The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish and the
Clitic-Pronoun Distinction
♣Sergio Baauw, ♦Peter Coopmans & ♠William Philip
♣♦Utrecht University &♠ Harvard University
0. Introduction
Our interest in language acquisition is directly related to what we take to the be
the main objective of generative linguistics: to acquire insight in the structure of
the human language faculty and the way the language faculty is embedded in
man's general cognitive capacity. One of the types of evidence that bears on this
issue comes from the so-called "projection problem": how is knowledge of
language acquired on the basis of the interaction between experience and the
language faculty? In first language acquisition we are confronted with the task of
explaining how children can master their native language so quickly and
effortlessly, despite the fact that the language input is deficient in a number of
ways (cf. Hornstein & Lightfoot, 1981). Most importantly, the language input is
far too impoverished to explain the richness and complexity of the linguistic
knowledge they acquire. There is a qualitative gap between the primary linguistic
data and the final state of linguistic knowledge.
Generative linguistics maintains that the solution to the projection problem,
the problem of bridging this qualitative gap, lies in the existence of an innate
language faculty, Universal Grammar (UG), which provides the necessary
linguistic knowledge that cannot be inferred from the linguistic input. UG
restricts the class of humanly possible grammars the child can choose from. It is
essentially a set of invariant principles applying to all human grammars, allowing
for a limited number of parametric options that the child needs to set on exposure
to the primary linguistic data. The parametric space at the level of UG accounts
for the variation that we find among the grammars of natural languages. On this
view the child does not have to learn any principles or abstract rules. Rather,
acquiring a language-particular grammar is limited to learning the lexicon:
learning the lexical items and fixing the parameters stated over functional
2 S. Baauw, P. Coopmans & W. Philip
elements of the lexicon. This is what is currently understood as the “lexical
learning hypothesis” (cf. Wexler & Manzini, 1986).
If the principles of UG are available from the outset, the structures
generated by the child grammars will have to obey these universal principles, just
as much as the structures of the adult grammar. This is often referred to as the
“continuity hypothesis” (cf. Goodluck, 1991). This view, if correct, implies that
the child non-adult behavior with respect to a particular phenomenon cannot be
explained in terms of the child’s not knowing the relevant linguistic principle, but
rather that the account must show that the child has not yet learnt the relevant
lexical properties of the elements affected by this linguistic principle, or that
there is a non-linguistic or extra-grammatical reason for the observed non-adult
behavior. The explanation may have a general cognitive basis, may point to
pragmatic problem of not knowing how to use grammatical structures
appropriately, or may indicate a problem the child has in processing the relevant
grammatical structures, etc.
In this paper we will focus on the problem that has come to be known as the
“Delay of Principle B Effect”( henceforth DPBE). This term stands for the
widely observed phenomenon that children seem to be able to interpret a simple
sentence like the girl is pointing at her as optionally expressing a reflexive
proposition (roughly equivalent to the meaning of the girl is pointing at herself ).
Children do not seem to know the principle (Condition B of the standard binding
theory of Chomsky, 1981) that rules out coreference between the pronoun her
and the girl. However, if Principle B is a linguistic principle at the level of UG,
this description cannot be correct. Children should have full knowledge of
Principle B. But if they know the principle, why do they not always obey it? Is
there a lexical learning effect (e.g. do they not yet know that her is a pronoun) or
is there some other, non-linguistic reason for the delay? Recently, various
proposals have been put forward to account for the DPBE as a kind of interface
problem between grammar and pragmatics. Although we sympathize with such
approaches, we will show here that such accounts cannot be the sole explanation.
We will discuss evidence, from our own recent work and that of others, that there
is variation between languages in the degree to which DPBE is attested, and
argue that this fact necessitates a further look at the grammatical factors that are
responsible for this degree of variation (on top of whatever interface solution to
the general problem of the DPBE is adopted). We will then show how this
variation in acquisition data (taken from Spanish, Dutch and English) can be
captured by a particular binding-theoretical model of UG, and show how this
developmental problem is compatible with the continuity hypothesis.
1. The Delay of Principle B-Effect: Cross-Linguistic Differences
The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish 3
Chien & Wexler (1990) investigated children’s knowledge of the binding
principles regulating the referential dependencies of anaphora like reflexive
himself and pronominal him in English and came up with the following
experimental results. In a sentence like (1a) English children allowed coreference
between her and the girl in 50% of the time. At the same time, however, these
children did not seem to have any trouble with the correct interpretation of
sentences with a reflexive pronoun (2b). This suggests that children have
problems with coreference but not with binding. Evidence for was produced by
Chien & Wexler, who also tested children’s performance on sentences like (1c),
with a quantified expression in the subject position. Their judgments on the illformedness of a reflexive reading for this example was significantly more adultlike than their performance on (1a).
(1) a.
b.
c.
The girl is pointing at her.
The girl is pointing at herself.
Every girl is pointing at her.
Children’s poor performance on coreference in examples such as (1a) has
been found for many other languages including Russian, Dutch and Icelandic
(Avrutin & Wexler, 1992;
Koster, 1993; Philip & Coopmans, 1996a;
Sigurjónsdóttir & Coopmans, 1996: Sigurjónsdóttir, 1992). Since the
impossibility of coreference in (1a) has traditionally been regarded as a violation
of Principle B of the Binding theory (Chomsky, 1981), this phenomenon has
come to be regarded as reflecting a developmental delay of a linguistic principle.
However, in studies like those of Chien & Wexler (1990) and Grodzinsky &
Reinhart (1993), it is argued that the DPBE is the result of extra-syntactic factors,
in particular problems children have with the application of a pragmatic principle
(Chien & Wexler's Principle P or Grodzinsky & Reinhart's Rule I) that rules out
coreference between two counter-indexed elements. On these views the DPBE
could be seen as an interface problem between discourse and grammar, and we
will return to the particular solutions to this interface problem in section 8.
