Acquisition of the Distributive Meaning of the Extrinsic Plural Marker in Korean

Abstract

The Korean marker -tul is generally taken to be a plural marker, although some argue that it indicates distributivity as well. The present study investigates whether -tul carries a plural meaning, a distributive meaning, or both in child and adult Korean. The findings indicate that children who are acquiring Korean rarely accept the distributive meaning, even when appropriate contextual support for the distributive interpretation is readily available. By contrast, adults show straightforward evidence of knowing the distributive meaning of -tul. The experimental results show that while Korean adults treat -tul as a plural and distributive marker, children (under the age of 8) treat -tul exclusively as a plural marker.