Full text
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| Author(s): |
Renato Caruso Vieira
Total Authors: 1
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| Document type: | Master's Dissertation |
| Press: | São Paulo. |
| Institution: | Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH/SBD) |
| Defense date: | 2014-03-19 |
| Examining board members: |
Elaine Bicudo Grolla;
Ruth Elisabeth Vasconcellos Lopes;
Esmeralda Vailati Negrão
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| Advisor: | Elaine Bicudo Grolla |
| Abstract | |
The present study investigates the acquisition of the reflexive expression \'ele mesmo\' by children acquiring Brazilian Portuguese as their mother language, considering the influence that such expression suffers from the variation between the semantic-pragmatic features of [+ probable] reflexivity and [- probable] reflexivity of the predicates in which it is included. Two experiments were conducted, one of production and another of comprehension, and we discovered that, not even among the oldest children tested (between 5;7 - 6;6 years of age), adult performance with the complex proform was achieved. The younger children tested (between 3;6 - 4;6 years of age) showed mastery of the semantic variation of the predicates. Therefore, the mistakes committed by the subjects cannot be explained by a lack of knowledge of these pragmatic features. In order to account for such non-adult behavior, we resorted to an explanation that blames the computational overload that the relevant mental operations to the interpretation of \'ele mesmo\' impose over the limited working memory of the children. (AU) | |
| FAPESP's process: | 11/14819-6 - The acquisition of the contrastive proform 'ele mesmo' in Brazilian Portuguese |
| Grantee: | Renato Caruso Vieira |
| Support Opportunities: | Scholarships in Brazil - Master |