| Project/Area Number |
17320062
|
|---|
| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B)
|
| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
|---|
| Section | 一般 |
|---|
| Research Field |
Linguistics
|
|---|
| Research Institution | Mie University |
|---|
Principal Investigator |
AYANO Seiki Mie University, Faculty of Humnities and Social Sciences, Professor (00222703)
|
|---|
| Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha) |
SUGISAKI Koji Mie University, Faculty of Humnities and Social Sciences, Asscoiate Professor (60362331)
HATTORI Noriko Mie University, Faculty of Humnities and Social Sciences, Professor (00198764)
OKAZAKI Yuji Tokyo Institute of Psychiatry, 東京都精神医学総合研究所, Visiting Researcher (40010318)
YAMAMOTO Tetsuro Mie University, Graduate School of Medicine, Professor (00127002)
YUKIKA Nishimura Mie University, Hospital, Assistant Professor (60456738)
吉田 悦子 三重大学, 人文学部, 助教授 (00240276)
|
|---|
| Project Period (FY) |
2005 – 2007
|
| Project Status |
Completed (Fiscal Year 2007)
|
| Budget Amount *help |
¥13,340,000 (Direct Cost: ¥12,200,000、Indirect Cost: ¥1,140,000)
Fiscal Year 2007: ¥4,940,000 (Direct Cost: ¥3,800,000、Indirect Cost: ¥1,140,000)
Fiscal Year 2006: ¥3,800,000 (Direct Cost: ¥3,800,000)
Fiscal Year 2005: ¥4,600,000 (Direct Cost: ¥4,600,000)
|
|---|
| Keywords | linguistics / innate language faculty / domain specificity / language acquisition / brain science / NIRS |
|---|
| Research Abstract |
This research project was of an interdisciplinary nature, viz linguistics and brain science(brain imaging), which evaluates the following two hypotheses : (i) the innate language faculty, which plays a crucial role in language acquisition, contains domain-specific properties, and(ii) this domain-specific language faculty has a modular nature and consists of sub-domains with distinctive functions.
In 2005-2007, we investigated the domain specificity of our innate language faculty, with adult subjects. We designed experiments, identified the areas of the brain to be examined, and conducted our experiments. More specifically, we first addressed the question of whether the fMRI findings reported in the literature concerning domain-specificity of a given syntactic operation in Japanese can be replicated with experiments using NIRS. Second, two competing hypotheses concerning the word-order variation in Japanese were evaluated, to determine whether the syntactic operation in question is involved in this phenomenon. Our research findings were presented at international conferences and published in a refereed international journal.
In addition, in 2007, we conducted experiments with children, based on our research findings with adult subjects. Despite a number of preliminary experiments, we were not able to establish an effective experimental design, hence no significant results. However, conducting the preliminary experiments itself was highly suggestive of how the research design could be improved and what our future research plans should be like.
|
