Ferry, A. , Nespor, M. & Mehler, J.
Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati
Research demonstrates that infants begin learning words during the first year of life (Bergelson & Swingley, 2012). Yet, learning a language requires more than simply building a vocabulary; infants must also learn the morphological rules and regularities of their language. One such regularity, the singular/plural distinction has been studied extensively in English-learning children. Those findings demonstrate that children do not acquire the singular-plural distinction until approximately 24 months, when they begin to produce and comprehend the distinction (Wood et al., 2009). Yet, in English, the singular/plural marking is not as robust as in other languages. Italian uses robust inflection morphology marking both gender and plurality of the noun in the same manner. The distinction is marked as a necessary component of the noun, in the article, and in adjectives associated with the noun (e.g., il ragazzo alto; i ragazzi alti; la ragazza alta; le ragazze alte). Here, we ask whether this robust marking highlights the singular/plural distinction earlier for Italian-learning infants than for English-learning infants. We compare this to the acquisition of gender morphology, which is marked the same way but infants have been shown discriminate natural gender categories early in development (Leinbach & Fagot, 1993). We tested 12- to 24-month-olds in a looking while listening task. During each trial infants viewed two images that differed either in gender or in plurality (e.g., one man versus two men). Sentences directed the infants to look at one of the images (e.g., ?Guarda il ragazzo!) while their looking time was recorded. Results indicate that gender morphology is acquired early in development. The acquisition of the singular/plural distinction emerges earlier in Italian infants than previously found in English-learning infants. The results are discussed in terms of the acquisition of morphology and the role of language in acquiring the singular/plural conceptual distinction.