Language change is a cultural evolutionary process in which variants of linguistic variables change in frequency through processes analogous to mutation, selection and genetic drift. In this work, we apply a recently-introduced method to corpus data to quantify the strength of selection in specific instances of historical language change. We first demonstrate, in the context of English irregular verbs, that this method is more reliable and interpretable than similar methods that have previously been applied. We further extend this study to demonstrate that a bias towards phonological simplicity overrides that favouring grammatical simplicity when these are in conflict. Finally, with reference to Spanish spelling reforms, we show that the method can also detect points in time at which selection strengths change, a feature that is generically expected for socially-motivated language change. Together, these results indicate how hypotheses for mechanisms of language change can be tested quantitatively using historical corpus data.

本文探讨了语言变化是如何通过文化进化的过程中进行的，我们应用了最近引入的方法来量化历史语言变化中选择强度，这个方法比以前应用过的类似方法更可靠和易于解释，结果表明在语音形式和语法形式之间选择时，倾向于语音形式简单性，最终证明了可以使用历史语料库数据定量测试语言变化机制的假设。

语言变化中选择机制的可靠识别