Non-Māori-speaking New Zealanders have a Māori proto-lexicon

Abstract We investigate implicit vocabulary learning by adults who are exposed to a language in their ambient environment. Most New Zealanders do not speak Māori, yet are exposed to it throughout their lifetime. We show that this exposure leads to a large proto-lexicon – implicit knowledge of the ex...

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Autores principales: Y. Oh, S. Todd, C. Beckner, J. Hay, J. King, J. Needle
Formato: article
Lenguaje:EN
Publicado: Nature Portfolio 2020
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Acceso en línea:https://doaj.org/article/e9fbcba6adda49ccb8c0c8abd7b9651d
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Sumario:Abstract We investigate implicit vocabulary learning by adults who are exposed to a language in their ambient environment. Most New Zealanders do not speak Māori, yet are exposed to it throughout their lifetime. We show that this exposure leads to a large proto-lexicon – implicit knowledge of the existence of words and sub-word units without any associated meaning. Despite not explicitly knowing many Māori words, non-Māori-speaking New Zealanders are able to access this proto-lexicon to distinguish Māori words from Māori-like nonwords. What's more, they are able to generalize over the proto-lexicon to generate sophisticated phonotactic knowledge, which lets them evaluate the well-formedness of Māori-like nonwords just as well as fluent Māori speakers.