Abstract
The study aimed at testing Polish children’s and adult’s ability to identify and interpret three different contrastive focus types; narrow final focus, narrow non-final focus, and broad focus. In the first experiment eight-year-old children (N = 15) and young adults (N = 15, age range 19–23) were asked to spot the focus in short utterances, and produce contrastive elements in response to three types of inputs with three distinct focus types. In the second experiment eight and four year old children (N = 14 and N = 15, respectively) and young adults (N = 16) listened to two types of utterances – with final contrastive and non-final contrastive focus and were asked to select a picture that best matched the implied meaning of the auditory input. Although in each group there were individuals with ceiling results and chance results, on average the adults outperformed the children in all the tasks. Implications of the findings for testing prosody development are discussed.
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Appendix A
Mean results for Experiment 1 – “Provide focus” (focus), and “Spot the focus”, (focus stronger).
| Gr. 1: Gr. 2: | children adults | N | Mean | SD | SE | 95% conf. for mean | Min. | Max. | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lower Lim. | Upper Lim. | ||||||||
| Broad focus | 1. | 15 | 0.80 | 1.37 | 0.36 | 0.04 | 1.56 | 0 | 5 |
| 2. | 15 | 4.00 | 1.89 | 0.49 | 2.95 | 5.05 | 1 | 7 | |
| Total | 30 | 2.40 | 2.30 | 0.42 | 1.54 | 3.26 | 0 | 7 | |
| % broad focus | 1 | 15 | 10.00 | 17.17 | 4.43 | 0.49 | 19.51 | .0 | 62.5 |
| 2 | 15 | 50.00 | 23.62 | 6.10 | 36.92 | 63.08 | 12.5 | 87.5 | |
| Total | 30 | 30.00 | 28.73 | 5.25 | 19.27 | 40.73 | .0 | 87.5 | |
| Final focus | 1 | 15 | 0.87 | 1.36 | 0.35 | 0.12 | 1.62 | 0 | 4 |
| 2 | 15 | 5.27 | 2.34 | 0.61 | 3.97 | 6.56 | 1 | 8 | |
| Total | 30 | 3.07 | 2.92 | 0.53 | 1.97 | 4.16 | 0 | 8 | |
| % final focus | 1 | 15 | 10.83 | 16.95 | 4.38 | 1.45 | 20.22 | .0 | 50.0 |
| 2 | 15 | 65.83 | 29.30 | 7.57 | 49.61 | 82.06 | 12.5 | 100.0 | |
| Total | 30 | 38.33 | 36.54 | 6.67 | 24.69 | 51.98 | .0 | 100.0 | |
| Non-final focus | 1 | 15 | 7.53 | 0.64 | 0.17 | 7.18 | 7.89 | 6 | 8 |
| 2 | 15 | 7.80 | 0.56 | 0.15 | 7.49 | 8.11 | 6 | 8 | |
| Total | 30 | 7.67 | 0.61 | 0.11 | 7.44 | 7.89 | 6 | 8 | |
| % non-final focus | 1 | 15 | 94.17 | 8.00 | 2.07 | 89.74 | 98.60 | 75.0 | 100.0 |
| 2 | 15 | 97.50 | 7.01 | 1.81 | 93.62 | 101.38 | 75.0 | 100.0 | |
| Total | 30 | 95.83 | 7.58 | 1.38 | 93.00 | 98.66 | 75.0 | 100.0 | |
| All types raw scores | 1 | 15 | 3.07 | 0.67 | 0.17 | 2.70 | 3.44 | 2.3 | 4.3 |
| 2 | 15 | 5.69 | 1.25 | 0.32 | 5.00 | 6.38 | 4.0 | 7.7 | |
| Total | 30 | 4.38 | 1.66 | 0.30 | 3.76 | 5.00 | 2.3 | 7.7 | |
| % all types | 1 | 15 | 38.33 | 8.36 | 2.16 | 33.70 | 42.97 | 29.2 | 54.2 |
| 2 | 15 | 71.11 | 15.63 | 4.04 | 62.46 | 79.77 | 50.0 | 95.8 | |
| Total | 30 | 54.72 | 20.72 | 3.78 | 46.98 | 62.46 | 29.2 | 95.8 | |
| Broad focus stronger | 1 | 15 | 4.73 | 2.40 | 0.62 | 3.40 | 6.07 | 1.0 | 8.0 |
| 2 | 15 | 6.20 | 0.86 | 0.22 | 5.72 | 6.68 | 5.0 | 7.0 | |
| Total | 30 | 5.47 | 1.93 | 0.35 | 4.75 | 6.19 | 1.0 | 8.0 | |
| % broad focus stronger | 1 | 15 | 59.17 | 30.05 | 7.76 | 42.52 | 75.81 | 12.5 | 100.0 |
