Abstract The study investigates semantic development of sublexically modal verbs of transfer, throw and send, in English-speaking children. For adults, sublexical modality of these verbs can be seen in the fact that the subevent of transfer of the object to the recipient need not take place in the actual world, e.g. Mary sent/threw a book to John does not entail a successful transfer of the book to John. Yet in two experiments (Experiment 1: 3–4 year-olds, N = 59; Experiment 2: 3–6 year olds, N = 120) young English-speaking children often misinterpreted Mary sent a book to John as entailing successful transfer. We show that such non-adultlike interpretations were present despite the children’s conceptual ability to entertain possible worlds. We propose that children may initially construct verb meanings on the basis of actual events, and later adjust them to include a modal component.

中文翻译：

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动词学习中的现实偏见：亚词法情态转移动词

摘要研究调查了英语儿童中亚词态情态动词的转移，投掷和发送的语义发展。对于成年人来说，这些动词的词法形式体现在以下事实上：将对象转移给接收者的子事件不一定发生在现实世界中，例如，玛丽寄给约翰的书并不意味着成功转移了。给约翰的书。然而，在两个实验中（实验1：3-4岁，N = 59；实验2：3-6岁，N = 120），会说英语的年轻儿童常常误解了玛丽向约翰寄来的一本书，因为这需要成功地转移。我们表明，尽管儿童具有娱乐可能世界的概念能力，但仍存在这种非成人式的解释。我们建议儿童可以根据实际事件初步构造动词含义，