Do children learn from their prediction mistakes? A registered report evaluating error-based theories of language acquisition.

ABSTRACT: Error-based theories of language acquisition suggest that children, like adults, continuously make and evaluate predictions in order to reach an adult-like state of language use. However, while these theories have become extremely influential, their central claim-that unpredictable input leads to higher rates of lasting change in linguistic representations-has scarcely been tested. We designed a prime surprisal-based intervention study to assess this claim. As predicted, both 5- to 6-year-old children (n = 72) and adults (n = 72) showed a pre- to post-test shift towards producing the dative syntactic structure they were exposed to in surprising sentences. The effect was significant in both age groups together, and in the child group separately when participants with ceiling p

SUBMITTER: Fazekas J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7735343 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature