ABSTRACT
A recurring phenomenon in discussions of the poverty of the stimulus argument is the relevance of linguistic structure in language production and interpretation. As a consequence, the role of linguistic structure has also been the focus of studies of language acquisition. In this chapter we look at structure dependence as it pertains to downward entailment. We start by reviewing previous studies investigating children’s adherence to structure dependent principles. Some of these studies concentrate on (the role of structure in) language production in young children. Important as they may be, these studies are vitiated by the usual possible confound; children’s productions only provide us with an estimate of the forms (or meanings) licensed by children’s grammars, but they do not allow us to draw inferences about what forms or meanings are not licensed by their grammars. In order to sidestep this potential confound, we turn to studies investigating children’s comprehension. Finally, we turn to downward entailment. The investigation of downward entailment expands our understanding of children’s use of structure dependent notions, thereby allowing us to address one feature of the poverty of the stimulus argument, namely the pervasiveness of structural notions like c-command in language interpretation.
