Deck 6: The Development of Syntax and Morphology: Learning the Structure of Language

Question 1

The characteristic that humans have the capacity to produce and understand an infinite number of novel utterances is known as:

A) language development.
B) language system knowledge.
C) generativity of language.
D) None of these answers are true.

Answer 1

C

Question 2

Mastery of the use of grammatical morphemes:

A) emerges early in the child's language after starting to use telegraphic speech.
B) occurs when the child has full command of the use of the progressive "ing".
C) requires a long time to achieve.
D) is a simple, but gradual process.

Answer 2

C

Question 3

Examination of how children acquire morphological forms in English demonstrates:

A) universals in all languages.
B) the uniqueness of the English language.
C) the complexity of other languages, such as Finnish, German, Luo and Kahluli.
D) the relationship between morphology and syntax.

Answer 3

C

Question 4

Two-word utterances:

A) represent the use of agent + action relations.
B) represent the use of agent + object relations.
C) utilize one of eight basic relational meanings in the majority of utterances.
D) requires extensive vocabulary development.

Question 5

Individual differences in grammatical development are:

A) demonstrated when comparing how children combine words in multiword utterances.
B) viewed in a holistic approach to analyzing sentence structures.
C) viewed in an analytical approach to analyzing sentence structures.
D) demonstrated when children advance to three-word utterances.

Question 6

Negation is expressed by:

A) changes in word order.
B) tacking on a marker at the beginning or ending of a sentence.
C) by shaking one's head.
D) All of these answers are true.

Question 7

The study of early childhood language centers on the following three categories of linguistic rules. They are:

A) lexical categories, functional categories and hierarchical sentence structure.
B) open-class words, closed-class words and sentence structure.
C) None of these answers are true.
D) Both of these answers are true.

Question 8

Two ways that young children combine words into two-word utterances include:

A) a child responding to another individual's utterance with a single-word utterances or a child repeating his own utterance twice.
B) separating two words with pause or running words together as if they are one word.
C) sequencing words that are connected in meaning and words that are not connected.
D) uttering words that are transcribed as horizontal constructions or as vertical constructions.

Question 9

Telegraphic speech:

A) represents primitive use of noun + verb utterances.
B) tends to be negations or questions.
C) represents adult-like simple phrases.
D) is usually comprised of affirmative or declarative statements.

Question 10

Morphemes are:

A) lexical items.
B) the smallest units of meaning.
C) a sentence unit.
D) embedded in words.

Question 11

A linguist delineates rule patterns for formulating sentences. These rules are called:

A) lexical rules.
B) descriptive rules.
C) phonological rules.
D) prescriptive rules.

Question 12

Complex sentences appear in children's language:

A) after negations.
B) in the order of object complementation, wh-embedded clauses, coordinating conjunctions and subordinating conjunctions.
C) by the majority of children between 6 and 7 years old.
D) by the majority of children between 4 and 5 years old.

Question 13

Morphological units such as adding "s" to the end of a singular form are referred to as:

A) bound morphemes, because the "s" is a single unit.
B) bound morphemes, because the "s" cannot stand alone as a word.
C) free morphemes, because the "s" cannot stand alone as a word.
D) free morphemes, because the "s" changes the meaning of the word.

Question 14

Syntax refers to the:

A) range of words an individual has in his or her lexicon.
B) endings of words when used in sentences.
C) rules for carrying out conversations.
D) rules for ordering parts of sentences.

Question 15

Children's early multiwords utterances:

A) include combinations of function words and descriptors.
B) express declaratives and negations.
C) generally include bound morphemes.
D) most commonly refer to the here and now.

Question 16

Combinatorial speech refers to instances when children:

A) combine meanings in two-word utterances.
B) combine meanings in three-word utterances.
C) develop cognitive skills which reflect knowledge of semantic relations in two and three-word utterances.
D) All of these answers are true.

Question 17

Rule-based grammar systems are:

A) approaches that categorize nouns and verbs as closed-class words.
B) used to analyze sentence components in categories.
C) used to analyze closed categories.
D) limited ways to describe the use of nouns and verbs.

Question 18

The most common form of passives used by children is:

A) the use the verb "got".
B) to duplicate adult use of passives.
C) used by the age of 2 ½ .
D) the use the verb "to be."

