國 立 政 治 大 學 研 究 所 碩 士 論 文 摘 要 研究所所別： 語言學研究所 論文名稱：音位和音節在中文兒童語音扮演的角色：心理語言學實驗的驗證 指導教授：萬依萍 研究生：廖昭媛 論文內容摘要：（共一冊，13,641字，分五章二十節，並扼要說明內容，共453字） 本文目的是想瞭解兒童在聽辨語音相似性，對於音位和音節的敏感性。本研究的受試者是41位操持國語的學齡前兒童。其中二十一位兒童參與非詞語音分類實驗（the nonword classification task）。兒童首先要學習兩個雙音節的標準語音，然後他（她）要依據聽覺上的相似性來歸類稍候聽到的測試音。他們需要要判定測試音聽起和哪一個標準音聽起來比較相似。結果顯示兒童在音位相似性或是音節相似方面的表現並無顯著的差異。另外二十位兒童皆下來進行非詞語音聽辯的實驗（The word-pair judgment task 1 and 2）。在測試工作（一），兒童要聽辨一對兩個雙音節的非詞語音，在前面的部份聽起來是否相似。結果顯示，兒童在音位和音節相似性，音位和最多相性似上的表現皆有顯著的差異性。在測試工作（二），兒童也是要聽辨一對兩個雙音節的非詞語音，在後面的部份聽起來是否相似。實驗的結果和測試工作（一）相同。整體上而言，要解釋在兒童聽辯語音上的表現，除了從「數量」方面的考量，更可以從語音本身結構上上的差異性來討論兒童對與音位和音節的敏感性。此外，在本文的實驗裡，並未發現相似因的位置會造成兒童在聽辯語音上的差異。 / Abstract This paper investigated the role of syllables and phonemes in Mandarin speaking children in terms of the sensitivity to the syllable correspondences and phoneme correspondences. In the first experiment, the nonword classification task, 21 kindergarteners were recruited. The child had to learn two disyllabic standard sounds. Then, he/she was presented with a test nonword and had to classifiy the test nonword to one of the two standard sounds if the test sound and the standard sound are sounded alike at the beginnings. The results in the nonword classification task have shown that the young children did not show the significant reliance on the type of the syllable correspondences. In the two further experiments, the word-pair judgment task 1 and 2, another 20 kindergarteners were recruited. The children were asked to judge whether two test words are sounded alike at the beginnings. The results in the word-pair judgment task 1 indicate that syllables are treated as a structural unit and phonemes are belonging to the lower level of the syllabic constructs. The children’s responses tend to reflect the effect of the syllable structure in the language process rather than the effect of the size of shared units. In the word-pair judgment task 2, the child has to judge whether the two test words are sounded alike at the ends. The results also indicate that children’s performance should be viewed in terms of syllable structures. Besides, the location of the shared unit did not play a role when children judge the similarity between the speech sounds. Children performed equally the same when the shared units are either at the beginnings or at the ends of words in the present study.

本研究探討漢語母子對話中，兒童使用情態動詞(modal verb)「會」的類別、人稱主詞及語用功能。受試者分成第一組(平均兩歲十一個月)與第二組(平均四歲十個月)。研究結果發現認知(epistemic)情態動詞的「會」比動力(dynamic)情態動詞的「會」晚習得，而義務(deontic)情態動詞的「會」則很少出現。其指出不同的習得順序與認知發展有關，即認知上易理解的概念比認知上較不易理解的早習得。在情態動詞「會」的人稱主詞上，兒童在動力和義務情態動詞「會」主要是使用第一人稱當主詞，然而兒童傾向使用第三人稱當認知情態動詞「會」的主詞。而兒童很少使用第二人稱當情態動詞「會」的主詞。情態動詞「會」語句的語用功能方面，動力情態動詞「會」語句包含請求、拒絕、描述、誇耀；義務情態動詞「會」語句只發現承諾的功能；而認知情態動詞「會」語句有爭辯、疑惑、推論的功能。研究結果顯示兒童能掌握情態動詞「會」語句不同的語用功能。 / This study examined Mandarin-speaking children’s different types, person subjects, and pragmatic functions of the modal hui utterances in mother-child conversations. Children were divided into Group I (mean age= 2;11) and Group II (mean age= 4;10). The results showed that the epistemic modal hui was acquired relatively late, compared with the dynamic modal hui. The deontic modal hui was a marginal use. It suggests that the different acquisition order seems to involve cognitive development, which means that the cognitively accessible concept may be acquired earlier than the less cognitively accessible one. As for the person subjects of the modal hui, children mainly used the dynamic and deontic modal hui with the first person subject; however, they tended to use the epistemic modal hui with the third person subject. Children rarely used the modal hui with the second person subject. With regard to the pragmatic functions of the modal hui utterances, it was found that the functions of the dynamic hui utterances included request, refusal, reporting, and boasting. In the deontic hui utterances, only the function of promise was found. The epistemic hui utterances served the functions of argument, puzzlement, and reasoning. The results suggest that children are sensitive to the pragmatic functional aspects of the modal hui utterances.

