The Acquisition of Three Temporal Adverbs by Two English-Speaking Childern

Abstract

由FIRST, ALREADY, YET探討時間副詞之習得英語的時間副詞，在句子中可以相當自由地出現在不同的位置，這對於以英語為母語的兒童而言，是否造成困難？他們習得時間副詞時，又是如何掌握各種不同的用法呢？本文利用兒童語言資料交換料交換系統(CHILDES)中的兩個英語資料庫，針對兩個兒童由兩歲三個月到五歲之間的語言資料中所有包含first, already, yet的語句，以電子計算機輔助搜查及分類的工作，探討說英語的兒童如何習得及使用這三個時間副詞。研究結果顯示，兒童很早（約兩歲半）便能正確，靈活地使用時間副詞，且其用法與周圍人們使用該詞之情況十分相似。三個時間副詞中，以first最早習得，亦最常使用，可能是由於first最常出現在語法上之顯著地位（如句尾），以及其本身在語意上十分特出（以時間順序而言，first名列第一）所致。Already的用法，以其後緊跟著主要動詞的一類最為常見，可見其主要作用為動詞之修飾語。牛津英語字典指出，yet最常與否定詞並用，且其前之否定詞不一定與之緊密相連；本文使用的資料顯示，兒童在幼兒期的語言，有關yet的用法，即已以此類為最大宗。此外，不連續性的結構，一般認為較難習得，然而，該項看法或許僅適用於構詞的層面，因為本的研究發現，not(n`t)...yet屬於不連續性的語法結構，卻並未對該二兒童造成任何困難。

English adverbs can freely occur at various syntactic positions. The nature of adverbs is among one of the most obscured aspects of the English language. How, then, do the English-speaking children acquire the different usages of a certain adverb? This paper addresses this question by examining three temporal adverbs first, already, and yet as they are used by two English-speaking children. The data comprise of two sets, obtained from the Child Language Data Exchange System (CHILDES) and processed with the help of computer. The two children are shown to start using adverbs rather early (around 2 years and 6 months of age) and are able to master the different usages, although some individual difference does exist. Furthermore, their usages of these adverbs are shown to be similar to those of the people around them. Among the three temporal adverbs, first is the earliest acquired and the most frequently used. The reason for this may be because first not only occurs mostly at a syntactically salient position (e.g., sentence-final), semantically it is also the most salient among the three. Already is mainly used as a verb-modifier, occuring immediately before the main verb. According to Oxford English Dictionary, the most commonly used yet is the type with negative preceding, either in the construction not yet or not (n`t) ... yet. The data examined strongly support such claim, indicating that children before three years of age already master this main usage. In addition, the discontinuous structure of not(n`t) ...yet does not seem to cause any difficulty for the two children.