Cross-linguistic Perspectives on Language Processing (STUDIES IN THEORETICAL PSYCHOLINGUISTICS Volume 25)

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Recent studies in psycholinguistics have explored a variety of languages, marking a significant trend that expands beyond English. Language processing research has evolved alongside language acquisition and theoretical linguistics, examining language universals more broadly. Since the early 2000s, extensive data from several Indo-European languages have emerged, with a focus on universal aspects preceding particular ones (see Slobin 1985 for a review). Current research emphasizes a continuous connection between cross-linguistic uniformities and individual language influences on development. As data from diverse languages accumulate, our understanding of language universals becomes more nuanced, painting a clearer picture of children's language. The first cross-linguistic studies in theoretical linguistics emerged in the late 1970s. Within the Chomskian framework, references to Romance languages prompted a shift from rule-based to principle-based formalism (Chomsky 1981, 1995). Alternative theories, such as Lexical Functional Grammar (Bresnan 1982) and Relational Grammar (Perlmutter 1983), gained empirical support from languages with significant structural differences from English, including Bantu, Malayalam, Romance, Slavic languages, and Warlpiri.