Acquisition of passives Flashcards
Thematic roles in passive sentences
The subject of a passive sentence is the theme/patient, rather than the agent;
Short passives
No by-phrase; the agent is not expressed
Long passives
Optional by-phrase is expressed, which expresses the subject
The apple was eaten by the girl.
Deriving (short) passives
Theme originates in object position;
* Theme moves to subject position (Specifier of IP (SpecIP))
Deriving long passives
Agent is base-generated in a PP inside the VP.
* The PP is an adjunct, not an argument
* The agent cannot be base-generated in the grammatical subject position because the agent is not obligatory.
Acquisition of passives is impacted by:
- Order of NPs (not arguments because subject has been demoted and is no longer obligatory): non-canonical (agent ≠ subject; theme ≠ object);
- Input: passives are rare in child-directed speech in many languages (including English);
- By-phrase: presence or absence of by-phrase;
- If a child assumes a passive has a by-phrase, child can be confused when there is none
- Type of passive: reversible vs. non-reversible; actional vs. nonactional verbs.
Input of passive sentences
In English :
- Only 0.4% of verbal utterances in CDS are passive constructions (Gordon & Chafetz 1990);
* English children fail to comprehend some types of passives until 9 years of age.
In Sesotho :
2.7% of verbal utterances in CDS are passive constructions;
* Sesotho children comprehend all types of passives by 3;1.
Animacy
Subjects are typically animate and agents of actions (volitionally causing an event or change of state)
Subject and object are semantically reversible when both are _______
Animate
e.g.
Mathilde was kicked by Emile.
Emile was kicked by Mathilde. Subject - Object are (not typically) reversible when only one is animate:
The apple was eaten by the girl.
Why are reversible passive sentences more challenging ?
It is more difficult to distinguish the animate subject in a sentence when both the subject and object are animate (such as in reversible passive sentences)1
Actional verbs
Denote actions or events that are observable; the theme/patient is affected by the event
E.g. The apple was eaten.
Non-actional verbs
Denote a state or something less visible; includes verbs of perception or emotion
E.g. The boy was seen.
Children of different MLU were asked to act out reversible passive and active sentences, all with actional verbs. What were the results ?
MLU 1.5:
Low accuracy in both active and passive reversibles
Errors :
- Children place themselves as the agent (due to methodology)
- Children reverse the arguments
MLU 1.5-3:
80+% accuracy for reversible active sentences
30% accuracy for reversible passives
MLU 3.5-4.25:
slightly improved, ~40% accuracy for reversible passives
English-learning children have problems with ____ ______ passive constructions until about the age of 9
Non actional
Accuracy on ______ passives is high even at 4 years old
Actional
In such sentences, there is no competition between the two NPs, both of which could be agents.
Sentences without a by-phrase
Children’s performance for short vs long (with by-phrase) passives
More accurate responses with short passives than with long passives
Children’s difficulty with passives involves understanding how the agent is expressed in a _______ not movement of the object.
By-phrase
Evidence for productivity of passives in spontaneous production
Children create novel passives, suggesting that their grammars do permit passive constructions
(e.g. it was bandaided)
When producing passives, children correctly move the_______
Object
This type of passive is rarely produced spontaneously
Long passives (with by-phrase)
Elicited production of passives :
* Novel verbs were presented to children in either active or passive voice;:
* To elicit production of passive, children heard a story that provided a context for the use of passive with the novel verb.
- Children used more actives than passives in their responses; but :
- Passives were sometimes produced by the children; regardless of whether or not the child had been trained on the active or passive forms of the verb; suggests productive knowledge of passive constructions (and showed above chance performance on further comprehension testing)
Are passives ever acquired early in production?
Yes, in languages where passives are required in certain contexts
E.g. the passive is the only grammatical way to form a question to a subject in Sesotho
, 2-year-old children produce passives regularly and correctly
