Verifying Theories of Language Acquisition Using Computer Models of Language Evolution

This article presents a dense database study of child language acquisition from a usage-based perspective and a new analysis of data from an earlier study on simulating language evolution. The new analysis is carried out to show how computer modeling studies can be designed to generate predictions (results) that can be compared quantitatively with empirical data obtained from the dense database studies. Although the comparison shows that the computer model in question is still far from realistic, the study illustrates how to carry out agent-based simulations of language evolution that allow quantitative verification of predictions with empirical data to validate theories on child language acquisition.

[1]  Anna L. Theakston,et al.  Can input explain children's me-for-I errors?* , 2009, Journal of Child Language.

[2]  Elena Lieven,et al.  Repetition and reuse in child language learning , 2009 .

[3]  Nick Chater,et al.  Distributional Information: A Powerful Cue for Acquiring Syntactic Categories , 1998, Cogn. Sci..

[4]  Henry Brighton,et al.  Compositional Syntax From Cultural Transmission , 2002, Artificial Life.

[5]  Ted Briscoe,et al.  Linguistic Evolution through Language Acquisition: Formal and Computational Models. , 2002 .

[6]  Morten H. Christiansen,et al.  The phonological-distributional coherence hypothesis: Cross-linguistic evidence in language acquisition , 2007, Cognitive Psychology.

[7]  Fernand Gobet,et al.  Modeling the Developmental Patterning of Finiteness Marking in English, Dutch, German, and Spanish Using MOSAIC , 2007, Cogn. Sci..

[8]  J. Stevenson.  The cultural origins of human cognition , 2001 .

[9]  L. Steels,et al.  coordinating perceptually grounded categories through language: a case study for colour , 2005, Behavioral and Brain Sciences.

[10]  Michael Tomasello,et al.  A construction based analysis of child directed speech , 2003, Cogn. Sci..

[11]  B. MacWhinney.  A multiple process solution to the logical problem of language acquisition , 2004, Journal of Child Language.

[12]  Bart de Boer,et al.  Editorial: Language Evolution: Computer Models for Empirical Data , 2010, Adapt. Behav..

[13]  Walter Daelemans,et al.  Memory-Based Language Processing , 2009, Studies in natural language processing.

[14]  Paul Vogt,et al.  Variation, competition and selection in the self-organisation of compositionality , 2007 .

[15]  Michael Tomasello,et al.  Two-year-old children's production of multiword utterances: A usage-based analysis , 2009 .

[16]  J. Batali.  Linguistic Evolution Through Language Acquisition: The negotiation and acquisition of recursive grammars as a result of competition among exemplars , 2002 .

[17]  Anna L. Theakston,et al.  The acquisition of auxiliary syntax: BE and HAVE , 2005 .

[18]  Simon Kirby,et al.  Innateness and culture in the evolution of language , 2006, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[19]  C. Rowland.  Explaining errors in children’s questions , 2007, Cognition.

[20]  M. Tomasello,et al.  Early syntactic creativity: a usage-based approach. , 2003, Journal of child language.

[21]  R. Horton.  Rules and representations , 1993, The Lancet.

[22]  Benjamin K. Bergen,et al.  ON THE EMERGENCE OF COMPOSITIONALITY , 2006 .

[23]  B. MacWhinney.  The CHILDES project: tools for analyzing talk , 1992 .

[24]  Simon Kirby,et al.  Spontaneous evolution of linguistic structure-an iterated learning model of the emergence of regularity and irregularity , 2001, IEEE Trans. Evol. Comput..

[25]  Joan L. Bybee,et al.  Regular morphology and the lexicon. , 1995 .

[26]  A. Wray.  Protolanguage as a holistic system for social interaction , 1998 .

[27]  Rens Bod,et al.  Children's Grammars Grow More Abstract with Age - Evidence from an Automatic Procedure for Identifying the Productive Units of Language , 2009, Top. Cogn. Sci..

[28]  Luc Steels,et al.  Unify and Merge in Fluid Construction Grammar , 2006, EELC.

[29]  Elena Lieven.  Producing multiword utterances , 2006 .

[30]  M. Tomasello,et al.  Differential productivity in young children's use of nouns and verbs , 1997, Journal of Child Language.

[31]  Bart de Boer,et al.  Language Evolution: Computer models for Empirical Data , 2010 .

[32]  M. Tomasello,et al.  Modeling children's early grammatical knowledge , 2009, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[33]  M. Tomasello.  Constructing a Language: A Usage-Based Theory of Language Acquisition , 2003 .

[34]  David Lightfoot,et al.  Explaining language change: an evolutionary approach , 2002 .

[35]  Paul Vogt,et al.  On the Acquisition and Evolution of Compositional Languages: Sparse Input and the Productive Creativity of Children , 2005, Adapt. Behav..

[36]  Paul Vogt,et al.  Cumulative Cultural Evolution: Can We Ever Learn More? , 2006, SAB.

[37]  S. Pinker,et al.  Natural language and natural selection , 1990, Behavioral and Brain Sciences.

[38]  Bart de Boer,et al.  The Origins of Vowel Systems , 2001 .

[39]  K. McRae,et al.  Children’s Grammars Grow More Abstract with Age – Evidence from an Automatic Procedure for Identifying the Productive Units of Language , 2008 .

[40]  Morten H. Christiansen,et al.  Language as shaped by the brain. , 2008, The Behavioral and brain sciences.

[41]  Jean-Arcady Meyer,et al.  Adaptive Behavior , 2005 .

[42]  Paul Vogt,et al.  The emergence of compositional structures in perceptually grounded language games , 2005, Artif. Intell..

[43]  Alison Wray,et al.  The transition to language , 2002 .

[44]  Joan L. Bybee,et al.  The effect of usage on degrees of constituency: the reduction of don't in English , 1999 .

[45]  Kirsten Abbot-Smith,et al.  Lexically Restricted Utterances in Russian, German, and English Child-Directed Speech , 2009, Cogn. Sci..

[46]  Rens Bod,et al.  From Exemplar to Grammar: A Probabilistic Analogy-Based Model of Language Learning , 2009, Cogn. Sci..

[47]  Colin Bannard,et al.  Stored Word Sequences in Language Learning , 2008, Psychological science.

[48]  L. Steels.  Perceptually grounded meaning creation , 1996 .

[49]  Ewa Dąbrowska,et al.  Towards a lexically specific grammar of children’s question constructions , 2005 .

[50]  Alaa A. Kharbouch,et al.  Three models for the description of language , 1956, IRE Trans. Inf. Theory.

[51]  Stefanie Tellex,et al.  The Human Speechome Project , 2006, EELC.

[52]  L. Steels,et al.  Crucial factors in the origins of word-meaning , 2000 .

[53]  Anna L Theakston,et al.  The influence of discourse context on children's provision of auxiliary BE* , 2008, Journal of Child Language.