Could Machine Learning Shed Light on Natural Language Complexity?

In this paper, we propose to use a subfield of machine learning –grammatical inference– to measure linguistic complexity from a developmental point of view. We focus on relative complexity by considering a child learner in the process of first language acquisition. The relevance of grammatical inference models for measuring linguistic complexity from a developmental point of view is based on the fact that algorithms proposed in this area can be considered computational models for studying first language acquisition. Even though it will be possible to use different techniques from the field of machine learning as computational models for dealing with linguistic complexity –since in any model we have algorithms that can learn from data–, we claim that grammatical inference models offer some advantages over other tools.