本研究旨在探討漢語母子對話中兒童「然後」的使用與其功能。研究語料來自於八位年齡介於兩歲七個月到五歲四個月的兒童，並分成兩組：年紀較小之兒童(平均兩歲十一個月)與年紀較大之兒童(平均四歲十個月)。本研究主要根據Su (1998)的分類，把兒童「然後」分為連接詞(connective)及言談標記(discourse marker)的使用。連接詞的使用有時間性(temporal)、遞增性(additive)、因果性(causal)及轉折性(contrast)四項功能。言談標記的使用有填補語(verbal filler)、主題接續(topic succession)及主題再開(resumptive opener)三項功能。研究結果顯示年紀較大之組的兒童使用「然後」的次數較多。隨著兒童年齡增長，言談標記使用的增加比連接詞的增加還多。「然後」當連接詞時，時間性功能使用得最多。與Yeh (2011)「然後」在敘述文中的研究比較，其顯示出「然後」在敘述文中出現得比在對話中還多。另外，時間性功能隨著年紀減少，而遞增性及因果性隨著年齡增加，可用Winskel (2003)的「概念複雜性」(conceptual complexity)來解釋。「然後」當言談標記時，兒童填補語使用得最多，其隨著年紀增加而減少使用。主題再開兩組都使用得少，而主題接續只出現在年紀較大之組別。總結，兒童在「然後」的使用上有發展上的不同。 / The study investigated Mandarin-speaking children’s different use of ranhou at different ages in mother-child conversations. Eight subjects aged from 2;7 to 5;4 were divided into two groups; a younger group (mean age: 2;11) and an older group (mean age: 4;10). In this study, the children’s use of ranhou was categorized into connective use and discourse marker use, mainly based on Su’s (1998) classification. The connective use of ranhou includes temporal, additive, causal, and contrast functions. The discourse marker use of ranhou contains verbal filler, topic succession, and resumptive opener functions. The results showed that older children used more tokens of ranhou than younger children. As children got older, the discourse marker use of ranhou increased much more than the connective use of ranhou. In the connective use of ranhou, temporal ranhou was the most frequent function. Compared with Yeh’s (2011) study of ranhou in narratives, it may be suggested that ranhou occurs more in narratives and less in conversations. Additionally, the temporal function decreased with age whereas the additive and causal functions increased with age, which could be explained by Winskel’s (2003) conceptual complexity. In the discourse marker use of ranhou, the verbal filler function was used the most and decreased with age. The tokens of the resumptive opener function were few in both groups, and the topic succession function only occurred in the older group. To conclude, the results suggest that there is a developmental difference in children’s use of ranhou.

