chapter of the thesis shows the results of a research focused on testing pupils attending secondary schools. The aim here is to prove the knowledge of comparative and superlative forms of adjectives in Russian and English languages on the basis of a written test. KEY WORDS: adjectives, comparison, language teaching methodology, grammar acquisition of a foreign language, Russian language, English language, testing of pupils