THE ACQUISITION OF KOREAN PLURALIZER –TUL By Mikyung Kim A THESIS Submitted to Michigan State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS Linguistics 2011 ABSTRACT THE ACQUISITION OF KOREAN PLURALIZER -TUL By Mikyung Kim This thesis presents an experiment designed to test children‟s knowledge of the Korean pluralizer –tul. Acquisition of this pluralizer was investigated in two ways: as an Intrinsic Plural Marker (IPM) attached to nominals and as an Extrinsic Plural Marker (EPM) attached to nonnominals. First of all, the results show that eight-year-olds associated the IPM –tul as plural. Seven- and eight-year-olds, however, were more confident with a singular interpretation than with a plural interpretation. Such behavior is due to the optionality of –tul. If children are exposed to inconsistent input, and the interpretation is ambiguous, the acquisition can be delayed. Second, the results show that the IPM –tul plays the same role in subject and in indirect object. Eight-year-olds treated the IPM –tul equally, regardless of the place that it is attached to. Third, the results with adults‟ responses suggest that the EPM -tul is associated to a plural subject interpretation. Seven- and eight-year-olds seemed that they did not know the interpretation of the EPM. Fourth, the results show that the EPM is harder for seven- and eight-year-olds to acquire than the IPM. The IPM is attached more locally than the EPM in terms of its semantic effect. Lastly, the results clearly show that there were age differences in acquisition of the pluralizer –tul. Although eight-year-olds were not adult-like, they performed a lot better than seven-yearolds did since they were more likely to be exposed to the plural interpretations. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First and foremost, I would like to show my gratitude to my advisor, Professor Cristina Schmitt, for her guidance, advice, and solid support in proofreading hundreds of thesis drafts and helping me throughout my graduate studies at MSU. From the earliest stage of my research, she spent much time training me and encouraging me to develop my thesis. Without her help, this thesis would not have been possible. Her suggestions and expertise have been invaluable for my growth as a student and a researcher. I am indebted to her more than she knows. I am grateful to my committee members, Professor Yen-Hwei Lin and Professor Alan Beretta for their support and useful comments on my thesis. I also appreciate Professor Eun-il Kim and Professor John Stonham at Pukyong National University for valuable advice before and after I worked on this research and for giving me an opportunity to collect data from their classes in Korea. I thank Pukyong National University students, Pulun Chojang Kindergarten, Samson Kindergarten, Dadae Kindergarten, and Hansaebeol Institute for their cooperation in carrying out the experiment with children. I would like to thank Hye-Sun Park and Nakano Nao for the discussion and comments on the experiment. I also thank Jihye Im who gave me useful advice for data in Korean. I would like to express special thanks to Haeik Park for his consistent encouragement and assistance during these years of study. Last but not least, my deepest gratitude and blessings go to my parents for their unending love and generous support. Words alone cannot express the thanks I owe to them. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES………………………………………………..…………………………........v LIST OF FIGURES…………………………………..……………………………...……..….....vi CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION…………………………………………………………………………….......1 CHAPTER 2 LINGUISTIC BACKGROUND………………………………………………………………..3 2.1 The Korean Pluralizer –tul….……………………………………...……………………...3 2.2 Syntax for –tul…………………………………………………………………....9 2.2.1 Rough Syntax for –tul……………………………………………………….....9 2.2.2 The Syntactic Structure of the EPM –tul…………………………………….…….12 2.3 Semantics for –tul…………………………………………………………………..……14 2.3.1 Semantic Properties of the IPM –tul……………………………………….....14 2.3.2 Semantic Properties of the EPM –tul………………………………………..…15 CHAPTER 3 ACQUISITION BACKGROUND …………………………………………… ……….22 3.1 Acquisition of Plural Morphology……………………………………………….....22 CHAPTER 4 A STUDY………………………………………………………………………………………..31 4.1 Hypotheses & Predictions……………………………………………………………..…31 4.2 Experiment……………………………………………………………………………...35 4.2.1 Subjects…..…………………………………………………………………….…..35 4.2.2 Design…..………………………………………………………………………….36 4.2.3 Conditions……………………...…………………………………………….….39 4.2.4 Method….………………………………………...………………….…….47 4.2.5 Predictions…..………………………………….………………………...49 4.2.6 Results…………………………………………….……………………………..51 4.2.7 Discussion………………………………………………………………………….64 CHAPTER 5 CONCLUSION…………………………………………………………………………………..71 APPENDICES…………………………………………………………………………………...74 APPENDIX A: Version 1. Items for Group A….…………………………………………...75 APPENDIX B: Version 2. Items for Group B……………………..…………………….….84 APPENDIX C: Filler sentences for Group A and B………………………………….…....93 BIBLIOGRAPHY…………………………………………………………………..………99 iv LIST OF TABLES Table 1. Ages of subjects……………………………………………………….………………35 Table 2. Six conditions of target sentences…………………………………….……………….37 Table 3. Percentage of predicted correct responses by adults………………….………………51 Table 4. Percentage of predicted correct all (“Yes” and “No”) responses by children…….…..55 Table 5. Percentage of predicted correct “No” responses by children………………….……...55 Table 6. A summary table of hypotheses and results…………………………….…………….70 v LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1. One of the six items…………………………………………………………………38 Figure 2. Four items for Condition 1_ONE-ONE……………………………………………..40 Figure 3. Condition 2_ONE-TUL (One Dog-Sheep)………………………………………….42 Figure 4. Condition 3_ TUL-ONE (Monkeys-One Squirrel)…………………………………44 Figure 5. Condition 4_ BARE-ONE-TUL (Bear-One Owl-give-tul)…………………………45 Figure 6. Condition 5_ BARE-BARE-TUL (Bird-Lion-sing-tul)…………………………….46 Figure 7. Condition 6_ TUL-BARE (Elephants-Mouse)……………………………………...47 Figure 8. An example of switching the subject and the indirect object……………………….48 Figure 9. Percentage of predicted correct “No” responses by adults………………………….52 Figure 10. Percentage of predicted correct “No” responses by six-year-olds…………………55 Figure 11. Percentage of predicted correct “No” responses by seven-year-olds……………...56 Figure 12. Percentage of predicted correct “No” responses by eight-year-olds………………56 Figure 13. Percentage of predicted correct “No” responses by all children per each condition57 Figure 14. Item 2 in Condition 1_ONE-ONE (in Version 1)……………………………….…65 Figure 15. Item 5 in Condition 1_ONE-ONE (in Version 2)………………………………….66 Figure 16. Item 3 in Condition 6_TUL-BARE (in Version 1)………………………………...67 vi CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION Most studies on the acquisition of plural morphology have largely focused on English, which has obligatory plural morphology (Graves and Koziol, 1971; Brown, 1973; Barner and Snedeker, 2006; Zapf and Smith, 2007 & 2008; Musolino, 2009). There are relatively few studies focusing on the acquisition of plurality in languages with optional plural morphology. In this thesis, we examine children‟s interpretation of the optional pluralizer –tul in Korean, and investigate how optional plural morphology is acquired. Previous work (Munn et al., 2009; Nakano et al., 2009; Park, 2010) has shown that children have difficulties with optional pluralizers. In this study, we test children‟s ability to interpret –tul as the Intrinsic Plural Marker and as the Extrinsic Plural Marker, something that has never been tested before. -Tul has some interesting properties that differ from those of a regular grammaticalized plural marker. First, -tul is optional. In Korean, noun phrases without a determiner or quantifier can appear in argument position and be interpreted as either singular or plural. Therefore, the pluralizer is not required to obtain a plural interpretation. Second, -tul can be used in two ways: either as an Intrinsic Plural Marker (IPM) or as an Extrinsic Plural Marker (EPM). The IPM –tul is morphologically attached to a noun and forces a plural interpretation of the noun. The EPM – tul is attached to non-nominal elements, such as verbs or adverbs, and forces a plural subject interpretation. Third, -tul is not allowed with inanimate nouns. It can only be attached to animate count nouns. 1 We ask the following questions: (1) how is optional plural morphology acquired? (2) do children associate the IPM –tul with plurality? (3) is the EPM –tul associated with subjects? (4) is the IPM acquired more easily than EPM? This thesis is organized as follows. In chapter 2, we describe the semantic and syntactic properties of the Korean pluralizer –tul as an IPM and an EPM. In chapter 3, we present previous research on the acquisition of plural morphology. In chapter 4, we introduce our hypotheses and predictions and present our experiment with results, and in chapter 5, we review our hypotheses and predictions and draw some conclusions. 2 CHAPTER 2 LINGUISTIC BACKGROUND 1 This chapter offers a description of Korean pluralizer –tul and presents an overview of the literature on this pluralizer. 2.1 The Korean Pluralizer –tul In English, a noun phrase has to be marked for plural or singular, and bare count nouns in argument position are only acceptable with a mass reading. In Korean, much like in other languages, noun phrases can appear in argument position in what appears to be its bare form (without determiners) and receive a plural or singular interpretation. As illustrated in (1), the noun phrase thokki („rabbit‟) appears bare and can be interpreted as „one rabbit‟ or „more than one rabbit‟. These noun phrases are called bare count nominals. (1) Thokki-ka canti-wi-ey i-ss-ta. rabbit-NOM grass-on-LOC be-PRS-DEC 2 „A rabbit is on the grass. / Rabbits are on the grass.‟ Chierchia (1998) introduces a semantic parameter called the Nominal Mapping Parameter to explain why bare nominals can appear in argument position in some languages, but not others. Nouns come from the lexicon either as predicates ([+pred]) or as arguments ([+arg]). [+pred] 1 The transcription of Korean follows the Yale Romanization system. 2 The following abbreviations are used in the present paper: ACC = accusative, CL = classifier, CONJ = conjunctive, DAT = dative, DEC = declarative, GEN = genitive, IND = indicative, INS = instrumental, LOC = locative, NOM = nominative, PAS = passive, PL = plural, PRG = (present) progressive, PRS = present, PST = past, TOP = topic, Q = question. 3 nouns denote properties, and [+arg] nouns denote kinds. In a given language, nouns can be denoted as only predicates (e.g., French), only kinds (e.g., Korean) or both (e.g., English). Kinds are treated as mass-like entities. Since they are entities, they are allowed to occur in argument position. Also, there should be no grammatical plural marker since kinds are like mass nouns and therefore inherently plural. Thus, it is assumed that languages that allow bare nouns in argument position should have no plural morphology and should require a classifier to shift kinds into predicates that can be counted. This type of language is called a classifier language, which includes Korean, Japanese, and Chinese, among others. However, the predictions that bare noun languages would have no plural morphology and that bare nouns would be interpreted as mass nouns has been challenged. In fact, many classifier languages also have pluralizers (e.g., Li, 1999; Chung, 2000). Korean, for instance, has two pluralizers, -tul and –ne. As a pluralizer, –tul has the properties of distributivity (Song, 1997; Park, 2008), exhaustivity (An, 2007) or both (Joh, 2005). The other pluralizer, -ne, is a true associative plural marker. X-ne includes x and those associated with x in a context c (Madigan et al., 2008). Furthermore, the fact that all nouns in a language such as Korean require a classifier to be counted does not mean that they are necessarily mass nouns. Classifier languages make a distinction between count and mass nouns. For instance, the pluralizer –tul is sensitive to the count-mass distinction, and is attached only to count nouns. As illustrated in (2), -tul is acceptable only when it is attached to count nouns, such as thokki („rabbit‟) or salam („person‟), as in (2a-b). It is unacceptable when attached to mass nouns, such as wuyu („milk‟) or seltang („sugar‟), as in (2c-d). 4 (2) a. thokki-tul b. salam-tul rabbit-PL „rabbits‟ c. person-PL „people‟ *wuyu-tul 3 d. *seltang-tul milk-PL sugar-PL „milks‟ „sugars‟ The first property of-tul is that it obeys animacy restrictions. -Tul is not allowed with inanimate nouns. Choe (1987) argues that the plural marker –tul can be attached only to animate count nouns. As illustrated in (3), the IPM-tul is attached to the animate noun wensungi („monkey‟) in subject position and gives a plural interpretation to the noun phrase, which is acceptable. On the other hand, when -tul is attached to an inanimate noun, such as panana („banana‟), the result in (3) is unacceptable. The example (4) is also unacceptable. In this case, the EPM-tul is attached to the verb ttelecessta („fell‟), and the subject cannot be associated to the EPM –tul, since it is inanimate. No agreement obtains here (see below for the EPM properties). (3) *Wensungi-tul-i monkey-PL-NOM panana-tul-ul mek-nun-ta. banana-PL-ACC eat-PRS-DEC „Monkeys eat bananas.‟ (4) *Yelsoy key twu kay-ka patak-ey ttelec-ess-ta-tul. two CL-TOP floor-LOC fall-PST-DEC-PL „Two keys fell on the floor.‟ 3 It should be noted that the examples (2c) and (2d) are also ruled out because these nouns are inanimate. 5 When a subject appears as a bare noun, and the EPM appears on the verb as in (5), the EPM on the verb disambiguates the bare noun and forces a plural interpretation of the subject, not the indirect object, as illustrated in (5a-b). The subjects, thokki („rabbit‟) and say („bird‟), must be interpreted as plural in (5a) and (5b), respectively. (5) a. Thokki-ka kepuki-eykey usan-lul ssu-ywecu-ko-tul rabbit-NOM turtle-DAT umbrella-ACC use-give-CONJ-PL i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC „Rabbits are sharing an umbrella/umbrellas with a turtle/turtles.‟ b. Say-ka namu wi-eyse saca-eykey nolayha-ko-tul bird-NOM tree on-LOC lion-DAT sing-CONJ-PL 4 i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC „Birds are singing to a lion/lions on the tree/trees.‟ Given that it shows animacy restrictions and is incompatible with classifiers, we suggest that it is, in fact, another classifier like an element, since classifiers show restrictions of this type. The second property of the pluralizer –tul is optionality. In other words, the pluralizer is not required for a plural interpretation. Noun phrases can appear bare and be interpreted as either singular or plural. The third property of –tul is that it has two different interpretations and distributions: the Intrinsic Plural Marker (IPM) -tul and the Extrinsic Plural Marker (EPM) -tul. 4 Sometimes speakers reject (5a) and (5b) because they may out of blue have decided on a singular interpretation for the subject, since it is not overtly marked for plurality. 6 The IPM –tul (e.g., Kang, 1994; Baek, 2002; Kim, 2005 and many others) is attached to a noun and pluralizes the noun associated to it. As seen in (6a), –tul is attached to the noun thokki („rabbit‟) in subject position and it forces a plural interpretation of the noun phrase. The IPM -tul can also be attached to the direct object nominal in (6b) and to the indirect object nominal in (6c), forcing a plural interpretation of the direct object and the indirect object, respectively. (6) a. Thokki-tul-i kepuki han-mali-lul ttalaka-n-ta. rabbit-PL-NOM turtle one-CL-ACC follow-PRS-DEC „Rabbits follow one turtle.‟ b. Thokki han-mali-ka kepuki-tul-ul ttalaka-n-ta. rabbit one-CL-NOM turtle-PL-ACC follow-PRS-DEC „One rabbit follows turtles.‟ c. Thokki han-mali-ka kepuki-tul-eykey usan hana-lul rabbit one-CL-NOM turtle-PL-DAT umbrella one-ACC ssu-ywecu-n-ta. use- give-PRS-DEC „One rabbit shares one umbrella with turtles.‟ The other type of –tul is the Extrinsic Plural Marker (EPM), which is attached to non-nominal elements such as verbs, adverbs or prepositions. For instance, -tul is attached to the verb nalayhako („sing‟) in (7b), the adverb khukey („loudly‟) in (7c), and the preposition wieyse („on‟) in (7d). As an EPM, -tul does not pluralize the element to which it attaches. In all these examples, it is the subject that has a plural interpretation. So, -tul in these cases seems to be agreement 7 because the meaning is the same, whether –tul is attached to the verb or not when the subject is clearly marked for plurality. In (7a), the IPM -tul is attached to the subject say („bird‟) and gives it a plural interpretation. In (7b), the EPM –tul co-occurs with –tul in the subject. These two sentences can be interpreted as meaning either that multiple birds are singing together or each bird is singing separately, and there does not seem to be a difference in interpretation between (7a), (7b), (7c), and (7d) respectively. (7) a. Say-tul-i nolayha-ko i-ss-ta. bird-PL-NOM sing-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „Birds are singing.‟ b. Say-tul-i nolayha-ko-tul i-ss-ta. bird-PL-NOM sing-CONJ-PL be-PRG-DEC „Birds are singing.‟ c. Say-tul-i khukey-tul nolayha-ko i-ss-ta. bird-PL-NOM loudly-PL sing-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „Birds are singing loudly. d. Say-tul-i namu wi-eyse-tul nolayha-ko i-ss-ta. bird-PL-NOM tree on-LOC-PL sing-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „Birds are singing on the tree/trees.‟ However, the EPM –tul is not just a morphological copy of the morpheme -tul on the subject. As illustrated in (8), the subject does not have the morpheme –tul, but it is acceptable to have the EPM on the verb, as in (8a). The reason is that the subject is a coordinated noun phrase, John 8 and Mary, which is inherently plural. In (8b), the subject is John, which is singular. In this case, the use of the EPM is unacceptable. The EPM on the verb forces a plural interpretation of the subject even if the subject is not marked as plural. (8) a. John-kwa-Mary-ka John-and-Mary-NOM namu tree alay-eyse nolayha-ko-tul under-LOC . sing-CONJ-PL i-ss-ta be-PRG-DEC „John and Mary are singing under the tree/trees.