%0 Journal Article
%T Learning to produce complement predicates with shared semantic subjects
%A Anat Ninio
%J First Language
%@ 1740-2344
%D 2018
%R 10.1177/0142723718755879
%X Many sentences of adult English are analytic constructions, namely clauses with a matrix verb complemented by a dependent predicate that does not have an expressed syntactic subject. Examples are subject and object control, raising to subject or object, periphrastic tense, aspect and modality, copular predication and do-support. In this article the authors test a suggestion derived from Dependency Grammar that despite differences in detail, all such constructions are governed by a common principle of structure sharing which young children master when they produce such sentences. Analytic sentences and telegraphic sentences were examined in the speech of 439 young children, mean age 2;3.11 (SD = 0;4.02). The production of different analytic constructions was significantly associated, raising the probability of each other by 32% on average. Telegraphic sentences overtly expressing the input¡¯s covert predicate¨Cargument relations also positively predicted the production of analytic sentences. These results suggest that children learn a general principle of sharing arguments, common to constructions with dependent predicates, making transfer and facilitation possible
%K Control
%K Dependency Grammar
%K do-support
%K periphrastic tense/aspect/modality
%K predicate¨Cargument relations
%K raising
%K structure sharing
%K syntactic development
%K telegraphic speech
%U https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0142723718755879