Search
Current issue
Categories
- acquisition lab
- alums
- awards
- candy
- colloquia
- computation
- department news
- dissertation defenses
- events
- faculty news
- glsa
- grad-student news
- grants
- graphs
- issues
- 04:04 (2006-02-16)
- 04:05 (2006-02-23)
- 04:06 (2006-03-02)
- 04:07 (2006-03-09)
- 04:08 (2006-03-16)
- 04:09 (2006-03-30)
- 04:10 (2006-04-06)
- 04:11 (2006-04-13)
- 04:12 (2006-04-20)
- 04:13 (2006-04-27)
- 04:14 (2006-05-04)
- 04:15 (2006-05-11)
- 04:16 (2006-05-18)
- 04:17 (2006-06-29)
- 04:18 (2006-07-27)
- 04:19 (2006-08-31)
- 04:20 (2006-09-07)
- 04:21 (2006-09-14)
- 04:22 (2006-09-21)
- 04:23 (2006-09-28)
- 04:24 (2006-10-05)
- 04:25 (2006-10-12)
- 04:26 (2006-10-19)
- 04:27 (2006-10-26)
- 04:28 (2006-11-02)
- 04:29 (2006-11-09)
- 04:30 (2006-11-16)
- 04:31 (2006-11-23)
- 04:32 (2006-11-30)
- 04:33 (2006-12-07)
- 04:34 (2006-12-14)
- 04:35 (2006-12-21)
- 05:01 (2007-02-01)
- 05:02 (2007-02-08)
- 05:03 (2007-02-15)
- 05:04 (2007-02-22)
- 05:05 (2007-03-01)
- 05:06 (2007-03-08)
- 05:07 (2007-03-15)
- 05:08 (2007-03-29)
- 05:09 (2007-04-05)
- 05:10 (2007-04-12)
- 05:11 (2007-04-19)
- 05:12 (2007-04-26)
- 05:13 (2007-05-03)
- 05:14 (2007-05-10)
- 05:15 (2007-05-17)
- 05:16 (2007-05-24)
- 05:17 (2007-05-31)
- 05:18 (2007-06-28)
- 05:19 (2007-07-26)
- 05:20 (2007-08-30)
- 05:21 (2007-09-06)
- 05:22 (2007-09-13)
- 05:23 (2007-09-20)
- 05:24 (2007-09-27)
- 05:25 (2007-10-04)
- 05:26 (2007-10-11)
- 05:27 (2007-10-18)
- 05:28 (2007-10-25)
- 05:29 (2007-11-01)
- 05:30 (2007-11-08)
- 05:31 (2007-11-15)
- 05:32 (2007-11-22)
- 05:33 (2007-11-29)
- 05:34 (2007-12-06)
- 05:35 (2007-12-13)
- 06:01 (2008-01-24)
- 06:02 (2008-01-31)
- 06:03 (2008-02-07)
- 06:04 (2008-02-14)
- 06:05 (2008-02-21)
- 06:06 (2008-02-28)
- 06:07 (2008-03-06)
- 06:08 (2008-03-13)
- 06:09 (2008-03-20)
- 06:10 (2008-03-27)
- 06:11 (2008-04-03)
- 06:12 (2008-04-10)
- 06:13 (2008-04-17)
- 06:14 (2008-04-24)
- 06:15 (2008-05-01)
- 06:16 (2008-05-08)
- 06:17 (2008-05-15)
- 06:18 (2008-06-26)
- 06:19 (2008-07-31)
- 06:20 (2008-08-28)
- 06:21 (2008-09-04)
- 06:22 (2008-09-11)
- 06:23 (2008-09-18)
- 06:24 (2008-09-25)
- 06:25 (2008-10-02)
- 06:26 (2008-10-09)
- 06:27 (2008-10-16)
- 06:28 (2008-10-23)
- 06:29 (2008-10-30)
- 06:30 (2008-11-06)
- 06:31 (2008-11-13)
- 06:32 (2008-11-20)
- 06:33 (2008-12-04)
- 06:34 (2008-12-11)
- 06:35 (2008-12-18)
- 07:01 (2009-01-22)
- 07:02 (2009-01-29)
- 07:03 (2009-02-05)
- 07:04 (2009-02-12)
- 07:05 (2009-02-19)
- 07:06 (2009-02-26)
- 07:07 (2009-03-05)
- 07:08 (2009-03-12)
- 07:09 (2009-03-26)
- 07:10 (2009-04-02)
- 07:11 (2009-04-09)
- 07:12 (2009-04-16)
- 07:13 (2009-04-23)
- 07:14 (2009-04-30)
- 07:15 (2009-05-07)
- 07:16 (2009-05-14)
- 07:17 (2009-05-21)
- 07:18 (2009-09-09)
- 07:19 (2009-09-16)
- 07:20 (2009-09-23)
- 07:21 (2009-10-01)
- 07:22 (2009-10-07)
- 07:23 (2009-10-14)
- 07:24 (2009-10-22)
- 07:24 (2009-10-28)
- 07:25 (2009-10-29)
- 07:26 (2009-11-11)
- 07:27 (2009-11-18)
- jobs
- miscellany
- phonetics lab
- phonology group
- photo albums
- prosody group
- publications/presentations
- semantics reading group
- syntax reading group
- undergrad news
- visiting scholars
- whisc
Other Ling Newsletters
« Thomas Russel Cable Arrives! | Main | The Supremes Unanimously Side With the Linguists»
Jeffrey Lidz Colloquium
Jeffrey Lidz
University of Maryland
The role of statistics in a selective theory of language acquisition
Friday, May 1, 3:30 pm, Machmer W-23
Reception to follow in the department lounge
Abstract
While research in the acquisition of syntax has largely focused on the necessity of abstract representations and the poverty of the stimulus with respect to these representations, very little research has asked how learners use the input to identify these representations. At the same time, research showing that infants are highly sensitive to the statistical structure of the input is often silent about the nature of the acquired representations. I present several experiments illustrating the role of statistical learning in a selective theory of syntax acquisition. I show (a) that infants can use statistical information to identify hierarchical phrase structure in an artificial grammar, (b) that the acquired representations allow for generalization to unobserved sentence structures, and (c) that statistical generalizations to be found in the input have consequences for morphosyntax that go beyond what can be inferred simply from the distributions. Hence, to the extent that learners use statistical information in learning syntax, they are doing so by comparing that information against the predictions of precise alternative syntactic representations.
Background reading
Jeffrey Lidz and Alexander Williams. 2006. On the absence of reflexive benefactives in Kannada. Yearbook of South Asian Languages and Linguistics. Mouton de Gruyter.
Joshua Viau and Jeffrey Lidz. 2008. Selective learning in the acquisition of Kannada ditransitives. Submitted.