‟ b. *John-i John-NOM naum alay-eyse nolayha-ko-tul i-ss-ta. tree sing-CONJ-PL be-PRG-DEC under-LOC „John is singing under the tree/trees.‟ 2.2 Syntax for -tul 2.2.1 Rough Syntax for –tul With this basic description, we, now, provide a preliminary analysis for –tul. We start with the structure of noun phrases in Korean. The classifier projection is needed, and we assume that its specifier is the place for quantity expressions (number + classifier). Following Li‟s (1999) work on Chinese, we assume that the syntactic structure of a noun phrase should look as in (9b) (we are assuming Korean to be a strict head final language). The structure for (9a) is illustrated in (9b). The noun say („bird‟) is originally the NP complement of ClP, and the classifier mali is in Cl head. The number twu („two‟) is in the specifier of the Cl head. Then, the NP moves to the specifier of the DP. This is necessary for the right word order to obtain. 9 (9) a. Say twu-mali bird 2-CL „two birds‟ –Tul is incompatible with a classifier. As illustrated in (10a-b) below, -tul appears to compete with the classifier „mali’. The example (10c) is unacceptable since both –tul and the classifier appear at the same time in a single DP. It can be acceptable only if NP-tul and the classifier are in two different DPs, as in (10d). In other words, –tul and a classifier are in the complementary distribution. (10) a. Say-tul b. Say twu-mali bird-PL „birds‟ c. bird 2-CL „two birds‟ *Say-tul-twu-mali d. Say-tul(-eul) twu-mali bird-PL-2-CL bird-PL(DAT) 2-CL „two birds‟ „two birds‟ 10 The Korean pluralizer –tul behaves much like the Chinese plural marker –men (Li, 1999). -Men cannot occur with the quantity (number + classifier) expression when it is attached to a common noun, as in (11). (11) * sange three-CL xuesheng-men student-PL „three student + men‟ (Li, 1999, p.77) Borer (2005) argues that the English plural morpheme -s works as a classifier inflection just as other classifier systems do. Following Borer‟s (2005) argument, we can argue that -tul and classifiers appear in the same position with the same function in the DP structure. In (12), the structure of say-tul („birds‟) is illustrated. We propose that when –tul is in the Cl head, ClP cannot have a specifier while it is allowed when a regular classifier is in the Cl head, as in (12a). If the specifier were allowed when –tul is in the Cl head, say twu-tul, should be possible, but it is not. This is illustrated in (12b). 11 This may suggest that –tul may have more features than a regular classifier or a regular pluralizer. We leave this open for further research, since the goal of this thesis is the investigation of the plural interpretation of –tul. 2.2.2 The Syntactic Structure of the EPM –tul First, we turn to the syntactic structure of –tul as an EPM. The EPM –tul appears with non-nominal phrases, but always forces a subject plural meaning. As seen in (13), the subject and indirect object are bare nouns, and the EPM –tul is attached to the verb. Its subject is interpreted as plural, „birds‟. On the other hand, its indirect object could be either singular or plural, „one lion‟ or „more than one lion‟, since it is a bare noun. 12 (13) Say-ka namu wi-eyse saca-eykey nolayha-ko-tul bird-NOM tree on-LOC lion-DAT sing-CONJ-PL i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC „Birds are singing to a lion/lions on the tree/trees.‟ Koopman (2004) argues that –tul can be optionally attached to non-nominal elements as long as the subject is plural. As illustrated in (14), -tul is attached to the preposition and the verb in (14a) and to the adverb in (14b). The two examples are grammatical since their subjects are plural. As in (14a), there is no subject, but it is assumed that the subject is plural and just not overtly realized. (14) a. Hakko-eyse-tul wass-ni-tul school-from-PL came-Q-PL „Did they come from school?‟ b. Ai-tul-i kwaja-lul child-PL-NOM cookie-ACC masitkey-tul mokotta taste-PL „The children ate the cookies with gusto.‟ ate-DEC (Koopman, 2004, p.31) As discussed so far, on the basis of the subject-EPM relation, we propose the following syntactic structure of the EPM when it is attached to the verb phrase. We will not discuss how the pluralizer ends up realized on the adverbs or PPs. Here, the EPM –tul is in v and must enter an 13 agreement relation with a plural subject. It can be spelled-out on v, as illustrated in (15). This allows us to capture that –tul is only acceptable where the subject is plural and animate. (15) Thokki-tul-i kwulum-lul ttalaka-ko-tul i-ss-ta. rabbit-PL-NOM cloud-ACC follow-CONJ-PL be-PRS-DEC „Rabbits are following the cloud(s).‟ 2.3 Semantics for -tul 2.3.1 Semantic Properties of the IPM -tul The IPM –tul has been considered as a plural marker (Kang, 1994; Baek, 2002; Kim, 2005). That is, it is attached to nominals and gives a plural interpretation. As in (16), the IPM –tul is attached to the subject nominal salam („person‟), and the noun phrase is interpreted as plural („more than one person‟). Here, the IPM –tul plays a role in pluralizing the phrase it 14 attaches to. However, its semantic properties are not clearly specified. Yim (2002) argues that a sentence with the IPM –tul triggers two readings: a distributive reading and a collective reading. The example (17a) and (17b) illustrates these functions of the IPM –tul. In (17a), the sentence can be interpreted as meaning that each person ran fast, or that all of the people ran fast together. Additionally, we can have a collective reading with the IPM –tul. In (17b), the sentence can be interpreted as meaning that all first-year-students built a raft together loudly. In other words, the sentence with the IPM –tul can have two readings at the same time, much like plurals in English, which allow both interpretations. (17) a. Salam-tul-i ppalli ttwi-ess-ta. person-PL-NOM fast run-PST-DEC „People ran fast.‟ b. Ilhaknyen haksaeng-tul-i sikkurupkke-tul ttaesmok-ul first-year student-PL-NOM loudly-PL . raft-ACC ciessta. build-PST-DEC „First-year students all built a raft all loudly.‟ (Joh, 2005, p.174) 2.3.2 Semantic Properties of the EPM -tul Given the syntactic structure of the EPM on v, some questions arise: Is the EPM only related to the subject, or is it related to the event and pluralizing the subject is the most straightforward way of achieving a plurality of event interpretations? It does not seem that the plurality of the event always occurs with the use of the EPM. Chung (2003) provides an example 15 to account for the relation between the event plurality and the EPM. As seen in (18a), the adverb yele pen („several times‟) pluralizes the event. In (18b), however, it becomes unacceptable when –tul is attached to the prepositional phrase mikwuk-ey („to America‟). In this sentence, the event is interpreted as pluralized, but the EPM is impossible because the subject cannot be interpreted as plural. In other words, -tul on is not necessarily related to the event‟s plurality of the verb, but to the plurality of the subject. (18) a. Nay-ka yele pen mikwuk-ey I-NOM several times America-to kapo-ess-ta. go-PST-DEC „I have been to America several times.‟ b. *Nay-ka yele pen I-NOM several times mikwuk-ey-tul kapo-ess-ta. America-to-PL go-PST-DEC (Chung, 2003, p.77) Song (1997) proposes that the EPM signals distribution, more than plurality. His argument is that its semantic function is not to pluralize a noun phrase since the EPM can appear on non-nominal elements which cannot be pluralized. Instead, the EPM appears to distribute events, activities, or properties individually over the members of a set, rather than the whole set. One of the examples that he presents is the EPM attached to an adverb, as seen in (19) below. The adverbs cal („well‟) and yongkamha-key („bravely‟) cannot be possibly multiplied. Rather, the manner specified is attributed to the action accomplished by each of the subjects. As in (19a), each child of the set accomplished the action of „playing well‟. Therefore, according to him, the function of the EPM attached to an adverb is to promote a distributive reading. 16 (19) a. 5 Ai-tul-i cal-tul nol-ass-ta. child-PL-NOM well-PL play-PST-IND „The children played well.‟ b. Ai-tul-i yongkamhakey-tul child-PL bravely-PL nase-ess-ta leave-PST-IND „The children came forward bravely.‟ (Song, 1997, p.211) Park (2008) also claims that –tul is not a simple plural marker since some examples cannot be entirely explained under the plural analysis. Much like Song (1997), she argues that EPM–tul is a distributive marker. The example (20), according to Park, shows that –tul obligatorily appears in distributive contexts. In this case, every participant takes part in some action. -Tul with the subject, haksayng („student‟), plays a role as the entity which is distributed to the locative „to a school‟. The EPM attached to the locative gives a distributive interpretation to the sentence. The same event „going to school‟ is distributed individually over the multiple agents. In this respect, she concludes that the EPM is associated with distributivity. (20) 6 Haksayng-tul-i hakkyo-ey-tul kassta. student-PL-NOM school-LOC-PL go-PST-DEC „The students went to a school separately.‟ 5 (Park, 2008, p.284) There is no difference in interpretation as follows: Both sentences are associated with distributivity. 6 The EPM –tul is attached after a case marker while the IPM –tul is attached before the case marker. 17 Given the data, the EPM does trigger a distributive reading in some contexts. It seems acceptable in the given examples. His claim that the EPM must appear in distributive contexts, is, however, too strong, because the occurrence of the EPM is not necessary to obtain a distributive reading. In (21), the sentence only allows a collective reading. It can be interpreted as meaning that all students gathered in the hallway. (21) Haksang-tul-i pokto-ey-tul moyessta. student-PL-NOM hallway-in-PL gather-PST-DEC „The students gathered in the hallway.‟ (An, 2007, p.7) An (2007) seems to agree that the EPM carries a distributive sense. She points out, however, that the EPM does not need to be only associated with distributivity. Instead, the reading with the EPM is also associated with a collective reading. As illustrated in (22), the sentences have a collective reading as well as a distributive reading. That is, it can be interpreted as meaning that each subject performs the action, or that all subjects perform the action together. As in (22a), for instance, it can be interpreted as meaning that each boy carried a piano for an hour or all boys carried a piano together for an hour. In the examples (22a) and (22b), the EPM carries both a distributive and a collective reading. 18 (22) a. 7 Namcaay-tul-i piano-lul-tul han sikan-tongan boy-PL-NOM piano-ACC-PL one hour-for nallassta. carry-PST-DEC „The boys carried the piano for an hour.‟ b. Yeccay-tul-i tteysmok-ul-tul mantulessta. girl-PL-NOM raft-ACC-PL build-PST-DEC „The girls built a raft.‟ c. Haksang-tul-i pokto-ey-tul moyessta. student-PL-NOM hallway-in-PL gather-PST-DEC „The students gathered in the hallway.‟ (An, 2007, p.7) The example (22c) only has a collective reading since the type of the predicate moyessta („gathered‟) itself gives a collective meaning. In this case, the EPM cannot force a distributive interpretation to the sentence. She argues that -tul as an EPM can be used regardless of the type of the predicate and then proposes that the occurrence of the EPM finally leads to an exhaustive effect. In order to argue for this approach, she draws an analogy between the Korean EPM and English „all‟. As one of the universal quantifiers, „all‟ is used in both a distributive and collective reading and also has an exhaustive effect. The properties of the EPM are similar to English „all‟. The reading with the EPM turns out to have an exhaustive effect. As illustrated in (23) below, the EPM –tul on the preposition phrase gives the exhaustivity to the interpretation of the given sentence. Therefore, according to her, the sentence is interpreted as meaning that all the girls must have jumped in the lake. 7 An (2007) proposes that the EPM –tul is attached after the case marker „-lul.‟ However, some native Korean speakers do not like this sentence because they think that it is ungrammatical. Rather, they prefer to use –tul before the case marker „-lul‟ as an IPM. 19 (23) Yehaksayng-tul-i hoswu-ey-tul ttwietulessta. girl-PL-NOM lake-in-PL jump-PST „The girls jumped all in the lake.‟ (An, 2007, p.18) Some argue that the EPM is associated with both distributivity and exhaustivity. Combining the two semantic properties above, Joh (2005) suggests that the EPM should be treated as both distributive and exhaustive. The use of the EPM is not satisfactorily described by only one of the semantic components. The example (24) reasonably demonstrates her claim. As in (24a), the IPM -tul is attached to the subject haksaeng („student‟) and allows a collective reading. The sentence can be interpreted as meaning that all first-year students built a raft together loudly. In (24b), however, -tul is attached to the adverb sikkurupkke („loudly‟) as well as the subject and gives both a distributive and an exhaustive reading. The sentence can be interpreted as meaning that each first-year student built a raft loudly, or that all of the first-year students built a raft loudly. (24) a. Ilhaknyen haksaeng-tul-i sikkurupkke ttaesmok-ul first-year student-PL-NOM loudly raft-ACC ciessta. build-PST-DEC „First-year students built a raft loudly.‟ 20 b. Ilhaknyen haksaeng-tul-i sikkurupkke-tul ttaesmok-ul first-year student-PL-NOM loudly-PL . raft-ACC ciessta. build-PST-DEC „First-year students all built a raft all loudly.‟ (Joh, 2005, p.174) In this thesis, we investigate the IPM –tul as a pluralizer. Also, we investigate whether the interpretation of the EPM as a pluralizer or an agreement marker is always associated to a plural interpretation of the subject. In our experiment, we do not test distributivity and exhaustivity. Rather, we only focus on the plural subject interpretation of the EPM. Given the data, however, it seems that much like the plural in English, it allows both distributive and exhaustive reading. I suggest that the IPM and the EPM play fundamentally the same role. That is, it is consistent that -tul gives a plural meaning even if it may have other additional interpretations. The only difference between the IPM and the EPM is the locus of the pluralization. In other words, the IPM gives a plural meaning to the NP to which it attaches. The EPM agrees with a plural subject, and, in cases of bare nouns, the EPM is still agreement, but it can be used to disambiguate the subject and force a plural interpretation of the subject. These circumstances raise questions about whether children know the use of the EPM and how they interpret it. To summarize, this chapter briefly examined the semantic and syntactic properties of –tul. Three points are crucial for this thesis: -tul is optional, the IPM –tul pluralizes the NPs, and the EPM –tul is associated with a plural interpretation of the subject. In the following chapter, we will discuss previous studies on the acquisition of plural morphology in some languages, including Korean. 21 CHAPTER 3 ACQUISITION BACKGROUND In this chapter, we discuss previous research on the acquisition of plural morphology in English, Spanish, and Korean. 3.1 Acquisition of Plural Morphology The acquisition of plural morphology has been investigated in many languages. Using free speech and elicitation tasks, Berko (1958) tested children‟s production of the English plural morphemes in novel words. Subjects were preschoolers aged between four and five and firstgrade students aged between five and a half and seven. In the experiment, picture cards that were colored and cartoon-like were presented with the novel words, and the relevant texts were read. Then, the children were asked to pluralize nouns. The text that described the card was read (e.g., “This is a wug. Now there is another one. There are two of them. There are two ___”). The results showed that before four years of age, children could apply the plural morpheme to the new words. Also, there were age differences in their ability to produce the plurals. First graders performed better than preschoolers. Brown (1973) proposed an order of morpheme acquisition in English. He conducted a longitudinal study to test children‟s acquisition of English morphemes. He taped three children, Adam, Eve, and Sarah, who were native speakers of English. He found that the three children acquired English morphemes more or less in the same order, even if the rate of acquisition was different individually. Based on the findings, he suggested five stages of language development in terms of morphology and syntax. In stage Ι, children aged between 15 and 30 months produce about 1.75 morphemes („that car‟ or „give ball‟). In stage II, children between 28 and 36 months, 22 learn to use „–s plurals‟ as well as „-ing‟, „in‟ and „on‟. In stage III, children between 36 and 42 months learn the „irregular past tense‟, „-s possessives‟ and „uncontractible copula‟. In stage IV, children between 40 and 46 months learn „articles‟, „regular past tense‟, ‟third person regular‟ and „present tense‟. In stage V, children between 42 and 52 months learn „third person irregular‟, „auxiliary‟ and „contractible copula‟. He argued that complexity in syntax and semantics affects the order of morpheme acquisition. More complex morphemes are acquired later. The plural morpheme was shown to be relatively easy and was produced in stage two between 28 to 34 months of age. Recently, Ferenz and Prasada (2002) investigated how children use singular and plural forms of nouns. They tested 48 English-speaking children aged from 20 to 66 months. In one experiment, they used an elicited production task to test if children use either referential or syntactic information to interpret the form of count nouns. They used a stuffed Big Bird doll that performed certain actions and asked the children to help him remember what he had done. In a trial, the children had two rows of three small toy animals (e.g., three dogs and three cats). The experimenter performed some actions on the animals. (e.g., “Big Bird sang a song to this one, and then, he sang a song to this one, and then, he sang a song to this one”). Then, the experimenter asked the child to remember what Big Bird had done. The child was presented with a sentence fragment. (e.g., “Big Bird sang a song to each ______” or “Big Bird sang a song to one of the _____”). The results showed that at about two years of age children can use both referential and syntactic information to determine the form of count nouns. They found that infants began to produce the plural at around two years of age, based on both morpho-syntactic and referential properties. 