Age of Acquisition Effects in TİD

I have investigated how the age of acquisition shapes grammatical representation and interpretation in sign languages, with a particular focus on complex morphosyntactic structures. Because most deaf children do not have access to a natural sign language from birth, my research seeks to identify which components of grammar are resilient to delayed exposure and which are age-sensitive, to inform linguistically grounded assessment and intervention practices. Drawing on production and comprehension studies in Turkish Sign Language, I show that while delayed exposure does not affect core morphological encoding in classifier constructions, it systematically impacts argument expression, perspective-taking, and discourse-level strategies such as zero-anaphora resolution.