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This corpus-based study addresses evaluative morphology in Swedish. It focusses on constructions with four quantifying intensifying adjectives (små- ‘small’, stor- ‘big’, halv- ‘half’, and hel- ‘whole’) combined with a verbal base (e.g., halvspringa ‘half-run’). The aim is to explore the evaluative meanings of these constructions in different genres and types of data (fiction, news, social media, dictionaries) as well as the potential competition with constructions involving neoclassical prefixes (e.g., mini-, mega-, mikro-, semi-) and with syntactic phrases including one of the adjectives as an adverbial plus a present participle. The study suggests that evaluative constructions with a verbal base are established and productive word-formation patterns in Swedish, preferably including native adjectives (as prefixoids), rather than neoclassical prefixes. In parallel, there are also syntactic means to express evaluation, whose use partly seems to vary depending on the adjectives involved.

It has been proposed that morphological knowledge facilitates the integration of sublexical and lexical codes in both word reading and spelling and mediates the transition from reliance on sublexical cues to lexical cues during early literacy development (Bahr et al., 2020). However, the specific stage at which morphology begins to influence reading and spelling remains unclear, as does the question of whether there are differences across languages (Landerl et al., 2022). In the present study, we explore the extent to which morphology may explain, in addition to the already known predictors of phonemic awareness (PA) and rapid automatic naming (RAN), individual variations in word reading and spelling within two groups of Swedish-speaking children identified with word reading difficulties (n = 77) and as typical reading (n = 59), respectively, in Grade 2. All children participated in standardized assessments of PA, RAN, morphological awareness (MA), vocabulary, word reading, and spelling at the beginning of Grade 2. Hierarchical regression analysis was used to investigate whether MA explained any additional variance within the dependent variables of word reading and spelling when controlling for word-reading group, PA, and RAN. As independent variables, word-reading group, PA, and RAN were included at the first step and MA was added at the second step. MA was found to have only a modest influence on the variances for word reading and spelling when controlling for group, PA and RAN. In conclusion, this study of beginning readers and spellers in Swedish, confirms previous findings that PA makes the more substantial contribution to the variation within early word reading and spelling, with MA contributing only modestly. These results support the view that phonics should provide the primary instructional foundations, with MA serving as a complementary component during the first years of literacy instruction.

In colloquial Swedish, -is suffixation is a productive derivational process. The suffix -is has many diminutive-like properties (e.g., -is combines with truncated bases or bases of different lexical classes). As its main use is not to convey smallness but rather a subjective, qualitative evaluation, the present study addresses -is suffixation within evaluative morphology theory. Based on corpus-data from social media texts, +500 -is words (types) are analyzed for formation pattern, lexical class, and gender. The majority of -is words are uter gender nouns, mostly referring to animate referents, a few have neuter gender, mostly referring to inanimates, and some are adjectives, adverbs, or interjections. Semantically, some -is words are homonymous or polysemous. The study holds that there are different, more or less regular subpatterns of -is suffixation. It also suggests that -is suffixation might be on its way to becoming regularized towards forming nouns with uter gender and animate referents. However, as new and old words on -is exist side by side in contemporary language, -is words lie on a continuum, with regular morphological subpatterns at one end and irregular formations at the other.

Swedish has two main types of action nominal constructions (ANCs), either compounding or phrasal (incorporating or nominal, in Koptjevskaja-Tamm 1993), which contain deverbal nouns in -ande or -(n)ing, along with dependent elements. This study investigates Swedish ANCs in use, based on a limited data set from a COVID-19 corpus. It adopts a lexeme-based approach, where deverbal nouns (simplex action nominals), whether including -ande or -(n)ing, are morphological constructs and contain a verb lexeme, specified for a list of arguments and an event structure. The study focusses on two questions: to what extent do the two suffixes occur in the compounding versus phrasal ANCs, and to what extent and by what means are the arguments of the verbal base expressed in the compounding versus phrasal ANCs. The data of 328 ANCs (type) show that compounding ANCs predominate over phrasal ANCs, whether combined with   -ande or -(n)ing, and that -(n)ing is much more frequent than -ande. As for the expression of arguments, the compounding ANCs contain equally often a modifier (similar to NN-compounding) or an Arg2/internal argument, whereas the phrasal ANCs more often express the Arg2. The Arg1/external argument tends to be expressed as a preposed genitive in one out of ten cases in both compounding and phrasal ANCs. Within a lexeme-based account, we can speak of a gradual transition from morphological constructions, more typically primary compounds (noun-noun) and less typically deverbal compounds (such as compounding ANCs), over to syntactic constructions (such as phrasal ANCs). In conclusion, the study suggests that compounding ANCs are the preferred option in contemporary Swedish for both suffixes, with compounding ANCs, in particular those with -(n)ing, bordering on NN-compounding. Given that both phrasal and compounding ANCs with -ande or -(n)ing occur, albeit to different extents, competition between the morphological and syntactic patterns remains unresolved.

The present study addresses competing binominal types in Swedish language development. It is based on diary data from one child and longitudinal recordings from four children between the ages 1-3. In Swedish, binominal lexemes correspond most often to NN compounding: one of the earliest word-formation patterns acquired by children; and a way to combine concepts to express different semantic relations. Still, other nominal constructions with genitives, adjectives, prepositions, or subordinators can express similar basic semantic relations, thus being competing binominal types in Swedish. In the data, the emergence and later establishment of different binominal types (syntactic or morphological) follow similar developmental paths among the children. NN compounds emerge the first, but once nominal constructions that contain prepositions or subordinators (som 'that' or 'as/like') become established, they constitute the strongest competitors to NN compounds, especially for descriptive purposes. The study suggests that Swedish-speaking children's early use of compounding could be a cognitively motivated option, since it implies a rather simple juxtaposition of two nouns, with little semantic specification. Over time, however, children gradually master to express the semantic relation between two concepts also through syntactic means, although NN compounding remains an open and well entrenched pattern for conceptual combination.

This study explores formal aspects and functions of 420 novel noun-noun (NN) compounds in diary data from three Swedish children (1;9–6;11). With regard to form, the data show that the children’s compounds respect target head order, allow for a small amount of internal inflection, and, in more than half of the cases where a liaison form is required, are properly formed. Most of the compounds concatenate two nouns (without the presence of liaison forms), as is the general case for Swedish NN compounds. With regard to function, the data permit us to distinguish three main functions of the coinages: I. Novel compound instead of established term, II. Novel compound for novel category, and III. Novel compound for specific entity. Type I involves attempts to target conventional compounds by relying either on perceptual or functional features or on recalled semantic, phonological, and/or morphological cues. Type II is innovative compounding par excellence: detailed discriminations and fantasy concepts are named. Type III divides into anaphoric and deictic uses as well as what we call appropriation, i.e. naming a specific entity. Types II and III are functions displayed by novel compounds in general. In conclusion, the three children seem to master the central facets of NN compounds, formally and functionally. Furthermore, compound production can constitute a simple and efficient means for young children to maximize and build more structure into their lexicon.