We report a computational study on the CHILDES database for learning a word grammar of Turkish nouns. The syllable-based model converges to a morpheme-based model in terms of overlaps in the set of lexical hypotheses. Morphology is a hidden variable in all models, and the search problem for hypotheses is narrowed down by a probabilistic conception of universal grammar à la Combinatory Categoria...

We present evidence from two picture-matching experiments that native adult speakers of American English order and interpret sequences nouns modified by adjectives/relative clauses containing adjectives in line with the Recursive Set-Subset Ordering Principle proposed Bleotu & Roeper (2022a, b) Bleotu, Foucault, (2023). This principle ensures an automatic mapping set-subset semantics to a r...

ConTroll is a grammar development system which supports the implementation of current constraint-based theories. It uses strongly typed feature structures as its principal data structure and offers definite relations, universal constraints, and lexical rules to express grammar constraints. The aspects of ConTroll of relevance to the development of large grammars are discussed in detail. The sys...

Evidence of children’s sensitivity to statistical features of their input in language acquisition is often used to argue against learning mechanisms driven by innate knowledge. At the same time, evidence of children acquiring knowledge that is richer than the input supports arguments in favor of such mechanisms. This tension can be resolved by separating the inferential and deductive components...

  Abstract The present study begins by sketching "Chaos/Complexity Theory" (C/CT) and its applica-tion to the nature of language and language acquisition. Then, the theory of "Universal Grammar" (UG) is explicated with an eye to C/CT. Firstly, it is revealed that CCT may or may not be allied with a theory of language acquisition that takes UG as the initial state of language acquisition for ...

Storage effect theory describes conditions under which recruitment fluctuation can promote the coexistence of multiple species competing for a single resource. In communities of benthic marine animals, larval settlement is often highly variable, and it has long been suspected that settlement variability promotes coexistence via the storage effect, but no empirical studies have provided quantita...

Findings from the field of experimental linguistics have shown that a native speaker may judge a variant that is part of her grammar as unacceptable, but still use it productively in spontaneous speech. The process of eliciting acceptability judgments from speakers of non-standard languages is sometimes clouded by factors akin to prescriptive notions of grammatical correctness. It has been argu...

This paper argues against the hypothesis of a "phonological mind" advanced by Berent. It establishes that there is no evidence that phonology is innate and that, in fact, the simplest hypothesis seems to be that phonology is learned like other human abilities. Moreover, the paper fleshes out the original claim of Philip Lieberman that Universal Grammar predicts that not everyone should be able ...

This paper gives a brief overview of some of the primary arguments for Radical Construction Grammar (Croft 2001). Radical Construction Grammar is a theory of syntactic representation which is compatible with—in fact, I believe, is a consequence of—the facts of the grammars of human languages. In fact, Radical Construction Grammar proposes an extremely minimalist model of syntax from a universal...