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The emergence of Dutch connectives; how cumulative cognitive complexity explains the order of acquisition*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 December 2008

JACQUELINE EVERS-VERMEUL  and
TED SANDERS
JACQUELINE EVERS-VERMEUL*
Affiliation:
Utrecht Institute of Linguistics OTS – Utrecht University
TED SANDERS
Affiliation:
Utrecht Institute of Linguistics OTS – Utrecht University
*
Address for correspondence: Jacqueline Evers-Vermeul, Utrecht Institute of Linguistics OTS, Trans 10, NL – 3512 JK Utrecht, The Netherlands. tel: +31 30 253 6337; fax: +31 30 253 6000; e-mail: J.Evers-Vermeul@let.uu.nl
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Abstract

Before they are three years old, most children have started to build coherent discourse. This article focuses on one important linguistic device children have to learn: connectives. The main questions are: Do connectives emerge in a fixed order? And if so, how can this order be explained? In line with Bloom et al. (1980) we propose to explain similarities in the development in terms of cumulative cognitive complexity: complex relations are acquired later than simple ones. Following a cognitive approach to coherence relations, we expect positive relations to be acquired before negatives and additives before temporals and causals. We develop a multidimensional approach to the acquisition process in order to account for the variation among children. Hypotheses were tested by analyzing data from children aged 1 ; 5–5 ; 6 on the emergence of Dutch connectives. The multidimensional approach of cognitive complexity describes both the uniformity and the diversity in the developmental sequences of Dutch-speaking and English-speaking children.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 36 , Issue 4 , September 2009 , pp. 829 - 854
Copyright
Copyright © 2008 Cambridge University Press

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Footnotes

[*]

This paper is based on the PhD dissertation of the first author (Evers-Vermeul, 2005), supervised by the second author and Fred Weerman. Part of the analyses in this paper have been performed in collaboration with Johanneke Wilson-Birnie. We would like to thank Fred Weerman, two anonymous reviewers and the editors for comments on earlier versions of this paper.

References

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