Tú no tenistes el COVID: 2sg Preterit Production in Child Heritage Speakers

Abstract

This study examined child heritage speakers’ production of verbs in the second-person singular (2 sg ) preterit. Twenty bilingual children completed an elicited production task targeting 2 sg preterit forms, which vary between standard and non-standard productions like tuviste and tuvistes . Overall, children regularized 31% of the time, with younger children showing higher rates of regularization. Spanish exposure was a significant factor: among younger participants, greater exposure was associated with more frequent regularization. Children regularized at nearly twice the rate of adults (16%), and their productions were moderately correlated with adult input. Notably, even children who lacked non-standard 2 sg forms in their input still produced them. These findings suggest that heritage language exposure is a key predictor of morphosyntactic development and sociolinguistic variation. Rather than acquiring a single “standard” form, child heritage speakers acquire a variable grammar in which both standard and non-standard 2 sg preterit forms coexist as part of the target system.