23 In another experiment, they used an act-out task to test how children use referential information when they use singular and plural forms and how they understand properties of the quantifiers one, two, three, each, all and the determiner the. In the experiment, children were asked to play a game with Big Bird and helped him to get things for going to the park. For instance, there were three frogs and three sharks in a tray. The children were told what Big Bird wanted them to do (e.g., “Big Bird wants you to put the sharks in the tray” or “Big Bird want you to put the shark(Ø) in the tray”). In these two experiments, they investigated how children use linguistic information in singular and plural forms. Kouider et al. (2006) used a preferential looking paradigm to test infants‟ knowledge of the plural morpheme on nouns. They recruited 20- to 36-month-old children. In their four experiments, twelve novel objects (e.g., blinket) were used for experimental words (e.g., truck), and twelve known objects were used for fillers. Two arrays of objects were presented on two different monitors. A single object was presented in one monitor and a set of eight objects was presented in the other monitor. Then, infants were told a sentence which could be singular or plural and matched with one of the pictures. In experiment 1 and 2, they heard linguistic markers of number on the verb (are vs. is), on the quantifier (a vs. some), and on the noun (-s vs. Ø). For example, one of the testing sentences with the novel words was “Look, there is a blicket” or “Look, there are some blickets”. In experiment 3 and 4, infants heard linguistic markers of number only on the noun (e.g., “Look at the blicketS” or “Look at the blicket”). Then, the two displays remained for six seconds in the two monitors after the first plural information in the sentence. The correct display danced on the screen to music and the other display disappeared. The results showed that 24-month-olds understood the singular-plural distinction with markers of number on the verb, on the noun and with quantifiers. 36-month-olds understood the singular- 24 plural distinction with markers of number only on the noun. In other words, before 24 months of age, infants understand the singular-plural distinction. It seems that various cues for plural or singular are helpful for 24-month-old children. Wood et al. (2009) used a manual search paradigm to investigate the development of the distinction between English singular and plural. They recruited 20- and 24-month-old children. In their experiment, the children were presented with a box and four objects, two familiar objects (e.g., car/cat) and the other two novel objects (e.g., blicket/klog). Infants were shown the experimenter placing these four objects in the box. Then, the experimenter moved the box behind a curtain out of view of the child. The infants could reach but not see the objects in the box. Then, the experiment pushed the box toward the child and asked them to get one of these (e.g., “Could you get the [car/cat/blicket/klog] for me?”). Infants heard a verbal description that described certain objects in the box, which could be either singular (e.g., “Could you get my car for me?”) or plural (e.g., “Could you get my cars for me?”). Lastly, the infants were allowed to search for these in the box for ten seconds. One of the findings in their study was that 24-month-old infants used plural markings to search for „more than one object‟ in a box. Based on the studies above, it is clear that the plural in English is acquired before three years of age. Miller (2007) argues that the acquisition of plural morphology is influenced by variable and inconsistent input. The idea is based on Yang‟s (2002) Variation Model of language acquisition. If input is consistent and frequent, children learn early. If input is variable, children take longer to learn. That is, the more reliable the language to which the child is exposed, the quicker he or she will learn. Miller studied the acquisition of plural in two dialects of Spanish, Mexico City Spanish and Chilean Spanish. Plural is always marked in Mexico City Spanish while it is often omitted in Chilean Spanish due to syllable-final /s/ lenition. 25 In the experiments for production of plural morphology, children aged between four and five years old were recruited, and three different production tasks were conducted: a free speech task, a repetition task, and a naming task. In order to collect data, the free speech task was used since subjects could freely talk about topics of interest (e.g., cartoons for children / family for adults). In the repetition task, pictures were used, and subjects were asked to repeat statements that the experimenter made about each picture (e.g., some firemen are eating apples). In the naming task, sets of toys were used and subjects were asked to name the toys. Each question was ¿Qué son? (“What are they?”) in which the existential verb shows no agreement. The results showed that Mexico City Spanish-speaking children, who were exposed to consistent input for plural morphology, systematically produce the plural morpheme. On the other hand, Chilean Spanish-speaking children, who were exposed to variable and ambiguous input for plural morphology, showed variable behaviors, sometimes producing the plural morpheme and sometimes omitting it. The results support Miller‟s (2007) Variability Delay Hypothesis that variable input delays the acquisition of plural morphology. In the experiments for comprehension of plural morphology, seven experimental studies were conducted: three act-out tasks, three picture matching tasks, an elicitation task. In study 1, an act-out task was used to investigate children‟s interpretation of plural and singular indefinite noun phrases. Each child was presented with some sets of objects and asked children to place some items in a small box (e.g., Pon pocas bolitas en la caja “Put few marbles in the box”). In study 2 and 3, a picture matching task was used to test child comprehension of the singular and plural indefinites. In study 2, each subject was presented with pairs of pictures and asked children questions by pointing to the appropriate picture (e.g., ¿En cuál de las dos tarjetas hay unas botellas? “In which of the two cards are there some bottles?”). In study 3, each subject was 26 presented with short narratives about some children taking a trip and asked questions with either plural indefinites unos/unas „some.M.PL/some.F.PL‟ or singular indefinites un/una „a/one.M.PL/a/one/F.PL‟. In study 4, an elicitation task was used to examine whether Chilean and Mexican children distinguish „one‟ from „more than one‟. Children were asked to name pictures of animals (e.g., ¿Qué hay aquí? “What‟s here?”). Study 4, in fact, is not a comprehension task, but it was placed in the chapter on comprehension, since the elicitation task, unlike the production tasks, involved naming plural and singular objects to test whether children use the plural morpheme to distinguish plural from singular. In study 5, a picture matching task was used to determine whether Chilean children associate the plural morpheme with an interpretation of „more than one‟ by testing their comprehension of bare plural s vs. bare singulars. Children were presented with four short narratives about some children taking a trip and asked questions with either bare plurals llaves/libras „key.F.PL/books.M.PL‟ or bare singular llave/libro „key.F.PL/book.M.PL‟. In study 6, an act-out task was used to test definite noun phrases involving inalienable possession. Subjects were shown a doll and asked to do activities (e.g., Tócale la/las rodilla „Touch her knee/knees‟). In Study 7, an act-out task was used to test Chilean and Mexican children interpretation of the plural morpheme in definite noun phrases with a referential interpretation. Subjects were presented with a display and asked do activities (e.g., Dame la Muñeca/ Muñecas dormidas al lado la casa “Give me the dolls (that are) asleep next to the house”). The findings of the comprehension studies show different results for three groups of children: 1) Mexican Working Class children (MexWC children), 2) Chilean Working Class children (ChWC children), and 3) Chilean Middle Class children (ChMC children). At age five, MexWC children associated plural morpheme to an interpretation „more than one‟, and ChWC children did not. ChMC children, like MexWC children, associated the 27 plural morpheme to an interpretation of „more than one‟, but they differently behaved from MexWC children on the plural indefinites unos/unas and the overt partitive uno de los. ChMC children paid attention to both lexical information of the determiner and the plural morpheme. It seemed that MexWC children and ChMC children were different in the development of plural morphology. In the experiments for comprehension, the results for Mexican children and Chilean children supported the Variability Delay Hypothesis. Munn et al. (2009) showed similar results in acquisition for the Mandarin Chinese pluralizer –men, which behaves similarly to the Korean pluralizer -tul. Like Korean, Chinese is also a classifier language. The Chinese pluralizer is interpreted as both definite and plural and it is associated with an associative reading. The researchers tested children aged three- to tenyears-old to investigate whether the children knew both definiteness and plurality properties of men. In a Truth Value Judgment Test set of experiments, they presented pictures and told a story related to the picture. Then, children were asked to respond with “Yes” or “No”. The results showed that the three age groups were different from each other. Mandarin Chinese speaking children at ages three and four did not recognize -men as plural or maximal. Five- and six-yearold children recognized -men as plural, but did not treat it as maximal. Seven- to ten-year-old children treated -men as plural and maximal, as adults do. Chinese children did not completely acquire the plural morpheme -men until sometime between the ages of seven and ten. Like Spanish and Korean, it seems that the acquisition of Chinese pluralizer is also delayed supporting the idea that unreliable input delays acquisition. Notice however that unlike the Spanish plural in Chilean which is just not overtly realized, the Mandarin –men is truly optional, except with pronouns. Furthermore, while the Spanish plural has no restrictions, -men, like Korean –tul, is restricted to animates. Finally, the Mandarin –men is also definite, unlike the Spanish plural. 28 Few studies have attempted to investigate the acquisition of Korean plural marking. Park (2010) studied the acquisition of two Korean pluralizers, the IPM -tul and –ne. In three experiments, a Truth Value Judgment Task (TVJT) was used to test four- and five-year-old children. In each experiment, pictures were presented along with stories. Then, target sentences were presented, which subjects had to accept or reject on the basis of the interpretation. For instance, “In the ocean, two whales swam. One of them went away to take a nap. The other one blew water”. Then, subjects decided if Gore-tul-i mul-eul ppum-ess-da.(„Whales blew water‟) or Bada-e gore du-mari-ga suyeong-eul hago-iss-oss-da. („In the ocean, two whales swam.‟) was true of false. The goal was to investigate if children knew that the two pluralizers are associated with a plural interpretation, that –tul was associated with an exhaustive reading, and –ne is associated with an associative reading. The results showed that most children failed to interpret the two morphemes as plural, as most adults would. This would seem to indicate that they had not acquired these plural markings. The results supported the hypothesis that the acquisition of plural morpheme is delayed as a result of the input being unreliable and inconsistent. As with Spanish, the input for plural marking is not systematic because plurality is not obligatorily marked. Korean children had not acquired the plural by age five. Compared to English children, who learn obligatory plural morphemes by age three, they were hence much delayed. Nakano et al. (2009) examined the acquisition of the Japanese pluralizer –tati with the Korean pluralizer –tul, since neither is always marked or has a definite interpretation. They recruited four and five year old children. A Truth Value Judgment Task (TVJT) was used to investigate if subjects associated these pluralizers with a plural interpretation, a maximality presupposition, and the associative reading. The findings of the Korean portion of the study were the same as Park‟s (2010). The results also showed that, by the age of six, Japanese were not 29 adult-like in the interpretation of –tati, and that adults and children show no maximality effect and no preference for the associative interpretation for the pluralizer. In the perspective of the acquisition, their findings supported the hypothesis that the optionality of the pluralizer delays the acquisition of the morphology. Since there have been few studies conducted on the acquisition of the Korean plural morphology, further studies on the Korean pluralizer that involve subjects who are older than five-year-old children, especially on the EPM –tul, are needed. 30 CHAPTER 4 A STUDY In this chapter, we propose the hypotheses and present an experiment testing children‟s knowledge of the IPM and the EPM –tul. The study that we present here examines children of the ages of six, seven, and eight years old, since Park (2010) has already shown that children younger than these ages do not know the IPM –tul. 4.1 Hypotheses & Predictions Miller (2007), following Yang (2002), argues that when input is variable, acquisition is delayed. In her study of plural acquisition, Chilean Spanish children were delayed in acquiring the plural morpheme in comparison to Mexico City Spanish children, but were adult-like by the age of seven. The variability in Chilean Spanish with respect to plural marking is different from that in Korean. Plural marking is obligatory in Spanish, but the form is not always realized due to a phonological process that weakens syllable final –s. The Korean pluralizer, on the other hand, is truly optional and also has animacy restrictions and perhaps other restrictions since it is incompatible with numbers, which suggests that it is less frequent. We have seen that by the age of five, children have not yet acquired –tul (Park, 2010). This leads to our first hypothesis: H1) Optional realization of a morpheme delays acquisition. Korean children are exposed to less plural morphology than Chilean Spanish children, since there are many restrictions on the use of the pluralizer in Korean (it never appears on inanimate nouns and never with numbers). If frequency plays a role, Korean children will take longer than Chilean Spanish children to acquire the rule for 31 plurality. P1) Korean children will not acquire plural morphology that is adult-like until age seven. As already discussed, the IPM –tul is associated with the noun to which it attaches and gives a plural interpretation to the noun. The interpretation of the IPM is quite consistently fixed as plural. The place to which -tul is attached does not affect its interpretation. In other words, -tul should force a plural interpretation to the noun to which it attaches, regardless of where it appears. H2) We hypothesize that once children learn the meaning of –tul, they will not make any distinctions between subject and indirect object position. P2) If children know the IPM properties, they would respond equally to the IPM –tul in subject and indirect object position. Third, the literature presented in the previous chapter, in particular Chung (2003) and An (2007), indicates that there is a close relation between a subject and the EPM –tul in interpretation. The interpretation of the EPM is always related to the subject in a sentence. This idea leads to our third hypothesis about the use of the EPM as follows. H3) We hypothesize that since –tul is attached to a non-pluralizable element, it will be interpreted as agreement with the subject. 32 P3) If children know the use of the EPM -tul, they will interpret sentences with the EPM on the verb as involving a plural interpretation of the subject. Fourth, the Korean pluralizer –tul is used either as the IPM or as the EPM. As seen in the previous chapter, –tul as the IPM and the EPM gives a plural interpretation. The significant difference between them is the place at which it attaches. The IPM is attached to the nominal and pluralizes the NP to which it attaches. On the other hand, the EPM is attached to non-nominal (specifically verbs in our study) and pluralizes the subject in a sentence. That is, the IPM is most local while the EPM is less local to the place that is pluralized. Presumably, such a property of -tul could affect the acquisition. According to Brown (1973), the English plural morpheme –s (e.g., my cars) is consistently produced by three years of age. On the other hand, third person /s/ (e.g., “He swims” or “The man brings”) is produced at around age four. In accordance with Brown‟s (1973) suggestion, Johnson et al. (2005) argue that children have a harder time using verbal morphology in interpretation. In the experiments, they recruited three- to six-year-old English speaking children. They focused on the comprehension of third person singular /s/ as a number agreement marker (e.g., The duck swims vs. The ducks swimØ), rather than on the production. The results indicated that children under the age of five were not sensitive to third person singular verbal morphology as a clue to determine number on the subject, when the number on the subject is marked by the consonant of the following word, the verb in this case. As previous research has shown, the plural morphology acquired much earlier than verbal morphology. 