Crucially, though, the DPBE appears to be absent in the acquisition of
Romance languages like Spanish and Italian, as has become evident from
experimental studies by Padilla (1990) for Spanish and McKee (1992) for Italian.
Padilla tested children’s judgments on sentences like those in (2a,b), McKee
tested children’s judgments on examples like (2c,d). Reflexive interpretations for
these sentences were consistently rejected.
(2) a.
La niña la señala.
4 S. Baauw, P. Coopmans & W. Philip
b.
c.
d.
`The girl is pointing at her.’
Juan lo lava.
`Juan is washing him.’
Lo gnomo lo lava.
`The gnome is washing him.’
Gianni lo asciuga.
`Gianni is washing him.’
The crucial difference between (1a) and the sentences in (2) is that the latter
contain clitic pronouns, suggesting that clitic pronouns are exempt from the
DPBE. This hypothesis is supported by recent experimental evidence on Italian,
which shows that Italian strong pronouns, such as lui `him’, do cause a DPBE,
unlike clitic pronouns (Berger, 1997).
In this paper we will discuss experimental evidence on the acquisition of
pronominal anaphora in Spanish, which shows that the hypothesis that clitics are
exempt from the DPBE is not entirely correct. We will show that although
Spanish children do not have a general DPBE, like English and Dutch children,
they appear to have a strong DPBE with clitics in so-called "Verbal Small
Clauses" (VSC). VSC also cause an extra strong DPBE in Dutch speaking
children, as shown by Philip & Coopmans (1996a). This indicates that in addition
to problems children may have with the application of a pragmatic rule that
regulates coreference, the DPBE must also involve a grammatical factor, which
may affect the interpretation of clitic pronouns as well.
In this paper we will first present the results of an experiment we carried out
on pronominal anaphora in Spanish (sections 2-4). We will then provide an
explanation for the existence of a DPBE in Spanish VSC (section 5). And finally,
we will discuss a solution to the problem of why this DPBE is not found in
examples like (2c,d), i.e. why the relevance of the pronoun being a clitic is
crucial in these environments.
2. The Experiment
The goal of the experiment was to find out whether Spanish speaking children
would have any kind of DPBE in three syntactic contexts: simple sentences with a
referential subject (3a), VSC constructions (3b), and simple sentences with a
quantifying subject (3c),
(3) a.
La niña la seca.
`The girl is drying her.'
(SIMPLE)
The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish 5
b.
c.
La niña la ve bailar.
(VSC)
`The girl sees her dance.'
Cada niña la seca.
(QUANT)
`Every girl is drying her.'
On the basis of McKee's (1992) findings with Italian children and Padilla (1990)
with Spanish speaking children, we expected virtually adult-like performance of
Spanish children on (3a), due to the clitic status of Spanish weak pronouns. In
neither McKee's nor Padilla’s experiment, however, VSC constructions and simple
sentences with a quantified antecedent, such as (3c), had been tested, so we had no
real expectations about Spanish children's performance on these constructions.
The experiment took the form of a Picture Verification Task, set up in the
following way. The child was asked to play a game with pictures in which one
player, who could not see the pictures, would try to guess what was happening in
each one, while the other player, who could see the picture, gave hints and judged
whether or not the guesses were correct. One experimenter played the role of
"guesser" throughout the experiment; another experimenter was the "helper" who
gave hints; and the child's task was to listen to the guesses, look at the pictures, and
judge whether or not the guesses were correct. The materials were counterbalanced
in such a way that roughly half the time the guesser made incorrect guesses.
Each experimental item had the following components. The Visual Input was a
single picture showing two female individuals of different age-types, one of whom
was performing some action, or a picture showing three female individuals of one
age-type, each performing some action, and another female individual of a different
age-type doing nothing. Most of these pictures were identical to those used by
Philip and Coopmans (1996a). The Context-Setting Input was a verbally presented
list of all the objects depicted in the picture, plus mention of the kind of action one
or more of them was performing (without identifying agents or patients). The list of
discourse referents was first presented by the helper as "hints" for the guesser, and
then mentioned once again by the guesser, in a predetermined order, just before the
guess was made. The Target Input was the guesser's guess. This was delivered as a
yes/no question so that it would always be felicitous as a simple request for
information, if not as a guess. Both the helper and the guesser used normal prosody
at all times. Finally, the Primary Data consisted in the child's "yes" or "no"
responses.
The experiment consisted of 3 test conditions and 9 control conditions. For
each of these experimental conditions there were 3 different trials with syntactically
identical target inputs but with different types of people and actions depicted in the
visual input and referred to by the target inputs. For the 8 conditions (including the
test conditions SIMPLE and QUANT), the three predicates used for the different
6 S. Baauw, P. Coopmans & W. Philip
trials were: tocar `touch', señalar `point (at)' and secar `dry'. For 4 conditions
(including the test condition VSC), the matrix predicate was always ver `see' and the
embedded predicates were saltar a la cuerda `jump rope', hacer burbujas `blow
bubbles' and bailar `dance'.
Every experimental item whose target input contained a pronominal clitic was
counterbalanced by an analogous experimental item whose target input used the
same predicate but contained a reflexive clitic, and every experimental item which
elicited an adult affirmative response (correct guess) was counterbalanced by an
analogous item eliciting an adult negative response (incorrect guess). For all
experimental conditions testing anaphora, the pronominal and reflexive clitics were
la `her' and se `herself/himself/themselves', respectively. (Note that se can also be
interpreted reciprocally with plural antecedents.) The 42 experimental items were
arranged in a single pseudo-random order, intermingled with 15 filler items, and
distributed over 2 test sessions. 45 five-year-olds (mean age 5;6) from two schools,
in Madrid and Valladolid participated in the study.
