Escolar Documentos
Profissional Documentos
Cultura Documentos
1, 1998
Mark Leikin1,2
Accepted June 24, 1997
This study investigated the ability of children between ages 3;0 and 7;2 to understand
and to produce locative prepositions in functionally autonomous form in Russian. Eighty-
eight children 'were required to manipulate two objects in nonverbal and verbal situa-
tions. Six types of locative relationships ("in," "on," "under," "above," "infront of,"
and ' 'behind'') were studied in constructions such as ' 'the sphere is in the cube.'' Results
showed that the children found difficulties in the functional use of prepositions. These
findings suggest that the acquisition of locative prepositions in childhood is not complete
at the time of their appearance in speech. This is a complex process which is not com-
pleted until approximately age 7. The acquisition of the prepositional system is equivalent
to the acquisition of the prepositions' semantic system.
91
4 In Russian the prepositional system is really a system of prepositions and verbal pre-
fixes, for example, the preposition v(in) and the locative verbal prefix v- (e.g., v-lez [he
got in]). (Vinogradov, 1986). Both items appear in children's speech at the same time
(Gvozdev, 1961).
Acquisition of Locative Prepositions in Russian 93
Russian locative prepositional system is used (Leikin, 1989).5 Here the sys-
tem of locative terms is represented as a hierarchical system of semantically
distinctive features (SDF), and the means for generating the system. It is
supposed that the meanings of prepositions have an internal structure built
up from semantically distinctive features. The model includes a finite stock
of SDF and the means for generation. The system is seen to be in the process
of expanding. Thus this model is a sort of tree structure.
The basic type of SDF is distinguished by four object-centered features:
(1) "co-existence" of two objects in time and space (e.g., in the terms of
prepositions, s [with]); (2) "functionality," i.e., the functional asymmetry
between objects of relation so that one is the located object (hereafter called
the figure) and the other is the reference object (hereafter called the land-
mark) (e.g., pri [attached to]); (3) "location" (event-function Stay and,
partly, state-function Be in Jackendoff' s [1983] model) specifying location
of the figure with additional meaning of stasis over a period of time; and
(4) "path" (event-function Go and, partly, state-function Orient in Jacken-
doff's model) specifying motion along a path such as "trajectory of mo-
tion."
The second type of SDF appears in the hierarchical structure after in-
corporation into the system of two new measures: the viewer's position and
the properties of the reference object such as its own intrinsic coordinate
axes. These are such specific spatial features as "vertical orientation," "hor-
izontal orientation," "surface contact," "front," "back," "container."
The meaning of the preposition may be described by a single feature
as in the case of the preposition 5 (with) (the feature "co-existence" +) or
as just one of realization of a SDF. For example, the meaning of the prep-
osition v (in) ("enclosure" +: "inclusion of figure in the volume of land-
mark") is one of the realizations of SDF "location" ("location" +). Note
that a realization of any feature (function in Jackendoff' s [1983, 1987] terms)
appears here as a certain initial meaning that may not necessarily be des-
ignated by a concrete preposition in a given language. Finally, a meaning
may be described by a combination of features and their realizations. For
example, the meaning of the preposition ot (from/away from) is described
by the combination of realizations of several SDFs: "inclusion of figure in
5 Some properties of this model, are similar to the theoretical views of van Schooneveld
(1978), particularly, the principle of hyponymy and the assumption that a limited num-
ber of semantic features constitutes a hierarchy of inclusion relationships, etc. These
similarities can most probably be traced back to Jakobson's (1971) theory. However, it
is not possible here to present a comprehensive comparison between these two different
models, or among other models such as Jackendorff' s theory of conceptual semantics
(Jackendorff, 1983, 1987) or Talmy's description of place expressions (Talmy, 1983).
Acquisition of Locative Prepositions in Russian 95
6 This pattern was constructed on the basis of analysis of literary texts, examples from
the living spoken language of adults (Kibrik, 1970; Shichkina, 1979), and, partly, ex-
amples of prepositional paraphasias of adult aphasics (Leikin, 1989).
96 Leikin
METHOD
Subjects
Eighty-eight subjects participated in the present study (male n = 46
and female n = 42). All were native Russian-speaking children, selected
from five age groups: (1) 17 children aged 3;0 to 3;9; (2) 15 children aged
4;0 to 4;11; (3) 17 children aged 5;0 to 5;11; (4) 10 children aged 6;0 to 6;
6; and (5) 19 children aged 6;7 to 7;2.
Procedure
Several tasks were administered to subjects, whereby each child had to
manipulate two objects in nonverbal and verbal situations. The objects were
a wooden sphere (diameter: 5 cm) and a plastic opaque cube (10 cm3) that
was open on one side. Six types of locative relationships (and six Russian
prepositions) were examined: in, on, under, above, in front of, behind. The
materials used in the verbal tasks included three types of prepositional con-
structions: (i) shar na kube (the sphere is on the cube)', (ii) shar nakhoditsja
na kube (the sphere is located on the cube); (iii) na kube shar (on the cube
there is the sphere). This aimed at the studying of possible influence of
syntactic context on comprehension of prepositions. Each of the three con-
structions was used for each of the six prepositions. In the experiment, the
words sphere and cube denoting the figure and the landmark of relation
were deliberately used instead of the more familiar ball and box. This aimed
at augmentation of the preposition's role in comprehension of the phrase's
meanings.
Acquisition of Locative Prepositions in Russian 97
Scoring
During the examination, the children were not told if their responses
were correct or not. There was no stimulation intended to elicit a certain
kind of response. The last response in the course of 1 min was accepted as
final. In nonverbal tasks and in the comprehension task, only the establish-
ment of suitable spatial relationships between given objects was accepted as
correct. In the verbal imitation task, the correct response was the repetition
of the presented construction without alterations causing semantic changes.
