If I were to design a comprehension test for children containing sentences such as \u201cWhich firewall did the hacker infiltrate?\u201d or \u201cwhich entrecote did the sous-chef drizzle?\u201d you would probably think I was crazy. The problem with these sentences is that they use rare terminology (from computing and cooking) which young children are unlikely to have heard. It\u2019s obviously crazy to use sentences like this. It\u2019s a good thing that standardised tests contain nice normal garden-variety sentences.<\/p>\n
Think again.<\/p>\n
Assessments such as the Test of Reception of Grammar (TROG) contain sentences such as \u201cThe sheep that the girl looks at is running.\u201d This describes a fairly common situation using simple vocabulary, so what\u2019s wrong with it? The problem is that this sentence is probably just as rare as \u201cWhich firewall did the hacker infiltrate?\u201d The issue is the Noun Phrase (the girl). This comes inside a relative clause (that the girl looks at). Relative clauses almost always contain pronouns (e.g. she) because one of their basic functions is to refer back to previously stated information. If you don\u2019t believe me, just read Fox and Thompson (1990).<\/p>\n
There is evidence to suggest that the input frequency of particular types of sentences greatly affects children\u2019s ability to process them. For example, Kidd et al. (2007) found that just by changing \u201cthe girl\u201d to \u201cshe\u201d, a pattern far more frequent in the input, sentences like the above become a lot easier to understand. Another good example of this is questions. Novogrodsky and Friedmann (2011) report that children with Specific Language Impairment find questions such as \u201cwhich cat was the dog chasing?\u201d particularly difficult to understand. They attribute this finding to a grammatical principle called Relativised Minimality. However, an alternative explanation is that this type of question is extremely rare in the input. In fact, according to my count, only 0.4% of object questions contain both a question phrase such as \u201cwhich cat\u201d, and a full Noun Phrase such as \u201cthe dog.\u201d The exact reason for this low frequency is open to debate, but it does appear that there is a very strong connection between input frequency and how well we understand a sentence.<\/p>\n
Is this a problem? Perhaps not. And I would never question the reliability of an assessment such as the TROG which has been carefully designed and rigorously standardised. But if we\u2019re presenting sentences which children almost never hear, then it does beg the question \u201cwhat exactly are we testing?\u201d Answers on a postcard please.<\/p>\n
Fox, B. A., & Thompson, S. A. (1990). A discourse explanation of the grammar of relative clauses in English conversation. Language, 297\u2013316.<\/p>\n
Friedmann, N., & Novogrodsky, R. (2011). Which questions are most difficult to understand?: The comprehension of Wh questions in three subtypes of SLI. Lingua, 121, 367 \u2013 382.<\/p>\n
Kidd, E., Brandt, S., Lieven, E., & Tomasello, M. (2007). Object relatives made easy: A cross-linguistic comparison of the constraints influencing young children\u2019s processing of relative clauses. Language and Cognitive Processes, 22(6), 860 \u2013 897.<\/p>\n
Nick Riches<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
If I were to design a comprehension test for children containing sentences such as \u201cWhich firewall did the hacker infiltrate?\u201d or \u201cwhich entrecote did the sous-chef drizzle?\u201d you would probably think I was crazy. The problem with these sentences is … Continue reading