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In:Individual Differences in Anaphora Resolution: Language and cognitive effects
Edited by Georgia Fotiadou and Ianthi Maria Tsimpli
[Language Faculty and Beyond 18] 2023
► pp. 166–191

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The use of null subjects by Greek-Italian bilingual children

Identifying cross-linguistic effects

 | University of Peloponnese
 | University of Frankfurt
 | University of Cologne
Published online: 2 November 2023
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https://doi.org/10.1075/lfab.18.07and
Abstract
It has been shown that Greek and Italian vary in the use of null subjects (Torregrossa, Bongartz & Tsimpli 2015; Torregrossa, Andreou & Bongartz 2020): while Italian null subjects tend to refer to the subject of the preceding clause, Greek null subjects show a less restricted distribution. The aim of this study is to show how this cross-linguistic difference is reflected in the use of null subjects by Greek-Italian bilingual children. Thirty-seven (N = 37) children ranging in age from 8;0 to 12;0 participated in the study. The production of null subjects was observed in narrative context and analyzed according to syntactic and discourse factors. The results show that the Greek pattern of use of null subjects is transferred to Italian and this effect is modulated by dominance, as measured by means of a sentence repetition task administered in both languages and background questionnaires.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Referring expressions: the case of null subjects in Greek and Italian
  • 3.Reference management in bilingual children: The role of cross-linguistic effects and dominance
  • 4.The present study: research questions and predictions
  • 5.Method
    • 5.1Participants
    • 5.2Screening tasks
      • 5.2.1Expressive vocabulary tests
      • 5.2.2Sentence repetition task
    • 5.3Narrative oral retelling task
      • 5.3.1Transcription and coding
  • 6.Results
  • 7.Discussion
  • Acknowledgments
  • Notes
  • References
References (64)
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