TY - JOUR
T1 - Population size and the rate of language evolution
T2 - A test across indo-European, Austronesian, and Bantu Languages
AU - Greenhill, Simon J.
AU - Hua, Xia
AU - Welsh, Caela F.
AU - Schneemann, Hilde
AU - Bromham, Lindell
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 Greenhill, Hua, Welsh, Schneemann and Bromham.
PY - 2018/4/27
Y1 - 2018/4/27
N2 - What role does speaker population size play in shaping rates of language evolution? There has been little consensus on the expected relationship between rates and patterns of language change and speaker population size, with some predicting faster rates of change in smaller populations, and others expecting greater change in larger populations. The growth of comparative databases has allowed population size effects to be investigated across a wide range of language groups, with mixed results. One recent study of a group of Polynesian languages revealed greater rates of word gain in larger populations and greater rates of word loss in smaller populations. However, that test was restricted to 20 closely related languages from small Oceanic islands. Here, we test if this pattern is a general feature of language evolution across a larger and more diverse sample of languages from both continental and island populations. We analyzed comparative language data for 153 pairs of closely-related sister languages from three of the world's largest language families: Austronesian, Indo-European, and Niger-Congo. We find some evidence that rates of word loss are significantly greater in smaller languages for the Indo-European comparisons, but we find no significant patterns in the other two language families. These results suggest either that the influence of population size on rates and patterns of language evolution is not universal, or that it is sufficiently weak that it may be overwhelmed by other influences in some cases. Further investigation, for a greater number of language comparisons and a wider range of language features, may determine which of these explanations holds true.
AB - What role does speaker population size play in shaping rates of language evolution? There has been little consensus on the expected relationship between rates and patterns of language change and speaker population size, with some predicting faster rates of change in smaller populations, and others expecting greater change in larger populations. The growth of comparative databases has allowed population size effects to be investigated across a wide range of language groups, with mixed results. One recent study of a group of Polynesian languages revealed greater rates of word gain in larger populations and greater rates of word loss in smaller populations. However, that test was restricted to 20 closely related languages from small Oceanic islands. Here, we test if this pattern is a general feature of language evolution across a larger and more diverse sample of languages from both continental and island populations. We analyzed comparative language data for 153 pairs of closely-related sister languages from three of the world's largest language families: Austronesian, Indo-European, and Niger-Congo. We find some evidence that rates of word loss are significantly greater in smaller languages for the Indo-European comparisons, but we find no significant patterns in the other two language families. These results suggest either that the influence of population size on rates and patterns of language evolution is not universal, or that it is sufficiently weak that it may be overwhelmed by other influences in some cases. Further investigation, for a greater number of language comparisons and a wider range of language features, may determine which of these explanations holds true.
KW - Computational historical linguistics
KW - Demography
KW - Galton's problem
KW - Language evolution
KW - Language phylogenies
KW - Phylogenetic independence
KW - Population size
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85046082303&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00576
DO - 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00576
M3 - Article
SN - 1664-1078
VL - 9
JO - Frontiers in Psychology
JF - Frontiers in Psychology
IS - APR
M1 - 576
ER -