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Syntactic Cues to Individuation in Mandarin Chinese1
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- Authors
- Issue Date
- 2009
- Citation
- Journal of Cognitive Science, Vol.10 No.2, pp. 135-148
- Keywords
- individuation ; numeral classifiers ; Mandarin –zi morpheme ; mass nouns ; count nouns ; bare nouns ; word meaning
- Abstract
- When presented with an entity (e.g., a wooden honey-dipper) labeled with a
novel noun, how does a listener know that the noun refers to an instance of an
object kind (honey-dipper) rather than to a substance kind (wood)? While English
speakers draw upon count-mass syntax for clues to the nouns meaning,
linguists have proposed that classifier languages, which lack count-mass syntax,
provide other syntactic cues. Three experiments tested Mandarin-speakers
sensitivity to the diminutive suffix -zi and the general classifier ge when interpreting
novel nouns. Experiment 1 found that -zi occurs more frequently with
nouns that denote object kinds. Experiment 2 demonstrated Mandarin-speaking
adults sensitivity to ge and -zi when inferring novel word meanings. Experiment
3 tested Mandarin three- to six-year-olds sensitivity to ge. We discuss differences
in the developmental course of these cues relative to cues in English,
and the impact of this difference to childrens understanding of individuation.
- ISSN
- 1598-2327
- Language
- English
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