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Word-learning Challenges and Children’s Non-Adult Behaviours with Modal Force - Dr. Ailis Cournane, NYU
Tuesday, November 18, 2025, 02:00pm - 03:20pm
152 Frelinghuysen Rd, Psych Bldg., Busch Campus, Room 105
Abstract:
Do preschool-aged children understand the force of modals like can and have to—that can expresses possibility and have to expresses necessity? We argue that preschool-aged children’s non-adult behaviours with modal force reflects a non-adult lexical semantics: they initially interpret necessity modals like have to as possibility modals. Prior studies show that children often over-accept necessity modals in possibility contexts, a pattern typically attributed to conceptual difficulties in reasoning about possibilities (Papafragou & Ozturk, 2014; Moscati et al., 2017; Bleotu et al., 2021). Modals also vary by flavor: epistemic modals express inferences from knowledge or evidence, while root modals express priorities of the subject (e.g., goals, obligations, preferences). These previous studies have tested modal force in epistemic tasks (e.g., inferring the contents of a box). Yet epistemic uses of modals are far less frequent in children’s input than root (non-epistemic) uses (van Dooren et al., 2022), and some epistemic reasoning tasks may impose additional metacognitive demands (Phillips & Kratzer, 2023).
In this talk, I present two new experiments testing modal force in teleological contexts (goal-oriented, root flavor), using modals that overwhelmingly occur in root uses in children’s input experience (e.g., can, have to) in English and French (Cournane, Dieuleveut, Repetti-Ludlow & Hacquard 2025; Lungu, Dieuleveut, Cournane & Hacquard, in prep). But, changing the task to a non-epistemic one and using input-consistent modals did not improve performance: children over-accepted have to in possibility scenarios at ceiling rates (compared to chance rates in most prior studies), treating it identically to can (see also Leahy & Zalnieriunas, 2021, who offer a conceptual account). We take this pattern as evidence of non-adult lexical semantics: children initially treat necessity modals as possibility, due to word-learning challenges which disproportionately affect necessity modals (Dieuleveut et al., 2021).
This analysis can explain all existing production and comprehension data from linguistic tasks across languages; time allowing, we will discuss whether and how additional conceptual limitations may be necessary to explain non-linguistic task patterns with possibility reasoning (e.g., Redshaw & Suddendorf 2006; Leahy & Carey, 2020) and epistemic reasoning (e.g., Robinson et al. 2006; Phillips & Kratzer, 2023), and how those would interact with language learning challenges.
Bio: Dr. Ailís Cournane
Ailís Cournane is an Associate Professor at NYU’s Department of Linguistics, specializing in first language acquisition. She is the creator and PI of the Child Language Lab @ NYU. She earned an MA and PhD in Linguistics from the University of Toronto, and previously worked at the Universität Mannheim (Germany). Her research focuses on how young children learn to linguistically express and comprehend possibility (e.g., what could or will happen, or what may or must be true) and counterfactuality (e.g., I wish cats had wings (=they don’t)) in various languages (so far: English, Bosnian, Dutch, French, German, Mandarin, and Spanish). More broadly, she leads and advises research on child development of syntax, semantics, pragmatics, and word learning. Cournane grew up in Montréal, QC and Durham, NH.