3. Test and Control Conditions
The three test conditions SIMPLE, VSC, and QUANT all eliciting adult "no"
responses, are exemplified in (4). For the QUANT condition, the universal
quantifier was the distributive determiner cada `every/each'. In the examples in (4),
the context-setting and target input of the guesser is indicated at the bottom of each
picture; the actual Spanish target input is shown in parentheses at the top.
(4) a. SIMPLE
(La niña la seca?)
The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish 7
Hmmm...a girl with a towel and a mom (context-setting input)
Is the girl drying her? (target input)
b. VSC
(¿La mamá la ve bailar?)
Hmm...a big mirror, a mom, and a girl (context-setting input)
Does the mom see her dance? (target input)
8 S. Baauw, P. Coopmans & W. Philip
c.
QUANT
(¿Cada mamá la señala con el dedo?)
Hmmm...tree moms and a girl (context-setting input)
Is every mom pointing at her? (target input)
Three control conditions LAY, VLAY and QLAY had the same types of
context-setting and target inputs as the SIMPLE, VSC and QUANT test conditions,
respectively, but were paired with pictures such as those in (5), so that they elicited
adult "yes" responses. Also, there were the three control conditions SEN, VSEN,
and QSEN, exemplified in (5), testing reflexive rather than pronominal clitics and
eliciting adult "no" responses. These were counterbalanced by three other control
conditions SEY, VSEY and QSEY which used the same type of context-setting and
target inputs as the SEN, VSEN and QSEN conditions, respectively, but which were
paired with pictures such as those in (4) above, so that they elicited adult affirmative
responses.
(5) a. SEN
(¿La niña se seca?)
The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish 9
Hmmm...a mom and a girl with a towel (context-setting input)
Is the girl drying herself? (target input)
b. VSEN (¿La abuelita se ve bailar?)
10 S. Baauw, P. Coopmans & W. Philip
Hmm...a big mirror, a girl and a grandma (context-setting input)
Does the grandma see herself dance? (target input)
c. QSEN (¿Cada niña se toca con la mano?)
The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish 11
Hmmm...a mom and three girls (context-setting input)
Is every girl touching herself? (target input)
4. Results
Performance on the control conditions was highly adult-like across-the-board, as
can be seen in the tables in (6).
(6) a.
Percent "Yes" Responses for Control Conditions Eliciting Adult "Yes"
Responses
LAY SEY QLAY QSEY VLAY VSEY
98% 99% 99%
98%
84% 98%
b.
Percent "No" Responses for Control Conditions Eliciting Adult "No"
12 S. Baauw, P. Coopmans & W. Philip
Responses
SEN
89%
QSEN VSEN
82%
87%
Performance on the test conditions SIMPLE and QUANT was also highly adultlike, as seen in the table in (7). However, performance on the VSC condition was
much less adult-like. A sign test shows SIMPLE to differ significantly from VSC (p
= 0.0000) while a t-test shows SEN not to differ significantly from VSEN (p =
0.5251).
(7) Percent Adult-like "No" Responses on Test Conditions
SIMPLE QUANT VSC
90%
90%
63%
The results of our experiment indicate, as expected, an adult-like
comprehension of anaphora, as the SEN, QSEN, VSEN, SEY, QSEY and VSEY
conditions show.1 The results also bear out our expectations concerning Spanish
children's comprehension of pronouns in simple sentences with a referential subject
(SIMPLE). Like the responses of the Italian children in McKee's (1992) study and
the Spanish children in Padilla (1990), the responses of the Spanish children of our
experiment on the SIMPLE condition were virtually adult-like, presumably as a
result of the clitic-status of both the Italian and Spanish weak object pronouns (we
will return to this point). Although McKee did not test sentences with pronouns
bound by a quantifying subject (QUANT) we had no reason to expect less than the
observed adult-like performance. Philip & Coopmans (1996b) show that the use of
the universal quantifier every/ieder did not only increase the number of adult-like
1
Although children performed adult-like on the QSEN condition in the vast majority of
the cases, in 18% of the cases they did not. We have evidence, however, that a visual
error was involved in one of the trials. The trial that was mainly responsible for this
unexpectedly high rate of nonadult-like performance was QSEN2, exemplified by picture
(5c). The reason for the children's failure on this trial is presumably the fact that the girls
seem to touch each other's hand. This opens the possibility to the children to interpret se
as reciprocal. Some children indeed seem to indicate that they had this interpretation.
Further evidence for this explanation is the fact that even some adults that we tested in a
pre-test gave a reciprocal interpretation.
The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish 13
responses of English children but also of Dutch children2. As for the VSC
condition, the results are more surprising. In 37% of the cases children seem to
allow coreference between the small clause subject and the matrix clause subject.
This calls for an explanation.
5. A DPBE in Spanish: a Grammatical Source
As Philip & Coopmans (1996a) have argued for Dutch, standard binding theory
(Chomsky, 1981) cannot easily account for the difference in children’s
performance between the SIMPLE condition and the VSC condition. The binding
principles regulating reflexives and pronominals do not distinguish between the
object position of transitive verbs and the subject position of a Small Clause
complement. A binding theoretical alternative that can straightforwardly account
for this distinction is Reinhart & Reuland’s (1993) “Reflexivity” model (R&R).
In this model the binding principles are stated in terms of reflexive predicates.
According to R&R, the distribution of pronouns is regulated by two
different modules of UG, the revised Binding Theory, consisting of two
conditions, and a well-formedness constraint on A-Chains which applies to all
local A-relations. The two Binding Conditions are stated in (8).
