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Development of Word Order in German Complement-Clause Constructions: Effects of Input Frequencies, Lexical Items, and Discourse Function

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 February 2026

Silke Brandt ,
Elena Lieven  and
Michael Tomasello
Silke Brandt*
Affiliation:
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
Elena Lieven*
Affiliation:
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology and University of Manchester
Michael Tomasello*
Affiliation:
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
*
Brandt, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology Deutscher Platz 6 D-04103 Leipzig Germany [brandt@eva.mpg.de]
[Iieven@eva.mpg.de]
[tomasello@eva.mpg.de]
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Abstract

We investigate the development of word order in German children's spontaneous production of complement clauses. From soon after their second birthday, young German children use both verb-final complements with complementizers and verb-second complements without complementizers. By their third birthday they use both kinds of complement clauses with a variety of complement-taking verbs. Early in development, however, verb-final complements and verb-second complements are used with separate sets of complement-taking verbs, and they are used with separate sets of item-specific main-clause phrases. For example, initially phrases such as ‘I want to see’ were used exclusively with verb-final complements, whereas phrases such as ‘do you see’ and ‘you have to say’ were used exclusively with verb-second complements. Only later in development—when specific complement-taking verbs were used with both verb-second and verb-final complements, with a greater variety of main-clause phrases, and when specific main-clause phrases were used with both verb-second and verb-final complements—was there evidence for structural links between these various, item-based, complement-clause constructions.

Keywords

language acquisitioncomplement clausesword orderfrequencyvariabilitydiscourse function

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Language , Volume 86 , Issue 3 , September 2010 , pp. 583 - 610
Copyright
Copyright © 2010 Linguistic Society of America

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