Chapter 1 Introduction 1
1.1 Research Orientation 1
1.2 Rationale 1
1.2.1 The Importance of Modal System 1
1.2.2 The Importance of Modal Acquisition in Child Language Research 2
1.2.3 The Deficiency of Previous Studies on Chinese Modal Acquisition 3
1.2.4 Summary 5
1.3 Scope 6
1.4 Organization of the Book 7
Chapter 2 Modal Acquisition 8
2.1 Modality 8
2.2 English Modal Auxiliaries 9
2.3 Chinese Modal Auxiliaries 10
2.3.1 Terms and Modal Forms Proposed by Chinese Linguists 10
2.3.2 The Syntactic Characteristics of Chinese Modals 12
2.3.3 The Semantic Characteristics of Chinese Modals 20
2.3.4 The Pragmatic Characteristics of Chinese Modals 36
2.4 The Acquisition of Modality 38
2.4.1 Previous Studies of Modal Acquisition in English and Other Languages 39
2.4.2 Previous Studies of Modal Acquisition in Chinese 53
2.5 Theoretical Accounts of Ll Modal Acquisition 56
2.5.1 Perkin’s Explanation 56
2.5.2 The Theory of Mind Hypothesis 57
2.5.3 Caregiver Input and Acquisition of Modality 60
2.5.4 A Converging Constraints Model 62
2.6 Research Questions 63
2.7 Summary 64
Chapter 3 Methodology 66
3.1 Case- study Methodology 66
3.1.1 Defining Case Study 66
3.1.2 Advantages and Disadvantages of Case Study 67
3.1.3 Justification for the Application of Case Study Method 70
3.2 The Subject and Settings 71
3.3 Data-collection Procedures 71
3.3.1 The Handwritten Diary 72
3.3.2 The Audio-recordings 73
3.3.3 The Video-recordings 74
3.4 Data Transcription and Analysis 74
Chapter 4 Features of Modals in the Child’s Data and in the Caregivers’ Data 81
4.1 The Acquisition of Modal Forms in the Child’s Data 81
4.1.1 The Emergence of Chinese Modal Forms in the Child’s Data 81
4.1.2 Distribution of Modal Forms in the Child’s Data Across Time Periods 90
4.1.3 Summary 94
4.2 The Acquisition of Semantics of Modals in the Child’s Data 95
4.2.1 The Semantic Category of Modals for the First Occurrence in the Child’s Data 95
4.2.2 Distribution of Semantic Categories of Modals in the Child’s Data Across Time Periods 98
4.2.3 Summary 113
4.3 The Acquisition of Syntactic Structures of Modal Utterances in the Child’s Data 114
4.3.1 Distribution of Syntactic Structures of Modal Utterances in the Child’s Data Across Time Periods 114
4.3.2 Sentence Types and Semantic Categories of Modals in the Child’s Data 121
4.3.3 Subjecthood and Semantic Categories of Modals in the Child’s Data 122
4.3.4 Summary 124
4.4 A Comparison of the Features of Modals in the Caregivers’ Data and in the Child’s Data Across Time Periods 125
4.4.1 Distribution of Modal Forms in the Caregivers’ Data and in the Child’s Data Across Time Periods 125
4.4.2 Distribution of Semantics of Modals in the Caregivers’ Data and in the Child’s Data Across Time Periods 130
4.4.3 Distribution of the Syntactic Structures of Modal Utterances in the Caregivers’ Data and in the Child’s Data Across Time Periods 147
4.4.4 Summary 154
Chapter 5 General Discussion 158
5.1 Summary of Major Findings 158
5.2 Discussion 159
References 164
Appendix The First Five Occurrences of Modals in the Child’s Data 176