Rules or connections in past-tense inflections: What does the evidence rule out?. McClelland, J. L & Patterson, K. Trends Cogn Sci, 6(11):465-472, 2002.
abstract   bibtex   
Pinker and colleagues propose two mechanisms - a rule system and a lexical memory - to form past tenses and other inflections. They predict that children's acquisition of the regular inflection is sudden; that the regular inflection applies uniformly regardless of phonological, semantic or other factors; and that the rule system is separably vulnerable to disruption. A connectionist account makes the opposite predictions. Pinker has taken existing evidence as support for his theory, but the review of the evidence presented here contradicts this assessment. Instead, it supports all three connectionist predictions: gradual acquisition of the past tense inflection; graded sensitivity to phonological and semantic content; and a single, integrated mechanism for regular and irregular forms, dependent jointly on phonology and semantics.
@Article{McClelland2002a,
  author   = {James L McClelland and Karalyn Patterson},
  journal  = {Trends Cogn Sci},
  title    = {Rules or connections in past-tense inflections: {W}hat does the evidence rule out?},
  year     = {2002},
  number   = {11},
  pages    = {465-472},
  volume   = {6},
  abstract = {Pinker and colleagues propose two mechanisms - a rule system and a
	lexical memory - to form past tenses and other inflections. They
	predict that children's acquisition of the regular inflection is
	sudden; that the regular inflection applies uniformly regardless
	of phonological, semantic or other factors; and that the rule system
	is separably vulnerable to disruption. A connectionist account makes
	the opposite predictions. Pinker has taken existing evidence as support
	for his theory, but the review of the evidence presented here contradicts
	this assessment. Instead, it supports all three connectionist predictions:
	gradual acquisition of the past tense inflection; graded sensitivity
	to phonological and semantic content; and a single, integrated mechanism
	for regular and irregular forms, dependent jointly on phonology and
	semantics.},
  keywords = {12457897},
}

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