The Syntax of Child Language

Dear Colleagues,

We are launching a Special Issue entitled “The Syntax of Child Language”. Children’s acquisition of syntax is an amazing feat. How children, exposed to a relatively small sample of language input, come to acquire the complex structures of their language is a central topic both in theoretical linguistics and in psycholinguistics. This question has been extensively investigated over the past 50 years or so. However, research findings on children’s acquisition of sentence structures are sometimes difficult to interpret, because children’s performance reflects a combination of their syntactic knowledge and the processing mechanisms through which they produce behaviour. Therefore, to fully reveal children’s syntactic knowledge, we must carefully examine these processing mechanisms. In addition, children master the syntax of their language through exposure and interaction with caregivers and others but, notably, with no formal instruction. To fully understand the nature of children’s syntactic development, it is also essential to explore the nature of children’s linguistic input and how, in principle, children can deduce correct generalizations about sentence structure in their language based upon this input. This three-way interaction between children’s innate structural knowledge, their processing mechanisms, and the linguistic input that they receive represents a general framework for understanding children’s acquisition of syntax. 

This Special Issue will bring together research that reflects the current state of our understanding of this three-way interaction in children’s acquisition of sentence structures. Submissions are encouraged to address the following questions. 

(1) How much do we know about the nature of children’s linguistic input?

(2) Given what we know about the nature of children’s linguistic input, can children deduce the correct generalizations about the sentence structures of their language? 

(3) What are the roles of the processing mechanisms in children’s deduction of syntactic generalizations?

(4) In what ways does children’s syntactic knowledge exceed the linguistic evidence available to them? 

(5) In what ways can children’s innate structural knowledge make the input more informative, to facilitate children’s acquisition of syntax?   

We hope that this special issue will shed light on major developments in child syntax and can provide the basis for future research in the field. We request that, prior to submitting a manuscript, interested authors initially submit a proposed title and an abstract of 200 words summarizing their intended contribution. Please send it to the guest editor (zhoupeng1892@zju.edu.cn) or to /Languages/ editorial office (languages@mdpi.com). Abstracts will be reviewed by the guest editor for the purposes of ensuring proper fit within the scope of the special issue. Full manuscripts will undergo double-blind peer-review. 

Tentative Completion Schedule
Abstract Submission Deadline: 31 May 2025
Notification of Abstract Acceptance: 30 June 2025
Full Manuscript Deadline: 30 November 2025

We look forward to your participation in this project.

Prof. Dr. Peng Zhou
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Languages is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• sentence structures
• language acquisition
• innate structural knowledge
• processing mechanisms
• linguistic input