Michael Tomasello

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Where Does Grammar Come From? in ontogeny
Michael Tomasello Max Planck Institute for
Evolutionary Anthropology Leipzig, Germany
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Phylogeny (species)
History (cultural group)
Ontogeny (individual)
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• UG ACCOUNT
• Learning of periphery
• Innate UG core linking

• U-B ACCOUNT
• All is learned (cognitively!)
• Dual Inheritance
• (i) constructions
• (ii) general cognitive learning processes

Dual Process
Single Process Not Connectionism
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Andrew Radford on UG Approach
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Culture Utterances
gt
Patterns of Language Use CONSTRUCTIONS
Language-specific categories and constructions,
with universals based on universal processes
ofcognition and communication
Biology Cognitive Learning Skills Intention-re
ading Pattern-finding
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Grammar
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Joint Attentional Frame and Semantic Roles
location
object/theme
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Common Ground Referent
Moll et al. (2008) Infancy.
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Kids Choose Shared One

• But NOT when they experience it with another
  adult (3x) - not own interest
• But NOT when then onlook as adult gets excited
  (3x) by herself - not adult interest
• Its the one we shared in a special way!

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Common Ground Referent
Moll et al. (2006) Cognition Development.
One we havent shared!
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Summary

• Semantics events roles
• Pragmatics given new
• Syntax distribution analogy
• Form imitative (vocal) learning

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Mothers Item-Based Speech to Children Cameron-Fau
lkner, Lieven, Tomasello (2004) Cognitive
Science
8/ 77
5/ 20
4/38
9/ 38
20/ 67
6/ 53

• 51 from 52 frames
• 45 start w/ one
• of 17 words

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Cameron-Faulkner, Lieven, Tomasello (2004)
Whats .18 Wheres .05 Whatre .09 Wherere .02
What do .05 Where shall .01 What did .04 What
has .03 Whos .08 What about .03 Who
did .01 What shall .02 What can .02 Which
one .02 What does .02 What hppnd .01 Why
dont .01 What were .01 What kind of .01 How
many .01
31 frames gt 80 of Wh Qs
13 frames gt 65 of Wh Qs
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Verb Islands at 2 Years of Age
not agentbut kicker
Tomasello (1992) First Verbs
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English childrens understanding of transitive
word order is verb-specific until age 2.5 - 3.0

1. Spontaneous Speech (diary)
2. Production Experiments (nonce verbs)
3. Weird Word Order Studies(nonce verbs)
4. Comprehension Experiments (nonce verbs)
5. Priming Studies (English verbs)

Gerntner Fisher (2006) Preferential
Looking? Dittmar et al. (2008)
Tomasello (2000 2003)
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Brooks TomaselloDevelopmental Psychology
(1999)
Adult Model Always Passive Its being tammed by
the horsie. Its being tammed. Active Biasing
Question Whats the horsie doing (to
it)? encouraging Hes tamming it Results 12
out of 48 three-year-old children (25) produced
a transitive SVO utterance
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Wug type Studies of Syntax (Tomasello,
Cognition, 2000)
. Japanese
Matsui et al.
children
. Hebrew
.
German
Wittek
. Hebrew
. Japanese
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Cues in Construction Learning Vary

• Frequency Cue Availability
• Consistency Cue Reliability
• Complexity Cue Cost

Cue Strength
And sometimes cues compete!
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German Transitives
Dittmar, Lieven, Tomasello (in press) Child
Development
Word Order vs. Case animacy agreement controlled

• Point to Picture Comprehension
• Competition Model w/ Novel Verbs

Prototype Der Hund wieft den Tiger. Word order
Die Katze wieft die Ziege. Conflict Den Hund
wieft der Tiger.
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Dittmar et al. (in press)
German childrens correct interpretation of
transitive sentences with novel verbs.
Prototype Der Hund wieft den Tiger. Word order
Die Katze wieft die Ziege. Conflict Den Hund
wieft der Tiger.
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Dittmar et al. (in press)
Conflict Condition Den Hund wieft der Tiger.
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Dittmar et al. (in press)
German Child-Directed Transitive Sentences
Conflict Den Hund wieft der Tiger.

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Prototype Der Hund wieft den Tiger.
Word order Die Katze wieft die Ziege.
68
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Only 1 had no personal pronoun or animacy cue.
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Why case so slow when higher cue strength than
word order?
for der 21
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Polish Dabrowska Tomasello (in press) J. Child
Language
Polish case marking on nouns - diff for diff
genders Question do they know all instrumentals
same?

