Most children who follow a typical developmental timeline learn the grammatical categories of words in their native language by the time they enter school. Researchers have worked to provide a number of explicit, testable models or algorithms in an attempt to model this language development. These models or algorithms have met with some varying success in terms of determining grammatical word categories from the transcripts of adult input to children. A new model of grammatical category acquisition involving an application of evolutionary computing algorithms may provide further understanding in this area. This model implements aspects of evolutionary biology, such as variation, adaptive change, self-regulation, and inheritance. The current thesis applies this model to six English language corpora. The model created dictionaries based on the words in each corpus and matched the words with their grammatical tags. The dictionaries evolved over 5,000 generations. Four different mutation rates were used in creating offspring dictionaries. The accuracy achieved by the model in correctly matching words with tags reached 90%. Considering this success, further research involving an evolutionary model appears warranted.

Most typically developing children have achieved a knowledge of the grammatical categories of the words in their native language by school age. To model this achievement, researchers have developed a variety of explicit, testable models or algorithms which have had partial but promising success in extracting the grammatical word categories from the transcriptions of caregiver input to children. Additional insight into children's learning of the grammatical categories of words might be obtained from an application of evolutionary computing algorithms, which simulate principles of evolutionary biology such as variation, adaptive change, self-regulation, and inheritance. Thus far, however, this approach has only been applied to English language corpora. The current thesis applied such a model to corpora of language addressed to five Spanish-speaking children, whose ages ranged from 0;11 to 4;8 (years; months). The model evolved dictionaries which linked words to their grammatical tags and was run for 5000 cycles; four different rates of mutation of offspring dictionaries were assessed. The accuracy for coding the words in the corpora of language addressed to the children peaked at about 85%. Directions for further development and evaluation of the model and its application to Spanish language corpora are suggested.

Past studies of grammatical gender have shown that native speakers encounter processing difficulties when encountering a form that does not agree in gender with previous words. However, the specific behavioral and neural responses to these difficulties have not been replicated across studies of the same type. This is in part due to different experimental designs and statistical analyses, but a crucial factor may be the lack of control between nouns of masculine and feminine gender in stimuli creation. Masculine and feminine gender show distinct distributional asymmetries and collapsing them into one condition diminishes the explanatory power of any study examining grammatical gender. We used reading times in a self-paced reading experiment to examine whether masculine and feminine gender violations differentially affect processing speeds. Fifty French speakers read sentences that were well-formed or contained a mismatch in gender between determiner and noun, half of which were masculine and half feminine. Following Beatty-Martínez et al. (2021), we added individual difference measures to determine how participant-specific factors modulate processing. Participants also completed a category verbal fluency task and the AX-CPT, a measure of cognitive control. They found that ERP components were modulated by these components for Spanish speakers and the modulation differed between masculine noun and feminine noun violations. We hypothesized that reading times would be similarly affected in French, a closely related language with the same gender categories. However, no conditions or interactions reached statistical significance. It is unclear whether this is due to the experimental manipulation or lack of control for participants’ language background, as we had a high number of bilingual and multilingual participants. Regardless, elements of the procedure may provide insight on how to design future experiments that lay a groundwork in understanding the most basic elements of gender processing. / Thesis / Master of Science (MSc) / Why is ‘pen’ masculine and ‘car’ feminine? Grammatical gender is a widespread feature of languages that comes naturally to native speakers and perplexes many second language learners. The assignment of gender seems to be random, but upon closer examination, patterns can be established. What do these differences mean for speakers of gendered languages? In the current study, we set out to determine how masculine and feminine grammatical gender is processed in French and how this is influenced by differences between individual speakers. Participants read French sentences that were either grammatical or contained a mismatch in gender between article and noun. Reading times were used to evaluate how speakers react when encountering an ungrammatical form with either masculine or feminine gender. Participants also completed tasks measuring response inhibition and verbal fluency to see how individuals with different cognitive and language skills react differently to unexpected forms.