Question 19

Children's first sentences tend to be incomplete and are missing which of the following?

A) Function words and bound morphemes
B) Transitional forms
C) Free morphemes
D) Declarative statements

Question 20

Studies of language as a system of rules:

A) refers to a set of abstract definitions.
B) considers language as a series of symbolic representations.
C) limits how linguists can account for generating sentences.
D) provides the basis of most linguistic studies.

Question 21

In studies of the role of feedback, researchers report that:

A) parents frequently provide negative evidence when children produce grammatical errors.
B) children more readily produce erroneous utterances when they do not have negative feedback.
C) it is unclear how children process parental behavior as a guide to acquiring accurate grammatical language.
D) parents' patterns of using appropriate feedback are consistent and predictable.

Question 22

Chomsky's view that mothers model language with errors and thus children have errorful language is:

A) challenged by child language researchers.
B) the basis for the phonological bootstrapping hyptothesis.
C) the basis for the prosodic bootstrapping hypothesis.
D) None of these answers are true.

Question 23

That children who know grammatical rules is evidenced in how they:

A) misuse overregulation.
B) apply word order to novel utterances.
C) respond to utterances with action.
D) apply lexical rules to grammar.

Question 24

Research on children's early language development and grammatical rules indicates that children:

A) utilize lexically based rules on how to understand language.
B) process language in terms of a semantically based grammar system of knowledge.
C) apply an underlying knowledge of syntax to comprehension of language.
D) All of these answers are true.

Question 25

The view that children's grammar is not "adult like" is known as:

A) lexically-based grammar.
B) inflection-based grammar.
C) syntactically-based grammar.
D) semantically-based grammar.

Question 26

Berko (1958) used his "wub test," to give children nonsense words and:

A) asked them to supply blank words.
B) examined patterns in children's productivity.
C) concluded that their underlying linguistic knowledge equaled aspects of their expressive language.
D) found that 3 year olds cannot use nonsense words in connected speech.

Question 27

Evidence that children develop an underlying system of rules for grammar is:

A) demonstrated by their use of noun - verb phrases in two word utterances.
B) found in their rote memory of multiword utterances.
C) seen in use of word combinations, errors made in applying rules and in experiments on using new word combinations.
D) indicated by the variety of word combinations they use.

Question 28

The connectionist model of explaining language development processes is based on:

A) the view that computer programs can be used to research and simulate language-learning processes in the human brain.
B) Chomskyan views of nativism and the learning mechanism.
C) the understanding that language is a system of rules that represent categories of abstract knowledge.
D) the view that language is not innate to individuals.

Question 29

Children between 12 and 14 months of age comprehend meaning in word combinations according to:

A) word order only.
B) word order and syntax.
C) word order, syntax and MLU.
D) word order, syntax, and grammatical morphemes.

Question 30

Questions regarding co-reference relations in children's language and the Universal Grammar approach:

A) are based on difficulties children have in interpreting complex sentences.
B) relate to the disagreement on the innateness of language in all children and evidence of problems in acquiring co-reference.
C) refers to research on how children develop an underlying grammar.
D) concerns strategies children use to interpret adult level utterances.

Question 31

Children's comprehension of structured speech is:

A) measured in terms of MLU by most researchers.
B) acquired on the same continuum as the production of speech.
C) difficult to measure because of the nature of children's response to stimuli.
D) examined with a broad range of measurements.

Question 32

Evidence that very young children understand grammar:

A) indicates that they do not comprehend two-word utterances until after they start expressing such utterances.
B) indicates that before they produce two-word utterances, they can comprehend the meaning of two-word utterances.
C) cannot be measured
D) None of these statements are true.

Question 33

The continuity assumption is based on the view that:

A) the endpoint in grammatical development occurs when the young child acquires adult-like language.
B) their children are innately equipped with grammatical categories at birth and do not develop in stages.
C) there is no endpoint in the child's development of grammatical language.
D) innate grammatical knowledge combines with stages of cognitive development to form the basis for child language learning.

Question 34

Researchers agree that 2-year old children have an understanding of

A) nouns and verbs.
B) an abstract noun and verb category.
C) an abstract noun category, but they disagree on how the children understand verbs.
D) an abstract verb category, but they disagree on how the children understand nouns.

