Karin Stromswold

The Acquisition of Subject and Object Wh-Questions

This article examines the acquisition of subject and object wh-questions by English-speaking children. The acquisitional predictions of several recent linguistic descriptions of subject and object questions are described and tested experimentally using the CHILDES transcripts of 12 English-speaking children. Analyses of these transcripts revealed that, contrary to previous reports and the prediction made by the Wh-subject In Situ and Small Clause Hypotheses, object, questions were acquired, at the same age or earlier than subject questions. Additional analyses revealed that this acquisitional ordering was not merely a reflection of the frequency with which children or adults asked subject and object questions, nor did it seem to be due to the greater noticeability of object gaps than subject gaps. One possibility that is consistent with all the results is that the acquisitional ordering reflects the way in which subject and object traces are governed.

Why aren't identical twins linguistically identical? Genetic, prenatal and postnatal factors.

Results of twin studies clearly demonstrate that genetic factors play an important role in the rate of language acquisition and linguistic proficiency attained by normal and impaired children and adults [see Stromswold, K. (2001). The heritability of language: A review and meta-analysis of twin, adoption and linkage studies. Language, 77, 647-723.]. That said, twin-based heritability estimates for language rarely exceed .6 and monozygotic (MZ) twins (who are usually assumed to have identical genetic and environmental endowments) sometimes have very different linguistic profiles. In addition, twins are more likely to suffer linguistic delays and impairments than singletons. Postnatal factors, such as differences in linguistic input twins receive, are usually assumed to be the major reason for these findings. This paper discusses how genetic, epigenetic, and perinatal environmental factors can lower heritability estimates for language, cause MZ twins to be linguistically discordant, and increase the risk of language impairments in twins. We present results from our ongoing Perinatal Environment and Genetic Interaction (PEGI) study that suggest that perinatal environmental factors affect linguistic development more than postnatal factors, and that postnatal factors affect cognitive development more than perinatal factors. Because perinatal factors are overwhelming biological, whereas postnatal factors tend to be psychosocial (e.g., how and how much parents speak to their children), these results support nativist/biological theories of language and language development and call into question empiricist/emergentist theories. These results are also consistent with modularist theories of language. We end by suggesting new methods that can be used to tease apart the effects of prenatal and postnatal environment and to investigate how these factors interact with genetic factors.

Good-Enough Language Processing: Evidence from Sentence-Video Matching

This paper investigates how detailed a linguistic representation is formed for descriptions of visual events. In two experiments, participants watched captioned videos and decided whether the captions accurately described the videos. In both experiments, videos depicted geometric shapes moving around the screen. In the first experiment, all of the captions were active sentences, and in the second experiment, half of the captions were active and half were passive. Results of these experiments indicate that participants who only encountered active sentences performed less detailed analyses of the sentences than participants who encountered both active and passive sentences, suggesting that the level of linguistic detail encoded reflects the complexity of the task that participants have to perform. These results are consistent with “good enough” models of language processing in which people process sentences heuristically or syntactically depending on the nature of the task they must perform.

Genes, specificity, and the lexical/functional distinction in language acquisition

Contrary to Mullers claims, and in support of modular theories, genetic factors play a substantial and significant role in language. The finding that some children with specific language impairment (SLI) have nonlinguistic impairments may reflect improper diagnosis of SLI or impairments that are secondary to linguistic impairments. Thus, such findings do not argue against the modularity thesis. The lexical/functional distinction appears to be innate and specifically linguistic and could be instantiated in either symbolic or connectionist systems.

Not all lexical access tasks are created equal: Lexical development between three and five

Lexical access tasks are designed to measure efficiency of lexical access, but task demands and methods vary greatly. Many lexical access tasks do not account for confounding factors including competence in other linguistic abilities. In this study, preschoolers were given two lexical access tasks. In the single-category naming (SCN) task, children rapidly named animals. In the multi-category naming (MCN) task, children named one item from each of 10 categories. Children were also tested on vocabulary, syntax, and articulation. First, scores on each task increase with age. Second, the two lexical access scores were only moderately correlated, suggesting that different ‘lexical access’ tasks measure different abilities. Finally, we compared scores on each of the lexical access tasks with scores on the other linguistic tasks, demonstrating that different linguistic abilities are involved in each task at different ages. Results suggest that even very similar tasks capture different aspects of lexical access, and that the SCN task is a purer lexical access test.

What Does the DAP:IQ Measure?: Drawing Comparisons between Drawing Performance and Developmental Assessments

ABSTRACT Human figure drawing tasks such as the Draw-a-Person test have long been used to assess intelligence (F. Goodenough, 1926). The authors investigate the skills tapped by drawing and the risk factors associated with poor drawing. Self-portraits of 345 preschool children were scored by raters trained in using the Draw-a-Person Intellectual Ability test (DAP:IQ) rubric (C. R. Reynolds & J. A. Hickman, 2004). Analyses of childrens fine motor, gross motor, social, cognitive, and language skills revealed that only fine motor skill was an independent predictor of DAP:IQ scores. Being a boy and having a low birth weight were associated with lower DAP:IQ scores. These findings suggest that although the DAP:IQ may not be a valid measure of cognitive ability, it may be a useful screening tool for fine motor disturbances in at-risk children, such as boys who were born at low birth weights. Furthermore, researchers who use human figure drawing tasks to measure intelligence should measure fine motor skill in addition to intelligence.