| 2 | 15 | 77.50 | 10.77 | 2.78 | 71.53 | 83.47 | 62.5 | 87.5 | |
| Total | 30 | 68.33 | 24.06 | 4.39 | 59.35 | 77.32 | 12.5 | 100.0 | |
| Final focus stronger | 1 | 15 | 7.47 | 0.52 | 0.13 | 7.18 | 7.75 | 7.0 | 8.0 |
| 2 | 15 | 7.80 | 0.56 | 0.14 | 7.49 | 8.11 | 6.0 | 8.0 | |
| Total | 30 | 7.63 | 0.56 | 0.10 | 7.43 | 7.84 | 6.0 | 8.0 | |
| % final focus stronger | 1 | 15 | 93.33 | 6.46 | 1.67 | 89.76 | 96.91 | 87.5 | 100.0 |
| 2 | 15 | 97.50 | 7.01 | 1.81 | 93.62 | 101.38 | 75.0 | 100.0 | |
| Total | 30 | 95.42 | 6.95 | 1.27 | 92.82 | 98.01 | 75.0 | 100.0 | |
| Non-final focus stronger | 1 | 15 | 4.07 | 1.87 | 0.48 | 3.03 | 5.10 | 1.0 | 8.0 |
| 2 | 15 | 7.80 | 0.41 | 0.11 | 7.57 | 8.03 | 7.0 | 8.0 | |
| Total | 30 | 5.93 | 2.32 | 0.42 | 5.07 | 6.80 | 1.0 | 8.0 | |
| % non-final focus stronger | 1 | 15 | 50.83 | 23.37 | 6.03 | 37.89 | 63.78 | 12.5 | 100.0 |
| 2 | 15 | 97.50 | 5.18 | 1.34 | 94.63 | 100.37 | 87.5 | 100.0 | |
| Total | 30 | 74.17 | 28.98 | 5.29 | 63.35 | 84.99 | 12.5 | 100.0 | |
| All types stronger | 1 | 15 | 16.27 | 3.75 | 0.97 | 14.19 | 18.34 | 10.0 | 23.0 |
| 2 | 15 | 21.80 | 1.08 | 0.28 | 21.20 | 22.40 | 19.0 | 23.0 | |
| Total | 30 | 19.03 | 3.91 | 0.71 | 17.57 | 20.49 | 10.0 | 23.0 | |
| % all focus stronger | 1 | 15 | 67.78 | 15.63 | 4.03 | 59.12 | 76.43 | 41.67 | 95.83 |
| 2 | 15 | 90.83 | 4.51 | 1.16 | 88.34 | 93.33 | 79.17 | 95.83 | |
| Total | 30 | 79.31 | 16.28 | 2.97 | 73.22 | 85.39 | 41.67 | 95.83 | |
Appendix B
An example of a “broadly contrastive” vs. “narrowly contrastive non-final” visual stimulus for audio file (6) – ‘But I wanted a pink cat’. The choice is between the yellow cat (the correct answer), which narrowly contrasts with the adjective ‘pink’, and a brown dog, which contrasts broadly with the whole noun phrase – ‘a pink cat’. (Colour online.)
An example of “broadly contrastive” vs “narrowly contrastive final” visual stimulus for audio file (7) – ‘But I wanted a pink cat’. The choice is between the final narrow focus reading – a pink bunny (the correct answer) and a broad focus reading – a brown dog. (Colour online.)
Appendix 3
Mean results in age groups in a comprehensive pilot study on Polish children’s prosody skills (Śmiecińska under review). All the figures represent percentage values. The Focus task is boldfaced. There were no significant differences between the age groups as far as the Focus results are concerned.
| Age group | N | Like Mean | Question Mean | Comma Mean | Focus Mean | Sentence Mean | Nonword Mean | Updown Mean | Sum of prosody Mean |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. 3;6–4;9 | 20 | 98.60 | 39.35 | 51.25 | 71.88 | 83.00 | 79.20 | 52.00 | 67.90 |
| 2. 5;0–5;9 | 24 | 98.83 | 58.92 | 64.06 | 78.65 | 88.65 | 79.13 | 58.33 | 75.22 |
| 3. 6;0–7;9 | 22 | 100.00 | 73.41 | 65.39 | 66.45 | 94.70 | 94.36 | 66.36 | 80.10 |
| 4. 8;1–10;9 | 20 | 100.00 | 100.00 | 72.50 | 78.73 | 99.50 | 99.15 | 92.00 | 91.70 |
| 5. 20–30 | 26 | 100.00 | 100.00 | 78.37 | 80.29 | 100.00 | 100.00 | 97.69 | 93.76 |
| Total | 11 | 99.50 | 75.14 | 66.86 | 75.44 | 93.40 | 90.55 | 73.93 | 82.12 |
| 2 | |||||||||
© 2017 Faculty of English, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznań, Poland
