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Child Language Acquisition: Why Universal Grammar Doesn't Help

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2026

Ben Ambridge ,
Julian M. Pine  and
Elena V. M. Lieven
Ben Ambridge*
Affiliation:
University of Liverpool
Julian M. Pine*
Affiliation:
University of Liverpool
Elena V. M. Lieven*
Affiliation:
University of Manchester
*
Ambridge and Pine, University of Liverpool Institute of Psychology, Health and Society Bedford Street South Liverpool, L69 7ZA, United Kingdom [Ben.Ambridge@liverpool.ac.uk] [Julian.Pine@liverpool.ac.uk]
Lieven, University of Manchester School of Psychological Sciences Coupland 1 Building Coupland Street, Oxford Road Manchester, M13 9PL, United Kingdom [elena.lieven@manchester.ac.uk]
Ambridge and Pine, University of Liverpool Institute of Psychology, Health and Society Bedford Street South Liverpool, L69 7ZA, United Kingdom [Ben.Ambridge@liverpool.ac.uk] [Julian.Pine@liverpool.ac.uk]
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Abstract

In many different domains of language acquisition, there exists an apparent learnability problem to which innate knowledge of some aspect of Universal Grammar (UG) has been proposed as a solution. The present article reviews these proposals in the core domains of (i) identifying syntactic categories, (ii) acquiring basic morphosyntax, (iii) structure dependence, (iv) subjacency, and (v) the binding principles. We conclude that, in each of these domains, the innate UG-specified knowledge posited does not, in fact, simplify the task facing the learner.

Keywords

binding principleschild language acquisitionfrequent framesparameter settingprosodic bootstrappingsemantic bootstrappingstructure dependencesubjacencysyntaxmorphosyntaxuniversal grammar

Information

Type
Perspectives
Information
Language , Volume 90 , Issue 3 , September 2014 , pp. e53 - e90
Copyright
Copyright © 2014 Linguistic Society of America

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