(8) Principle A: A reflexive-marked syntactic predicate must be interpreted
reflexively
Principle B: A reflexively interpreted semantic predicate must be reflexivemarked
In R&R theory reflexive-marking can take place in two ways: by using a syntactic
“reflexifier”, a so-called SELF-anaphor (e.g. English -self, Dutch -zelf, Spanish
mismo), or by a process that takes place in the lexicon and creates “inherently
reflexive predicates” (e.g. Spanish equivocar `be mistaken'). A predicate which is
interpreted reflexively is a predicate whose co-arguments are co-indexed.
In (9) we will demonstrate how these two binding principles work, using
2
Philip & Coopmans (1996b) observe that the performance of Dutch children on the
QUANT condition was less adult-like than has generally been found with English
speaking children. Philip & Coopmans attribute this to Dutch iedere is ambiguous
between every and any in English. Nonetheless, for the 4-to-6-year-olds, performance on
the QUANT condition was still significantly more adult-like than performance on the
SIMPLE condition.
14 S. Baauw, P. Coopmans & W. Philip
Spanish examples.
(9) a.
b.
c.
d.
*La niñai se vio a sí mismoj `The girl saw himself.’ (Pr. A violated)
+Refl
`The girl saw her.’
(Pr. B violated)
*La niñai lai vio
-Refl
La niñai se vio a sí mismai `The girl saw herself.’
+Refl
La niñai sei equivoca.
`The girl is mistaken'
+Refl
In (9a) we see a violation of Principle A. Sí mismo syntactically reflexive-marks the
predicate ver `see’. Principle A states that if a predicate is reflexive-marked it
should have a reflexive interpretation, i.e. its co-arguments must have the same
index. Since this is obviously not the case in (9a), the construction is ruled out. (9b)
is a Principle B violation. The indices indicate that the predicate see must be
interpreted reflexively. Principle B states that the predicate should be reflexivemarked, inherently (i.e. in the lexicon) or syntactically. However, there is no
reflexive marker in (9b), nor is ver inherently reflexive, so the sentence is illformed. In (9c) the indices of the two arguments of the predicate tell us that the
predicate should be interpreted reflexively. Because the predicate is reflexivemarked by sí misma, both Principles A and B are respected, and the sentence is
well-formed. In (9d), finally, the co-arguments of the predicate equivocar have the
same index, so it must be interpreted reflexively. Since equivocar is inherently
reflexive, the predicate is reflexive-marked in the lexicon. It follows that both
Principles A and B are satisfied and the sentence explaining the well-formedness of
(9d).
Note, however, that the principles of R&R's binding theory do not rule out
structures (10a,b), which would have been ruled out by Principle B of the Standard
binding Theory.
(10) a.
b.
*La niñai lai equivoca.
`The girl is mistaken'
*La niñai lai ve bailar.
`The girl sees her dance.'
In (10a) the predicate is interpreted reflexively, because its two arguments are coindexed. The predicate is inherently reflexive, so it is reflexive-marked. Both
binding principles in (8) are satisfied, but the structure is still out. The same applies
to structure (10b). In this case la is not the object of ver `see’, but the subject of
The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish 15
bailar `dance', the predicate of the embedded clause. Although la is governed and
case-marked by the matrix verb, it is not an argument of this predicate, since it
receives its thematic role from the embedded bailar. This means that since the
subject of the matrix clause and the subject of the embedded clause are not semantic
co-arguments, the binding principles of R&R regulating the occurrence of pronouns
do not apply.3
Nonetheless, the structures in (10) are ill formed. R&R (1993) argue that the
explanation must lie in the working of an independently motivated Condition on Achains:
(11) General Condition on A-Chains
A maximal A-chain (a1.....an) contains exactly one link --a1-- that is both
[+R] and Case-marked.
This condition states that the tail of an A-chain must be “referentially defective”, or
[-R], in the terminology of R&R. Anaphors, such as Spanish se, Dutch zich and
English himself, are [-R]. None of these elements is able to refer independently to
an object in the discourse. For their reference they always depend on a syntactic
antecedent. Pronouns, such as Dutch hem and Spanish lo `him', on the other hand,
are [+R], which means that they do not depend on a syntactic antecedent in order to
refer to an object in the discourse.
To illustrate the working of the A-chain Condition we will give two examples,
one of a well-formed A-chain (12a), and one of an ill-formed A-chain (12b).
(12) a.
b.
[La niñai sei vió [ ti bailar]].
+R
-R
*[La niñai lai vió [ ti bailar]].
+R
+R
`The girl saw herself dance'
`The girl saw her dance.'
In the well-formed (12a), (containing la niña and se) the A-chain contains exactly
one [+R]-element: the head of the chain la niña. In the ill-formed (12b), the A-chain
contains two [+R]-elements, la niña and la `her'.
However, Spanish children’s performance on the VSC condition suggests
that they allow la to be bound by la niña. Philip & Coopmans (1996a) noted that
the VSC construction gives rise to an extra strong DPBE in Dutch. While Dutch
children perform adult-like around 50% of the time in the SIMPLE condition,
3
That is why we included the VSC condition in our test. If Binding Theory does not
apply, poor performance on (10b) cannot be strictly interpreted as a delay in the
knowledge or application of Principle B. It must be due to something else.
16 S. Baauw, P. Coopmans & W. Philip
they exhibit only 20% adult-like performance in the VSC construction. Earlier,
Sigurjónsdóttir & Coopmans (1996) found a similar extra strong DPBE for Dutch
in inherently reflexive predicates, another construction in which only the A-Chain
condition rules out coreference in the adult-language. This has led to the proposal
that Dutch children analyse pronouns such as hem `him' and haar `her' as
elements that can be optionally [+R] and [-R]. We will propose the same for
Spanish la. If Spanish children can optionally analyse la as [-R], the A-Chain is
not violated in a VSC construction such as (3b) (cf. Baauw, Escobar & Philip,
1997)
The question then arises: why Spanish children initially misanalyze the
clitic-pronoun la as [-R]/[+R] elements. We suggest the following. Spanish and
Dutch children’s misclassification of Spanish la and Dutch hem and haar as a
both [+R] and [-R] is due to the exceptional status of 3rd person pronouns in
adult Spanish and Dutch. 1st and 2nd person pronouns are [-R] when they form
the tail of an A-Chain, but [+R] otherwise, as is illustrated for Spanish in (13).
