<OT> New Posting: ROA-951

[roa at ruccs.rutgers.edu]

ROA 951-0108

A unified explanation for production/comprehension asymmetries

Petra Hendriks <P.Hendriks at rug.nl>

Direct link: http://roa.rutgers.edu/view.php3?roa=951


Abstract:
In the past decades, research on language acquisition has
identified several asymmetries between production and comprehensi
on in various languages and in various areas of language.
Many of these asymmetries came as a surprise to their investigato
rs, because no asymmetries are expected under the traditional
view of the grammar as a direction-insensitive system of
rules. This paper argues that viewing the grammar as a direction-
sensitive system of constraints on form and meaning, as
in Optimality Theory, allows for a unified linguistic explanation
of various types of production/comprehension asymmetries
in language acquisition.

Comments: To appear in: Anna Gavarró Algueró & M. João Freitas (Eds.), Proceedings of GALA 2007, Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
Keywords: language acquisition, production/comprehension asymmetries, bidirectional optimization
Areas: Language Acquisition,Syntax,Semantics
Type: Conference Proceedings Chapter

Direct link: http://roa.rutgers.edu/view.php3?roa=951