Prosodic bootstrapping Bootstrapping (linguistics)

1 prosodic bootstrapping

1.1 prosodic cues syntactic structure
1.2 prosodic cues clauses , phrases
1.3 criticism

prosodic bootstrapping

even before infants can comprehend word meaning, prosodic details assist them in discovering syntactic boundaries. prosodic bootstrapping or phonological bootstrapping investigates how prosodic information — includes stress, rhythm, intonation, pitch, pausing, dialectal features — can assist child in discovering grammatical structure of language or acquiring.

in general, prosody introduces features reflect either attributes of speaker or of utterance type. speaker attributes include emotional state, presence of irony or sarcasm. utterance-level attributes used mark questions, statements, , commands, , can used mark contrast.

prosodic features associated speaker: emotional state, irony, sarcasm
prosodic features associate utterance type: question, statement, command, contrast

similarly, in sign language, prosody includes facial expression, mouthing, , rhythm, length, , tension of gestures , signs.

in language, words not categorized phrases, clauses, , sentences. words organized prosodic envelopes. idea of prosodic envelope states words go syntactically form similar intonation pattern. explains how children discover syllable , word boundaries through prosodic cues. overall, prosodic bootstrapping explores determining grammatical groupings in speech stream rather learning word meaning.

one of key components of prosodic bootstrapping hypothesis prosodic cues may aid infants in identifying lexical , syntactical properties. this, 3 key elements of prosodic bootstrapping can proposed:

there evidence acquisition of language-specific prosodic qualities start before infant born. seen in neonate crying patterns, have qualities similar prosody of language acquiring. way infant born ability if prosodic patterns of target language learned in utero. further evidence of young infants using prosodic cues ability discriminate acoustic property of pitch change 1–2 months old.

prosodic cues syntactic structure

infants , young children receive of language input in form of infant-directed speech (ids) , child-directed speech (cds), characterized having exaggerated prosody , simplification of words , grammar structure. when interacting infants , children, adults raise , widen pitch, , reduce speech rate. however, these cues vary across cultures , across languages.

there several ways in infant , child directed speech can facilitate language acquisition. in recent studies, shown ids , cds contain prosodic information may infants , children distinguish between paralinguistic expressions (e.g. gasps, laughs, expressions) , informative speech. in western cultures, mothers speak children using exaggerated intonation , pauses, offer insight syntactic groupings such noun phrases, verb phrases, , prepositional phrases. means linguistic input infants , children receive include prosodic bracketing around syntactically relevant chunks.

(1) boy patting dog hand.
(2) *look boy ... ... patting ... dog ... hand.
(3) … [dp boy] ... [vp patting dog] ... [pp hand].

a sentence (1) not typically produced pauses indicated in (2), pauses interrupt syntactic constituents. example, pausing between , dog interrupt noun phrase (dp) constituent, pausing between , hand. often, pauses placed group utterance chunks correspond beginnings , ends of constituents such noun phrases (dps), verb phrases (vps), , prepositional phrases (pps). result, sentences (3), pauses correspond syntactic constituents, more natural.

moreover, within these phrases distinct patterns of stress, helps differentiate individual elements within phrase, such noun article. typically, articles , other unbound morphemes unstressed , relatively short in duration in contrast pronunciation of nouns. furthermore, in verb phrases, auxiliary verbs less stressed main verbs. can seen in (4).

4. running.

prosodic bootstrapping states these naturally occurring intonation packages infants , children bracket linguistic input syntactic groupings. currently, there not enough evidence suggest prosodic cues in ids , cds facilitate in acquisition of more complex syntax, ids , cds richer linguistic inputs infants , children.

prosodic cues clauses , phrases

there continued research whether infants use prosodic cues – in particular, pauses – when processing clauses , phrases. clauses largest constituent structure in phrase , produced in isolation in conversation; example, <did walk dog?>. consequently, phrases smaller components of clauses. example, <the tall man> or <walks dog>. peter w. jusczyk argued infants use prosody parse speech smaller units analysis. he, along colleagues, reported 4.5 month old infants illustrated preference artificial pauses @ clause boundaries in comparison pauses @ other places in sentence. preferring pauses @ clause boundaries, illustrates infants abilities discriminate clauses in passage. reveals while infants not understand word meaning, in process of learning native language , grammatical structure. in separate study, jusczyk reported 9 month old infants preferred passages pauses occurring between subject-noun phrases , verb phrases. these results further evidence of infant sensitivity syntactic boundaries. in follow study louann gerken et al., researchers compared sentences such (1) , (2). prosodic boundaries indicated parentheses.

5. (joe)(kissed dog).
6. (he kissed)(the dog).

in (1), there pause before verb <kissed>. location of subject-verb phrase boundary. comparably in (2), contains weak pronoun, speakers either not produce salient prosodic boundary or place boundary after verb <kissed>. when tested, 9 month old infants illustrated preference pauses located before verb, such in (1). however, when passages pronoun subjects used, such in (2), infants did not show preference pause occurs. while these results again illustrate infants sensitive prosodic cues in speech, introduce evidence infants prefer prosodic boundaries occur naturally in speech. although use of prosody in infant speech processing viewed assisting infants in speech parsing, has not yet been established how speech segmentation enriches acquisition of syntax.

criticism

critics of prosodic bootstrapping have argued reliability of prosodic cues has been overestimated , prosodic boundaries don t match syntactic boundaries. argued instead while prosody provide infants , children useful clues language, not explain how children learn combine clauses, phrases, , sentences, nor word meaning. result, comprehensive account of how children learn language must combine prosodic bootstrapping other types of bootstrapping more general learning mechanisms.