Research has suggested that children who speak African American English (AAE) have difficulty using features produced in Mainstream American English (MAE) but not AAE, to comprehend sentences in MAE. However, past studies mainly examined dialect features, such as verbal -s, that are produced as final consonants with shorter durations when produced in conversation which impacts their phonetic saliency. Therefore, it is unclear if previous results are due to the phonetic saliency of the feature or how AAE speakers process MAE dialect features more generally. This study evaluated if there were group differences in how AAE- and MAE-speaking children used the auxiliary verbs was and were, a dialect feature with increased phonetic saliency but produced differently between the dialects, to interpret sentences in MAE. Participants aged 6, 5–10, and 0 years, who spoke MAE or AAE, completed the DELV-ST, a vocabulary measure (PVT), and a sentence comprehension task. In the sentence comprehension task, participants heard sentences in MAE that had either unambiguous or ambiguous subjects. Sentences with ambiguous subjects were used to evaluate group differences in sentence comprehension. AAE-speaking children were less likely than MAE-speaking children to use the auxiliary verbs was and were to interpret sentences in MAE. Furthermore, dialect density was predictive of Black participant’s sensitivity to the auxiliary verb. This finding is consistent with how the auxiliary verb is produced between the two dialects: was is used to mark both singular and plural subjects in AAE, while MAE uses was for singular and were for plural subjects. This study demonstrated that even when the dialect feature is more phonetically salient, differences between how verb morphology is produced in AAE and MAE impact how AAE-speaking children comprehend MAE sentences.

研究表明，说非裔美式英语 (AAE) 的儿童很难使用主流美式英语 (MAE) 而非 AAE 中产生的功能来理解 MAE 中的句子。然而，过去的研究主要检查方言特征，例如动词-s，这些特征在对话中产生为持续时间较短的最终辅音，这会影响其语音显着性。因此，尚不清楚先前的结果是否是由于该功能的语音显着性或 AAE 说话者如何更普遍地处理 MAE 方言功能。这项研究评估了讲 AAE 和 MAE 的儿童使用助动词was和were 的方式是否存在群体差异，一种具有增加的语音显着性但在方言之间产生不同的方言特征，用于解释 MAE 中的句子。年龄为 6 岁、5-10 岁和 0 岁、讲 MAE 或 AAE 的参与者完成了 DELV-ST、词汇测量 (PVT) 和句子理解任务。在句子理解任务中，参与者听到 MAE 中主语不明确或不明确的句子。主语不明确的句子用于评估句子理解方面的群体差异。讲 AAE 的儿童比讲 MAE 的儿童更不可能使用助动词was和were解释 MAE 中的句子。此外，方言密度可以预测黑人参与者对助动词的敏感性。这一发现与两种方言之间助动词的产生方式是一致的： AAE 中was用于标记单数和复数主语，而 MAE 用于单数和复数主语。这项研究表明，即使方言特征在语音上更加突出，AAE 和 MAE 中动词形态的生成方式之间的差异也会影响讲 AAE 的儿童理解 MAE 句子的方式。