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一些研究發現常見的ESL(English as a Second Language)學習者在英語寫作時的錯誤為：用字不適當、動詞的形式不正確、句子缺少主詞、以及動詞時態錯誤。這些錯誤主要是起因於：字彙之不足、不清楚文法概念、本身母語的干擾。為了改善ESL學習者的寫作。我們希望能從文法關係的資訊來提供協助。目前，研究文法關係大多著重於字詞構成的單一文法關係，然而字詞在句中可能同時具備了不只一種文法關係。在我們的研究中，我們先發展文法關係樣式辨識系統。從句子中利用此系統提供使用者可搭配的文法關係，以了解可供使用的對應字詞。對應字詞可以輔助學習者適當地使用此關鍵字。此外設計使用者介面供查詢文法關係。以上，我們利用文法關係與搭配字詞來提供使用者英語寫作上的協助。而找尋樣式的做法，我們提出關聯法則和LSA(Latent Semantic Analysis)來實作。 / Some study found some common ESL (English as a Second Language) learners English Writing Error: improper use of the word, the verb form is not correct, the sentence lack of subject and verb tense errors. These errors are mainly due to: lack of vocabulary, grammar concept is not clear, the mother-tongue interference. In order to improve the ESL writing, we hope that the information from the grammatical relation to provide assistance. At present, the studies of grammatical relation mostly emphasize the word consisting of a single grammatical relation. However, words in the sentence may also have more than one grammatical relation. In our study, we first develop grammatical relation pattern recognition system. From the sentence using the system provides users with the grammatical relation, in order to understand the availability of the corresponding words. The corresponding words can help learners make appropriate use of this keyword. In addition the design of the user interface provides querying grammatical relation. This work makes use of grammatical relation and collocation in order to provide users with the assistance of English writing. And look for patterns of practice, we have proposed association rules and LSA (Latent Semantic Analysis) to implement.

Submitted by Filipe dos Santos (fsantos@pucsp.br) on 2016-08-18T11:53:56Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Daniel de Almeida Leão.pdf: 1416276 bytes, checksum: ba4bc8cff6ad87ee22845be2197eedfb (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-08-18T11:53:56Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Daniel de Almeida Leão.pdf: 1416276 bytes, checksum: ba4bc8cff6ad87ee22845be2197eedfb (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-04-28 / This study has as its main goal to investigate the relation between the grammatical system of gender classification for the nouns of the Portuguese language in Brazil and the biological gender of their referents from the perspective of language as a probabilistic system (Halliday, 1991, 1993). More specifically, the investigation extracted the frequencies for the grammatical gender of the nouns (masculine and/or feminine) for the Portuguese language in Brazil and the relation between the grammatical gender and the biological sex of the nouns. For such, this study has as its basis the Corpus Linguistics, a theoretical-scientific methodology which sees the language as a probabilistic system, through the observation of empirical data (Berber Sardinha, 2004). Although the grammatical gender is an aspect of the language approached throughout the grammars of the Portuguese language and its study constantly discussed among scholars and researchers of the field, the great majority of these studies have as basis a traditional perspective of the language, brought by the use of norms (Bechara, 2013). This means that, possibly, there is no other study about this subject which is based on the language in use, in a probabilistic approach (Halliday, 1991, 1993), following the principles of Corpus Linguistics (Berber Sardinha, 2004). In order to accomplish this goal, this work was executed as the following: (i) all the nouns of a corpus (The Brazilian Corpus of Register Variation – CBVR) were extracted; (ii) the nouns were transferred to a database in which they could be classified; (iii) the nouns were classified manually in respect to their grammatical gender and biological gender, following the criteria described in this work’s methodology; (iv) after classifying the nouns, they were accounted according to each of the categories described in the methodology, (v) after that, for each research question, the frequencies were extracted and the probabilities were calculated and; (vi) the research questions were answered based on how the frequencies and probabilities had been revealed. In bringing up the results, it is expected that this research has been able to contribute for offering a new perspective about this subject, one that takes into account the current Portuguese language in Brazil for the 21st century. It is also expected that the methodology designed for the execution of this study could be adapted and applied to several other studies of similar goals, bringing new perspectives for other aspects of the language / O trabalho teve como objetivo principal investigar a relação entre o sistema gramatical de gênero dos substantivos do português Brasil e o gênero biológico de seus referentes a partir da visão da linguagem como sistema probabilístico (Halliday, 1991,1993). Mais especificamente, foi investigada a frequência