1 - General Issues Flashcards
Why study language acquisition?
Enables us to have a better understanding of:
1) Learning behaviour and cognition and
2) Adult linguistic systems (limits on cross language variation which help refine linguistic theory.
3) Atypical language acquisition due to deprivation of early linguistic input and language impairment to better interventions
4) Second language acquisition, leading to better tools.
What is Language Acquisition?
Language acquisition is a process of grammar creation.
What is Grammar?
A grammar is a system of principles, rules and constraints that governs:
1) The production, perception and patterning of speech sounds
2) The formation and interpretation of words and sentences.
How do children learn the entire grammatical system of their language?
On the basis of input to which they are exposed to, potentially guided by some innate mechanisms (biases) about what a language is.
What are the 6 components of language?
1) Phonological - sounds and sound patterns
2) Lexical - words
3) Morphological - word structure and word formation
4) Syntactic - sentence structure
5) Semantics - meaning of words and sentences
6) Pragmatic - communicative competence
In terms of Phonology, what do children need to acquire? Give an example.
Children need to acquire the constraints on the distribution of sounds. Different languages have different constraints.
Example:
1. English-exposed children need to learn that [ŋ] can occur word-finally but not word-initially; that certain strings of consonants [mb] is not possible.
2. Tagalog has [ŋ] occurs both word- initially and finally and French has no [ŋ].
In terms of morpho-phonology, what do children need to acquire? Give an example.
Children need to acquire principles and rules concerning that certain sounds occur depending on their environments/contexts.
Ex. Affixes - English-exposed child needs to learn that plural inflection is realized as a suffix and that it has three allomorphs cat-[s], dog-[z], and glass-[əz].
In terms of the lexicon, what do children need to acquire?
Children must learn the meaning of words.
What is semantic generalization? Under what language component is it under? Give an example.
Semantic generalization is overextending a meaning of a word and is found under the lexical component of language.
Ex. A child will know that a dog is furry and has four legs, and will call any furry & 4-legged animal a dog.
In terms of syntax, what does a child need to acquire? Give an example.
Children must learn word order constraints…
Ex. English-exposed child must learn that word order is typically SVO or DAN and not SOV (Janpanese) or DNA (French).
… and sentence structure - what constructions are permitted in their language.
In terms of syntax-semantics , what does a child need to acquire? Give an example.
Children must learn constraints on the distributions and interpretations of certain categorical words. (i.e., sentence structure)
Ex. English-exposed child must learn the constraints on the distribution and interpretation of pronouns:
a) Mary told John to wash himself.
b) * Mary told John to wash herself.
What do children not acquire early on in regards to syntax-semantics? Give and example.
Children have not acquired ambiguity of a sentence and that there are multiple meanings of a structure.
Ex. The chicken is ready to eat.
The child only gets the meaning of the chicken doing the eating, not that it is ready to be eaten.
What are the properties of the process of language acquisition?
Language acquisition is:
1) Not instantaneous, but gradual
2) It is based on increased input and improved understanding of available input.
Is language acquisition instantaneous? If not, what is it? And what is it based on?
No, language acquisition is not instantaneous. It takes place gradually based on increased input and improved understanding of available input.
Universally, do children go through the same developmental stages of language acquisition? And do they occur at the same rate?
Yes, children go through the same developmental stages of language acquisition in the same order, but they do not occur at the same rate or age,