(13) a.
b.
c.
d.
Juan me ha visto.
(me = [+R])
`J. has seen me.'
Me he secado.
(me = [-R])
`I dried myself off.'
Los hombres te han visto. (te = [+R])
`The men have seen you.'
¿Te has secado?
(te = [-R])
`Did you dry yourself off?'
3rd person pronouns, however, are always [+R] in adult Spanish (and Dutch).
Children are initially not aware of this and overgeneralize the double status of 1st
and 2nd person pronouns as elements that are both [+R] and [-R] to 3rd person
pronouns. The difference between the child and adult systems for Spanish is
given in (14).
(14) Adult Spanish:
me --> [+R] and [-R]
te --> [+R] and [-R]
la --> [+R]
Child Spanish:
me
te
la
[+R] and [-R]
[+R] and [-R]
[+R] and [-R
(1st pers. sing.)
(2nd pers. sing.)
(3rd pers. sing. fem.)
The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish 17
se
--> [-R]
se
[-R]
(3rd pers. sing.)
This hypothesis is supported by additional cross-linguistic evidence. The same
asymmetry between SIMPLE and VSC has been found in child French (Hamann
& Philip, 1997) and Norwegian (Hestvik & Philip, 1997), but not in child
English, which shows the same DPBE for both the SIMPLE condition as well as
the VSC condition (around 50% adult-like performance) (Philip & Coopmans,
1996a). This follows from the fact that unlike French and Norwegian 1st and 2nd
person pronouns, English 1st and 2nd person pronouns are always [+R], as can be
seen in (15).
(15) a.
b.
*I am drying me.
*Did you dry you?
As a consequence, English speaking children will never be tempted to analyse
him/her as [-R]/[+R] elements. They will always interpret 3rd person pronouns as
[+R], which means that the A-Chain Condition will rule out a binding (i.e.
coindexation) relation between the matrix subject and the subject pronoun in the
VSC (although English speaking children will still allow coreference of the
pronoun and the local antecedent around 50% of the time, due to factors
discussed in the next section).
6. A Pragmatic Source of the DPBE and the Relevance of the Clitic Pronoun
Distinction
What the above discussion has shown is that one cannot say that the DPBE is
absent with clitic pronouns. The purely grammatical factor that is involved in the
DPBE, the A-Chain Condition, applies both to clitics as well as strong pronouns,
as is illustrated by the Dutch and Spanish children’s behavior on the VSC
condition. However, what still needs to be accounted for is the absence of a
DPBE in Spanish in the SIMPLE condition. The SIMPLE condition is based on a
syntactic configuration to which in particular principle B applies. In this case the
clitic status of Spanish weak pronouns seems to matter, since both English and
Dutch speaking children exhibit only around 50% adult-like performance in this
condition. In fact even a Romance language such as Italian provides evidence for
the relevance of the clitic/full pronoun distinction in the SIMPLE condition. In a
pilot study carried out by Berger (1997) on the acquisition of pronominal
coreference in (bilingual) Italian speaking children, both SIMPLE sentences with
a clitic pronoun (16a) as well as sentences with a strong pronoun (16b) were
18 S. Baauw, P. Coopmans & W. Philip
tested.
(16) a.
b.
Il ragazzo sta indicando lui.
Il ragazzo lo sta indicando.
`The boy is pointing at him.'
Berger found that children allow coreference of the pronoun with the local
subject much more often in sentences with strong pronouns than in sentences
with a clitic pronoun.
(17) Percent adult-like "No" responses on test conditions in Italian.
Full pronoun
20%
Clitic
64%
The relevance of the clitic status of weak pronouns in Romance has also been
highlighted by McKee (1992) as an explanation for the absence of a DPBE in
child Italian. Her solution capitalizes on the movement properties of clitics.
McKee argues that syntactic clitics, like Italian weak pronouns, end up VPexternally, attached to INFL. In contrast, pronouns in languages like English
remain in the VP. McKee’s explanation for the DPBE in constructions such as
(1a) is that English children initially misconstrue the VP as the minimal
governing category for the pronoun in object position, thereby allowing it to
corefer freely with the subject in [Spec, IP]. For the clitic pronoun attached to
INFL, Italian children automatically extend the binding domain to IP and
correctly rule out coreference between the pronoun and the subject in the Italian
counterpart of (1a). McKee’s solution is problematic for various reasons. First,
we have seen that the DPBE is not totally absent from Spanish, since it appears in
VSCs. Second, like Romance clitics, unstressed pronouns in Dutch also undergo
movement to a VP external position, beyond negation, as shown in (18). Yet
Dutch children show a DPBE.
(18) Jan heeft haar niet [VP t gezien].
John has haar not seen
It is for these reasons that we cannot adopt McKee’s proposal. Instead we will
put forward a proposal that draws attention to the referential and interpretative
properties of clitics and full pronouns.
In section 1. we already made reference to a possible pragmatic source of
the DPBE. One of the explanations along these lines has been provided by
The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish 19
Grodzinsky & Reinhart's. They argue that children never violate Principle B, but
that the DPBE in sentences such as (1a) is due to children's unability to apply
Rule I, a rule at the syntax-pragmatics interface that regulates intra-sentential
coreference. Rule I is given in (19).
(19) Rule I: Intrasentential Coreference
NP A cannot corefer with NP B if replacing A with C, C a variable A-bound
by B, yields an indistinguishable interpretation.