dos gêneros dos substantivos (masculinos e femininos) na língua portuguesa escrita e falada no Brasil e a relação entre o sistema de gênero gramatical e o gênero biológico dos substantivos. Para tal, o estudo realizado tem como base a Linguística de Corpus, metodologia teórico-científica que vê a língua como sistema probabilístico por meio da observação de dados empíricos (Berber Sardinha, 2004). Embora o gênero gramatical dos substantivos seja um aspecto abordado em todas as gramáticas da língua e seja discutido por acadêmicos e pesquisadores da área constantemente, a grande maioria dos estudos possui base em uma visão tradicional, fixada pelo uso da norma (Bechara, 2013). Isso significa que, possivelmente, não haja estudo acerca do tema que reflete a língua em uso de maneira probabilística (Halliday 1991, 1993), conforme os pressupostos da Linguística de Corpus (Berber Sardinha, 2004).Para a consecução desse objetivo, a pesquisa se sucedeu da seguinte maneira: (i) foram extraídos todos os substantivos de um corpus (o Corpus Brasileiro de Variação de Registros - CBVR); (ii) os substantivos foram transferidos para uma base de dados sob a qual puderam ser classificados; (iii) foi feita a classificação manual de cada um dos substantivos quanto ao gênero gramatical e gênero biológico, seguindo os critérios descritos na metodologia deste trabalho; (iv) ao final da classificação, foi feita contagem de quantos substantivos foram classificados para cada uma as categorias descritas; (v) foram extraídas as frequências e calculadas as probabilidades para cada uma das perguntas de pesquisa e; (vi) as perguntas foram respondidas com base nas frequências e probabilidades reveladas. Ao trazer os resultados, espera-se que esta pesquisa tenha contribuído para oferecer uma nova perspectiva acerca do tema, uma que leve em consideração o português do Brasil em uso corrente no século XXI. Espera-se também que a metodologia desenhada para a execução deste estudo possa ser adaptada e aplicada em diversos outros de cunho similar, trazendo novas perspectivas para outros aspectos da língua

Cette recherche porte sur l’acquisition du genre grammatical français langue maternelle et langue seconde. Dans une perspective développementale, nous cherchons à décrire la manière dont de jeunes enfants, scolarisés en France et au Luxembourg, déterminent le genre des noms en se fondant sur les indices infra-lexicaux portés par les noms. Notre préoccupation consiste à examiner le type de connaissances acquises et les mécanismes sous-jacents à cette acquisition en langue maternelle, mais aussi lors de l’apprentissage du français langue seconde au niveau de l’école primaire au Luxembourg. Nous faisons l’hypothèse que l’extraction des connaissances de genre n’est pas fondée uniquement sur la valeur prédictive des terminaisons mais que les informations morphologiques portées par certaines terminaisons, les suffixes, interviennent aussi dans le processus d’acquisition du genre. En effet, la diversité d’informations portées par cette unité (sémantiques, lexicales et de genre) peut rendre cette unité plus « saillante » parmi l’ensemble des régularités pouvant être extraites. Trois expériences ont permis de mettre en évidence que la détermination du genre fondée sur les indices formels dépend effectivement d’autres facteurs, tels que la nature des terminaisons. Par ailleurs, une série de simulations informatiques a été conduite apportant des données complémentaires aux résultats expérimentaux. L’ensemble de ces données apportent des informations utiles pour l’apprentissage et l’enseignement précoce du française langue seconde au niveau de l’école primaire. / This research concerns the acquisition of the French grammatical gender in first and second language. From a developmental perspective, we tempt to describe the way of young children being sent to school in France and Luxembourg determine the gender of names, by using the infra-lexical cues carried by these. Our concern consists in examining the kind of knowledge acquired and the mechanisms underlying this acquisition for the mother tongue and also during the learning of French as a second language at the primary school in Luxembourg. We hypothesize that the extraction of gender knowledge is not only dependent on the predictive value of endings but that morphological information carried by certain endings, suffixes, also intervenes in the process of gender acquisition. Indeed, the range of information carried by this unit (semantic, lexical and of gender) can make this unit more "striking" among all the regularities being able to be extracted. Three experiments allowed to bring to light that the determination of gender based on formal cues depends effectively on other factors, such as the nature of endings. Besides, a series of computational simulations was driven, bringing additional data to the experimental results. All these data brings useful information to the learning and the early teaching of French as a second language at the primary school.

