The Acquisition of Subject and Object Wh-Questions

This article examines the acquisition of subject and object wh-questions by English-speaking children. The acquisitional predictions of several recent linguistic descriptions of subject and object questions are described and tested experimentally using the CHILDES transcripts of 12 English-speaking children. Analyses of these transcripts revealed that, contrary to previous reports and the prediction made by the Wh-subject In Situ and Small Clause Hypotheses, object questions were acquired at the same age or earlier than subject questions. Additional analyses revealed that this acquisitional ordering was not merely a reflection of the frequency with which children or adults asked subject and object questions, nor did it seem to be due to the greater noticeability of object gaps than subject gaps. One possibility that is consistent with all the results is that the acquisitional ordering reflects the way in which subject and object traces are governed.