本篇論文的目的在於探討兒童在親子對話中行使重新請求 (request reformulation) 的情況，研究問題如下: 1.兒童採取哪些重新請求的策略以達到請求的目的? 2.親子對話中，常見的重新請求的序列模式（patterns of request reformulation sequences）為何？ 2.如何從兒童重新請求的使用反映出角色取代能力 (perspective-taking ability )的發展? 研究對象為一位三歲和一位六歲的男孩。研究結果顯示隨著年紀的增長，兒童能使用更多元的重新請求策略。研究也發現造成請求失敗的原因隨著不同年齡的兒童有所差異。隨著年紀的增長，兒童面臨的失敗原因和挑戰日漸複雜、困難，兒童會依據不同的失敗原因採取重新請求的策略。最後，研究顯示不同年齡兒童採取的重新請求策略可以展現出他們不同階段的角色取代能力的發展。三歲的兒童無法跳脫自己的觀點而從別人的角度來看待自己的請求，所以重新請求著重於強調自己的需求。六歲的兒童較能夠從別人的立場看待自己的請求，所以他較有能力在考量對方的觀點和利益之後採用對雙方有益的策略。 / The purpose of this study is to explore how children at different age make reformulation to compensate for an unsuccessful request. Firstly, we aim to investigate what reformulation strategies children apply and the patterns of reformulation sequences. Second, we further aim to explore how children’s use of reformulation strategies reveals the development of perspective-taking ability. The data analyzed are natural conversations of two Mandarin-speaking mother-child dyads. Subjects in this present study are two male children. One subject is three years and six months old and the other is six years old. The strategies of request reformulation adopted in this study are mainly based on Levin and Rubin’s (1984) categorization. The results show that children would have a greater variety of reformulation strategies as they get older. Furthermore, aggravation and explanation are both children’s main strategies of reformulation. With the growth of age, children decrease the use of aggravation and increase the use of bargain and mitigation. Furthermore, the results of reformulation sequences reveal that the two children are confronted with different causes of the failure to obtain compliance, which influences their adoption of reformulation strategies. The younger child faced the communicative breakdown and his mother’s ignorance while the older child encountered his mother’s queries and disagreements. Finally, the two children’s application of reformulation strategies revealed their different ability to take the other’s perspectives. The younger child’s reliance on aggravation and speaker-oriented negotiation reveals that he is embedded in his own viewpoints and is less able to view his request from the hearer’s viewpoints while the older child is more able to view the request from the hearer’ perspective and take her benefits into account. Our findings throw some light on children’s use of request reformulation strategy and the development of the perspective-taking ability.

本研究主要探討台灣漢語兒童在日常家庭對話中，對父母行使請求時的語言表現及禮貌現象，以了解漢語兒童的語用發展歷程與現象。研究的重點主要是在兒童表達請求的言語行為時所使用的語言形式，以及人際關係中會影響兒童禮貌表現的因素及其反應在語言形式的使用情形。透過對兩位以漢語為母語的兒童長期互動的觀察，本研究發現，兒童在表達請求時，採用多元的語言形式，包含祈使句、直述句、帶有語尾助詞的祈使句、以及表達個人慾望或需求的陳述句。考量這些語言形式使用的情境後進一步發現，兒童傾向在一般的日常對話中多以表達個人慾望的陳述句為表達請求的主要語言形式，而在合作互動的情境中，主要的請求語言形式則絕大多數為祈使句；這樣的語言功能分工，在兩歲半左右可以明顯觀察得到。 另外，透過兒童語言形式表達禮貌的觀察顯示，兒童普遍會依照人際互動的一些因素來選擇表達請求時所適用的語言形式，尤以有效性及地位高低為主要的兩個考量因素。觀察中發現，兒童大量使用祈使句及表達個人慾望需求的陳述句來表達請求，而其他的語言型式相對上則少得許多，主要的因素很有可能是這兩類的語言型式，在他們與父母互動中最能有效達到他們的溝通目的。此外，兒童也會依照他們在表達請求時與他們父母間的地位高低來考量請求所要使用的語言形式。儘管觀察結果指出，兒童傾向使用能有效達到溝通互動目的的語言形式來表達他們的請求，必要時，他們也會依照互動雙方的地位關係進行語言形式的微調，這樣的語言表現有明顯的系統性；而這樣的系統性，進而突顯了兒童約略在三歲前即對禮貌在語言形式使用的影響有了初步的系統與了解。 除了句法結構外，兒童也會透過詞彙單位來傳達他們在請求所應注意的禮貌，例如，必要時，他們會使用「幫」、「請」、及「我們」來修飾或削弱請求時可能對對方所造成的影響。這些詞彙的使用在發展上屬於略晚才習得的語言形式。 最後，研究的結果也指出，雖然兒童表達請求時，使用較為間接而有禮的語言形式，未必較能有效地達到他們的溝通目的，但是如果在表達請求的同時，也進一步說明理由者，達到溝通目的的機率則有明顯的增加。另外，從語言形式和表達請求的情境及人際地位的互動中發現，兒童表達請求的基本語言形式極有可能為表達個人的慾望與需求的陳述句，儘管祈使句在所觀察的語料中使用的頻率最高。這樣的論點，不但符合其他文獻中針對兒童語言發展的發現，也貼近兒童語言發展為連續過程的觀點，且也反應了人類語言發展的基本歷程。 / This study aims to investigate Mandarin-speaking children’s requests and their linguistic politeness so as to contribute to the understanding of children’s pragmatic development as well as linguistic development. The present study is mainly concerned with what linguistic devices children utilize to issue requests in spontaneous interactions with their parents and what interpersonal factors may have an influence on children’s uses of request forms. These two issues were discussed through examinations over children’s spontaneous interactions with their parents in family settings. On the basis of the longitudinal