Notre étude porte sur l’observation de connaissances linguistiques et métalinguistiques chez les adultes francophones apprenant l’Espagnol Langue Étrangère (ELE). Ces connaissances constituent la compétence grammaticale que les apprenants construisent au fur et à mesure qu’ils s’approprient la L2.Dans le but d’observer ces connaissances au stade intermédiaire d’apprentissage — c’est-à-dire au niveau seuil (B1) établi par le Cadre Commun de Référence pour les Langues (Conseil de l’Europe, 2001) —, nous avons procédé à une étude expérimentale auprès de 30 adultes francophones. Notre démarche comporte 2 tâches d’expérimentation : une tâche de décision et une tâche de production orale. La tâche de décision repose sur un test de jugement de grammaticalité : on demande aux participants d’évaluer, dans un temps limité, un corpus des phrases (exposées les unes après les autres, à la fois à l’écrit et à l’oral) dont certaines contenaient une erreur. Le corpus de phrases présenté à nouveau sur papier, on demande ensuite aux participants de donner un jugement définitif (sans mesure de temps de réponse), à partir duquel, s’ils jugent une phrase incorrecte, ils doivent indiquer où se situe l’erreur et l’expliquer. Quant à la tâche de production orale, il a été demandé aux participants de produire un discours descriptif et narratif en L2 espagnol à l’aide d’un stimulus visuel (bande dessinée). Les résultats de nos tâches expérimentales nous ont permis de recueillir des données sur le temps de réponse, sur la capacité de jugement de phrases, sur le type de discours employé pour expliquer l’erreur et sur les structures syntaxiques utilisées spontanément en production orale.Ces données sont analysées et discutées en vue de fournir des pistes sur la capacité des adultes francophones apprenant l’ELE à détecter des erreurs en langue cible et à en expliciter les règles transgressées ; sur les problèmes qu’ils retrouvent dans leur appropriation du système grammatical de l’espagnol ; et sur les connaissances dont ils se servent pour analyser et produire les structures de la langue objet. En outre, les résultats obtenus nous permettent à notre tour d’envisager autrement l’apprentissage de la grammaire de l’espagnol et d’avancer la perspective d’un modèle d’enseignement adapté aux capacités métacognitives et métalinguistiques de l’apprenant francophone. / The framework of our study is focused on the assessment of linguistic and metalinguistic knowledge of francophone adults learning Spanish as a foreign language. This knowledge constitutes the basis of grammatical competence built by learners as they develop skills in the target language.Our aim is the observation of linguistic and metalinguistic knowledge used by francophone adult learners of Spanish as a second language (L2). Thus, we designed and directed an experimental study to 30 French-speakers with a threshold-level in Spanish, based on the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (Council of Europe, 2001). Our approach consisted of two experimental tasks: A decision making task and a task of oral production. The first task was conducted with a grammaticality judgement test in which participants had to evaluate, in a limited response time, a corpus of 36 sentences (presented one after the other, at both written and oral). The second task was conducted with the definitive confirmation of judgments about the corpus. Participants were thus asked to give a final judgement about the correctness of sentences (without measuring response time). If they judged a sentence as incorrect, they have to specify the error and explain it. As for the oral production task, the participants were asked to produce a descriptive and narrative speech in Spanish by using visual stimuli (a comic strip). The results achieved allowed us to collect data on the response time, on the sentences judgment ability, on the type of speech used to explain the error and on syntactical structures used spontaneously in oral speech. Those data were analyzed and discussed with the aim of providing insights on the capacity of francophone adults learning Spanish as a foreign language for detecting and explaining errors in the target language; on their difficulties in acquiring the Spanish grammatical system; and on their knowledge to analyze and produce structures in target language.The results enabled us to reconsider the learning of Spanish grammar otherwise with a view to teaching models adapted to the metacognitive and metalinguistic skills of francophone learners.