• Elicited Production
• Novel Verb Modeled w/
• NP-nom VERB NP-masc instr.
• Elicited same verb w/ feminine noun as object

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(No Transcript)
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Dabrowska et al. (in press)
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1. S-COMPLEMENTSDiessel Tomasello, Cognitive
Linguistics (2001)

• Subjects Adam, Eve, Sarah, Naomi, Peter, Nina -
  1 to 5 years
• Complex Ss 2807 tokens
• Examples from Sarah Examples from Nina
• I think hes gone See that monkey crying
• I think its in here See Becca sleeping
• I think my daddy took it See that go
• I think I saw one See my hands are washed
• its a crazy bone, I think See he bites me
• I think dis is de bowl See him lie down

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Diessel Tomasello, Cognitive Linguistics (2001)
Subjects in Complex Ss
1-P 2-P 3-P Lex Imp Guess 100 -- -- -- -- Bet
100 -- -- -- -- Mean 52 48 -- -- -- Know 36 55 0
5 04 -- Think 85 13 02 -- -- Wish 97 -- -- 03 --
Hope 88 12 -- -- -- See 07 01 01 -- 91 Look
-- -- -- -- 100 Watch -- -- 11 -- 89 Remember 6 6
-- -- 88
- Virtually no complementizers - Virtually no
non-present tenses - Virtually no modals or
negations
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2. RELATIVE CLAUSESDiessel Tomasello,
Cognitive Linguistics (2000)

• - Subjects 4 CHILDES children from 19 to 51
• - Total of 324 relative clauses
• Heres the toy that goes around.
• Thats the sugar that fell out.
• Theres the ball I bought
• Thiss the bird that sings.
• Thats the one that goes moo.
• Heres the boy that ran into the water.

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Diessel Tomasello, Cognitive Linguistics (2000)

• Earliest All
• NP ONLY
• The girl that came with us .05 .19
• PRESENTATIONALS
• This is the car that turns around .75 .47
• OBLIQUES
• Im going to the zoo that has snakes 0 .06
• OBJECT
• She has a bathtub that goes with it .20 .26
• SUBJECT
• The one that not finished is up there 0 .01
• 50 of these Look at all the chairs Peters
  got

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3. Wh- Questions
Ambridge, Rowland, Theakston, Tomasello
(submitted)
Adult Ask her why the dog is sleeping. Child
Why is the dog sleeping? Adult Ask her where
the pig can swim. Child Where can the pig swim?
4 year olds

• MAIN RESULT different number errors for
• different wh- words
• different auxiliaries
• same auxiliary w/ diff number (e.g., do
  does)

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• 4. Tough Movement
• Fabian-Kraus Ammon (1980

Jill is easy to see
4/5 year olds
correct in comprehension
find 100 catch 93 save 69 draw
53 watch 33 hear 25
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1. Transitivity Overgeneralizations

• Mommy, can you stay this open?
• I come closer so it wont fall.
• Dont giggle me.
• She came it over there.
• I want to stay this rubber band on.
• Eva wont stay things where I want them to be.
• You cried her.
• Will you climb me up there?
• Kannst Du mich hochklettern?

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Constraint

• ENTRENCHMENT
• Repeated use makes other uses sound
  unconventional
• PRE-EMPTION
• Alternative forms block the extension of a verb
  to a construction
• ANALOGIES
• Semantic subclasses of verbs

Evidence at 2.5 years Brooks Tomasello (1999)
Child Development
Evidence for these both at 4.5 years Brooks
Tomasello (1999) Language
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Three constraining factors working over
developmental time.
Growing abstractness of the transitive
construction
Many overgeneralizations b/c not entrenched
Preemption
Verb Subclasses
No overgeneralizations b/c Verb Islands
Giggle Chortle Laugh
Entrenchment
Low overgeneralzations b/c preemtion and verb
subclasses in addition to entrenchment
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Overall Summary

• Early linguistic representations are mostly
  concrete
• w/ item-based abstractions only gt no UG core.
• Abstractions are created gradually,
  piecemeal, based on specifiable characteristics
  of the input - constraints also gt general
  cognitive processes.
• Children produce utterances by combining in
  functionally appropriate ways known pieces of
  language of different kinds gt U-B syntax.

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Final Query

• All theories must employ something like this
  account to explain the acquisition of particular
  language-specific constructions
• The question is whether, in addition, we need a
  second set of acquisition processes to link these
  constructions to an innate UG?
• Why?