A aquisição do princípio C da teoria de ligação em português brasileiro: questões metodológicas

Abstract

The distribution of referential expressions in natural languages isregulated by the Principle C. It is generally assumed that this principle is universal, operating in all languages. The goal of this studyis to investigate children’s knowledge about the Principle C. Oursubjects are Brazilian Portuguese-speaking children ranging from4;0 to 6;6 years. More specifically, we investigate the acquisitionof Principle C by means of two different methods: the grammarjudgment task (GJT) and the truth-value judgment task (TVJJ). Thisis intended to address some critiques found in the literature arguingthat the TVJJ might not be appropriate for testing Principle C cases.Using two methods for testing the same structures with the samechildren, we were able to check potential differences in children’sbehavior by using these two methods. In general, the results suggest that children from 4;0 on display knowledge about PrincipleC, since they rejectviolations of the principle. The results also suggest that the TVJJ is appropriate for testing this principle.

Keywords

• Principle C
• experimental methodologies
• backward anaphora
• forward anaphora