Finally, in the naming task any suitable verbal description of the presented
spatial relation was deemed correct. During the experiment, the examiner
made use of a registering form to record each child's performances and the
accompanying activity and explanations by the child. In each task, the de-
gree of appropriate performance was determined by calculating the per-
centage of correct responses. For example, if in the 3;0 to 3;9 age group the
prepositional constructions were comprehended correctly in 175 out of 306
presentations, the percentage of appropriate performances would be 57 (175
divided by 306, multiplied by 100). The statistical treatment of data was
carried out by the F method (angular transformation of Fisher) (Runyon &
Haber, 1991).
RESULTS
All the children performed the nonverbal tasks without error or diffi-
culty. They correctly placed the sphere and the cube in locative relationships
according to the given pattern. Thus, the children could comprehend and
express such relationships (including "under" and "above") in their non-
verbal behavior (i.e., in this case, by means of the sphere and the cube.)
These results were fully expected since, according to E. V. Clark (1973,
1980), Halpern et al. (1983), Johnston (1988), and Cox and Izard (1990),
nonverbal cognitive skills concerned with spatial relations are acquired in
earlier stages of child development. The same results were obtained in the
verbal repetition task. The children had no problem repeating the given
construction. Several alterations of a constructional nature occurred, but all
these were within the framework of permissible variations in Russian. The
prepositions and case inflections were repeated correctly. These results were
expected, like those in the previous tasks. It was important, however, to test
the children's ability to express studied types of phrases through verbal
imitation.
Table I summarizes the children's performance in the comprehension
and naming tasks. Errors are seen to occur in all age groups. As might be
Acquisition of Locative Prepositions in Russian 99
7 In Russian the distinction by the feature (meaning) "contact" among the studied prep-
ositions is realized only in the pair of the prepositions na (on) (with contact) and nad
(above) (without contact).
100 Leikin
8 In these meanings the feature "contact" is not realized, being superseded by the feature
"proximity."
Acquisition of Locative Prepositions in Russian 103
most frequent in both tasks (e.g., in —» under, on —> over) or only in one
task (e.g., behind —> in front of in the comprehension task, and behind —>
on in the naming task). Also, an asymmetrical pattern of substitutions was
observed (e.g., behind —» under in the Comprehension task, and under —»
behind in the naming task).
Analysis of the substitutions (in the comprehension and the naming
tasks) did not disclose any connection between the nature of errors on the
one hand, and the frequency, prosodic and articular complexity, or phonetic
similarity of the prepositions on the other. Rather the results (see Figs. 2
and 3) reflected the semantic complexity of the prepositions. Analyzing the
substitutions from the viewpoint of the proposed pattern of locative mean-
ings, it was found that the nature of the substitutions to some extent corre-
lated with SDFs and their structure within the system (see Fig. 1). Thus, the
children's substitutions may now be expressed in terms of the model of
prepositional semantic system:
1. Substitutions by common feature (the neutralization of one or more fea-
tures): (i) on —> above, above —> on, higher —» above, beyond —» on.
The common feature is the "vertical orientation" (from above) in the
presence of neutralization of the opposition by the feature "contact." (ii)
at —> in front of, about —> in front of, beside —> in front of, etc.; about
-> above, about —> behind, etc.; away from —> in front of, toward —» in
front of, etc. The common feature is "inclusion of 0-1 in the neighbor-
hood of 0-2" with neutralization of the features "orientation" and "way
of orientation," that is, the substitution of specific meaning by a more
common generic meaning. (iii) to left —» under, to right —> above, etc.
The common feature is an "orientation" with neutralization of the feature
"way of orientation."
2. Substitutions by contrast of meaning: outside -» in, on —> in, in —» under,
in —> above, etc. In these substitutions the main opposition is by the
104 Leikin
DISCUSSION
("in front of, by/near"). Such opposition by the feature "proximity" has
explicit expression, for example, in certain Caucasian languages (Kibrik,
1970). Hence, these findings indicate that spatial properties of relations seem
to dominate in the system of locatives forming with children. The features
revealed by children correlate to a large extent with spatial relations existing
in the extralinguistic reality (Dromi, 1978; Jackendoff, 1987; Landau &
Stecker, 1990). This becomes especially evident through comparison of these
results with the data of a similar experiment with adult aphasics (Leikin,
1996). Aphasic substitutions revealed not only spatial features but also lin-
guistic relations existing between locative meanings in the language.
Thus, the following picture of acquisition and further development of
locatives may be expected. Prepositions appear in children's language pri-
marily in response to the demand of the adult language's syntactic form. At
this stage (at age 3) prepositions perform mostly syntactic functions like
case inflections. Prepositions, however, also possess a certain semantic load,
being recognized mostly in familiar contexts. These initial locative meanings
conform to the level of the child's cognitive development. They are concrete
and have deictic features. In this respect, the prepositions are similar to
locative adverbs and may be used in an adverbial function. At the same
time, adverbs are preferred by the children at this stage. Further development
of prepositional meanings is affected by the development of cognitive skills,
and these in turn exert an inverse influence on the cognitive development
of locatives. This process is characterized by the formation of a locative
SDF system. Evidently the SDF system in children's language reflects the
properties of a child's cognition. The development of this system makes
possible the acquisition of a concept of locatives having full adult meaning.
One of the most important indications of the acquisition of a prepositional
system is the "functional" usage of prepositions. Again, the system is af-
fected by adult language and comes to reflect not only relationships of ex-
tralinguistic reality but primarily the relationships which are expressed in
the language.
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