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Children's understanding of factive presuppositions: an experiment and a review*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

Richard P. Scoville  and
Alice M. Gordon
Richard P. Scoville
Affiliation:
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Alice M. Gordon
Affiliation:
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
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Abstract

This paper presents a study of children's ability to recognize the presuppositions of sentences with factive and nonfactive verbs, and a review of recent research on the acquisition of factive presuppositions. In the present study, subjects in grades K, 2, 5 and 8, and adults, were asked to judge the truth of the complement clauses of sentences of the form ‘Doctor Fact (verb) that the ball is (is not) blue.’ The task was presented in the context of a television quiz show, with subjects as putative contestants. A tendency was found among younger subjects to overgeneralize the scope of negation of complement verbs into the main clauses of factive sentences. A gradual increase in comprehension of factive and nonfactive verbs was found, extending into adolescence. In a comparison of the present results with those of several recent studies, marked differences were found in the age of acquisition of factivity. These differences are discussed in terms of variations in task requirements and assessment techniques. It is concluded that acquisition proceeds on a verb-by-verb basis, rather than as a unitary process.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 7 , Issue 2 , June 1980 , pp. 381 - 399
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1980

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Footnotes

[*]

This study was supported in part by a Public Health Service research training grant 5 T32 MH 14261-01 from the National Institute of Mental Health. Thanks are due to Dr David Rogers, Assistant Superintendent of the Person County, N.C. schools; to Mr Samuel Spencer, principal of the South Elementary School; to Mr Smith Knight, principal of the Southern Junior High School, and to the teachers and students for their enthusiastic cooperation. The authors would like to acknowledge the assistance of those who participated in the production of the videotape: Sandy Zeskind, Susan McHale, Jane Perrin and Heinz Whitefoot. We are grateful to Dr Michael Maratsos for his detailed comments on an earlier draft of this paper. Address for correspondence: Richard Scoville, Department of Psychology, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC 27514, USA.

References

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