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How children process over-regularizations: Evidence from event-related brain potentials*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 July 2007

HARALD CLAHSEN ,
MONIKA LÜCK  and
ANJA HAHNE
HARALD CLAHSEN*
Affiliation:
Department of Linguistics, University of Essex
MONIKA LÜCK
Affiliation:
Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
ANJA HAHNE
Affiliation:
Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
*
Address for correspondence: Harald Clahsen, Department of Linguistics, University of Essex, Colchester, CO4 3SQ, United Kingdom. Phone: +44-1206-872228. Fax: +44-1206-872198. Email: harald@essex.ac.uk
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Abstract

This study examines the mental processes involved in children's on-line recognition of inflected word forms using event-related potentials (ERPs). Sixty children in three age groups (20 six- to seven-year-olds, 20 eight- to nine-year-olds, 20 eleven- to twelve-year-olds) and 23 adults (tested in a previous study) listened to sentences containing correct or incorrect German noun plural forms. In the two older child groups, as well as in the adult group, over-regularized plural forms elicited brain responses that are characteristic of combinatorial (grammatical) violations. We also found that ERP components associated with language processing change from child to adult with respect to their onsets and their topography. The ERP violation effects obtained for over-regularizations suggest that children (aged eight years and above) and adults employ morphological computation for processing purposes, consistent with dual-mechanism models of inflection. The observed differences between children's and adults' ERP responses are argued to result from children's smaller lexicons and from slower and less efficient processing.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 34 , Issue 3 , August 2007 , pp. 601 - 622
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2007

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