Language development is a gradual process that extends from childhood through adolescents into adulthood (Nippold 2004). Therefore, age is regarded as an essential factor in first language acquisition, especially the expressions of figurative language
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(Prinz 1983, Kempler and his colleagues 1999, Levorato and Cacciari 2002, Hsieh 2008, Hsieh and Hsu 2010). In the present study, the children‟s performances differed from the control group with respect to different experimental variables. Firstly, regarding the factor of non-literal meanings of lao, the results showed that all the experimental groups achieved a significant difference from the control group in the acquisition of non-literal meanings of lao. That is, the children‟s performances on non-literal meanings of lao presented a developmental pattern. This finding is consistent with the result of Levorato and Cacciari (2002) in that the ability to process figurative language correlated with age. Moreover, the results showed that G4 and G5 (i.e., 10-year-olds and 11-year-olds) have already acquired the non-literal meaning significantly better than the younger ones (G1 to G3), which is supported by Kempler and his colleagues (1999) in that children at the ages of 10 to 11 have started the approximating adult-like knowledge of figurative explanation for idioms. On the contrary, concerning the literal meaning of lao, although there was a significant difference between G2 and the control group, the children‟s acquisition of literal meaning as a whole seems to be nearly identical to the adults‟.
With regard to the performance of transparent and opaque meanings of lao, the experimental groups were compared with the control group. The results showed that the control group significantly outperformed all the children (p < .001) on the opaque non-literal meaning, implying that to acquire the opaque meaning was challenging for the children. This is due to the fact that the children in our study still lacked the background knowledge of the word. For example, in the phrase lao shou „an expert,‟
lao denotes someone who is experienced which is a consequence derived from the semantic feature of the core meaning „a period of time.‟ In other words, comparing to the transparent meanings, the acquisition of the opaque meaning required more
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cognitive load which as noted by Ackerman (1982), strongly constrains children‟s performance on figurative language. On the other hand, regarding the transparent meaning of lao, the control group performed significantly better than the experimental groups (p < .001) except for G5 (p > .05). This showed that the 11 year-olds have gained the ability to derive the non-literal meanings of lao in lao pengyou „a long-existing friend‟ from the core meaning. The results indicated that the older children (10 and 11-year-olds) presented a significantly better performance (p < .001) in acquiring the opaque meaning than the younger children (7 to 9-years-old), implying that they have started to develop the ability to infer the figurative meaning from the core meaning although their ability has not yet been well-developed as the adults.
With respect to the performances of lao with animate and inanimate NPs, the control group significantly outperformed the experimental group on the inanimate NPs (p < .001). The difficulty for the children to process the meanings of lao with inanimate NPs lied in that the animacy constraint is violated. The children in our study failed to accept the semantic appropriateness for an inanimate NP modified by lao involving the biological function (i.e., growth, aged). The older children (10 and 11-year-olds) processed the meanings of lao with inanimate NPs significantly better than the younger children (7 to 9-year-olds), indicating that not until the age of 10 did the children begin to present an emerging acceptance to the violation of animacy constraint. That is, the boundaries of animacy and the expressions of metaphorical meaning is broken (Hsieh 2008). The finding is consistent with Hsieh (2008) in that G1 to G3 encountered more difficulties in acquiring the meanings of lao with inanimate NPs. Generally speaking, the older children (G4 and G5) performed significantly better than the younger ones on the meanings with both animate and
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inanimate NPs. This showed that the older children had the sensitivity to the incompatiblility between inanimate NPs with non-literal meanings of lao. As discussed by Schwartz (1980), children‟s meta-linguistic abilities can be observed from the violations of animacy constraints. Consequently, the older children were able to accept the incompatibility between inanimate NP has succeeded in the acquisition of non-literal meanings lao.
Finally, a summary of the children‟s developmental stages in the acquisition of non-literal meaning of lao is illustrated in Figure 4-13.
Stage I: (G1)
1. Being able to comprehend the literal meaning of lao
Stage II: (G2, G3)
Being able to comprehend but not adult-like:
(1) the literal meaning of lao
(2) the non-literal meaning of lao (transparent and opaque) (3) lao with inanimate NPs
Stage III: (G4, G5)
Being able to comprehend:
(1) the literal meaning of lao
(2) the non-literal meaning of lao (transparent and opaque) (3) lao with inanimate and animate NPs
Figure 4-13 Developmental Stages for Chinese Children’s Acquisition of Lao
Actually, the children‟s language processes were gradual. At Stage I, the 7-year-old children were able to comprehend the literal meaning of lao but not the rest
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types of lao. This might be due to the fact that their cognitive abilities concerning the difference between what is said and what is meant still have not developed. Then, the children at Stage II (i.e., those 8 and 9-year-olds) were able to comprehend the transparent and opaque non-literal meaning of lao, and lao with inanimate NPs. At Stage III, they were able to comprehend lao with both animate and inanimate NPs. To conclude, although the older children (10 and 11-year-olds) did not performed similarly as the adults did on non-literal meanings of lao, it was found that with the age increased, their ability to acquire non-literal expressions would continue developing up to adolescents and finally to the adulthood (Hsieh 2008).