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In:Variation in Language Acquisition: Unity in diversity
Edited by Laura Rosseel and Eline Zenner
[Trends in Language Acquisition Research 34] 2025
► pp. 142–153

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Chapter 7
Grammar policing children

Does gender matter?

 | Utrecht University
 | University of Waterloo
 | University of Toronto Mississauga
Published online: 4 November 2025
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/tilar.34.07pie
Abstract
In western societies, women’s speech tends to be scrutinized/policed more than men’s, with stigmatized features like uptalk, creaky voice, and the discourse marker like associated primarily with women (despite also being used by men). Here, we explored the developmental roots of this phenomenon, asking whether girls’ speech is scrutinized more than that of boys. Caregivers of Canadian English- speaking 3- to 5-year-olds (N = 194) were asked how they would respond to their child making a salient grammatical error. Caregivers of girls were more likely to report using explicit correction strategies compared to caregivers of boys. Caregivers’ reported strategies were unrelated to children’s morphosyntactic knowledge. We discuss our results within the context of sociolinguistic development and the acquisition of gendered language ideologies.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Method
    • 2.1Participants
    • 2.2Procedure
  • 3.Results
  • 4.General discussion
  • Notes
  • References
  • Appendix
References (52)
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