data produced by two children, it has been found that when requesting, children draw upon various linguistic devices, primarily including simple imperatives, WANT statements, imperatives with sentence-final particle, and declaratives. Such a variety of request forms can be observed from an early age on, at around two years old, but demonstrates no remarkable development, judged simply by these formal devices used at different ages. When situational contexts are also taken into account, nevertheless, a developmental pattern regarding the request forms is thus revealed. In terms of situational contexts, children are found to use simple imperatives primarily to convey their requests when involved in interactive activities with their parents, whereas they tend to utilize both simple imperatives and WANT statements when having common talks with their parents. Such a division of labor can be noticeably observed when children are about two and half years old. As to children’s linguistic politeness when making requests, the results reveal that children are aware of the influence of certain interactional and interpersonal factors on the appropriate use of linguistic forms. Children are inclined to draw upon comparatively more effective forms to issue their requests, and therefore children by and large request with pure imperatives and WANT statements, since these two request forms may effectively obtain the desirable compliance from their parents. In addition to effectiveness, children may also take interpersonal status and request cost into consideration when judging which request forms to use in the immediate context. Such consideration of interpersonal status when determining the appropriate request forms to use may thus reflects children’s awareness of politeness at around the age of three. In addition to syntactic structures, children are also found to draw upon lexical items to show their deference to politeness. Children may use such lexical forms as qing ‘please’, bang ‘to help with’ and women ‘let’s; we’ to mitigate the illocutionary force in their requests. These forms, despite their low frequencies in the data, may thus reveal children’s sensitivity to politeness when making such a face-threatening act as requests. The use of these polite lexical forms also discloses a comparatively late development in linguistic politeness; children may not use such polite forms until they reach the second half of their second year. A late development is also observed in the respect of children’s use of reasons to justify their requests. The results show that children’s justification may generally increase the effectiveness of their requests, but such use is infrequent and only observed at a later age, around the age of three. Finally, the results of the investigation into the data may suggest that WANT statements are highly likely an earlier developed request form and the prime linguistic forms children rely on to issue their requests, given the findings that children tend to request with WANT statements when interacting with parents at a lower status as a child and that children’s use of request forms are prone to the effect of interpersonal status. Such a suggestion may not only conform to the findings in previous studies with regard to children’s linguistic development in requests, but also accord with the general developmental pattern of human languages.

本篇論文針對三位以臺灣華語為母語的音韻異常兒童，採長期觀察的方式，研究中文顎音[tɕ, tɕʰ, ɕ]的習得狀況與產製現象。習得狀況方面，詳細描述顎音的習得順序、常見的語音錯誤之音韻歷程、延遲的音韻歷程類型、錯誤取代模式隨著年紀增長而改變的情形。產製現象方面，本篇論文探討了顎音所在音節的音節複雜度(Syllable complexity)是否會對顎音的正確率以及錯誤取代狀況有所影響。 本研究共觀察三位年齡為三歲十個月至五歲三個月且正在接受語言治療的音韻異常兒童長達六個月，以每週一次的頻率前往醫院收集幼童與語言治療師之間的自然對話，並利用錄製回來的影音檔做譯寫和分析。 結果顯示，音韻異常兒童的顎音習得狀況有以下現象：(1)顎音發展較為停滯，幾乎沒有隨著年齡的增長而有進步的現象。(2)音韻異常兒童在發顎音時，會系統性的使用不該是他的年齡所應該出現的音韻歷程。(3)顎音的語音錯誤之音韻歷程種類不多，但使用的頻率卻非常頻繁。上述結果皆驗證了前人文獻的研究結果(Stoel-Gammon & Dunn, 1985; Jeng, 2011)。除此之外，本研究也發現音韻異常兒童具有以下特徵：(4)音韻異常兒童能夠察覺兩個音之間送氣特徵(aspiration feature)的不同，在選擇替代音時，也會選擇與目標音有相同送氣特徵的音來取代。(5)音韻異常兒童的語言能力和語言表現之間有落差，也就是說，他們知道能夠區辨出哪個是正確的音，但卻無法正確的使用該語音。(6)音節複雜度會對音韻異常兒童的顎音產製造成影響。因此，音韻異常兒童在顎音的習得狀況和產製表現上都和正常兒童不同。 