Rules, rote, and analogy in morphological formations by Hungarian children

Abstract

This study examines the relative contributions of rote-memorization, analogic formation and rule-operation in the production of plurals by Hungarian children. In order to maximize analogic formations, each of fifteen actual roots was matched to a rhyming nonsense root. The elicited plural responses were characterized in terms of five stages of morphological learning. The importance of rule-operation as an explanation of word formation was evidenced by the fact that children producing responses characteristic of a given stage did not produce responses for later stages. The contribution of analogic formation was seen to be minimal and the effect of rote-memorization only somewhat greater.