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(Preface: I'm not well-versed in language acquisition, so the context I've provided here will be dumbed-down, or perhaps just dumb.)

Context: When children acquire their first language, they typically go through a phase where they take grammatical rules (e.g. "form past tense by adding -ed to a verb") and apply them in situations where they aren't applicable (e.g. using *goed as the past tense of go). This is called overgeneralization. Children acquiring English as a first language overgeneralize verb conjugations all over the place - "I ated the candy", "She telled me to do it", etc.

Since Japanese has fewer irregular conjugations than English, I expect overgeneralization (in the context of conjugation) to be less visible, but I doubt that it is absent altogether. I have, for example, heard *iikunai as the overgeneralized negative of ii "good" in place of yokunai. (Albeit this was a child character in an anime, not a real child, so this may not be representative.)

Question: Do children make similar errors with irregular verbs and other conjugatable words? For example, might they use *shiru as the 終止形 of suru "to do" or *kinai as the negative of kuru "to come"? What about with irregular honorifics like irassharu, gozaru? (I guess children wouldn't use these as much, since keigo is mastered relatively late...)

I would also be interested in cases where children incorrectly treat non-conjugatable words as conjugatable, e.g. (to use some examples from the comments), *ippakunai as the negative of ippai "a lot; much" or *kireikunai as the negative of kirei "pretty".

senshin
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  • I usually ignore all the papers about child acquisition, but IIRC a lot of overgeneralizations in child Japanese have to do with particles, that is, overgeneralizing syntax rather than morphology. I think I've seen mention of overgeneralizing に and の. –  Jun 15 '14 at 02:47
  • いっぱくない。にはくある。^_^ – Eiríkr Útlendi Jun 15 '14 at 07:47
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    私は小さい時、「きれいじゃない」を「きれいくない」とか、「飲めない」を「飲められない」(「食べる>>食べられない」だから、「飲む>>飲められない」と思った)、「かっこよくない」を「かっこいくない」(「かっこいい」が一つの形容詞だと思った)、「できる」を「できられない」(なぜかはわからない)とか言ってた記憶があります。 –  Jun 15 '14 at 08:20
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    @Choko -- interesting. My wife as a learner sometimes still says きれいくない, perhaps suggesting that at least some of these overgeneralization patterns extend beyond just child learners. I'd be interested in studies comparing child vs adult learners and such patterns. – Eiríkr Útlendi Jun 15 '14 at 21:58
  • @Choko, my mother (a native) uses きれくない. I think maybe it's a dialectal thing. – dainichi Jun 16 '14 at 00:53
  • @dainichi, I'm curious -- does she use any other similar conjugations, like きれかった or きれく[verb]? – Eiríkr Útlendi Jun 16 '14 at 01:57
  • 「きれくない・きれいくない・きれかった」「飲めれない」「違くて」などは大人で使っている人もいますが、基本的には「[乱れた日本語](http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%97%A5%E6%9C%AC%E8%AA%9E%E3%81%AE%E4%B9%B1%E3%82%8C)」の類いだと思います。 – naruto Jun 16 '14 at 02:25
  • @dainichi "uses" >> Do you mean... she still uses it? Maaybe as a 若者言葉? –  Jun 16 '14 at 02:49
  • @Choko, yes, she still uses it. She's in her 60's so she's definitely not a 若者, but she left Japan when she was in her 30's, maybe it was a 若者言葉 back then. – dainichi Jun 16 '14 at 04:22
  • @Choko, actually, it might be more きれかった than きれくない. Googling, I definitely see pages suggesting that it's 関西弁 or 大阪弁, e.g. http://nanapi.jp/51230/ – dainichi Jun 16 '14 at 04:38
  • Just now I heard a Japanese boy around 2 years old say 「電話してとく」 instead of 「電話しとく」 (although 電話しとく itself is 若者言葉) – naruto Jun 16 '14 at 09:09
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    「～～しておく」が「～～しとく」になるのって若者言葉ですか。口語で年齢関係なく使われる縮約(「え」の脱落)だと思うんですけど。 –  Jun 17 '14 at 07:34
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    幼児の言葉の間違いって、住んでいる地域もだけど、まず親(or身近な大人)の出身地や方言によっても違ってくるでしょうし、あと、同じような環境でも、子ども一人一人によってすごく違ってくるので(個性・個体差がある)、一概に「こうだ。」とは言えないと思います。 –  Jun 17 '14 at 07:38
  • @Choko ごめんなさい、大人も普通に使ってると思います(^^;) – naruto Jun 17 '14 at 16:41

4 Answers4

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There are a lot of ways that these over-generalizations occur doing child language acquisition. They do in fact occur -- often -- in Japanese. In fact, I think it is safe to say that they occur in every language.

There's a rather in depth list of examples of some of these over-generalizations available in the papers referenced below. I will describe one example here: the over-generalization of ～らせて (e.g. as seen in 遅【おく】らせて) and ～させて (e.g. 食べさせて). Thus many children will say things like:

おきらせて and おきさせて (＝おこして).

Even earlier than that, Japanese children will often simply use 自動詞 to express the meaning of a 他動詞, as seen in:

かあさん、でんしゃ、うごいてくれ。(＝かあさん、でんしゃをうごかしてくれ)

There are many more papers and likely books written on this subject, but any Japanese-language introductory book on language acquisition should have a bunch more examples.

References

rintaun
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I think this is not really overgeneralization, but when I was in Tokyo I've heard quite a few little kids use 連用形＋して instead of 連用形＋音便＋て to form て-form (i.e. 飲みして, 待ちして), likely to avoid the messy 音便 rules. I guess this is some sort of new form that spread among kids.

Edit: After recalling a bit, it seems that this "error" comes up the most often with 〜てみる. So kids would say ちょっと待って, but 飲みしてみて.

ithisa
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  • Never heard kids in Tokyo (or anywhere) say 飲みして or 待ちして. –  Jun 19 '14 at 00:09
  • Did you maybe hear 飲まして ("let me drink") instead? I've never heard 飲みして either. – Earthliŋ Jul 06 '14 at 18:22
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    TBH it was a few tiny kids running around in a group in 未来館 with grammar that is very peculiar in other parts (I swear some of them generalize 〜い to 〜かる for adjectives!), so maybe it is some weird constructed dialect these particular kids use for fun. Probably they'll end up growing up into conlangers like JRR Tolkien :P – ithisa Jul 07 '14 at 12:32
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The kinds of mistakes that children make depend on how often they hear the correct speech around them. From my experience, Japanese children make fewer mistakes in conjugating verbs than in using particles properly. I've heard adult women use "kireiku nai" deliberately for the same of emphasizing their point. My first Japanese teacher used to say that you spend your first year of Japanese study learning all of the rules, and then the rest of your life learning when to break them. I've also heard adults say yon-nichi instead of yoka to differentiate between four days and eight days.

user6750
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I expect children in all cultures go through a trial and error period of well intended but amusing errors as their ability to speak develops.

This paper looks at the development of Japanese children's narrative abilities, comparing the narrative given for a series of pictures by several age groups up to adult.

http://www.researchgate.net/publication/245402146_Anchor_tense_in_Japanese_Narrative
(Short version:http://csjarchive.cogsci.rpi.edu/proceedings/2006/iccs/p119.pdf)

It does not identify errors so much as track how a child's ability to relate a story changes as he/she gets older. Basically as a child begins to appreciate aspect and tense he/she starts to set all narratives in the past (たーform). Then, as this sense develops, the child starts to introduce expressions in the るーpresent tense aswell.

Tim
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