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Cross- and intra-linguistic variation with respect to e.g. word order in current generative theories is understood as the result of invariant principles of Universal Grammar interacting with certain language specific parameters. A theory of parametrisation of UG is also supposed to explain certain aspects of the process of language acquisition, as well as language change.
An important role in any theory of parametrization plays the notion of the 'default state' (corresponding to the 'unmarked state' in certain theories). The default state with respect to word order in current syntatcic theories (e.g. Kayne, 1994; Chomsky, 1995) is taken to be SVO. Parametrized, i.e. language specific properties of certain functional categories and invariant universal principles are responsible for a language specific word order. On the one hand, the 'default state' in such theories is defined by invariant universal principles, on the other hand, by 'default properties' or 'default values' of the parametrized components.
Most accounts of developmental sequences rely on variants of markedness hierarchies that are based on linguistic or non-linguistic factors (for discussion, see White 1982, Hyams 1986, Borer/ Wexler 1986, Penner & Weissenborn 1996).
The criteria for markedness are not uniform across different domains and cannot be defined independently of a theory of these domains. Generally speaking, they all imply some kind of complexity measure, e.g. in terms of semantic features, syntactic operations, accessibility of trigger information in the input, perceptual salience and so on. Acquisition is predicted to proceed from the unmarked to the marked cases, the latter putting higher processing demands on the child than the former. For the present, it is not clear how different markedness effects interact in the actual course of development. Markedness considerations concerning non-linguistic conceptual domains (e.g. space, time) are supposed to hold for all learners. How predictions based on these universal markedness hierarchies interact with language-specific markedness predictions to produce the observable developmental sequences is addressed in much of the cross-linguistic work in language acquisition (see Slobin 1986, for the acquisition of DP in Germanic dialects see Penner & Weissenborn 1996).
In our paper we will relate such considerations to the problem of first language acquisition and language change.
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