音韻異常兒童使用的錯誤音的模式顯示塞擦音基底形式中的[stop]成分及[cont]成分並非均等(asymmetrical relationship)，且塞擦音是屬於以左邊的成分為主要核心的語音(left-headed)，並從第一語言習得的觀點為塞擦音的真實面貌提供了一項證據。 / The purpose of this study is to discuss the issue concerning the acquisition and production of Mandarin palatals [tɕ, tɕʰ, ɕ] in Taiwan Mandarin-speaking disordered children. Four aspects regarding the acquisition of Mandarin palatals are included in this study: the order of acquisition, the phonological processes involved, the delayed phonological processes, and the path of error patterns. In addition, the effect of syllable complexity on disordered children’s palatal production is also examined. Three disordered children (aged 3;10 to 5;3) who were identified as having delayed phonological development are investigated in this study. A six-to-seven month of longitudinal observation is conducted by recording the spontaneous speech between the therapists and the children during the process of speech therapy. The results showed that phonologically disordered children have the following characteristics on palatal acquisition and production: (1) static phonemic system that stops at an early level of development, (2) persistent uses of delayed processes, and (3) frequent uses of phonological processes. These characteristics were asserted in the literature (Stoel-Gammon & Dunn, 1985; Jeng, 2011) and have been proved in this study. In addition, we found that disordered children are unconsciously able to notice the aspiration feature of two sounds, and will use an error sound that has an identical aspiration feature with the target. Moreover, the disparity between the linguistic competence and the linguistic performance in the disordered children was also found. Last, syllable complexity has found to affect disordered children’s palatal production. The substitution errors used by the disordered children support Schafer’s (1995) study, in which he claimed that the underlying representation of affricates is left-headed. To sum up, this study has provided a piece of evidence for the unsolved issue of the nature of affricates from the field of first language acquisition, and might serve as a reference for parents and speech therapists for understanding palatal acquisition and production in disordered children.

本研究探討兒童在給予非優先應答時所採取的語用策略，以及母親在接續的對話中所給予的回應。研究的語料來自於一名以漢語為母語的四歲兒童與她的母親之間的日常對話。在分析的資料中，我們將非優先應答區分成拒絕和異議兩類，分析之後，結果發現受試兒童採取六種不同的語用策略來表達非優先應答，分別為(1)直接否定(simple negation)、(2)理由(account)、(3)挑戰(challenge)、(4)修正(correction)、(5)部分認同(partial agreement)、(6)反請求(counter-request)，而受試者的非優先應答往往結構簡單，內容直接而缺少修飾，雖然她在否定或提出異議時，能給予進一步的解釋，但是她所提出的多為以自我為中心的理由。另外，母親在面對受試者直接的拒絕或異議時，多半會以下列三種方式回應：一、再次陳述自己的要求或想法，二、提供更多的解釋來說服對方，三、提出問題要求對方進一步說明拒絕或不同意的原因，以上的三種回應策略都使母親有再一次的機會來說服受試兒童接受她的要求，或者同意她的想法。 / This study investigates children’s pragmatic strategies of delivering dispreferred responses and also how the mothers reacted in the subsequent turns. The data analyzed are a Mandarin-speaking four-year-old child’s natural conversation with her mother. In the observed verbal exchanges, the subject child’s dispreferred seconds are categorized into refusals and disagreements. After careful examination, six pragmatic strategies are identified in the dispreferred turns, namely, simple negation, account, challenge, correction, partial agreement, and counter-request. The results indicate the child’s dispreferreds are generally simple in structure, direct and unmitigated in force. Though she was capable of providing accounts for her refusals or disagreements, the reasons she gave are mostly self-oriented and serve to express her non-compliance and disapproval. As for the mother’s subsequent responses, it is found that facing the child’s direct and socially disruptive seconds, the mother generally targeted at her previous turn and attempted to carry on the prior illocutionary force. When her directive or statement was refused or denied, she tended to responded with reformulations, persuading remarks or queries, which elicited more information about the dispreferred acts. All of these three strategies provided another chance for the achievement of compliance or agreement.

