A Study of Children’s Acquisition of the Deixis in Chinese Mandarin: Asymmetry Distribution of “zhe”, “zhege” and “na”, “nage” between Positions of Subject and Object
- DOI
- 10.2991/assehr.k.211120.090How to use a DOI?
- Keywords
- acquisition of deixis; Chinese demonstrative deixis; Chinese Mandarin children
- Abstract
Acquisition of the deixis category has been a hot topic for over decades and many linguists have researched it from different perspectives. However, many studies focus on L2 acquisition of deixis learning rather than on children’s acquisition of native languages especially Mandarin Chinese. Thus, this study aims to investigate children’s acquisition of the demonstratives “zhe” and “na” in Mandarin Chinese especially the asymmetry distribution of “zhe” vs. “zhege” and “na” vs. “nage” between positions of subjects and objects. The study tested 18 Chinese children from 3 to 5 years old on their acquisition of deixis in Mandarin using elicited production as well as elicited imitation. The research shows that children have not acquired the demonstrative deixis of “zhe”-series and “na”-series absolutely before 6 years old but senior children relatively did better than junior children. Moreover, children’s development of “na” is later than the development of “zhe”. In addition, children from 3 years old to 5 years old have not acquired the asymmetric distribution of “zhe”/ “na” vs. “zhege”/ “nage” at the position of subject and object. I hope this study can further the research on children’s language acquisition and cognitive development.
- Copyright
- © 2021 The Authors. Published by Atlantis Press SARL.
- Open Access
- This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC license.
Cite this article
TY - CONF AU - Xiaohui Sun PY - 2021 DA - 2021/11/29 TI - A Study of Children’s Acquisition of the Deixis in Chinese Mandarin: Asymmetry Distribution of “zhe”, “zhege” and “na”, “nage” between Positions of Subject and Object BT - Proceedings of the 2021 3rd International Conference on Literature, Art and Human Development (ICLAHD 2021) PB - Atlantis Press SP - 473 EP - 479 SN - 2352-5398 UR - https://doi.org/10.2991/assehr.k.211120.090 DO - 10.2991/assehr.k.211120.090 ID - Sun2021 ER -