acquisition theories Flashcards
Who developed the Behaviorism Theory?
B.F. Skinner
What does this theory state?
A child will imitate the language of its parents or careres, and successful attempts are reward because an adults has recognised the word and praised them, encouraging the child to continue doing it.
Relies of reinforcement - both positive and negative reinforcement.
What is the behavourism theory otherwise known as?
Imitation and reinforcement.
Who developed the Innateness theory?
Noam Chomsky
What does the innateness theory state?
The LAD (language acquisition device) is based on the child’s natural predisposition to learn language by hearing speech. The child is able to interpret what they hear based on underlying principles they already have.
Biologically determined.
All human languages share the common principles which as such enable a child to make virutous errors whihc cause there to be linguistic universals for the child.
What is innateness otherwise know as?
Nativism
What concept does the LAD already understand?
Verb tense.
When hearing forms such as “worked”, “played” and “patted”, the child will form the hypothesis that past tense of verbs is formed by adding the sound /d/, /t/ or /id/ to the base form.
Who developed the Cognitive theory?
Jean Piaget
What does the cognitive theory state?
A child has to be able to understand an idea or concept before they can acquire the particular terminology to express it.
Based on intellectual development (it has to be learnt)
What is seriation?
Where a child is able to compare objects with respective sizes.
What does Piaget suggest about the seriation stage?
A child that has not yet reached this stage would not be able to leanr and use comparative adjectives.
What is object permanence?
Where an object exists independently of perception.
What does object permanence stem from?
During the first year of life, children seem unaware of the existence of objects they cannot see. An object that moves out of their eyesight ceases to exist. By around 18 months, children have learnt that objects have an existence independently of their perception.
What link can be made from the large increases in children’s vocabulary as a result of this of the cognitive theory?
Object permanence and the learning of labels for objects.
Who developed the Input theory?
Jerome Bruner
