Leonard Laurence B, Deevy Patricia, Kurtz Robert, Krantz Chorev Laurie, Owen Amanda, Polite Elgustus, Elam Diana, Finneran Denise
Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences, Purdue University, Heavilon Hall, 500 Oval Drive, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA.
J Speech Lang Hear Res. 2007 Jun;50(3):759-77. doi: 10.1044/1092-4388(2007/053).
Many typically developing children first use inflections such as -ed with verb predicates whose meanings are compatible with the functions of the inflection (e.g., using -ed when describing events of brief duration with clear end points, such as dropped). This tendency is assumed to be beneficial for development. In this study, the authors examine whether preschool-aged children with specific language impairment (SLI) show a similar tendency.
Sixteen children in each of three groups participated-children with SLI, typically developing children matched for age (TD-A), and younger typically developing children matched for mean length of utterance (TD-MLU). The children described actions in contexts that promoted either past tense -ed or progressive aspect -ing in past contexts. Half of the verb predicates referred to events of brief duration with distinct endpoints (e.g., drop), and half referred to events of considerable duration with less distinct points of termination (e.g., play).
Both the TD-A children and the TD-MLU children used -ed with verb predicates of the first type more consistently than they did with verb predicates of the second type. They showed the reverse pattern for -ing. The children with SLI did not show any effects according to the verb predicate type. However, although the children with SLI made less overall use of -ed than did both groups of TD children, they differed only from the TD-A children in their overall use of -ing.
Difficulties with tense-related morphology may be compounded in children with SLI if they fail to make use of associations between the lexical aspect of verb predicates and the grammatical function of the accompanying inflections. The authors argue that the advantages of using these associations as a starting point in acquisition may be especially important in the case of -ed. Additional studies of children with SLI are clearly needed, including those that employ longitudinal, naturalistic data.
许多发育正常的儿童最初会在意义与词尾变化功能相符的动词谓语中使用-ed等词尾变化（例如，在描述有明确终点的短暂持续事件时使用-ed，如dropped）。这种倾向被认为对语言发展有益。在本研究中，作者探究患有特定语言障碍（SLI）的学龄前儿童是否表现出类似的倾向。
三组儿童各16名参与研究——患有SLI的儿童、年龄匹配的发育正常儿童（TD-A）以及平均语句长度匹配的年龄较小的发育正常儿童（TD-MLU）。孩子们在促进过去时态-ed或过去语境中的进行时态-ing的情境中描述动作。一半的动词谓语指有明确终点的短暂持续事件（例如，drop），另一半指终止点不太明确的持续时间较长的事件（例如，play）。
TD-A组儿童和TD-MLU组儿童在第一类动词谓语中使用-ed比在第二类动词谓语中更一致。对于-ing，他们表现出相反的模式。患有SLI的儿童根据动词谓语类型未表现出任何影响。然而，尽管患有SLI的儿童总体上比两组发育正常儿童使用-ed的频率更低，但他们仅在-ing的总体使用上与TD-A组儿童存在差异。
如果患有SLI的儿童未能利用动词谓语的词汇体与伴随词尾变化的语法功能之间的关联，那么与时态相关的形态学困难可能会更加复杂。作者认为，在习得过程中以这些关联为起点的优势在-ed的情况下可能尤为重要。显然需要对患有SLI的儿童进行更多研究，包括那些采用纵向、自然主义数据的研究。