Rule I makes reference to two ways of encoding referential dependencies: one
way is by co-indexation of two elements. This process takes place in syntax and
is called binding. The other way implies counter-indexation of two elements that
happen to have the same semantic value (=refer to the same object in the
discourse). This way of establishing a referential dependency takes place outside
the realm of syntax proper and is called coreference. What Rule I basically says
is that if (20b) (coreference configuration) and (20c) (bound-variable
configuration) lead to the same interpretation, (20c) must be chosen and (20b)
rejected.4 Stated differently; if there is no difference in interpretation, binding,
which takes place in the syntax, is a more economical way of establishing a
referential dependency than coreference, which is of a pragmatic nature.5
(20) a.
b.
*The girli is pointing at heri.
Pr. B violated
The girli is pointing at herj.
Pr. B satisfied
Coreference: [i] and [j] happen to have the same semantic value.
c.
The girli is pointing at xi.
We follow G&R’s proposal that children have problems applying Rule I. This
rule requires that two LF representations of the same construction (1a), i.e. (20b)
and (20c) be compared. G&R propose that this is what young children cannot do.
4
For a sentence like (1a) the binding option represented in (19c) is syntactically
encoded as (i)
(i) The girl is pointing at herself.
5
Note that (20a) is never a possible configuration to the child, since we assume that,
like adults, children do not violate the Binding Principles or any other principle of UG,
in line with the Continuity Hypothesis, alluded to in the introduction.
20 S. Baauw, P. Coopmans & W. Philip
It breaks down due to limitations on their working memory. When this happens,
in order to determine the reference of the pronoun, children will adopt a guessing
strategy, leading to the observed 50% non adult-like performance.
What does this mean for clitics? If the DPBE does not show up in SIMPLE
sentences with clitics, this can only mean that Rule I does not apply to clitics. But
what makes clitics so different from strong pronouns that Rule I does not apply to
the former? One property that makes clitic different from strong pronouns is that
clitics are heads, while strong pronouns can be argued to be XPs (Cardinaletti,
1994). Under the DP hypothesis this means that clitics are Ds that move out of
the DP in order to adjoin to INFL. The reason for this movement does not
concern us here, but perhaps clitics move in order to check a strong D-feature (in
the framework of the Minimalist Program, Chomsky, 1995). The D-position is
considered to be the host of referentiality and the Spell-out of formal features like
person, number and gender (the so-called “phi-features”). If clitics are just Ds
this means that they only host formal features and referential force. This is
different for strong pronouns. In addition to the formal features full pronouns also
have some (minimal) semantic content. This semantic content at least consists of
specification for the feature [human]. We can describe this as follows:
(21) Strong pronouns are [+human], clitics are [+/-human] (i.e. underspecified
for the feature [human]).
This is illustrated by Spanish (22a,b) and Italian (22c,d). While clitics can refer
to both human and nonhuman objects, strong pronouns can only refer to human
objects (Delfitto & Corver, 1993; Cardinaletti & Starke, 1995).
(22) a.
b.
c.
d.
Ayer la vimos.
Ayer la vimos a ella.
`Yesterday we saw her.’
Gianni lo vede.
Gianni vede lui.
`Gianni saw him.’
(la = Maria/the house)
(ella = Maria/*the house)
(lo = Mario/the tree)
(lui = Mario/*the tree)
Delitto & Corver (1993) argue that Ds, in order to be interpretable at LF, need
the support of a nominal category with minimal semantic content. When the Dposition is occupied by an article, the lexical support is provided by the NP it
selects. Pronouns, however, do not select a lexical NP, (although, they may select
an empty category as their NP complement). Delfitto & Corver argue that the
The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish 21
following applies to pronouns:
(23) In order to enable their formal feature to be interpretable at LF, pronouns
need specification for the feature [human].
The [human] feature must be seen as an interpretable, noncomputational feature
that offers the phi-features the minimal lexical support to be interpretable at LF.
This means that strong pronouns, as [+human] elements, allow their phi-features
to be interpretable at LF. Clitics however, since they are underspecified for the
[human] feature, are "incomplete" or "deficient" in some sense: they are not able
to provide their phi-features the minimal semantic support necessary for their
interpretation at LF. We propose that in order to become "complete", that is,
interpretable at LF, clitics must get their specification from somewhere else. This
"somewhere else" is the discourse. Let us propose the following for clitics:
(24) Clitics need a discourse antecedent in order to become specified for the
feature [human].
(24) explains another property of clitics: they cannot refer deictically, unlike
strong pronouns.
What is the relevance of the deficient nature of clitics for the application of
Rule I? Observe that Rule I only plays a role when coreference is an option.6
Rule I inspects two elements with the same reference in order to determine
whether coreference is a legitimate alternative to binding. However, in the case of
local coreference with clitics, Rule I must inspect the relation between the local
subject and an element that cannot be interpreted independently, the clitic. A
clitic is only interpretable in combination with its discourse antecedent. In some
sense one could say that a clitic constitutes a discontinuous element that consists
of a D-head and a discourse antecedent that provides the D with a specification
for the feature [human], necessary for interpretation of the D at LF. The relation
between the clitic head and its discourse antecedent could be viewed as a relation
of the type expressed in (25)
(25) discourse antecedenti
6
[CP....clitici....]
If children’s problems with the application of Rule I is an important source of the
DPBE, then it is a straightforward explanation of why the DPBE is not found in the
QUANT condition (not even in English). Rule I is only applicable in the case of
coreference. Quantifiers do not enter in coreference relations, only in binding relations
(cf. Chien & Wexler, 1990; Grodzinsky & Reinhart, 1993).
22 S. Baauw, P. Coopmans & W. Philip
What does this mean for the inspection by Rule I? In (26) we give a situation of a
clitic that corefers with a local subject.