33 H4) The IPM and the EPM –tul are attached to different elements in the clause. The IPM pluralizes the NP locally while the EPM is an agreement with a plural subject. Therefore, it is reasonable to hypothesize that the IPM will be acquired before the EPM. P4) Children would learn the IPM earlier than the EPM. Older children have been exposed to more plurals than younger children. Possibly, they could have more opportunities to evaluate their own grammar. This general observation leads us to the fifth hypothesis. H5) If there are some age differences in the acquisition of the linguistic ability, younger children will make more errors than older children. In other words, the older they are, the fewer errors they make. P5) Eight-year-olds will perform better than six- and seven-year-olds. Based on the hypotheses and predictions above, we designed an experiment testing the IPM and the EPM. In the next section, we will introduce the materials used to test our hypotheses and results. 34 4.2 Experiment 4.2.1 Subjects Subjects were 80 adult native speakers of Korean from Pukyong National University and 60 children, who were acquiring Korean as their native language in Busan, Korea. The ages of all subjects are illustrated in detail in Table 1 below. All adults were between the ages of 20 and 29 years old. All children were between six to eight years old. Children were separated into three groups according to their ages. Group 1 had 20 children, all of who were six years old. Group 2 had 20 children, all of who were seven years old. Group 3 had 20 children, all of whom were eight years old. In Korea, children generally start to attend schools at the age of seven. Hence, group 1 was comprised of preschool children and groups 2 and 3 of schoolchildren. All children were recruited from four different local childcare centers in Busan, Korea. Table 1. Ages of subjects N Group 1 (6yrs) Group 2 (7yrs) Group 3 (8yrs) Adults (20-29yrs) Mean Range Standard Deviation 20 5.9 5;5-6;4 .293 20 7.0 6;5-7;5 .264 20 8.0 7;5-8;4 .283 80 N/A N/A 35 N/A 4.2.2 Design We used a Truth Value Judgment Task (TVJT) as explained in Gordon (1996) and Crain and Thornton (1998). This task allows children to judge target sentences in the context of a short story. Also, experimenters can investigate children‟s grammar and interpretations. For instance, a child will agree to a target sentence if the interpretation of the target sentence is true in the context. The child will reject the target sentence if the interpretation is false in the context. In our experiment, all participants responded with “Yes” or “No” to a question regarding a situation. Children‟s understanding of target sentences with –tul could thus be evaluated. Children were presented with short stories describing the events in the pictures. After the stories, images from the last picture remained in the display, and the target sentence was read. Then, participants made a decision regarding whether the target sentence was true or false. With this method, we examined the participants‟ interpretations of target sentences with -tul. Each target sentence contained a ditransitive verb. The goal was to compare children‟s knowledge of the IPM and the EPM –tul. In a ditransitive sentence, there were three noun phrases that could be pluralized: a subject, an Indirect Object (I.O), and a Direct Object (D.O). In all the experimental sentences, the properties of the direct object remained constant. Subjects were either one-NP (e.g., one rabbit), NP-tul (e.g., rabbits), or NP-bare (e.g., rabbit), which can have a singular or a plural interpretation. Indirect objects also varied in that there could be oneNP, NP-bare, or NP-tul. Direct objects were always fixed as singular, one-NP. Verbs either had –tul or did not. The manipulation of subject, indirect object and verb allowed us to create six conditions. All the conditions are illustrated in Table 2 below. 36 Table 2. Six conditions of target sentences Subject Indirect Object Direct Object Verb Condition 1 ONE-ONE one-NP (ex. one rabbit) one-NP (ex. one turtle) one-NP (ex. one umbrella) bare (ex. share) Condition 2 ONE-TUL one-NP (ex. one dog) NP-tul (ex. sheep) one-NP (ex. way) bare (ex. show) Condition 3 TUL-ONE NP-tul (ex. monkeys) one-NP (ex. one squirrel) one-NP (ex. one banana) bare (ex. feed) Condition 4 BARE-ONE-TUL bare (ex. bear) one-NP (ex. one owl) one-NP (ex. one nest) V-tul (ex. give-tul) Condition 5 BARE-BARE-TUL bare (ex. bird) bare (ex. lion) one-NP (ex. one song) V-tul (ex. sing-tul) Condition 6 TUL-BARE NP-tul (ex. elephants) bare (ex. mouse) one-NP (ex. water) bare (ex. sprinkle) The six conditions show the subject, the indirect object, and the verb form. In Condition1, ONEONE, both subject and indirect object are one-NP. In Condition 2, ONE-TUL, the subject is oneNP, and the indirect object is NP-tul. In Condition 3, TUL-ONE, the subject is NP-tul, and the indirect object is one-NP. In Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, the subject is a bare noun, the indirect object is one-NP, and the verb is V-tul. In Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, the subject and indirect object are bare nouns, and the verb is V-tul. In Condition 6, TUL-BARE, the subject is NP-tul, and the indirect object is a bare noun. For each condition, there were four test items. Two were expected to be true and two were expected to false. 37 Each participant received 24 experimental sentences, divided into six conditions. Four items (pictures + stories) were used per condition. There were two versions of the test so that all experimental materials could be counterbalanced (see Appendix for Version 1 and 2). Each setup consisted of four slides in a Power Point presentation as shown in Figure1. Target Sentences had the following form: Subject, Indirect Object, Direct Object, Verb (S I.O D.O V). Figure 1.One of the six items (For interpretation of the references to color in this and all other figures, the reader is referred to the electronic version of this thesis.) Pictures Story & the following question Story1-1 Mayu hwachanghan nal i-ta. Very sunny day be-DEC „It is a very sunny day.‟ Kepuki-tul-i sanchay-ul nawa-ss-ta. Turtle-PL-NOM walk-ACC go-PST-DEC „Turtles are going out for a walk.‟ Story 1-2 Kapcaki pi-ka nayliki all of sudden rain-TOP falling „All of sudden, it starts to rain.‟ sicakha-n-ta. start-PRS-DEC Story1-3 Kepuki twi-ey thokki-ka turtle beyond-LOC rabbit-NOM „Right beyond turtles, a rabbit(s) appears.‟ Thokki-un usan-ul tulko Rabbit-NOM umbrella-ACC with „It is coming with an umbrella/umbrellas.‟ 38 natana-n-ta. appear-PRS-DEC o-n-ta. come-PRS-DEC Figure 1. (cont‟d) Question 1 for Condition 1 Thokki han mali-ka kepuki han mali-eykey rabbit one CL-NOM turtle one CL-DAT hana-lul ssu-ywecu-ko i-ss-ta. one-ACC use-give-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „One rabbit is sharing one umbrella with one turtle.‟ usan umbrella Predicted correct answer → True / False Note. All items are seen in Appendix. 4.2.3 Conditions Condition 1_ONE-ONE In Condition1, ONE-ONE, both subject and indirect object are one-NP, which must receive a singular interpretation. This condition, ONE-ONE, was used as a control to investigate if children understood one-NP as referring to a single object. A noun phrase should be interpreted as singular when the number one and the related classifier are attached to the noun. In Condition 1, two noun phrases, the subject and the indirect object, should be interpreted as singular. The sentence should be judged True in Item1 and False in Item 2, provided the implicature of „exactly one‟ was calculated. If not, then it could also be true when the interpretation „at least one‟ was also available. 8 8 Huang et al. (2004) discussed the interpretation of number words by young children to account for the semantic meanings of number words. They pointed out that the acquisition of number words has been largely understood by two viewpoints: 1) numbers have exact semantics (two means EXACTLY TWO) and 2) numbers have lower-bounded semantics (AT LEAST TWO). In their experiments, they found that two- and three-year-olds interpreted two to mean exact two at an early stage of development. They concluded that numbers have exact meanings. 39 Figure 2. Four items for Condition 1_ONE-ONE Item 1: Rabbit & Turtle Picture Target sentence Thokki han mali-ka kepuki han mali-eykey rabbit one CL-NOM turtle one CL-DAT ssu-ywecu-ko i-ss-ta. use-give-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „One rabbit is sharing one umbrella with one turtle.‟ usan hana-lul umbrella one-ACC Predicted correct answer → True / False Item 2: Dog & Sheep Picture Target sentence Kay han mali-ka yang han mali-eykey kil-ul annayhaycu-ko dog one-CL-NOM sheep one-CL-DAT way-ACC show-CONJ „One dog is showing the way to one sheep.‟ Predicted correct answer → True / False 40 i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Figure 2. (cont‟d) Item 3: Monkey & Squirrel Picture Target sentence Wensungi han mali-ka talamcwi han mali-eykey panana han kay-lul mekyecu-ko monkey one-CL-NOM squirrel one-CL-DAT banana one-CL-ACC feed-CONJ i-ss-ta be-PRG-DEC „One monkey is feeding one banana to one squirrel.‟ Predicted correct answer → True / False Item 4: Bear & Owl Picture Target sentence Kom han mali-ka puengi han mali-eykey tungci han kay-lul cu-ko i-ss-ta. bear one-CL-NOM owl one-CL-DAT net one-CL-ACC give-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „One bear is giving one net to one owl.‟ Predicted correct answer → True / False Condition 1, ONE-ONE, has two true and two false as target answers for four different items. The same was done for all five other conditions (see Appendix for all the conditions and items in the second version of the experiment). 41 Condition 2_ONE-TUL In Condition 2, ONE-TUL, the subject has „one‟, which is singular, and the indirect object has –tul, which is plural. This condition, ONE-TUL, tested whether children knew the interpretation of the IPM –tul when it was attached to the indirect object. In this case, the indirect object should refer to a plurality. For instance, the subject should refer to „one dog‟, and the indirect object should refer to „sheep‟, as seen in Figure 3. The comparison between the answers for Condition 1, ONE-ONE, and Condition 2, ONE-TUL, tested whether children knew the difference between one-NP and NP-tul. If they knew that one-NP is interpreted as singular, and NP-tul is interpreted as plural, they should have the same behavior as adults and accept a picture with a multiplicity of nouns in indirect object position and reject it when the indirect object in the picture was a singleton, as illustrated in Figure 3 below. Figure 3. Condition 2_ONE-TUL (One Dog-Sheep) Picture Target sentence Kay han mali-ka yang-tul-eykey kil-ul annayhaycu-ko dog one-CL-NOM sheep-PL-DAT way-ACC show-CONJ „One dog is showing the way to sheep.‟ Predicted correct answer → True / False 42 i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Condition 3_ TUL-ONE In Condition 3, TUL-ONE, the subject is pluralized with –tul, and the indirect object is one-NP, singular. Here, the subject is plural and the indirect object is singular. The comparison between Condition 2, ONE-TUL, and Condition 3, TUL-ONE, tested whether there was any difference when –tul was attached to the subject as opposed to the indirect object. The IPM –tul should pluralize the closest NP to which -tul is attached, rather than simply any NP in the clause. The logic, here, is simple. The subject should be interpreted as plural when –tul is attached to the subject. And, the indirect object should be interpreted as plural when –tul is attached to the indirect object. If children know this, they should reject the target sentence with the picture in Figure 3 for Condition 2, ONE-TUL. In Figure 3, there is „one dog‟ and „one sheep‟. For the target sentence in Condition 2, ONE-TUL, however, the subject should be interpreted as „one dog‟ and the indirect object should be interpreted as „more than one sheep‟ since –tul is attached to the indirect object. In Figure 2, the picture and the target sentence do not match. In Condition 3, TUL-ONE, if children knew the interpretation of subject–tul, they should accept the picture with the target sentence in Figure 3 below. In the picture, there are „two monkeys‟ as the subject and „one squirrel‟ as the indirect object. For the target sentence in Condition 3, TUL-ONE, the subject, should be interpreted as referring to a plural set, „more than one monkey‟, since –tul is attached to the subject. The indirect object should be interpreted as singular, „one squirrel‟. The target sentence is correctly matched with the picture to the left, but not with the one on the right. 43 Figure 4. Condition 3_ TUL-ONE (Monkeys-One Squirrel) Picture Target sentence Wensungi-tul -i talamcwi han mali-eykey panana han kay-lul monkey-PL-NOM squirrel one-CL-DAT banana one-CL-ACC mekyecu-ko i-ss-ta. feed-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „Monkeys are feeding one banana to one squirrel.‟ Predicted correct answer → True / False Expected answer → True / False Condition 4_ BARE-ONE-TUL Now, what happens when-tul is attached to the verb, rather than to the noun phrase, as in the previous cases? In Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, the subject is a bare noun, the indirect object is singular, and –tul is attached to the verb. In this condition, the subject would be expected to be interpreted as a plural since –tul attached to the verb signals a plural subject. For instance, the subject should be interpreted as „more than one bear‟, and the indirect object should be „one owl‟. Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, should be interpreted identically to Condition 3, TUL-ONE. That is, –tul attached to the verb and –tul attached to the subject give the same interpretation of plurality of the subject. In these two conditions, the subjects should be interpreted as plural, and the indirect object should be interpreted as singular. Condition 5_ BARE-BARE-TUL In Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, the subject and indirect object are both bare nouns that could be either singular or plural, and –tul is attached to the verb. In this condition, the subject should be interpreted as plural, not the object, since –tul attached to the verb is associated 44 to its plural subject, just like Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL. Therefore, only the subject is obligatorily plural. Both Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, and Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, tested how children dealt with –tul when it is attached to the verb. If children knew that –tul attached to the verb gave a plural subject interpretation, they should reject the picture with the target sentence in Figure 5 below. Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, differs from Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, in that there are two potential noun phrases with which the EPM-tul could agree. Figure 5. Condition 4_ BARE-ONE-TUL (Bear-One Owl-give-Tul) Picture Target sentence Kom-i puengi han mali-eykey tungci han kay-lul cu-ko-tul i-ss-ta. bear-NOM owl one-CL-DAT net one-CL-ACC give-CONJ-PL be-PRG-DEC „Bears are giving one net to one owl.‟ Expected answer → True / False In the picture, there is „one bear‟ and „one owl‟. In the target sentence, „bear‟ is a bare noun, and it could be singular or plural. The bear, however, should be interpreted as plural since –tul is attached to the verb. The picture does not match with the target sentence, since there is only „one bear‟. In the same way, if children knew about the interpretation of –tul attached to the verb, they should accept the picture with the target sentence in Figure 6 below. There are „two birds‟ singing to „one lion‟ in the picture. In the target sentence, the subject should be interpreted as „more than one bird‟ since –tul is attached to the verb „sing‟. The indirect object could still be 45 interpreted as either „one lion‟ or „more than one lion‟ since it is a bare noun. Finally, the plural subject in the target sentence corresponded with „two birds‟ in the picture. Figure 6. Condition 5_ BARE-BARE-TUL (Bird-Lion-sing-Tul) Picture Target sentence Say-ka saca-eykey nolayha-ycu-ko-tul bird-NOM lion-DAT sing-give-CONJ-PL „Birds are singing a song to one lion/lions.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Predicted correct answer → True / False Predicted correct answer → True / False Condition 6_ TUL-BARE Lastly, Condition 6, TUL-BARE, the subject has –tul, the indirect object is a bare noun, and the verb is bare. That is, the only thing that should be obligatorily pluralized is the subject. For instance, the subject should be „more than one elephant‟, and the indirect object could be either „one mouse‟ or „more than one mouse‟. Condition 6, TUL-BARE, tested whether children knew that it should be treated exactly the same as Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL. If children know both the IPM and the EPM, they should reject the picture with the target sentence in Figure 6. In the picture, there is „one elephant‟ and „one mouse‟ in the lake. The target sentence, however, should give a meaning of „more than one elephant‟ as the subject since –tul is attached to the subject. The indirect object could be either „one mouse‟ or „more than one mouse‟ since it is a bare noun. In Figure 7 below, the picture does not correspond to the target sentence. In this condition, the subject must be 46 obligatorily interpreted as plural, and the indirect object, which is bare, could be either singular or plural. Finally, the interpretation of Condition 6, TUL-BARE, is the same as Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL. Figure 7. Condition 6_ TUL-BARE (Elephants-Mouse) Picture Target sentence Khokkili-tul-i cui-eykey mwul-ul elephant-TUL-NOM mouse-DAT water-ACC „Elephants are sprinkling water to one mouse/mice.