Abstract: This paper presents a hypothesis-testing theory of syntax acquisition. The first section presents our model. We claim that: (I) children learn a transformational grammar, including a set of phrase structure and transformational rules; (2) linguistic universals and Occam’s razor constrain the initial hypothesis space available to the device; (3) hypotheses tested by the device consist of candidate phrase structure and transformational rules; (4) linguistics evidence confirms or disconfirms hypotheses. Specific examples of incorrect phrase structure and transformational hypotheses are presented.
The second section briefly surveys other approaches to language acquisition both syntactic and non-syntactic-and compares them to our model. In the third section, we address several methodological issues: (I) the relevance of linguistic theory to the model: (2) how the model is tested; (3) the domain of the theory.