(26) discourse antecedenti
[CP subjectj....clitici....]
coreference: semantic value of [i] = semantic value of [j]
Suppose now that when Rule I inspects the coreference relation between the clitic
and a local subject, it can only see the subject and the clitic head, but not the
discourse antecedent (After all, Rule I is an intrasentential coreference rule,
G&R). However, without its discourse antecedent, the clitic is not complete: the
clitic can only be interpreted in combination with its discourse antecedent. We
propose that this is what makes the application of Rule I impossible: since no
semantic value can be attached to the index of a referentially “incomplete”
element, a configuration such as (26) is not fit for inspection by Rule I, and does
not occur. If Rule I is not applicable, it is not invoked, which means that it cannot
break down in young children. If coreference cannot be inspected, a binding
option will be potentially left. However, since a binding relation between the
clitic la and a local subject, will lead to a violation of Principle B, children will
consistently reject this option. The result is virtually adult like performance in the
SIMPLE condition.
Interestingly, there is some independent evidence for this view on the
working of Rule I. If we take a look at (26) again, we will notice a great
similarity with this structure and an instance of Strong Cross Over (Warsow,
1972; Chomsky, 1981), given in (27) and (28):
(27) *Who did he see?
(who = he)
(28) [CP Whi [IP subjectj....ti....]]
coreference: semantic value of [i] = semantic value of [j]
G&R noted that Rule I does not apply to structures of Strong Cross Over. We will
argue that the reason why Rule I does not apply to SCO is exactly the same as
why it does not apply to constructions with clitics. As is clear from (28), the trace
and the wh-element form a discontinuous element. Rule I, however, can only see
the trace. The trace, though, is only interpretable in combination with its whantecedent. This makes application of Rule I impossible.
If this is true, then the prediction is that young children, irrespective of the
The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish 23
language they are acquiring, will not have any trouble in excluding Strong Cross
Over constructions. These structures have been tested by Thornton (1990) in
research on the possible existence of a "Delay of Principle C Effect" in young
children. Her findings confirm our prediction: children appear to adhere to
principle C and hence reject structures such as (29).
(29) a.
b.
*Who did he say t has bought a hat? (who = he).
*Who did he see? (who = he)
Since Rule I cannot apply in Strong Cross Over structures, it cannot break down
either, leading to the observed adult-like performance.
7. Conclusion
We have shown that the DPBE is caused by two factors: a grammatical factor,
which applies to both clitic pronouns and strong pronouns, and a pragmatic
factor, which only applies to strong pronouns. The grammatical factor is an
instance of lexical learning. Spanish children need to learn that la can only be a
[+R] element. The pragmatic factor, which we assume to be G&R Rule I,
regulates intrasentential coreference and is responsible for ruling out coreference
between a pronoun and its local antecedent. Processing difficulties are
responsible for its breakdown in young children acquiring languages such as
Dutch and English. We have argued that clitics cannot be inspected by Rule I,
since they are part of a discontinuous element, consisting of the clitic and a
discourse antecedent, a result of their underspecification for the feature [human].
The discourse antecedent is not visible to Rule I. The clitic alone, on the other
hand, is incomplete and hence not inspectable on its own by Rule I. Since Rule I
cannot do its job, it is not invoked, hence it cannot break down. To the extent that
the DPBE can be attested in Spanish, we are able to explain its occurrence (and
its absence in the SIMPLE conditions) by spelling out in detail what the effects
are of acquiring the lexical feature specification of pronouns and the grammatical
structures that can be inspected by Rule I. Such an explanation can be put
forward without claiming that principles of UG need be acquired. Children’s
grammars are constrained by UG from the onset of language acquisition, as is
shown by this study of the linguistic development of Spanish children.
24 S. Baauw, P. Coopmans & W. Philip
Acknowledgments
The research reported here has been supported partly by the Spanish Ministry of
Education (F.P.I. Program, Grant no. 09000072), and partly by the International
Office of the Utrecht University. We wish to thank Linda Escobar for her help with
the preparation of the experiments and her assistance in running them. We also wish
to thank the children who participated in this study, and their parents and teachers,
at the Colegio Aldeafuente in Madrid, and the Colegio Pinoalbar in Valladolid,
Spain. Credit is also given to Ignacio Bosque for letting us run the control test on
his students at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, and to Margarita España
Villasante for her assistance in running the experiments.
A version of this paper has been presented at the “Colloquium on the
Acquisition of Spanish and Portuguese,” McGill University, Montreal, 2-4 October
1997. We thank the participants for their questions and comments.
References
Avrutin , S. & K. Wexler (1992) `Development of Principle B in Russian:
coindexation at LF and coreference,’ Language Acquisition, 2, 259-306
Baauw, S., M.A. Escobar & W. Philip (1997) `A Delay of Principle B Effect in
Spanish speaking children: the role of lexical feature acquisition,’ In: A.
Sorace, C. Heycock & R. Shillcock (Eds.), Proceedings of GALA `97,
Human Communication Research Centre, Edinburgh
Berger, C. (1997) Research paper `Acquisition of syntax’, Utrecht University.
Cardinaletti, A. & M. Starke (1995) `Tripartition of pronouns and its acquisition:
Principle B puzzles are ambiguity problems,’ NELS, 25, 1-12.
Cardinaletti, A. (1994) `The internal structure of pronominal DPs,’ The Linguistic
Review, 11, 195-219.
Chien, Y.-C. & K. Wexler (1990) `Children's knowledge of locality conditions in
binding as evidence for the modularity of syntax and pragmatics,’ Language
Acquisition, 1, 225-295.
Chomsky, N. (1981) Lectures on government and binding, Foris, Dordrecht
Chomsky, N. (1995) The minimalist program, The MIT Press,
Cambridge/London.
Delfitto, D. & N. Corver (1993) `Feature asymmetry and the nature of pronoun
movement,’ ms, Utrecht University.
