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Early Prosodic Word Acquisition in Catalan Maximality and minimality constraints on outputs

Early Prosodic Word Acquisition in Catalan Maximality and minimality constraints on outputs. Pilar Prieto ICREA and UAB Second Lisbon Meeting on Language Acquisition University of Lisbon, June 1-4, 2004 2004. Theory of prosodic restrictions.

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Early Prosodic Word Acquisition in Catalan Maximality and minimality constraints on outputs

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  1. Early Prosodic Word Acquisition in Catalan Maximality and minimality constraints on outputs Pilar Prieto ICREA and UAB Second Lisbon Meeting on Language Acquisition University of Lisbon, June 1-4, 2004 2004

  2. Theory of prosodic restrictions • Recent research on phonological acquisition has shown that early PW production across different languages is largely guided by prosodic conditions. • Children’s word productions tend to circumscribe to consistent size and rhythmic patterns (Demuth & Fee 1995, Demuth 1996a, 1996b, 2003, Kehoe 1999/2000, Fikkert 1994, Levelt et al. 1999/2000, Lleó & Demuth 1999, Pater 1997, among others). • Minimality constraints. Children’s initial productions tend to be minimally a binary foot (or a ‘minimal word’) (vg. Demuth & Fee 1995, Salidis & Johnson 1997). • Maximality constraints. Children’s early words are both minimally and maximally one binary foot (e.g., a moraic trochee in English; refs. above).

  3. The English data • In an initial stage, PW are limited by a binary foot template (namely, a moraic trochee). TrocheesIambsDactils potato [] balloon [] elephant [] spaghetti [] garage [] animal [] together [] belong [] buffalo [] delicious [] police [] medicine [] remember []guitar []camera [] Pater (1997) Vg. hand [], down []

  4. Frequency effects • Recent evidence also shows that children’s early words reflect the predominant (high frequency) prosodic structures in the language. • While unfooted syllables are often omitted until the age of 2;6 in English (Kehoe 2000), Spanish language learners acquire unfooted syllables quite early (Demuth 2001a, Lleó 2003, Roark and Demuth 2000).

  5. The French data • In the initial stage (13-15 mesos), half of the words consist of a binary foot and the other half subminimal CV forms. peigne [] ‘comb’ madame [] ‘madam’ pomme [] ‘apple’ soldat [] ‘soldier’ sable [] ‘sand’ chausson [] ‘slipper’ vache [] ‘cow’ culotte [] ‘trousers’ verre [] ‘glass’ fromage [] ‘cheese’ Demuth (2003:152), Demuth & Johnson (2003) • French does not conform to a minimal requirement of a binary foot. • Violation attributed to language-particular evidence from French: high frequency of subminimal words of the CV type and few codas.

  6. Goals of the study • To assess the minimality and maximality hypotheses for early PW production in Catalan. • To assess the role of language-particular frequency properties of the input in shaping children’s early words. • Catalan provides a good test case for exploring this issue, as this language is prosodically middle way between Spanish and French (higher frequency of CV-type subminimal words and of bisyllabic iambs than Spanish).

  7. Prosodic structure in Catalan • Catalan is prosodically middle way between Spanish and French: Catalan has more monosyllabic and iambic words than Spanish due to the productive historical loss of word-final masculine vowel markers (Span. caballo > Cat. cavall, Span mano > Cat. mà). Similarly, and Span. Cat cabello > Cat. cabell). • Previous counts of PW frequency distributions did not cover all PW shape types (cf. Cabré 1993, Guasti & Gavarró 2003).

  8. Child-Directed Catalan Corpora • Downloaded Catalan files from the Serra corpus in CHILDES. • 17 files from Pep (1;1.28-2;8) • Extracted a total of 22.311 words. • Extracted with ‘freq’ command in CLAN. • Manually counted and distributed into classes (CV, CV, CVC, ss, ss, sss, sss, sss, etc.) Table 1. Data used for the word frequency distribution

  9. 31% of the total number of words were unstressed clitics of the type ho, hi, la, el, etc. • The rest of the data (stressedlexical items) have the following distribution:

  10. Methodology • Longitudinal analysis of 6 monolingual Catalan children. • 4 children from the Serra corpus: recorded once a month from the one-word stage until 4 years of age. • 2 children recorded by author (once a month plus diary) Table 2. Data used in the study

  11. Minimality effects • At an initial stage (13-17 months) neither of the six children show minimality effects on outputs. • The 6 children reproduce monosyllabic CV words with no evidence of augmentation. Target CV no [] ‘no’ (Pep 1;1.18, Anna 1;2.15, Lluís 1;3) té [] ‘have this’ (Guillem 1;1.29, Ot 1:1.15) pa [] ‘bread’ (Anna 1;2.5 mà [] ‘hand’ (Guillem 1;4.26, Ot 1:3.12) sí [], [] ‘yes’ (Guillem 1;4.26, Ot 1:3.12)

  12. In early stages, CVC words and CVCV(C) words can be truncated to CV outputs but are commonly targeted as CVC. • Evidence of compensatory lengthening when deleting a final C: Target CVC meu [me:] ‘mine’ (Anna 1;2) carn [tan], [an] ‘meat’ (Anna 1;2; 1;5) peu [:], [:] ‘foot’ (Anna 1;2.15; ) nen [nn] ‘child’ (Anna 1;2) Nil [ni:] ‘first name’ (Ot 1;3.12, Anna 1;2.15) gat [:] ‘cat’ (Ot 1;3.15) llum [:],[] ‘light’ (Laura 1:7.20, Lluís 1;2) Pau [:] ‘first name’ (Anna 1;2.15) pam [] ‘onomatopeia’ (Anna 1;2) tot [] ‘all’ (Anna 1;2; Lluís 1;3.15) nas [] ‘nose’ (Anna 1;2)

  13. Early production of subminimal CV words (with no augmentation) and CVC type words (without truncation) in Catalan. • This indicates that a sufficient (not great) exposure to specific word shapes is enough to ‘license’ early acquisition of CV and CVC-type words: • Stressed monosyllables (CV type): 13% • Stressed monosyllables (CVC type): 22% • Language learners are sensitive to a sufficient presence of prosodic structures in the input.

