The development of the causative construction in Persian child language

Abstract

The acquisition of systematic patterns and exceptions in different languages can be readily examined using the causative construction. Persian allows four types of causative structures, including one productive multiword structure (i.e. the light verb construction). In this study, we examine the development of all four structures in Persian child speech between the ages of 1;11 and 6;7, in correspondence with their caregivers' speech. We define developmental stages based on dendrograms derived from variability clustering (Gries & Stoll, 2009). These stages are further substantiated by qualitative data, including overgeneralization errors and alternating structures. We find that Persian-speaking children learn to exploit two (i.e. lexical and light verb construction causatives) of the four constructions. They go from relying on lexical causatives to forming progressively constrained templates for the more complex light verb construction. This first study of the development of Persian causatives supports a usage-based account of verb-by-verb learning in child language development.

The acquisition of causatives in Q’anjob’al Maya

“…A review of the structure of causatives and the similar, naturalistic child data used for K’iche’, Tzotzil, and Q’anjob’al indicates that the difference in the acquisition of causatives may be either due to structural and distributional differences between causatives in these languages, or due to the sampling or the type of analysis done in each language. Beyond Mayan languages, this study provides evidence for the potential for early acquisition of periphrastic causatives, unlike in Persian (Family & Allen, 2015), for instance. This suggests that children’s acquisition of causatives is not uniform, but conditioned by the language to which they are exposed, confirming the expectations of Bowerman (1988).…”

“…Studies on the acquisition of causatives have shown that children acquire the causative system of the language that they are exposed to, for example, Bowerman (1988). Family and Allen (2015), report that of the four types of causatives in Persian children initially acquire two types: lexical and light verb causatives. They start with the lexical causatives and progressively move to the light verb constructions.…”

“…Causation is an event that involves external force that changes the status or position of another participant (Family & Allen, 2015). Crystal (2003) states that the causative is a linguistic form that refers to alternative versions of a clause.…”

“…Most languages have at least one way of expressing causation. There are four known possibilities for causative formation in most natural language: lexical, morphological, periphrastic, and a light verb construction (Family & Allen, 2015). In English, for example, there are two types of causatives: periphrastic and lexical.…”

“…In causative constructions, verbs can alternate between non-causative and causative in different ways (Family & Allen, 2015; Pye, 1990, 1993). Some intransitive verbs (3a) alternate only with the periphrastic causative (3b), but not with a lexical transitive (3c) (Marcotte, 2005, p. 8).…”