從否定獲得來看中文兒童的體與情態獲得

The Acquisition of Mandarin Aspects and Modals: Evidence from the Acquisition of Negation

本文通過調查三名兒童的語料 (1;9–2;1)，研究他們如何習得中文的體和情態動詞。他們對中文兩個否定詞「不」和「沒」的成功區分反映了他們的語法已經擁有體和情態動詞的相應結構，從而印證了強連續性假說 (Lust 1999)。我分析兒童體和情態動詞在肯定句中的缺失是由於他們所運用的標誌方法不同於成人語法，例如，他們使用隱性運符的准許結構，成人使用顯性詞彙移位結構。而兒童的所運用的規則在其他語言或方言中並不罕見，這也符合原則參數語法關於兒童語言發展的預測 (Hyams 1986)。

This paper investigates three Mandarin-speaking children’s corpora (1;9 through 2;1) to study their acquisition of aspects and modals. Their perfect distinction and use of the aspectual and modal negators, mei and bu, suggest the existence of AspectP and ModalP, which supports the Strong Continuity Hypothesis (Lust 1999). I argue that the lack of overt aspect markers and modals in their affirmative sentences is due to their aspect- and modal- marking mechanisms that are different from the adults’, i.e. movement vs. licensing and overt operator vs. covert operator, which, however, are possible dialectal and cross-linguistic variations. The findings are consistent with the Principles-and-Parameters approach to child language development (Hyams 1986).