Hamann, C. & W. Philip (1997) `The French Delay of Principle B Effect,’ ms.,
Utrecht University.
Goodluck, H. (1991) Language acquisition: a linguistic introduction, Blackwell,
The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish 25
Oxford.
Grodzinsky, J. & T. Reinhart (1993) `The innateness of binding and coreference,’
Linguistic Inquiry, 24, 69-102.
Hornstein, N. & D. Lightfoot (Eds.). (1981) Explanation in linguistics: the
logical problem of language acquisition, Longman, London/New York
McKee, C. (1992). A comparison of pronouns and anaphors in Italian and
English acquisition,' Language Acquisition, 2, 21-54.
Koster, C. (1993) Errors in anaphora acquisition, Doctoral dissertation, Utrecht
University.
Padilla, J. A. (1990) On the Definition of Binding Domains in Spanish, Kluwer
Academic Publishers, Dordrecht.
Philip, W. & P. Coopmans (1996a) The role of lexical feature acquisition in the
development of pronominal anaphora, In: W. Philip & F. Wijnen (Eds.),
Amsterdam Series on Child Language Development, Vol. 5.
Philip, W. & P. Coopmans (1996b) `The double Dutch Delay of Principle B
Effect,’ BU Proceedings.
Philip W. & A. Hestvik (1997) `Reflexivity, anti-subject orientation and language
acquisition, NELS 27
Reinhart, T. & E. Reuland (1993) `Reflexivity,’ Linguistic Inquiry, 24, 657-720.
Sigurjónsdóttir, S. (1992) Binding in Icelandic: evidence from language
acquisition, Doctoral dissertation, University of California.
Sigurjónsdóttir, S. & P. Coopmans (1996) `The acquisition of anaphoric relations
in Dutch,’ In: W.Philip & F. Wijnen (Eds.), Amsterdam Series in Child
Language Development, Vol. 5.
Thornton, R. (1990) Adventures in long-distance moving: The acquistion of
complex wh-questions, Doctoral dissertation, University of Connecticut.
Wexler, K. & R. Manzini (1987) Parameters and learnability, In: T. Roeper & E.
Williams (Eds.), Parameter setting, D. Reidel Publishing Company,
Dordrecht.
Wassow, T. (1972) Anaphoric relations in English, Doctoral dissertation. MIT.
26 S. Baauw, P. Coopmans & W. Philip
Appendix
Target Input
Session I
1 SEY
(yes)
2 SEN
(no)
3 filler
(yes)
4 filler
(no)
5 QSEN (no)
6 LAY
(yes)
7 filler
(yes)
8 QUANT (no)
9 SIMPLE (no)
10 VLAY (yes)
11 VSEY (yes)
12 filler
(no)
13 VSEN (no)
14 filler
(yes)
15 filler
(yes)
16 VSC
(no)
17 filler
(yes)
18 QSEY (yes)
19 QLAY (yes)
20 filler
(no)
21 filler
(yes)
22 LAY
(yes)
23 filler
(yes)
24 QSEN (no)
25 filler
(no)
¿La abuelita se seca?
¿La niña se seca?
¿Llevan todos los elefantes un globo?
¿Bebe cada niño una limonada?
¿Cada niña se seca?
¿La abuelita la seca?
¿Ha cogido cada niño un cerdito?
¿Cada mamá la seca?
¿La niña la seca?
¿La niña la ve saltar a la cuerda?
¿La niña se ve saltar a la cuerda?
¿LLevan todos los niños un paraguas?
¿La niña se ve saltar a la cuerda?
¿Lleva cada cerdito una manzana?
¿Montan todos los niños un elefante?
¿La niña la ve saltar a la cuerda?
¿LLeva un elefante todos los globos?
¿Cada niña se seca?
¿Cada mamá la seca?
¿Lleva cada dinosaurio un globo?
¿LLeva cada jirafa un globo?
¿La niña la toca con la mano?
¿Monta cada niño un caballo?
¿Cada niña se toca con la mano?
¿LLeva un elefante todos los globos?
Session II
26 QSEY (yes)
27 filler
(yes)
28 SEN
(no)
29 QUANT (no)
30 VLAY (yes)
31 VSEY (yes)
32 SIMPLE (no)
¿Cada niña se toca con la mano?
¿LLeva un niño todos los paraguas?
¿La niña se toca con la mano?
¿Cada niña la toca con la mano?
¿La mamá la ve bailar?
¿La niña se ve bailar?
¿La niña la toca con la mano?
The Acquisition of Pronominal Coreference in Spanish 27
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
filler
(no)
VSC
(no)
QSEY (yes)
LAY
(yes)
VSEN (no)
QLAY (yes)
SEN
(no)
SEY
(yes)
QSEN (no)
filler
(no)
SIMPLE (no)
SEY
(yes)
VLAY (yes)
VSEY (yes)
QUANT (no)
VSEN (no)
QLAY (yes)
VSC
(no)
filler
(yes)
¿LLeva un niño todos los paraguas?
¿La mamá la ve bailar?
¿Cada niña se señala con el dedo?
¿La mamá la señala con el dedo?
¿La abuelita se ve bailar?
¿Cada niña la toca con la mano?
¿La niña se señala con el dedo?
¿La abuelita se toca con la mano?
¿Cada mamá se señala con el dedo?
¿LLeva una jirafa todos los globos?
¿La abuela la señala con el dedo?
¿La mamá se señala con el dedo?
¿La niña la ve hacer burbujas?
¿La abuelita se ve hacer burbujas?
¿Cada mamá la señala con el dedo?
¿La niña se ve hacer burbujas?
¿Cada niña la señala con el dedo?
¿La niña la ve hacer burbujas?
¿LLeva una jirafa todos los globos?
test filler total
yes 21 9
27
no 21 6
24