Language Acquisition and Use: Learning and Applying Probabilistic Constraints
Abstract
What kinds of knowledge underlie the use of language and how is this knowledge acquired? Linguists equate knowing a language with knowing a grammar. Classic "poverty of the stimulus" arguments suggest that grammar identification is an intractable inductive problem and that acquisition is possible only because children possess innate knowledge of grammatical structure. An alternative view is emerging from studies of statistical and probabilistic aspects of language, connectionist models, and the learning capacities of infants. This approach emphasizes continuity between how language is acquired and how it is used. It retains the idea that innate capacities constrain language learning, but calls into question whether they include knowledge of grammatical structure.
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Sensitivity to the frequency of particular verb+argument structure combinations continues into older childhood and adulthood, with high-frequency combinations protecting children from error.
“Indeed, a number of grammaticality judgment studies have demonstrated that sensitivity to the frequency of particular verb+argument structure combinations continues into older childhood and adulthood (MacDonald, 1994, 1999; Seidenberg, 1997; Ellis, 2002; Stefanowitsch & Gries, 2003; Theakston, 2004; Stefanowitsch, 2008; Wonnacott, Newport & Tanenhaus, 2008; Ambridge, Pine & Rowland, 2012; Ambridge”
From The ubiquity of frequency effects in first language acquisition (2015) · cites this paper as Seidenberg, 1997
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Ellis, N. C. (2002) · Studies in Second Language Acquisition · doi:10.1017/s0272263102002024 · Cited by 2,230 · see citing works
Statistical learning of tone sequences by human infants and adults
Saffran, J. R., Johnson, E. K., Aslin, R. N., & Newport, E. L. (1999) · Cognition · doi:10.1016/s0010-0277(98)00075-4 · Cited by 1,429 · see citing works
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The ubiquity of frequency effects in first language acquisition
AMBRIDGE, B., KIDD, E., ROWLAND, C. F., & THEAKSTON, A. L. (2015) · Journal of Child Language · doi:10.1017/s030500091400049x · Cited by 589 · see citing works
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- Authors
- Seidenberg, M. S.
- Affiliations
- University of Southern California (US)
- Corresponding author
- Seidenberg, Mark S.
- ORCID
- Seidenberg, Mark S.
- Venue
- Science
- Published
- 1997-03-14
- Volume
- 275
- Issue
- 5306
- Pages
- 1599-1603
- ISSN
- 0036-8075 (ISSN-L)
- 1095-9203
- OpenAlex
- W2110638188
- Cited by
- 338
- References
- 2
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 18 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 4 · 2020: 8 · 2019: 9 · 2018: 10 · 2017: 8 · 2016: 10 · 2015: 15 · 2014: 9 · 2013: 20 · 2012: 14
- FWCI
- 8.36
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Science (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- U.S. Public Health Service (KO2-01188, P01 47566)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Language Development and Disorders
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Language and Linguistics › Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation
- Social Sciences › Cultural Studies › Language and cultural evolution
- Keywords
- language acquisition, chance constraints, statistical learning, poverty of the stimulus, grammatical structure, connectionist models, infant language acquisition, language use, inductive learning
- MeSH terms
- Adult, Algorithms, Child, Humans, Infant, Language Development, Learning, Linguistics, Probability, Psycholinguistics, Neural Networks, Computer
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