Two-year-olds compute syntactic structure on-line

Developmental Science
Savita BernalAnne Christophe

Abstract

Syntax allows human beings to build an infinite number of new sentences from a finite stock of words. Because toddlers typically utter only one or two words at a time, they have been thought to have no syntax. Using event-related potentials (ERPs), we demonstrated that 2-year-olds do compute syntactic structure when listening to spoken sentences. We observed an early left-lateralized brain response when an expected verb was incorrectly replaced by a noun (or vice versa). Thus, toddlers build on-line expectations as to the syntactic category of the next word in a sentence. In addition, the response topography was different for nouns and verbs, suggesting that different neural networks already underlie noun and verb processing in toddlers, as they do in adults.

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Citations

Oct 9, 2015·Neuron·G Dehaene-Lambertz, E S Spelke
Apr 4, 2016·Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience·Perrine BrusiniAnne Christophe
Jul 8, 2015·Developmental Neuropsychology·Caroline P HoyniakJohn E Bates
Oct 22, 2015·Journal of Child Language·Isabelle BarrièreThierry Nazzi
Dec 6, 2018·Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research : JSLHR·Matthew James ValleauSudha Arunachalam
Feb 22, 2013·Neuroreport·Masahiro HataHiroko Hagiwara
Jan 28, 2021·Developmental Science·Yun Jung Kim, Megha Sundara

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