‟ ppuly-ecu-ko sprinkle-give-CONJ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Predicted correct answer → True / False As seen above, a total of six conditions were used in our experiment to assess how the position of –tul influences children‟s ability to interpret it as plural. Under these conditions, the experiments were performed to investigate how children interpreted the use of –tul. 4.2.4 Method Each child was tested in a small isolated room, in order not to be disturbed by others. The child sat next to the experimenter, and they watched the computer screen together. The trial was recorded with a video camera in front of the child. Before the experiment started, a simple question was given with a picture of an animal to warm up. For example, the child was shown a picture with a rabbit on the grass. “Look, there is a rabbit on the grass. Do you think it is right? Or is it a turtle on the grass?” The experimenter encouraged them to answer either true or false and explained what was going to be done. The child was expected to match the picture with the 47 sentence of the question. They did not indicate any sign of confusion or misunderstanding. All of them answered the warm-up questions correctly. In the experiment, the stories were told by the experimenter. The pictures were seen in the screen. The last picture remained in the screen while the target sentence was being read. Children answered true or false. The participants were separated into two groups that got different target sentences in the same stories. Therefore, all the materials were counterbalanced. Figure 8 below shows one example of the testing materials. For Group 1, the target sentence was “A rabbit is sharing an umbrella with a turtle”. The subject was „one rabbit‟, and the indirect object was „one turtle.‟ For Group 2, the target sentence was, “A turtle is sharing an umbrella with a rabbit.” Here, the subject was „one turtle‟ and the indirect object was „one rabbit‟. Figure 8. An example of switching the subject and the indirect object Group A: Rabbit & Turtle Picture Target sentence Thokki han mali-ka kepuki han mali-eykey usan-han a-lul rabbit one-CL-NOM turtle one-CL-DAT umbrella one-CL-ACC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC „One rabbit is sharing one umbrella with one turtle.‟ Predicted correct answer → True / False ssu-ywecu-ko use-give-CONJ Predicted correct answer → True / False 48 Figure 8. (cont‟d) Group B: Turtle & Rabbit Picture Target sentence Kepuki han mali-ka thokk han mali-eykey usan-hana-lul turtle one-CL-NOM rabbit one-CL-DAT umbrella one-CL-ACC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC „One turtle is sharing one umbrella with one rabbit.‟ Predicted correct answer → True / False ssu-ywecu-ko use-give-CONJ Predicted correct answer → True / False All the experimental sentences were the same for both adults and children, except for how they were presented. The difference was that, for children, the stories and questions were repeated when they did not understand, did not respond at all, or kept changing answers. However, the questions were said only once for adults. Moreover, 48 filler questions were used for adults, so the purpose of the experiment was not apparent to them. The filler questions were all about weather, colors, heights, or actions, which were not related to plurality at all. The target questions and filler questions are in the ratio of 1:2. 4.2.5 Predictions Miller (2007) proposes the Variability Delay Hypothesis. She argues that variable input will delay the acquisition of grammatical morphology since the variability brings about ambiguity. In the case of Korean, children will take more time compared to English children, who master the plural morpheme before three years of age because the input of the plural morpheme is consistent. Also, Korean children will take longer to learn plural morphology than 49 Chilean Spanish children, according to our hypothesis. In Spanish, plural marking is obligatory, but it is not always realized due to a phonological process. On the other hand, the Korean pluralizer is truly optional and has animacy restrictions. Thus, the use of the Korean pluralizer is less frequent than that of Spanish. Second, the IPM -tul is associated with the noun to which it attaches and gives a plural interpretation to the noun. If children know the interpretation of –tul, they will interpret it as plural. Also, –tul plays the same role in subject and indirect object position. If children know the role of –tul, they will perform well when it is attached either to the subject or the indirect object. Third, based on the observation of the use of the EPM –tul, it is expected that the EPM –tul is associated with its subject in a sentence. If the use of the EPM is related to its subject, adults‟ interpretation will confirm this hypothesis. If children understand this relation between the subject and the EPM, they will exhibit similar interpretations. Fourth, researchers have found that each inflection is acquired at different stages by young children (Brown, 1973; Hsieh et al., 1999; Johnson et al., 2005). For instance, verb inflections are harder to acquire than noun inflections in the case of English. Comparing the understanding of the IPM and the EPM –tul, the EPM will be harder to master since it pluralizes the subject in a sentence wherever it is attached. The EPM can be close or far from the pluralized element, the subject, which is less local. The IPM may be a lot easier for children since it pluralizes the closest NP, which is most local. Lastly, age differences will be found in terms of the linguistic ability. Six-year-old children will perform differently from eight-year-old children. Over years, children will become more adult-like. 50 4.2.6 Results We used the responses of adults as a control group to compare three different age groups, six, seven, and eight-year-old children. Descriptive statistics for adults‟ responses are illustrated in Table 3 below. In order to analyze the results, we only extracted expected correct “No” responses from our data. Conroy (2009) discusses the Principle of Charity, a widespread assumption on using the True Value Judgment Task, and which proposes that children tend to assent to the truth of a sentence if they can. In a scenario, for instance, a target sentence is true even if it is ambiguous in such a way that the scenario makes only one reading of the sentence true. By using correct “No” responses, we can evaluate children‟s grammatical knowledge with more accuracy. Table 3. Percentage of predicted correct responses by adults All (“Yes” and “No”) responses Only “No” responses Cond 1 ONE-ONE 87% (278/320) 81% (129/160) Cond 2 ONE-TUL 84% (268/320) 86% (138/160) Cond 3 TUL-ONE 83% (264/320) 84% (134/160) Cond 4 BARE-ONE-TUL 73% (232/320) 81% (130/160) Cond 5 BARE-BARE-TUL 68% (219/320) 67% (107/160) Cond 6 TUL-BARE Note. N = 80. 87% (279/320) 96% (154/160) 51 Figure 9. Percentage of predicted correct “No” responses by adults (The asterisk indicates that participants show a significant different behavior in two conditions.) As a control, Condition 1, ONE-ONE, was anticipated to be the cleanest of all conditions since it tests if participants know that one-NP refers to singular. Adults correctly responded 81% of the time to the statements containing one-NP. The responses show that adults associate one-NP with singular. Rather, some adult participants in group B did not like the singular interpretation in the experimental items, which should be interpreted as singular. They seemed to have interpreted „one‟ to mean „at least one‟. The reason for this is unclear although not unacceptable. As a result, their incorrect responses affected the percentage of Condition 1, ONE-ONE. The result was lower than expected. Condition 2 and Condition 3, ONE-TUL and TUL-ONE, were used to test if participants understood the interpretation of –tul when it is attached to a noun. Adults gave correct responses 86% and 84% of the time. The responses show that adults associate NP-tul with plurality. If subjects understood the interpretation of NP-tul, they would behave the same in Condition 2, ONE-TUL, and Condition 3, TUL-ONE. To compare these two conditions, a paired-samples t52 test was conducted. Adults did not show any significantly different behaviors in Condition 2 (mean proportion correct = .86, SD = .22) and Condition 3 (mean proportion correct = .84, SD = .26); t (79) = .66, p = .508. Given adults‟ responses, our first prediction, that –tul plays the same role in subject and indirect object position, was confirmed. Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, was used to test the use of EPM. The subject is a bare noun, and the indirect object is singular. The subject would be interpreted as plural, since –tul attached to the verb forces a plural interpretation to the subject. The prediction is that the interpretation of Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, has the same interpretation with Condition 3, TUL-ONE. These two conditions should be interpreted as a plural subject and a singular indirect object. Here, adults did not show significantly different behaviors in Condition 3 (mean proportion correct = .84, SD = .26) and Condition 4 (mean proportion correct = .81, SD = .31); t (79) = .59, p = .559. The results suggest that adults gave the same interpretations (a plural subject and a singular indirect object) with different forms (with the IPM and with the EPM, respectively). If the use of the EPM is related to its subject, adults‟ interpretation will confirm our third hypothesis. The interpretation of the EPM is tested in Condition 4 and Condition 5, BARE-ONETUL and BARE-BARE-TUL. In these two conditions, the subjects are bare nouns that can be either singular or plural, but they would be interpreted as plural since the EPM -tul on the verbs forces a plural subject. In Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, adults responded correctly 81% of the time to statements containing the EPM-tul. They seem to interpret the EPM –tul as associated with a plural subject. In Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, adults seem to be less confident about associating the EPM –tul with a plural subject. They gave correct responses 67% of the time, compared to 81% of the time for Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL. There was a significant 53 difference in Condition 4 (mean proportion correct = .81, SD = .31) and Condition 5 (mean proportion correct = .67, SD = .39); t (79) = 3.00, p = .004, marked by asterisks in Figure 9. The results suggest that subjects have more difficulty interpreting the EPM in Condition 5 than the EPM in Condition 4. If Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, requires a plural subject interpretation, it should have the same interpretation as Condition 6, TUL-BARE. Adults gave correct responses 96% of the time in Condition 6, TUL-BARE, while they gave correct responses 67% in Condition 5, BAREBARE-TUL. There was a significantly different behavior in Condition 5 (mean proportion correct = .67, SD = .39) and in Condition 6 (mean proportion correct = .96, SD = .13); t (79) = -6.52, p = .000. Sentences with the IPM (Condition 6) are differently treated from ones with the EPM (Condition 5). The results suggest that sentences with the IPM are easier for adults to interpret than sentences with the EPM. The results of the adults showed that they associated one-NP to the singular interpretation and NP-tul to the plural interpretation. However, the interpretation of the EPM-tul did not clearly show that they associated it to a singular subject. In Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, adults tended to associate the EPM –tul to a plural subject interpretation. In Condition 5, BARE-BARETUL, it seemed that adults had a harder time to interpret the EPM on the verb. Some people seemed not to like a bare noun in subject and in indirect object with the EPM-tul. Let us now consider children‟s performance on each condition. Descriptive statistics for children‟ responses are illustrated in Table 4 below. 54 Table 4. Percentage of predicted correct all (“Yes” and “No”) responses by children All (“Yes” and “No”) responses 6 yrs 7yrs 8yrs Cond 1 ONE-ONE 55% (44/80) 79% (63/80) 84% (67/80) Cond 2 ONE-TUL 49% (39/80) 65% (52/80) 80% (64/80) Cond 3 TUL-ONE 53% (42/80) 78% (62/80) 71% (57/80) Cond 4 BARE-ONE-TUL 61% (49/80) 60% (48/80) 81% (65/80) Cond 5 BARE-BARE-TUL 49% (39/80) 55% (44/80) 59% (47/80) Cond 6 TUL-BARE 46% (37/80) Note. N = 60 (20 per age group) 65% (52/80) 74% (59/80) Table 5. Percentage of predicted correct “No” responses by children Only “No” responses 6 yrs 7yrs 8yrs Cond 1 ONE-ONE 20% (8/40) 58% (23/40) 68% (27/40) Cond 2 ONE-TUL 15% (6/40) 35% (14/40) 63% (25/40) Cond 3 TUL-ONE 18% (7/40) 65% (26/40) 50% (20/40) Cond 4 BARE-ONE-TUL 30% (12/40) 45% (18/40) 73% (29/40) 8% (3/40) 25% (10/40) 30% (12/40) Cond 6 TUL-BARE 10% (4/40) Note. N = 60 (20 per age group) 35% (14/40) 48% (19/40) Cond 5 BARE-BARE-TUL Figure 10. Percentage of predicted correct “No” responses by six-year-olds 55 Figure 11. Percentage of predicted correct “No” responses by seven-year-olds Figure 12. Percentage of predicted correct “No” responses by eight-year-olds 56 Figure 13. Percentage of predicted correct “No” responses by all children per each condition 57 9 In all conditions, we found that the youngest children, six-year-olds, had a strong “Yes” bias to true responses, and they were significantly different from other groups. So, we cannot confirm the performance of the six-year-olds, and will not discuss them any further. We, next, compare seven- and eight-year-old children and adults. In Condition 1, ONE-ONE, seven- and eight-year-olds correctly responded 58% and 68% of the time to the statements containing one-NP, respectively. First, a one-way between subjects ANOVA was conducted to compare the effect of ages on Condition 1, ONE-ONE. There was a significant effect of ages on this condition at the p < .05 level (F(3,136) = 18.733, p = .000). Next, post hoc comparisons using the Tukey HSD test indicated that the mean score of seven-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .58, SD = .37) did not significantly differ from that of eight-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .68, SD = .37). However, seven-year-olds were significantly different from adults (mean proportion correct = .80, SD = .28), while the mean score of eight-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .68, SD = .37) did not significantly differ from that of adults (mean 9 A paired-samples t-test was conducted to compare predicted correct “Yes” and “No” responses in each condition. In Condition 1, ONE-ONE, there was a significant difference in predicted correct “Yes” responses (mean proportion correct = .90, SD = .26) and “No” responses (mean proportion correct = .20, SD = .41); t(19) = 5.272, p = .000. In Condition 2, ONE-TUL, there was a significant difference in predicted correct “Yes” responses (mean proportion correct = .83, SD = .34) and “No” responses (mean proportion correct = .15, SD = .24); t(19) = 6.469, p = .000. In Condition 3, TUL-ONE, there was a significant difference in predicted correct “Yes” responses (mean proportion correct = .88, SD = .28) and “No” responses (mean proportion correct = .18, SD = .29); t(19) = 6.294, p = .000. In Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, there was a significant difference in predicted correct “Yes” responses (mean proportion correct = .93, SD = .24) and “No” responses (mean proportion correct = .30, SD = .38); t(19) = 5.225, p = .000. In Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, there was a significant difference in predicted correct “Yes” responses (mean proportion correct = .90, SD = .21) and “No” responses (mean proportion correct = .08, SD = .18); t(19) = 11.000, p = .000. In Condition 6, TUL-BARE, there was a significant difference in predicted correct “Yes” responses (mean proportion correct = .83, SD = .34 and “No” responses (mean proportion correct = .10, SD = .21); t(19) = 8.542, p = .000. The results suggest that seven- and eight-year-olds tend to choose “Yes” responses, rather than “No” responses, in all conditions. 58 proportion correct = .80, SD = .28). The results suggest that in Condition 1, ONE-ONE, adults and eight-year-olds associate one-NP as singular, better than seven year-olds, which is intriguing. In Condition 2, ONE-TUL, seven- and eight-year-olds correctly responded 35% and 63% of the time to the statements containing NP-tul, respectively. First, a one-way between subjects ANOVA was conducted to compare the effect of ages on Condition 2, ONE-TUL. There was a significant effect of ages on this condition at the p < .05 level (F(3,136) = 47.134, p = .000). Next, post hoc comparisons using the Tukey HSD test indicated that the mean score of seven-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .35, SD = .37) was significantly different from eight-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .63, SD = .36) and adults (mean proportion correct = .86, SD = .22). Eightyear-olds (mean proportion correct = .63, SD = .36) were significantly different from adults (mean proportion correct = .86, SD = .22). The results suggest that in Condition 2, ONE-TUL, seven and eight-year-olds treat NP-tul differently than adults. In Condition 3, TUL-ONE, seven- and eight-year-olds correctly responded 65% and 50% of the time to the statements containing NP-tul, respectively. First, a one-way between subjects ANOVA was conducted to compare the effect of ages on Condition 3, TUL-ONE. There was a significant effect of ages on this condition at the p < .05 level (F(3,136) = 30.276, p = .000). Next, post hoc comparisons using the Tukey HSD test indicated that the mean score of seven-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .65, SD = .29) did not significantly differ from eight-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .50, SD = .40) and adults (mean proportion correct = .84, SD = .26). However, eight-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .50, SD = .40) were significantly different from adults (mean proportion correct = .84, SD = .26). The results show that in Condition 3, TUL-ONE, seven-year-olds treat NP-tul as adults do, but eight-year-olds not. It is not consistent 59 with what was found in Condition 2, ONE-TUL, which both seven and eight-year-olds treat NPtul differently than adults do. Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, was used for testing the use of EPM. The subject would be interpreted as plural since –tul attached to the verb forces a plural interpretation of the subject. The prediction is that the interpretation of this condition should be identical to Condition 3, TUL-ONE. In Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, seven- and eight-year-olds correctly responded 45% and 73% of the time to the statements containing the EPM -tul, respectively. First, a oneway between subjects ANOVA indicated that there was a significant effect of ages on Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, at the p < .05 level (F(3,136) = 15.193, p = .000). Next, post hoc comparisons using the Tukey HSD test indicated that the mean score of seven-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .45, SD = .39) did not significantly differ from that of eight-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .73, SD = .38). However, seven-year-olds were significantly different from adults (mean proportion correct = .81, SD = .31). Eight-year-olds did not significantly differ from adults (mean proportion correct = .81, SD = .31). The results show that in Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, eight-year-olds associate EPM-tul with a plural subject in Condition 4, as adults do. In Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, seven- and eight-year-olds correctly responded 25% and (30%) of the time to the statements containing the EPM -tul, respectively. First, a one-way between subjects ANOVA indicated that there was a significant effect of ages on Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, at the p < .05 level (F(3,136) = 19.646, p = .000). Next, post hoc comparisons using the Tukey HSD test indicated that the mean score of seven-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .25, SD = .41) did not significantly differ from eight-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .30, SD = .34). Seven- and eight-year-olds were significantly different to 60 adults (mean proportion correct = .67 SD = .39). The results suggest that in Condition 5, BAREBARE-TUL, seven- and eight-year-olds do not treat the EPM –tul as adults do. In Condition 6, TUL-BARE, seven- and eight-year-olds correctly responded 35% and 48% of the time to the statements containing NP-tul, respectively. First, a one-way between subjects ANOVA indicated that there was a significant effect of ages on Condition 6, TUL-BARE, at the p < .05 level (F(3,136) = 73.308, p = .000). Next, post hoc comparisons using the Tukey HSD test indicated that the mean score of seven-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .35, SD = .43) did not significantly differ from eight-year-olds (mean proportion correct = .48, SD = .47). However, seven- and eight-year-olds were significantly different to adults (mean proportion correct = .96 SD = .13). The results suggest that in Condition 6, TUL-BARE, seven- and eightyear-olds do not treat NP-tul as adults do. Now, we compare each condition in interpretation. Condition 2, ONE-TUL, and Condition 3, TUL-ONE, were used to test if children knew NP-tul is interpreted as plural independent of syntactic position. A paired-samples t-test was conducted to compare the difference between Condition 2 and Condition3. For seven-year-olds, there was a significantly different behavior in Condition 2 (mean proportion correct = .35, SD = .37) and in Condition 3 (mean proportion correct = .65, SD = .29); t (19) = -3.94, p = 0.001. The results show that seven-year-olds prefer NP-tul in subject position than indirect object position. Eight-year-olds, on the other hand, did not show significantly different behaviors in Condition 2 (mean proportion correct = .63, SD = .36) and in Condition 3 (mean proportion correct = .50, SD = .40); t (19) = 1.75, p = .096. The results show that eight-year-olds equally treat NP-tul in subject and indirect object, which is consistent with what was found in adults‟ responses. 61 Next, Condition 3, TUL-ONE, and Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, are compared, since these conditions are interpreted as a plural subject and a singular indirect object. A pairedsamples t-test was conducted to compare the difference in Condition 3 and Condition 4. For seven-year-olds, there was a significant difference between Condition 3 (mean proportion correct = .65, SD = .29) and Condition 4 (mean proportion correct = .45, SD = .39); t (19) = 2.990, p = 0.008. For eight-year-olds, there was also a significant difference between Condition 3 (mean proportion correct = .50, SD = .40) and Condition 4 (mean proportion correct = .73, SD = .38); t (19) = -2.44, p = .025. The results suggest that seven- and eight-year-olds treat the IPM in Condition 3 and the EPM in Condition 4 differently. We assume that the IPM would be easier than the EPM. Surprisingly, eight-year-olds correctly responded 50% of the time in Condition 3, TUL-ONE, and performed best (73%) in Condition 4 with the EPM, which was unexpected. Third, Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, and Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, were used to test the EPM -tul. If the EPM-tul forces a plural subject interpretation, children should perform the same in Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, and Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL. A paired-samples test was conducted to compare Condition 4 and Condition5. Seven-year-olds did not show significant different behaviors in Condition 4 (mean proportion correct = .45, SD = .39) and in Condition 5 (mean proportion correct = .28, SD = .41); t (19) = 1.677, p = .110. The results suggest that seven-year-olds seemed not to know exactly how to interpret the EPM –tul in Condition 4 and Condition 5. For eight-year-olds, there was a significant difference between Condition 4 (mean proportion correct = .73, SD = .38) and Condition 5 (mean proportion correct = .30, SD = .34); t (19) = 5.667, p = .000. The results suggest that eight-year-olds seem to prefer the EPM with a plural subject interpretation in Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL. However, they 62 did not show the same behavior in Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL. So, we cannot conclude that eight-year-olds associate the EPM with a plural subject interpretation. Fourth, Condition 6, TUL-BARE, should be interpreted as Condition 5, BARE-BARETUL. In these two conditions, both subjects are interpreted as plural, and indirect objects are interpreted as either singular or plural. A paired-samples t-test was conducted to compare the difference in Condition 5 and Condition 6. Seven-year-olds did not know significantly different behavior between Condition 5 (mean proportion correct = .28, SD = .41) and Condition 6 (mean proportion correct = .35, SD = .44); t (19) = -.809, p = .428. The results suggest that seven-yearolds did not know the EPM –tul, rather than showing that they have the same interpretation in Condition 5 and Condition 6. For eight-year-olds, there was a significant difference between Condition 5 (mean proportion correct = .30, SD = .34) and Condition 6 (mean proportion correct= .48, SD = .47); t(19) = -2.333, p = .031. The results suggest that eight-year-olds seemed to have a harder time interpreting the EPM in Condition 5 than the IPM in Condition 6. Overall, however, the means are too low for further conclusions. To summarize, we found that there is an age difference in conditions. Eight-year-olds performed better in most conditions since, we assume, they have had much more exposure to the IPM and the EPM –tul than seven-year-olds. In Condition 2, ONE-TUL, seven-and eight-yearolds correctly responded at chance (35%) and above chance (63%) , respectively. Eight-year-olds are more likely to seem that they associate NP-tul as an IPM to plural. In Condition 3, TUL-ONE, seven- and eight-year-olds correctly responded above chance (65%) and at chance (50%), respectively. Only in this condition, seven-year-olds performed better than eight-year-olds They seemed to associate NP-tul as plural in Condition 4, TUL-ONE, but not to know NP-tul as plural in Condition 2, ONE-TUL. We assume that seven-year-olds prefer NP-tul in subject position 63 than indirect object position, while eight-year-olds treat NP-tul in both subject and indirect object as adults do. In Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, seven- and eight-year-olds correctly responded below chance (45%) and above chance (73%), respectively. Seven-year-olds seemed to have no idea how to interpret the EPM while eight-year-olds associated the EPM to a plural subject interpretation. In Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, seven- and eight-year-olds correctly responded below chance (28%) and (30%), respectively. In this condition, they all seemed to have no idea of the EPM. We cannot conclude that the EPM forces a plural subject interpretation from the responses of seven- and eight-year-olds. Lastly, we assume that the IPM is easier than the EPM. The findings relating to Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, seemed to support this idea since seven- and eight-year-olds performed most poorly (28%) and (30%), respectively. In Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, however, we cannot say that the IPM is easier than the EPM. since eight-year-olds correctly responded above chance (73%) of the time in Condition 4 with the EPM, which is the most highest in all conditions and unexpected. 4.2.7 Discussion Based on the results of all three age groups, Korean children seemed to have difficulty interpreting the IPM and the EPM –tul even by age eight. Nevertheless, we found a clear developmental pattern such that eight-year-olds performed better than seven-year-olds. Performances of seven- and eight-year-olds were still not adult-like in many conditions. For instance, eight-year-olds were significantly different from adults in Condition 2, 3, 5 and 6. Seven-year-olds were significantly different from adults in Condition 1, 2, 4, 5 and 6. As expected, the acquisition of plural morphology is delayed since plural marking is truly optional, and the input is variable. In the case of Chilean Spanish, children also take some time to 64 master plural morphology, but they master it by age seven since plural marking is optional, and the input is variable only due to a phonological process. In our experiment, we observed that Korean children were not adult-like by age eight in Condition 2, 3, 5 and 6. Thus, Hypothesis 1, that Korean children may have a harder time learning plural morphology than Chilean Spanish children do, is confirmed. Obviously, the variability in Korean is different to that in Chilean Spanish. In our experiment, Condition 1, ONE-ONE, was meant as a simple control, and we expected the best performance. Adults should have performed perfectly. In the experiment, however, adults gave correct responses 81% of the time, which was not as high as expected. In Condition 1, ONE-ONE, four items were used, two true and two false. We only extracted two correct “No” responses for our results. As illustrated below, one of these is Item 2 (Dog-Sheep) in which adults correctly responded 82% of the time. The other is Item 4 (Bear-Owl) in which adults correctly responded 81% of the time. Figure 14. Item 2 in Condition 1_ONE-ONE (in Version 1) Item 2: Dog & Sheep Picture Target sentence Kay han mali-ka yang han mali-eykey kil-ul annayhaycu-ko dog one-CL-NOM sheep one-CL-DAT way-ACC show-CONJ „One dog is showing the way to one sheep.‟ Predicted correct answer → True / False 65 i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Figure 15. Item 5 in Condition 1_ONE-ONE (in Version 2) Item 5: Owl & Bear Picture Target sentence Puengi han mali-ka kom han mali-eykey owl one-CL-NOM bear one-CL-DAT „One owl is giving one net to one bear.‟ tungci han kay-lul net one-CL-ACC cu-ko give-CONJ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Predicted correct answer → True / False One reason that the rate of correct responses in Condition 1 was not quite as high would be that adults treated singular as meaning „at least one‟. In Figure 13, for instance, this could mean that the picture could be seen as “There is a dog which is showing the way to a sheep, and there is another sheep standing right next to his friend”. It seemed that some adults said “Yes” to the target sentence with one-NP since a dog is showing the way to „at least one sheep‟. The other reason could be that the experimental picture gave an incorrect representation. As illustrated in Figure 14, for instance, “There is an owl which is giving a net to two bears”. However, it could be seen as “There are two bears which are giving a net to an owl”, since the net originally belongs to the owl according to the relevant context. In other words, the subject and the indirect object could be switched due to the presentation of the picture when interpreting. But if this was the case, there should have been more “No” responses. Therefore, we believe the first explanation to be correct, i.e. adults accepted the „at least one‟ interpretation. 66 Figure 16. Item 3 in Condition 6_TUL-BARE (in Version 1) Item 5: Monkey & Squirrel Picture Target sentence Wensungi-tul-i talamcwi-eykey panana han kay-lul monkey-PL-NOM squirrel-DAT banana one-CL-ACC „Monkeys are feeding one banana to one squirrel/squirrels.‟ mekyecu-ko feed-CONJ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Predicted correct answer → True / False Next, we observed the role of –tul either in subject or in indirect object position in Condition 2, ONE-TUL, and Condition 3, TUL-ONE. Adults did not show significantly different behaviors. Also, eight-year-olds did not show significantly different behaviors in Condition 2 and Condition 3. Adults and eight-year-olds seemed not to be influenced by the place in which –tul appeared. Therefore, in our experiment with the responses of adults and eight-year-olds, Hypothesis 2 could be confirmed. However, for seven-year-olds, there was a significant difference in behavior in Condition 2, ONE-TUL, and Condition 3, TUL-ONE. Seven-year-olds seemed to prefer the IPM in subject position to the IPM in the indirect object position. They may focus more on the subject interpretation than on the indirect object interpretation. We do not exactly know the reason for this. With time, children seem to learn that the IPM –tul plays the same role in subject and indirect object position. Further research could investigate this issue. For the analysis of the interpretation of the EPM –tul, adults and eight-year-olds seemed to interpret the EPM –tul as being associated with a plural subject in Condition 4, BARE-ONETUL. Adults correctly responded 81% of the time, and eight-year-olds did 73% in this condition. On the other hand, in Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, adults correctly responded 67% of the 67 time, and eight-year-olds gave correct responses 30% to statements containing the EPM-tul, which is much lower than the one in Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL. In conditions with the EPM, adults seem to be more confident about interpreting the EPM –tul in Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, than in Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL. In Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, the subject could be interpreted as either singular or plural since it appears bare, and the indirect object is interpreted as singular. Then, there is only one noun phrase in the subject position that the EPM –tul affects. In Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL, on the other hand, there are two noun phrases that could be pluralized since both subject and indirect object are bare nouns. In this respect, Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, would be easier to interpret if subjects knew that the EPM is associated with the plural subject. Besides, adults also showed that they were a little more confident about interpreting the EPM in Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL (81%) than in Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL (67%). Some adults did not like the target sentences when bare nouns appear with the EPM. They seemed to think that the EPM should be in agreement with an already plural subject. Hypothesis 3 could thus be confirmed in the adult group. Eight-year-olds showed a greatly different behavior in Condition 4 (73%) and Condition 5 (30%). We cannot confirm that the EPM forces a plural interpretation, based on the responses of eight-year-olds. Besides, seven-year-olds gave correct responses 45% of the time in Condition 4 and 28% of the time in Condition 5, since the percentage correct is too low to draw a conclusion. Comparing the IPM and EPM, it seems that the IPM is easier for children to understand in Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL. Seven-years-olds gave correct responses 65% of the time in Condition 3 with the IPM and 28% of the time in Condition 5 with the EPM. Eight-year-olds gave correct responses 50% of the time in Condition 3 with the IPM and 30% of the time in Condition 5 with the EPM. Adults also showed that they gave correct responses 84% of the time 68 in Condition 3 with the IPM and 67% of the time in Condition 5 with the EPM. Thus, we can conclude that our Hypothesis 4 is proven in terms of Condition 5, BARE-BARE-TUL. However, in the other condition with the EPM, Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL, seven- and eight-year-olds correctly responded 45% and 73% of the time, which are higher percentages than in Condition 2 (35% and 63%). Hence, we cannot confirm that the IPM is easier than the EPM on the basis of the responses in Condition 4, BARE-ONE-TUL. Lastly, the developmental patterns are clearly observed even though the youngest children, six-year-olds, have a strong “Yes” bias. They seemed to have little idea what they were dealing with in the experiment. Seven-year-olds clearly performed better than six-year-olds did.Eight-year-olds performed better than seven-year-olds and the closest to what adults did of the three age groups. The oldest groups were more confident about distinguishing the difference between singular and plural than two other younger groups. The older they were, the fewer errors they made. Nevertheless, eight-year-olds seem to need more time to master the pluralizer –tul. Therefore, our Hypothesis 5 regarding age differences in the acquisition of plurality is confirmed. 