Institut für Sprache und Information, Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf Düsseldorf, Germany.
Front Psychol. 2014 Jun 24;5:634. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00634. eCollection 2014.
German nouns may alternate from singular to plural in two different ways. Some singular forms that end in a voiceless obstruent have a plural in which this obstruent is voiced. Another alternation concerns the vowel. Some singular forms with a back vowel have a plural form in which this back vowel is front. For each noun it has to be established individually whether it alternates or not. The voicing alternation is phonetically grounded, but the vowel alternation is not. Knowledge about such alternations involves two things. First, it involves knowledge of which words alternate and which words do not and second, it involves the ability to extend the alternations to novel words. We studied the knowledge of which words alternate and the proportion to which they alternate in two corpus studies. We studied the knowledge of speakers concerning which words alternate and what generalizations can be based upon these words by means of a production study. The production study involved words and nonces. We asked twenty 5 year-olds, twenty 7 year-olds, and ten adults to produce the plural for a given singular word and a plural for a given singular nonce. In the corpus study we found that both alternations occur with the same frequency. In the production of alternations in words we found that participants in all age groups make few mistakes. With respect to the production of alternations in nonce words, we found that the proportion of voicing alternations decreases with age, while the proportion of vowel alternations increases. We explain this change in the ability to generalize the alternations to nonces on the basis of the confidence speakers can have in a generalization. Young children have a small lexicon and they can form relatively unreliable generalizations on lexical distributions. They are, however, proficient users of language and have great phonetic experience. They can more confidently form generalizations on the basis of this experience. Adults have a large lexicon and, as a consequence, they can confidently form generalizations based on their lexicon. In addition, they know that many alternations are not based on phonetic considerations.
德语名词有两种不同的方式在单数和复数之间交替。一些以清辅音结尾的单数形式在复数形式中，这个清辅音变成浊辅音。另一种交替涉及元音。一些以后元音开头的单数形式在复数形式中，这个后元音变成前元音。对于每个名词，都必须单独确定它是否交替。浊辅音交替在语音上是有根据的，但元音交替则不是。对这种交替的了解涉及两件事。首先，它涉及到哪些词交替，哪些词不交替的知识；其次，它涉及到将交替扩展到新单词的能力。我们通过两项语料库研究来研究哪些词会发生交替以及交替的比例，通过一项产生性研究来研究说话者对哪些词发生交替以及可以基于这些词进行什么样的概括的知识。产生性研究涉及单词和无实义词。我们要求二十名 5 岁儿童、二十名 7 岁儿童和十名成年人说出给定单数单词的复数形式和给定单数无实义词的复数形式。在语料库研究中，我们发现这两种交替的发生频率相同。在单词交替的产生中，我们发现所有年龄组的参与者都很少犯错误。对于无实义词的交替产生，我们发现浊音交替的比例随着年龄的增长而减少，而元音交替的比例则增加。我们根据说话者对概括的信心来解释这种将交替概括到无实义词的能力的变化。年幼的孩子词汇量较小，他们可以在词汇分布的基础上形成相对不可靠的概括。然而，他们是语言的熟练使用者，并且有丰富的语音经验。他们可以更有信心地基于这种经验进行概括。成年人词汇量较大，因此，他们可以基于词汇形成可靠的概括。此外，他们知道许多交替不是基于语音考虑的。