  14. Maximality constraints • In an initial period (12-16 months), the 6 children produce bisyllabic trochees in a target-like way: Target trochees papa []‘dad’ (Ot 1;3.12, Anna 1;1.15) mama [] ‘mum’ (Guillem 1;1.29, Ot 1;3.12) gràcies [], [ts] ‘please’ (Guillem 1;1.29, Pep 1;2.3; Ot 1;3.12) aigua [], [] ‘water’ (Pep 1;2.3, Lluís 1;2.4) globus [] ‘balloon’ (Lluís 1;2.4) caca []‘poop’(Anna 1;2.15, Pep 1;3.23) àvia [], [] ‘grandmother’ (Ot 1;3.12, Anna 1;2) hola [:] ‘hello’ (Ot 1;3.12)

  15. Unfooted syllables in bisyllabic iambs appear since the very beginning in the four children, but in a non-systematic way. Iambs are progressively produced target-like. Target bisyllabic iambs (not truncated) petit [] ‘small’ (Pep 1;1.18) aquí[] ‘here’ (Pep 1;2.3) aquest[] ‘this one’ (Pep 1;2.3) ja està [:] ‘it’s over’ (Anna 1;2.15) gatet [] ‘small cat’ (Lluís 1;6.7) iogurt [], [] ‘ioghourt’ (Anna 1;3.15, Ot 1;4) dormir [], [] ‘to sleep’ (Ot 1;3.12, Laura 1;7.20) Pilar [] ‘first name’ (Lluís 1;6.7)

  16. Target bisyllabic iambs (truncated) aquí [], [] ‘here’ (Ot 1;3.12, Pep 1;2.3) aquest [] ‘this one’ (Guillem 1;4.26) paper [] ‘paper’ (Pep 1;3.23) allà [], [l] ‘there’ (Pep 1;4.24) cargol [] ‘snail’ (Ot 1;4.12) cavall [ ] ‘horse’ (Ot 1;4.12) Joan [] ‘proper name’ (Lluís 1;7.15) pernil [] ‘prosciutto’ (Anna 1;4.15) ocell [] ‘bird’ (Lluís 1;7.15) Lluís [] ‘first name’ (Lluís 1;7.15) sisplau [pau] ‘please’ (Ot 1;4.12) adéu [], [] ‘bye’ (Pep 1;4.24, Ot 1;3.12) conill [::] ‘rabbit’ (Anna 1;2.15)

  17. In an initial period that goes up to 18-20 months, Catalan children truncate amphibracs quite systematically: Target amphibracs sabata [] ‘shoe’ (Anna 1;7) pilota [] ‘ball’ (Lluís 1;7.15) aquesta [] ‘this.fs’ (Anna 1;7) Maria [:] ‘first name’ (Lluís 1;7.15) Irene [nene] ‘first name’ (Lluís 1;7.15) cullera [jej] ‘spoon’ (Lluís 1;7.15) escola [] ‘school’ (Ot 1:6:24) Mireia [j], [jj] ‘first name’ (Lluís 1;7.15, Anna 1;7)

  18. Between 1;10 and 2;2 Catalan children truncate unfooted syllables in amphibracs and produce pretonic syllables in iambs. • Catalan children seem to fulfill a maximality constraint on outputs, namely, a bisyllabic foot template. Outputs Bisyllabic trocheesBisyllabic iambs princesa [] banyador [] corona [] cocodril [] Olivia [] elefant [] hipopòtam [] ratolins [] Adriana [] també [] bessones [] pastís [] cadira []barret [] Anna (2;1.10)

  19. Truncation of pretonic syllables in Catalan • Unfooted syllables in iambs are generally produced from the start (with a crescendo curve) and amphibracs are truncated up until 1;10-2;6 (depending on the child).

  20. Yet, Pep masters the acquisition of unfooted syllables much earlier than the other 3 children: • According to Serra (p.c.) Pep had more contact with Spanish than the rest.

  21. Catalan vs. English • The Catalan case contrasts heavily with that of Germanic languages: in English, unfooted syllables are often omitted until the age of 2;6 (Kehoe 2000). • Massive evidence of monosyllabic words in English explains extended period with a moraic trochee template (balloon > []). • NB: English and Spanish frequencies come from Roak & Demuth (2000)

  22. Catalan vs. Spanish • Unfooted syllables in iambs and amphibracs are produced from the start in Spanish (Lleó 2003). Lleó (this conference) shows that all children produce iambs from the start and María and Miguel produce amphibracs later than iambs but earlier than Catalan (1;10-2 years of age). • Bisyllabic maximality constraint lasts longer in Catalan. • Differences in time acquisition can be attributed to a higher percentage of amphibracs in the language (Span. 18% vs. Cat. 7%).

  23. Conclusions • Early production of subminimal CV words (with no augmentation) and CVC type words (without truncation) in Catalan. • No evidence of the minimality constraint. • Language learners are sensitive to a sufficient presence (and not just high-frequency) of prosodic structures in the input. • Catalan children show an active maximality constraint on outputs (bisyllabic feet) roughly at the end of the second year of age. • Differences between Catalan and Spanish can be attributed to relative PW distributions in the language. • Foot markedness constraints and relative PW frequency in the language combine to produce active constraints on PW acquisition.

  24. Obrigada!

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