69 Table 6. A summary table of hypotheses and results Hypotheses 7yrs H1) Korean children may have a harder time learning plural morphology than Chilean Spanish speaking children do. Results 8yrs Adults Confirmed Confirmed N/A H2) The IPM –tul plays the same role in subject and indirect object. Unconfirmed Confirmed Confirmed H3) The EPM -tul is associated with the subject in a sentence. Unconfirmed Unconfirmed Confirmed Confirmed in Cond 5 Confirmed in Cond 5 (Unconfirmed in Cond 4) (Unconfirmed in Cond 4) Confirmed Confirmed Confirmed H4) The IPM will be acquired earlier than the EPM. H5) The older they are, the fewer errors they make. 70 Confirmed CHAPTER 5 CONCLUSION The Korean pluralizer -tul has some interesting properties: (1) it is not obligatory, but optional; (2) it attaches to non-nominal elements (the EPM) as well as nominals (the IPM); and (3) it has animacy restrictions. Our study was designed to investigate children‟s knowledge of -tul as forcing a plural interpretation. We examined how children interpret the IPM and the EPM -tul. First, we found that NP-tul (as an IPM) is associated with a plural interpretation in accordance with Kang‟s (1994) and Baek‟s (2002) argument. In our experiment, adults showed that they interpreted NP-tul (as an IPM) as plural. Seven- and eight-year-olds seemed to interpret NP-tul as plural, but they were still not completely adult-like. Overall, seven- and eight-year-olds seemed to be more confident with a singular interpretation than with a plural interpretation. This may be because of the optionality of –tul. The basic idea is that if children are exposed to variable input, and the interpretation is ambiguous, the acquisition of grammatical morphology is delayed. The results in our experiment clearly show the effect of variability in the input of plurality. If -tul were obligatorily marked, and the input is consistent, Korean children would probably acquire this pluralizer earlier. Moreover, we found that Korean children have a harder time acquiring plural morphology than Chilean Spanish-speaking children do. In Korean and Chilean Spanish, because the input for plural is variable, and the interpretation is ambiguous, the acquisition is delayed. However, other properties of plural morphology are different in these two languages. Korean plural marking is truly optional while Chilean Spanish plural marking is obligatory, but the form is not always 71 realized due to a phonological process of lenition. Also, the Korean plural is restricted to animate nouns while Chilean Spanish has no restrictions. Consequently, Korean children, who do not behave as adults by eight, take longer to master plural morphology, compared to Chilean Spanish-speaking children who behave like adults by age seven. Rather, Korean children behave more like Chinese and Japanese children than Chilean Spanish-speaking children. Also, we observed children‟s behavior when the IPM –tul appears in subject and indirect object position. If children know the role of –tul, they should perform well wherever it is attached to. In our study, seven-year-olds showed different behavior and seemed to be more confident about interpreting –tul in subject position. The reason for this might be frequency or the fact that the EPM affects subjects. Seven-year-olds disconfirmed our Hypothesis 2, but we do not exactly know why. This issue should be examined in further research. Interestingly, eightyear-olds did not show different behavior when –tul was in subject or the indirect object. They treated –tul equally regardless of the place to which it is attached, which is also observed in adults‟ responses. Third, based on the adult responses, we confirmed that the interpretation of the EPM –tul is related to the subject in a sentence. To study the EPM as agreement, the data for the EPM should be collected in free speech. This would allow us to determine whether the IPM and the EPM are equally frequent or not. Fourth, we compared the IPM and the EPM –tul. The IPM -tul is attached more locally than the EPM -tul in terms of its interpretative effect. The IPM –tul gives a plural interpretation to the noun phrase to which it is attached. The IPM –tul modifies the closest NP in a sentence. On the other hand, the EPM –tul forces a plural subject interpretation wherever it is attached. That is, the EPM –tul cares about the subject. Relying on this point, we assume that the IPM –tul 72 will be easier to learn than the EPM –tul. We found that seven- and eight-year-olds had more difficulty learning the EPM –tul, compared to the IPM –tul. Even adults showed that they were more confident about interpreting the IPM –tul than the EPM –tul, perhaps because it has more restrictions for certain speakers. Fifth, in the perspective of the acquisition of plurality, we conclude that there are clear developmental patterns. The oldest children performed best and the youngest did worst. The sixyear-olds had a “Yes” bias, and we cannot, obviously, talk about them, except to say that it shows a delay. The seven-year-olds made more mistakes than the eight-year-olds did. The improvement of the linguistic ability can be seen throughout the results of our experiment. The eight-year-olds‟ responses were most close to adults‟, but they were still not entirely adult-like. Over years, children undergo trial and error and try to make their linguistic ability perfect. To summarize, the results of our experiment demonstrate that the IPM –tul is associated with a plural interpretation and that the EPM –tul is associated with a plural subject interpretation. Korean children by age eight are still not adult-like. It seems that the properties of the pluralizer –tul are semantically complicated, besides optional. 73 APPENDICES 74 APPENDIX A Version 1. Items for Group A 1. Item 1 (Rabbit & Turtle) Picture 1 Picture 2 Picture 3 Mayu hwachanghan nal i-ta. Very sunny day be-DEC „It is a very sunny day.‟ Kepuki-tul-i sanchay-ul nawa-ss-ta. Turtle-PL-NOM walk-ACC go-PST-DEC „Turtles are going out for a walk‟ Kapcaki pi-ka nayliki sicakha-n-ta. all of sudden rain-TOP falling start-PRS-DEC „All of sudden, it starts to rain.‟ Kepuki twi-ey thokki-ka natana-n-ta. turtle beyond-LOC rabbit-NOM appear-PRS-DEC „Right beyond turtles, a rabbit/rabbits appear/appears.‟ Thokki-un usan-ul tulko o-n-ta. Rabbit-NOM umbrella-ACC with come-PRS-DEC „It is coming with an umbrella/umbrellas.‟ Picture 4 Question 1. Thokki han mali-ka kepuki han mali-eykey rabbit one CL-NOM turtle one CL-DAT ssu-ywecu-ko i-ss-ta. use-give-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „One rabbit is sharing one umbrella with one turtle.‟ 75 usan hana-lul umbrella one-ACC 2. Item 2 (Dog & Sheep) Picture 1 Picture 2 Picture 3 Yang-tul-i mokcang-ey yeki ceki i-ss-ta. sheep-PL-TOP pasture-LOC here there be-PRS-DEC „Sheep are here and there in the pasture.‟ Yang-tul-i huyn tamcang-ul ttala ket-ko i-ss-ta. sheep-PL-NOM white fence-ACC along walk-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „They are walking along the white fence.‟ Myechmyech-un nuli-ta. some-TOP slow-DEC „Some of them are slow.‟ Kutul-eun tuchyeci-n-ta. they-TOP fall behind-PRS-DEC. „They fall behind others.‟ Mellise kay-ka tuchecin yang-ul po-ko i-ss-ta. from a distance dog-NOM fallen sheep-ACC watch-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „From a distance, one dog/dogs watch/watches one sheep/sheep which fall/falls behind.‟ Picture 4 Question 2 Kay han mali-ka yang han mali-eykey kil-ul annayhaycu-ko dog one-CL-NOM sheep one-CL-DAT way-ACC show-CONJ „One dog is showing the way to one sheep.‟ Question 3 Kay han mali-ka yang-tul-eykey kil-ul nnayhaycu-ko dog one-CL-NOM sheep-PL-DAT way-ACC show-CONJ „One dog is showing the way to sheep.‟ 76 i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC 3. Item 3 (Monkey & Squirrel) Picture 1 Picture 2 Picture 3 Paykophunp wensungi-tul-un meki-lul chac-ule naka-ss-ta. hungry monkey-PL-NOM food-ACC find-CONJ go out-PST-DEC „Hungry monkeys are out to find some food.‟ Kutul-un haypyen-eyse panana namu-lul palkyenha-n-ta. they-NOM beach-LOC banana tree-ACC find-PRS-DEC „They find some banana a tree/trees in the beach.‟ Kutul-un panana-lul tta-ss-ta. they-NOM banana-ACC pick-PST-DEC „They picked up a banana/bananas.‟ Kutul-un panana-lul kaciko cip-ey ka-n-ta. they-NOM banana-ACC with home-LOC go-PRS-DEC „They are going home with a banana/bananas.‟ Kutul-un paykophun talamcwi-lul manna-n-ta. they-NOM hungry squirrel-ACC run into-PRS-DEC „They run into one monkey/monkeys who is/are hungry too.‟ Picture 4 Question 4 Wensungi han mali-ka talamcwi-tul-eykey monkey one-CL-NOM squirrel-PL-DAT meyecu-ko i-ss-ta feed-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „One monkey is feeding one banana to squirrels.‟ panana han kay-lul anana one-CL-ACC Question 5 Wensungi-tul-i talamcwi han mali-eykey panana han kay-lul monky-PL-NOM squirrel one-CL-DAT banana one-CL-ACC mekyecu-ko i-ss-ta feed-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „Monkeys are feeding one banana to one squirrel.‟ 77 4. Item 4 (Bear & Owl) Picture 1 Picture 2 Kom-tul-i sup-eyse yaku-lul ha-ko i-ss-ta. bear-PL-NOM forest-LOC baseball-ACC do-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „Bears are playing baseball in the forest.‟ Kayki-ka kkuthnan hu motu cip-ulo tolaka-n-ta. game-TOP finish after all-NOM home-LOC go back-PRS-DEC „After finishing the game, all of are going back to home.‟ Cip-ulo katencung kom-un sup-eyse tungi han kay-lul palkyenha-n-ta. home-LOC on the way bear-NOM forest-LOC nest one-CL-ACC find-PRS-DEC „On the way home, one bear/bears find/finds nest in the forest.‟ Picture 3 Question 6 Kom-tul-i pungi han mali-eykey bear-PL-NOM owl one-CL-DAT „Bears are giving one net to one owl.‟ tungci han kay-lul net one-CL-ACC cu-ko give-CONJ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Picture 4 Question 7 Kom-i pungi han mali-eykey tungci han kay-lul bear-NOM owl one-CL-DAT net one-CL-ACC „Bears are giving one net to one owl.‟ 78 cu-ko-tul give-CONJ-PL i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC 5. Item 5 (Bird & Lion) Picture 1 Picture 2 Picture 3 Say-ka namu wi-ey anca issupnita. bird-TOP tree top-LOC sit is-PRG-DEC „One bird/birds is/are sitting on a branch/branches.‟ Hay-ka cin hu aki saca-ka say kunche-ey natana-ss-ta. sun-TOP go after baby lion-TOP bird near-LOC appear-PST-DEC „After the sun goes down, a baby lion/lions appears/appear near the bird/birds.‟ Ku saca-nun say yep-ulo kakkai takao-n-ta. the lion-NOM bird to-LOC closely come-PRS-DEC „The lion/lions is/are coming close to the bird/birds.‟ Picture 4 Question 8 Say-ka saca han mali-eykey nolayha-ycu-ko-tul bird-NOM lion one-CL-DAT sing-give-CONJ-PL „Birds are singing a song to one lion.‟ Question 9 Say-ka saca-eykey nolaha-ycu-ko-tul bird-NOM lion-DAT sing-give-CONJ-PL „Birds are singing a song to one lion/lions.‟ 79 i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC issupnita. be-PRS-DEC 6. Item 6 (Elephant & Mouse) Picture 1 Picture 2 Enu yelumnal khokkili-tul-i hosu-ey i-ss-ta one summer day elephant-PL-TOP lake-LOC is-PRS-DEC „One summer day, there are elephants in the lake.‟ Kutul-un kh-lo mwul-ul ppume syawe-lul ha-n-ta. they-NOM nose-INS water-ACC sprinkle shower-ACC do-PRG-DEC „They are sprinkling water with their trunk and taking a shower.‟ Cui yeksi nemu tep-ta mouse-NOM too very hot-DEC „One mouse/mice is/are very hot, too.‟ Picture 3 Question 10 Khokkili-ka cui-eykey mul-tul ppuly-ecu-ko-tul elephant-NOM lion-DAT water-ACC sprinkle-give-CONJ-PL „Elephants are sprinkling water to one mouse/mice.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Picture 4 Question 11 Khokkili-tul-i cui-eykey mul-ul ppuly-ecu-ko elephant-PL-NOM mouse-DAT water-ACC sprinkle-give-CONJ „Elephant are sprinkling water to one mouse/mice.‟ 80 i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Question 12 Thokki-tul-i kepuki-eykey usan-hana-lul rabbit-PL-NOM turtle-DAT umbrella one-CL-ACC „Rabbits are sharing one umbrella with one turtle/turtles.‟ Question 13 Wensungi han mali-ka talamcwi han-mali-eykey monkey one-CL-NOM squirrel one-CL-DAT meyecu-ko i-ss-ta feed-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „One monkey is feeding one banana to one squirrel.‟ ssu-ywecu-ko use-give-CONJ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC panana han kay-lul banana one-CL-ACC Question 14 Kom han mali-ka puengi han mali-eykey tungci han kay-lul cu-ko i-ss-ta. bear one-CL-NOM owl one-CL-DAT net one-CL-ACC give-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „One bear is giving one net to one owl.‟ Question 15 Kom han mali-ka puengi-tul-eykey tungci han kay-lul cu-ko i-ss-ta. bear one-CL-NOM owl-PL-DAT net one-CL-ACC give-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „One bear is giving one net to owls.‟ Question 16 Say han mali-ka saca-tul-eykey nolayha-ecu-ko i-ss-ta. bird one-CL-NOM lion-PL-DAT sing-give-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „A bird is singing a song to lions.‟ Question 17 Say-tul-i saca han mali-eykey nolayha-ecu-ko i-ss-ta. bird-PL-NOM lion one-CL-DAT sing-give-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „Birds are singing a song to one lion‟ 81 Question 18 Khokkili-tul-i cui han mali-eykey mul-ul elephant-PL-NOM mouse one-CL-DAT water-ACC „Elephants are sprinkling water to one mouse.‟ Question 19 Khokkili-ka cui han mali-eykey mul-ul elephant-NOM mouse one-CL-DAT water-ACC „Elephants are sprinkling water to one mouse.‟ ppuly-ecu-ko sprinkle-give-CONJ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC ppuly-ecu-ko-tul sprinkle-give-CONJ-PL i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Question 20 Thokki-ka kepuki han mali-eykey usan-hana-lul ssu-ywecuko-tul i-ss-ta. rabbit-NOM turtle one-CL-DAT umbrella one-CL-ACC use-give-PL be-PRG-DEC „Rabbits are sharing one umbrella with one turtle.‟ Question 21 Thokki-ka kepuki-eykey usan-hana-lul ssu-ywecu-ko-tul i-ss-ta. rabbit-NOM turtle-DAT umbrella one-CL-ACC share-give-CONJ-PL be-PRG-DEC „Rabbits are sharing one umbrella to one turtle/turtles.‟ Question 22 Kay-ka yang-eykey kil-ul annayhaycu-ko-tul dog-NOM sheep-DAT way-ACC show-CONJ-PL „Dogs are showing the way to one sheep/sheep.‟ Question 23 Kay-tul-i yang-eykey kil-ul annayhaycu-ko dog-PL-NOM sheep-DAT way-ACC show-CONJ „Dogs are showing the way to one sheep/sheep.‟ 82 i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Question 24 Wensungi-tul-i talamcwi-eykey panana han kay-lul monkey-PL-NOM squirrel-DAT banana one-CL-ACC „Monkeys are feeding one banana to one squirrel/squirrels.‟ 83 mekyecu-ko feed-CONJ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC APPENDIX B Version 2. Items for Group B 1. Item 1 (Turtle & Rabbit) Picture 1 Picture 2 Picture 3 Mayu hwachanghan nal i-ta. Very sunny day be-DEC „It is a very sunny day.‟ Thokki-tul-i sanchay-ul naw-ass-ta. rabbit-PL-NOM walk-ACC go out-PST-DEC „Rabbits are going out for a walk‟ Kapcaki pi-ka nayliki sicakha-n-ta. all of sudden rain-TOP falling start-PRS-DEC „All of sudden, it starts to rain.‟ Thokki twi-ey kepuki-ka natana-n-ta. rabbit beyond-LOC rabbit-NOM appear-PRS-DEC „Right beyond rabbits, one turtle/turtles appears/appear.‟ Kepuki-nun usan-ul tulko o-n-ta. turtle-NOM umbrella-ACC with come-PRS-DEC „It is coming with one turtle/turtles.‟ Question 1 Kepuki han mali-ka thokki han mali-eykey turtle one-CL-NOM rabbit one-CL-DAT ssu-ywecu-ko i-ss-ta. use-give-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „One turtle is sharing one umbrella with one rabbit.‟ 84 usan-hana-lul umbrella one-CL-ACC 2. Item 2 (Sheep & Dog) Picture 1 Picture 2 Picture 3 Kay-tul-i mokcang-ey yeki ceki i-ss-ta. dog-PL-TOP pasture-LOC here there be-PRS-DEC „Dogs are here and there in the pasture.‟ Kay-tul-i huyn tamcang-ul ttala ket-ko i-ss-ta. dog-PL-NOM white fence-ACC along walk-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „They are walking along the white fence.‟ Myechmyech-un nuli-ta. some-TOP slow-DEC „Some of them are slow.‟ Kutul-eu tuchyeci-n-ta. they-TOPM fall behind-PRS-DEC. „They fall behind others.‟ Mellise yang-i tuchecin kay-lul po-ko i-ss-ta. from a distance sheep-NOM fallen dog-ACC watch-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „From a distance, one sheep/sheep watch(es) a dog/dogs which fall behind.‟ Picture 4 Question 2 Yang han mali-ka kay han mali-eykey kil-ul sheep one-CL-NOM dog one -CL-DAT way-ACC „One sheep is showing the way to one dog.‟ Question 3 Yang han mali-ka kay-tul-eykey kil-ul sheep one-CL-NOM dog-PL-DAT way-ACC „One sheep is showing the way to dogs.‟ 85 annayhaycu-ko show-CONJ annayhaycu-ko show-CONJ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC 3. Item 3 (Squirrel & Monkey) Picture 1 Picture 2 Picture 3 Paykophunp talamcwi-tul-un meki-lul chac-ule naka-ss-ta. hungry squirrel-PL-NOM food-ACC find go out-PST-DEC „Hungry squirrels are out to find some food.‟ Kutul-un haypyen-eyse panana namu-lul palkyenha-n-ta. they-NOM beach-LOC banana tree-ACC find-PRS-DEC „They find some banana trees in the beach.‟ Kutul-un panana-lul tta-ss-ta. they-NOM banana-ACC pick-PST-DEC „They picked them up.‟ Kutul-un panana-lul kaciko cip-ey ka-n-ta. they-NOM banana-ACC with home-LOC go-PRS-DEC „They are going home with bananas.‟ Kutul-un paykophun wensungi -lul manna-n-ta. they-NOM hungry monkey-ACC run into-PRS-DEC „They run into one monkey/monkeys who is/are hungry too.‟ Picture 4 Question 4 Talamcwi han mali-ka wensungi-tul-eykey squirrel one-CL-NOM monkey-PL-DAT panana han kay-lul banana one-CL-ACC mekyecu-ko feed-CONJ i-ss-ta be-PRG-DEC „One squirrel is feeding one banana to monkeys.‟ Question 5 Talamcwi-tul-i wensungi han mali-eykey panana han kay-lul squirrel-PL-NOM squirrel one-CL-DAT banana one-CL-ACC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC „Squirrels are feeding one banana to one monkey.