本研究的目的為探究中文母子對話中，母親的互動風格與話題延續的關係。 研究問題為: (a)本研究中兩位母親的互動風格為何? (b)兩位孩童的話題延續表現有何不同? (c)母親的互動風格與話題延續有怎樣的互動關係? 研究語料為兩組親子互動的自然語料，各取三個小時，孩童的年紀約為三歲。研究結果顯示兩位母親的互動風格有所不同，分別屬於命令型和引誘型。 而小孩的在話題延續上表現則是相近，大多用回應母親問題的方式來延續話題並且能在不同的情境中提供新資訊。對兩組親子互動的探究顯示命令型的母親比較不會延續對話而經常改變話題，造成較短的話題片斷。引誘型的母親則較注重對話的延續且較少改變話題，造成較長的話題片斷。 / The purpose of the study is to investigate the interaction of the maternal interactional styles and topic maintenance in Mandarin mother-child conversational interaction. There are three research questions: (a) What are the mothers’ interactional styles in the current case? (b) What are the differences among children’s competences of topic maintenance? (c) How do the maternal interaction styles interact with topic maintenance in the conversational interactions? Naturally occurring conversations of two dyads' conversational interactions were adopted as the data and analyzed. Results suggested that while the two mothers differed in terms of their interactional styles, the two children showed nearly equal sophistication in terms of their topic-maintaining competences. Examinations of the two dyads' interactions also revealed that the directive mother was less interested in maintaining the conversations, changed topics more frequently, and maintained discourse topics for less turns. The conversation-eliciting mother paid more attention on maintaining of the conversations, change topics less frequently, and maintained discourse topics for much more turns.

本篇論文是針對六位以台灣華語為母語的嬰幼兒，採長期觀察的方式，研究 台灣華語字彙產製的音韻變化性(phonological variability)，並詳細描述單音節詞和雙音節詞之中音節類型出現的頻率、變化性、以及代換模式。本研究同時要用Jakoson (1968)的音節標記理論來檢驗各種音節類型中的共通性。 本研究一共觀察了有六位年齡在十一個月至兩歲的嬰幼兒長達一年。以兩個 禮拜一次的頻率收集嬰幼兒和母親之間的自然對話，並利用錄製回來的影音檔做 譯寫和分析。 結果顯示小朋友的音韻變化是很常見的，且是有規則可循的。小朋友的音韻變異量的高峰(variability peak)會出現在當小朋友的音韻發展從一個階段進展到另一個階段的時候，而本篇論文顯示與當小朋友由單字期(one-word stage)進展到雙字期(two-word stage)以及字彙量有大幅上升的時期符合。華語音節習得的部分，結果顯示CV 是頻率最高、變化性最低，且最常被拿來替換的音節類型。CVG 也是頻率高的音節類型之一，但他的變化性也很高，主要是因為韻尾省略 (coda-dropping)的現象在小朋友的早期發展很常見的關係，所以CVG 雖然頻率高但是變化性也很高而且是最常被取代的音節類型之一。 最後，將所有的結果拿來檢驗Jakoson (1968)的音節標記理論，結果發現頻 率高以及變化性低的音節類型都是無標記(unmarked)的音節類型，相反的頻率低 以及變化性高的音節類型則都是有標記的(marked)音節類型，此外小朋友會用無 標記的音節類型來取代有標記的音節類型。 / The purpose of this study is to discuss the issue concerning phonological variability of children acquiring Taiwan Mandarin. Two aspects are including in the following: the phonological variability of words and the syllable types composed the words. The overall variability pattern, the frequency, variability rate, and substitution pattern of syllable type were analyzed. Six participants are investigated in the study, aged between 0;11 to 2;0. A longitudinal observation study is conducted by the author and the research team. The results showed that phonological variability is common in early phonological development. The increase in variability reflects the reorganization of phonological system, where children started to produce two-word utterances and the amount of different words was increased. As for the syllable type analysis, CV presented the highest in frequency, the lowest in variability rate, and also was used to replace other syllable type more often. CVG was one of the most frequently used syllable type; however, the variability rate of CVG was also high. The reason may due to the fact coda-dropping is a very common phenomenon in children’s development. The results in this study were examined in the markedness theory of syllable proposed by Jakobson (1968). The results showed that syllable types with higher frequency and lower variability rates were unmarked syllable types, while syllable types with lower frequency and higher variability rates were marked syllable types. Furthermore, children tended to use a more unmarked syllable to replace a more marked syllable.