Classifiers as Count Syntax: Individuation and Measurement in the Acquisition of Mandarin Chinese

Abstract

The distinction between mass nouns (e.g., butter) and count nouns (e.g., table) offers a test case for asking how the syntax and semantics of natural language are related, and how children exploit syntaxsemantics mappings when acquiring language. Virtually no studies have examined this distinction in classifier languages (e.g., Mandarin Chinese) due to the widespread assumption that such languages lack mass-count syntax. However, Cheng and Sybesma (1998) argue that Mandarin encodes the mass-count at the classifier level: classifiers can be categorized as "mass-classifiers" or "count-classifiers." Mass and count classifiers differ in semantic interpretation and occur in different syntactic constructions. The current study is first an empirical test of Cheng and Sybesma's hypothesis, and second, a test of the acquisition of putative mass and count classifiers by children learning Mandarin. Experiments 1 and 2 asked whether count-classifiers select individuals and mass classifiers select nonindividuals and sets of individuals. Adult Mandarin-speakers indeed showed this pattern of interpretation, while 4-to 6-year-olds had not fully mastered the distinction. Experiment 3 tested participants' syntactic sensitivity by asking them to match two syntactic constructions (one that supported the mass or portion reading and one that did not) to two contrasting choices (a portion of an object and a whole object). A developmental trend was observed for the syntactic knowledge from 4-year-old children into adulthood: adults were near perfect and the older children were more likely than the younger children to correctly match the contrasting phrases to the objects. Thus, in three experiments we find support for Cheng and Sybesma's analysis, but also find that children master the syntax and semantics of Mandarin classifiers much later than Englishspeaking children acquire knowledge of the English mass-count distinction.

Cross-linguistic relations between quantifiers and numerals in language acquisition: Evidence from Japanese

“…For example, as reported in our analysis of Japanese child-directed speech, numerals are frequently used with classifiers, which intervene between the numeral and the head noun. As shown here, and by previous studies of classifier acquisition, children only begin to acquire adult-like classifier meanings at around the age of 3 (Chien, Lust & Chang, 2003;Li, Barner, & Huang, 2008;Sumiya & Colunga, 2006;Yamamato & Keil, 2000), despite using them frequently in spontaneous speech. As a result, hearing an NP that contains a numeral confronts Japanese children with two difficult problems simultaneously, equivalent to hearing an English sentence like "toma-blicket cat" (assuming that the noun is not dropped, and they know its meaning).…”

“…This can hardly help children converge on a meaning for one, especially since there are over 100 classifiers in Japanese, 30 of which are used frequently (Downing, 1996). Children learning Japanese and Chinese acquire classifier meanings very gradually, and even some very common classifiers are not fully understood by the age of 6 (see Sumiya & Colunga, 2006;Uchida & Imai, 1999;Yamamoto & Keil, 2000; for evidence from Mandarin Chinese, see Chien, Lust & Chiang, 2003;Li, Barner, & Huang, 2008). Thus, the use of numerals in children's language input is highly variable and different in many respects from the use of quantifiers.…”

Neural correlates of quantity processing of numeral classifiers.

“…Classifier (or measure word; Cipolotti et al, 1991;X. Li & Bisang, 2012) A type of quantifiers with explicit quantity information that "must occur with a number and/or a demonstrative, or certain quantifiers before a noun" (C. Li & Thompson, 1981, p. 104) and as measuring units of individual persons, objects, and things (P. Li et al, 2008).…”

Language, thought, and real nouns

“…Not all nouns that can appear in count syntax are created equal -some nouns specify particular units for counting, whereas other nouns require units to be specified Cheng & Sybesma, 1998;Grinevald, 2004;Li, Barner, & Huang, 2008;Lyons, 1977 Chinese there is direct evidence that count interpretation must be structurally licensed, but mass interpretatation need not be." (Borer, 2005, p. 108) 10 The use of classifiers with specific words likely also leads to classifiers licensing inferences about the meanings of novel words with which they are used.…”