‟ 86 mekyecu-ko feed-CONJ 4. Item 4 (Owl & Bear) Picture 1 Picture 2 Kom-tul-i sup-eyse yaku-lul ha-ko i-ss-ta. bear-PL-NOM forest-LOC baseball-ACC do-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „Bears are playing baseball in the forest.‟ Kayki-ka kkuthnan hu motu cip-ey tolaka-n-ta. game-TOP finish after all-NOM home-LOC go back-PRS-DEC „After finishing the game, all of are going back to home.‟ Cip-ulo katencung kom-un tungi han kay-lul kacin puengi-lul palkyenha-n-ta. home-LOC on the way bear-NOM nest one-CL-ACC with owl-ACC find-PRS-DEC „On the way home, one bear/bears find/finds one owl/owls with a nest.‟ Sanyang-ul nakalyeten puengi-nun tungi-lul kom-eyke mathki-ko sip-ta. hunt-ACC going owl-NOM nest-ACC bear-DAT leave-CONJ want-DEC „The owl which was going to hunt is going to leave the net/nets to the bear.‟ Picture 3 Question 6 Puengi-tul-i kom han mali-eykey tungci han kay-lul cu-ko owl-PL-NOM bear-one-CL-DAT net one-CL-ACC give-CONJ „Owls are giving one net to one bear.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRS-DEC Picture 4 Question 7 Puengi-ka kom han mali-eykey tungci han kay-lul owl-NOM bear one-CL-DAT net one-CL-ACC „Owls are giving one net to one bear.‟ 87 cu-ko-tul give-CONJ-PL i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC 5. Item 5 (Lion & Bird) Picture 1 Picture 2 Saca-tul-i namu alay-eyse swi-ko i-ss-ta. bird-PL-TOP tree under-LOC take a rest -CONJ be-PRG-DEC „Lions are taking a rest under the tree/trees.‟ Hay-ka cin hu saca kunch-ey aki say-ka natana-ss-ta. sun-TOP go after lion near-LOC baby bird-NOM appear-PST-DEC „After the sun goes down, one baby bird/birds appears/appear near the lion/lions.‟ Ku say-nun saca yep-ulo kakkai takao-n-ta. the bird-NOM lion to-LOC closely come-PRS-DEC „The bird is coming closely to the lion/lions.‟ Picture 3 Question 8 Saca-ka say han mali-eykey nolayha-ycu-ko-tul lion-NOM bird one-CL-DAT sing-give-CONJ-PL „Lions are singing a song to one bird.‟ i-ss-ta be-PRG-DEC Picture 4 Question 9 Saca-ka say-eykey nolayha-ycu-ko-tul lion-NOM bird-DAT sing-give-CONJ-PL „Lions are singing a song to one bird/birds.‟ 6. Item 6 (Elephant & Mouse) 88 i-ss-ta be-PRG-DEC Picture 1 Picture 2 Enu yelumnal cui-ka hosu-lo mwul-ul ppum-ko i-ss-ta one summer day mouse-NOM hose-INS water-ACC sprinkle-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „One summer day, one mouse/mice is/are sprinkling water with a hose/hoses.‟ Khokkili-ka hosu-ey natana-ss-ta. elephant-NOM lake-LOC appear-PST-DEC „One elephant/elephants appears/appear in the lake.‟ Nal-i tewese khokkili-nun syawe-lul ha-ko sip-ta. day-TOP hot elephant-NOM shower-ACC do-CONJ want-DEC „The elephant wants to take a shower since it is very hot.‟ Picture 3 Question 10 Cui-ka khokkili-eykey mul-ul ppuly-ecu-ko-tul Mouse-NOM elephant-DAT water-ACC sprinkle-give-CONJ-PL „Mice are sprinkling water to one elephant/elephants.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Picture 4 Question 11 Cui-tul-i khokkili-eykey mul-ul ppuly-ecu-ko mouse-PL-NOM elephant-DAT water-ACC sprinkle-give-CONJ „Mice are sprinkling water to one elephant/elephants.‟ 89 i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Question 12 Kepuki-tui thokki-eykey usan-hana-lul turtle-PL-NOM rabbit-DAT umbrella one-CL-ACC „Turtles are sharing one umbrella with one rabbit/rabbits.‟ ssu-ywecu-ko use-give-CONJ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Question 13 Talamcwi han mali -ka wensungi han mali-eykey squirrel one-CL-NOM monkey-one-CL-DAT i-ss-ta be-PRG-DEC „One squirrel is feeding one banana to one monkey.‟ panana han kay-lul banana one-CL-ACC mekyecu-ko feed-CONJ Question 14 Puengi han mali-ka kom han mali-eykey tungci han kay-lul cu-ko i-ss-ta. owl one-CL-NOM bear one-CL-DAT net one-CL-ACC give-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „One owl is giving one net to one bear.‟ Question 15 Puengi han mali-ka kom-tul-eykey tungci han kay-lul cu-ko i-ss-ta. owl one-CL-NOM bear-PL-DAT net one-CL-ACC give-CONJ be-PRG-DEC „One owl is giving one net to bears.‟ Question 16 Saca han mali-ka say-tul-eykey lion one-CL-NOM bird-PL-DAT „One lion is singing a song to birds.‟ Question 17 Saca-tul-i say han mali-eykey lion-PL-NOM bird one-CL-DAT „Lions are singing a song to one bird.‟ nolayha-ycu-ko sing-give-CONJ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC nolayha-ycu-ko sing-give-CONJ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC 90 Question 18 Cui-tul-i khokkili han mali-eykey mul-ul mouse-PL-NOM elephant one-CL-DAT water-ACC „Mice are sprinkling water to one elephant.‟ Question 19 Cui-ka khokkili han mali-eykey mul-ul Mouse-NOM elephant one-CL-DAT water-ACC „Mice are sprinkling water to one elephant.‟ ppuly-ecu-ko i-ss-ta. sprinkle-give-CONJ be-PRG-DEC ppuly-ecuko-tul i-ss-ta. sprinkle-give-CONJ-PL be-PRG-DEC Question 20 Kepuki-ka thokki han mali-eykey usan-hana-lul ssu-wyecu-ko-tul turtle-NOM rabbit one-CL-DAT umbrella one-CL-ACC use-give-CONJ-PL „Rabbits are sharing one umbrella with one turtle.‟ Question 21 Kepuki -ka thokki-eykey usan-hana-lul ssu-ywecu-ko-tul turtle-NOM rabbit-DAT umbrella one-CL-ACC use-give-CONJ-PL „Rabbits are sharing one umbrella with one turtle/turtles.‟ Question 22 Yang-i kay-eykey kil-ul annayhaycu-ko-tul sheep-NOM dog-DAT way-ACC show-CONJ-PL „Sheep are showing the way to one dog/dogs.‟ Question 23 Yang-tul-i kay-eykey kil-ul annayhaycu-ko sheep-PL-NOM dog-DAT way-ACC show-CONJ „Sheep are showing the way to one dog/dogs.‟ 91 i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC Question 24 Talamcwi-tul-i wensung-eykey panana han kay-lul squirrel-PL-NOM monkey-DAT banana one-CL-ACC „Squirrels are feeding one banana to one monkey/monkeys.‟ 92 mekyecu-ko feed-CONJ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC APPENDIX C Filler sentences for Group A and B 1. Item 1 (Rabbit & Turtle) (1) Canti wi-lo pi-ka grass on-LOC rain-TOP „It is raining on the grass.‟ nayli-ko fall-CONJ (2) Kepuki-ka thokki poda te turtle-TOP rabbit than more „The turtle is taller than the rabbit.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC khu-ta. tall-DEC (3) Thokki-ka phalan usan-ul rabbit-NOM blue umbrella-ACC „The rabbit is holding a blue umbrella.‟ tul-ko hold-CONJ (4) Thokki-ka kepuki poda te rabbit-TOP turtle than more „The rabbit is taller than the turtle.‟ khu-ta. tall-DEC (5) Thokki wa kepuki-ka ttwieka-ko rabbit and turtle-NOM run-CONDJ „The rabbit and the turtle are running.‟ (6) Kepuki-ka thokki poda aphse turtle-TOP rabbit than ahead „The turtle is going before the rabbit.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC ka-n-ta. go-PRS-DEC (7) Thokki wa kepuki-ka san-ul olu-ko rabbit and turtle-NOM mountain-ACC climb-CONJ „The rabbit and the turtle are climbing the mountain.‟ (8) Thokki-ka honca usan-ul ssu-ko rabbit-NOM alone umbrella-ACC use-CONJ „The rabbit is holding one umbrella/umbrellas alone.‟ 93 i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC 2. Item 2 (Dog & Sheep) (1) Kay wa yang-un ppalkan tamcang-i issnun dog and sheep-TOP red fence-TOP with „The dog and the sheep are in the pasture with the red fence.‟ (2) Kay wa yang-i khi-ka dog and sheep-NOM height-TOP „The dog is as tall as the sheep.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRS-DEC pisusha-ta. similar-DEC (3) Kay-nun huynsak i ko yang-un dog-TOP white be and sheep-TOP „The dog is white and the sheep is brown.‟ kalsak i-ta. brown be-DEC (4) Kay wa yang-i phulun candi uy-ey dog and sheep-TOP green grass on-LOC „The dog and the sheep are on the green grass.‟ (5) Kay-ka yang-eykey cicko dog-NOM sheep-DAT bark „The dog is barking at the sheep.‟ mokcang-ey pasture-LOC i-ss-ta. be-PRS-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC (6) Kay wa yang-i ultali an-ey dog and sheep-TOP fence in-LOC „The dog and the sheep are in the fence.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRS-DEC (7) Phyociphan-ey hwasalphyo-un olunccok-ul sign-LOC arrow-TOP right-ACC „The arrow in the sign is pointing to the right.‟ hyangha-ko point-CONJ (8) Kay wa yang-i ultali-lul nemeka-ko dog and sheep_NOM fence-ACC cross-CONJ „The dog and the sheep are crossing the fence.‟ 94 i-ss-ta. be-PRS-DEC i-ss-ta. is-PRG-DEC 3. Item 3 (Monkey & Squirrel) (1) Wensungi wa talamci-ka haypye-ye monkey and squirrel-TOP beach-LOC „The monkey and the squirrel are at the beach.‟ (2) Wensungi-un talamci poda te monkey-NOM squirrel than more „The monkey is taller than the squirrel.‟ khu-ta. tall-DEC (3) Wensung wa talamci-ka pam-ey monkey and squirrel-NOM night-at „The monkey and the squirrel met at night.‟ (4) Wensungi wa talamci-nun motu monkey and squirrel-TOP all „The monkey and the squirrel are all brown.‟ (5) Namu-ey panama-ka manhi tree-LOC banana-TOP many „Bananas are hanging in the tree.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC manna-ss-ta. meet-PST-DEC kalsayk brown i-ta. be-DEC tally-e-i-ss-ta. hang-PAS-be-PRG-DEC (6) Wensungi wa talamci-ka panana-lul mek-ko monkey and squirrel-NOM banana-ACC eat-CONJ „The monkey and the squirrel are eating one banana/bananas.‟ (7) Wensungi wa talamci-nun muinto-ey monkey and squirrel-TOP island-LOC „The monkey and the squirrel are in an insland.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRS-DEC (8) Wensungi-nun honca panana-lul mek-ko monkey-NOM alone banana-ACC eat-CONJ „The monkey is eating one banana/bananas alone.‟ 95 i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC 4. Item 4 (Bear & Owl) (1) Kom kwa puengi-ka sansok-ey bear and owl-NOM mountain-LOC „The bear and the owl are in the mountain.‟ (2) Tungci-ey han kay-uy net-LOC one CL-GEN „There is an egg in the net.‟ al-i egg-TOP i-ss-ta. be-PRS-DEC (3) Kom kwa puengi-ka ssau-ko bear and owl-NOM fight-CONJ „The bear and the owl are fighting.‟ (4) Kom-i puengi poda te bear-NOM owl than more „The bear is shorter than the owl.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRS-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC cak-ta. short-DEC (5) Kom-un kalsayk i ko puengi-nun kemcengsak bear-TOP brown be and owl-TOP black „The bear is brown and the owl is black.‟ (6) Puengi-ka kom wi-lo nal-ko owl-NOM bear over-LOC fly-CONJ „The owl is flying over the bear.‟ i-ta. be-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC (7) Kom kwa puengi-ka saykki puengi wa nol-ko bear and owl-NOM baby owl with play-CONJ „The bear and the owl are playing with one baby owl/owls.‟ (8) Kom kwa puengi-ka namukaci wi-ey bear and owl-NOM branch on-LOC „The bear and the owl are on the branch.‟ 96 i-ss-ta. be-PRS-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC 5. Item 5 (Bird & Lion) (1) Saca wa say-nun kamanhi lion and bird-NOM still „The lion and the bird are sitting still.‟ anc-a sit-CONJ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC (2) Saca wa say-ka nunonun sup-eyse nol-ko lion and bird-NOM snowing forest-LOC play-CONJ „The lion and the bird are playing in the snowing forest.‟ (3) Saca-ka say poda te lion-TOP bird than more „The lion is taller than the bird.‟ kyu-ta. tall-DEC (4) Saca-ka say cupyen-eyse nol-ko lion-NOM bird around-LOC play-CONJ „The lion is playing around the bird.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC (5) Say wa saca-ka ulii-ey kathye i-ss-ta. bird and lion-TOP cage-LOC trapped be-PRS-DEC „The bird and the lion are trapped in one cage/cages.‟ (6) Say wa saca-ka kangka-ey se i-ss-ta. bird and lion-TOP riverside-LO stand be-PRG-DEC „The bird and the lion are standing by the riverside.‟ (7) Saca wa say-ka namu-wi-ey lion and bird-TOP tree-on-LOC „The lion and the bird are on the tree.‟ (8) Say-nun saca poda te bird-TOP lion than more „The bird is taller than the lion.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRS-DEC khu-ta. tall-DEC 97 i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC 6. Item 6 (Elephant & Mouse) (1) Khokkili-nun cwi poda te elephant-TOP mouse than more „The elephant is taller than the mouse.‟ khu-ta. tall-DEC (2) Cwi-nun khokkili tung wi-ey mouse-TOP elephant back on-LOC „The mouse is on the elephant‟s back.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRS-DEC (3) Khokkili-nun hoysak i ko cwi-nun elephant-TOP gray be and mouse-TOP „The elephant is gray and the mouse is brown.‟ kalsak i-ta. brown be-DEC (4) Khokkili-ka kho-lo mul-ul ppuli-ko elehant-NOM nose-INS water-ACC sprinkle-CONJ „The elephant is sprinkling with its nose.‟ (5) Cwi-nun khokkili mith-eyse nol-ko mouse-NOM elephant under-LOC play-CONJ „The mouse is playing under the elephant.‟ (6) Khokkili wa cwi-nun motu hoysak elephant and mouse-TOP all gray „The elephant and the mouse are all gray.‟ i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC i-ta. be-DEC (7) Khokkili wa cwi-nun palampunun pataska-ey elephant and mouse-TOP windy beach-LOC „The elephant and the mouse are in the windy beach.‟ (8) Khokkili wa cwi-nun naccam-ul ca-ko elephant and mouse-NOM nap-ACC take-CONJ „The elephant and the mouse are taking a nap.‟ 98 i-ss-ta. be-PRS-DEC i-ss-ta. be-PRG-DEC BIBLIOGRAPHY 99 BIBLIOGRAPHY An, Y. (2007). Re extrinsic –tul. Qualifying Paper in Stony Brook University. Baek, M. (2002). “Handkwuke pokswu uymi yenkwu [A study on Korean plural senses].” Discourse and Recognition, 9(2), 59-78. Seoul, South Korea. Barner, D., & Snedeker, J. (2006). Children‟s early understanding of mass-count syntax: individuation, lexical content, and the number asymmetry hypothesis. Language learning and development, 2(3), 163-194. Berko, J. (1958). The Child's Learning of English Morphology. Word, 14, 150- 177. Borer, H. (2005). Structuring Sense Ι. Oxford: Oxford Press. Brown, R. (1973). A First Language: The Early Stages, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA. Chierchia, G. (1998). Reference to Kinds across Languages. Natural Langauge Semantics, 6, 339-405. Choe, J. (1987). Anti-Quantifiers and a Theory of Distributivity, Ph.D. dissertation, University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Chung, D. (2003). Dummy tul in Gapping Construction, A paper presented at the Conference of Generative Grammar in Korea. Chung, S. (2000). On reference to kinds in Indonesian. Natural Language Semantics, 8, 157-171. Conroy, A. (2009). Equal Treatment for All Antecedents: How Children Succeed with Principle B. Linguistic Inquiry, 40(3), 446-486. Crain, S., & Thornton, R. (1998). Investigations in Universal Grammar: A guide for experiments on the acquisition of syntax and semantics. MIT press. Ferenz, K. S., & Prasada, S. (2002). Singular or plural? Children‟s knowledge of the factors that determine the appropriate form of the count nouns. Journal of Child Language, 29, 49–70. Gordon, P. (1996). The truth-value judgment task. In Methods for assessing children‟s syntax. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press. Graves, F.M., & Koziol, S. (1971). Noun plural development in primary grade children. Child Development, 42, 1165-1173. 100 Hsieh, L., Leonard, B. L., & Swanson, L. (1999). Some differences between English plural noun inflections and third singular verb inflections in the input: the contributions of frequency, sentence position, and duration. Journal of Child Language, 26, 531-543. Huang, Y., Snedeker, J., & Spelke, E. (2004). What exactly do numbers mean? Poster presented at the 26th annual meeting of the Cognitive Science Society. Chicago, IL. Joh, Y. (2005). A semantic analysis of the Korean plural marker TUL. In Proceedings of SuB9, Emar Maier, Corien Bary, and Janneke Huitink (eds.), 170-182. www.ru.nl/ncs/sub9 Johnson, V., de Villiers, J., & Seymour, H. (2005). „Agreement without understading? The case of third person singular /s/‟, First Language, 25, 317-330. Hsieh, Li., Leonard, L. B., & Swanson, L. (1999). Some differences between English plural noun inflections and third singular verb inflections in the input: the contributions of frequency, sentence, position, and duration. Journal of Child Language, 26, 531-543. Li, Y. A. (1999). Plurality in a classifier language. Journal of East Asian Linguistics, 8, 75-99. Kang, B. (1994). Plurality and other semantic aspects of common nouns in Korean. Journal of East Asian Linguistics, 3, 1-24. Kim, C. (2005). The Korean Plural Marker –tul and its implications. Ph. D. dissertation, University of Delaware. Koopman, H. (2004). Korean (and Japanese) morphology from a syntactic perspective. Linguistic Inquiry, 36 (4), 601-633. Kouider, S., Halberda, J.,Wood, J., & Carey, S. (2006). Acquisition of English number marking: The singular-plural distinction. Language Learning and Development, 2(1), 1–25. Li, Y. A. (1999). Plurality in a classifier language. Journal of East Asian Linguistics, 8, 75-99. Madigan, S., Yamada, M., & Peng, A. (2008). Inclusive Reference in Korean: Implications for a Theory of Plurality. Proceedings of Harvard ISOKL 2007. Miller, K. L. (2007). Variable input and the acquisition of plurality in two varieties of Spanish. Ph. D. dissertation, Michigan State University. Munn, A., Zhang, X., & Schmitt, C. (2009). Acquisition of plurality in language without plurality. Merging Features: Computation, Interpretation and Acquisition. Oxford University Press. 310-327. Musolino, J. (2009). The logical syntax of number words: Theory, acquisition and processing. Cognition, 111(1), 24-45. 101 Nakano, N., Park, H., & Schmitt, C. (2009). A Comparative Study of the Acquisition of Plural Morphemes in Japanese and Korean. Proceedings of The 11th Tokyo Conference on Psycholinguistics. (in press). Park, H. (2010). The acquisition of plural morpheme in Korean. Master‟s thesis, Michigan State University. Park, S. (2008). Plural marking in classifier languages: a case study of the so-called plural marking –tul. Toronto Working Papers in Linguistics 28, 281-295. Song, J. (1997). The so-called Plural Copy in Korean as a marker of distribution and focus. Journal of Pragmatics, 27, 203-224. Wood, J. N., Kouider, S., & Carey, S. (2009). Acquisition of Singular-plural morphology. Developmental psychology, 45(1), 202-206. Yang, C. D. (2002). Knowledge and learning in natural language. Oxford University Press, Oxford. Yim, C. (2002). The semantics of non-nominal tul in Korean. Korean linguistics, 11, 183-202. Zapf, J. A., & Smith, L. B. (2007). When do children generalize the plural to novel nouns? First Language, 27, 53-73. Zapf, J. A., & Smith, L. B. (2008). Meaning matters in children‟s plural productions. Cognition, 108, 466-476. 102