The development of relative clauses in spontaneous child speech

This study examines the development of relative clauses in the speech of four English-speaking children between 1;9 and 5;2 years of age. It is shown that the earliest relative clauses occur in presentational constructions that express a single proposition in two ®nite clauses. Starting from such simple sentences, children gradually learn the use of more complex constructions in which the relative clause modi®es the noun of a fulledged main clause. Five factors are considered that might contribute to the development of relative clauses in spontaneous child speech: (1) the ambient language, (2) the formulaic character of the main clause, (3) the information structure of the whole utterance, (4) the communicative function of presentational relatives, and (5) the limited processing capacity of young children.