Question 35

The major interest in the subject of "nature or nurture" derives from:

A) psychologists' questions regarding babies' ability to talk.
B) discussions concerning children's general cognitive processing.
C) interest in how children acquire grammatical knowledge.
D) studies of animal's communicative behavior.

Question 36

Children's use of a variety of response strategies to speech:

A) demonstrates the child's knowledge of sentence structure and ability to apply the knowledge to his or her understanding.
B) indicates that the child only partially understand what is said to them.
C) demonstrates the child's high level of comprehension.
D) indicates how the child comprehends passive sentence structures.

Question 37

Pinker (1984, 1989) suggests that children:

A) have an innate understanding of language.
B) know that agents of action are likely to be objects.
C) innately have the categories of nouns and verbs.
D) that recipients of actions are likely to be subjects of sentences.

Question 38

Most children acquire multiword utterances by:

A) using the tune, or holistic approach in which they combine whole chunks of language into an utterance.
B) using an analytical approach, in which they break speech down into smaller units and then learn to combine them.
C) a combination of the tune approach and the analytical approach.
D) All of these answers are true.

Question 39

Studies of the relationship of grammatical development to cognitive development indicate that:

A) the acquisition of grammar is closely associated with levels of symbolic play.
B) children who use longer utterances are more cognitively advanced.
C) general cognitive development processes are closely associated with grammatical development.
D) there is little correlation between grammatical development and cognitive development.

Question 40

Mean length of utterance (MLU) is a useful tool to:

A) identify the nature of a child's grammar.
B) identify the child's mean use of morphemes.
C) predict the level of complexity in structures after acquiring the stage of 3.0.
D) measure the level of production of language up to an MLU of 3.0.

Question 41

Discuss the arguments of continuity vs. discontinuity of grammatical development.

Question 42

Describe the research on how children develop comprehension of structured speech.

Question 43

Select one theory of language development that you feel describes how children develop language. Describe that theory and discuss why you feel it describes how language is acquired.

Question 44

Principles and parameters theory suggests:

A) universal grammar dictates how options are filled.
B) languages share a set of language specific features that differ only by a constrained set of options.
C) there are no specific features shared by languages.
D) parameters are not part of language acquisition.

Question 45

The social/cognitive position on language development claims:

A) children imitate what they hear and are reinforced when they are correct.
B) social interaction with other speakers is the requisite experience for language development.
C) children use a universal grammar to develop language.
D) children use semantic bootstrapping to develop language.

Question 46

Describe the features of adult's knowledge of language structure and discuss application the perspectives on descriptive versus prescriptive rules.

Question 47

The innate grammar position on language development suggests that:

A) there is an innate syntactic knowledge and language specific learning procedures that are the basis for language development.
B) the innate desire to interact with others forms the basis for language development.
C) children are born with a set of words that they use in language development.
D) None of these answers are true.

Question 48

The connectionist theory suggests that language development is the outcome of:

A) finding grammar units.
B) cognitive units.
C) developing relative strengths of the interconnected network units.
D) diminishing the relative strengths of the interconnected network units and implementing the grammatical units that remain.

Question 49

Describe the meaning of semantic bootstrapping, compare and contrast literature on the significance of it in child language development.

Question 50

Describe the stages of grammatical development in early multiword utterances.

Question 51

Behaviorists' accounts of language development claim that:

A) children use input to formulate language rules.
B) children imitate what they area and are reinforced when they are correct.
C) children use a universal grammar to develop language.
D) social interaction is critical to language development.

Question 52

Review the text discussion of the role of language experience and discuss the meaning of the phonological bootstrapping hypothesis.

Question 53

In arguing against the behaviorist view of language development, Chomsky (1957):

A) suggests that children imitate what they hear.
B) set the stage for future research and argument on the innateness of human capacity for language learning,
C) argued that the productivity of language depends on "grammatical habits."
D) None of these answers are true.

Question 54

Compare the development of grammatical morphemes to that of sentence forms, including complex sentence forms.

Question 55

The issue of explaining the acquisition of grammar often evolves around the concepts of "nature or nurture." Compare the various arguments for and against these concepts. Make sure to discuss language induction.

Question 56

Describe the research on how children's experience with language influences development of grammatical knowledge.