Child Language Acquisition Flashcards
Morphological Overgeneralisation
Applying a grammatical pattern when it is not appropriate/correct.
Critical Learning Period
The theory that there is a period when a child must learn a new language, due to neuroplasticity.
First Language Acquisition
The process by which a child acquires a first/home language.
Universal Grammar
The theory that children are born with an innate knowledge about language structure that allows them to adopt any language.
Usage-Based Theory
The theory that children acquire language through social interactions, in combination with general cognitive skills.
Pre-verbal Stage
From birth to around 6 months - a child communicates basic needs through crying, coughing, gurgling, or cooing.
Babbling Stage
From 6 to 12 months - a child experiments with repetitive vocal sounds, mostly with consonant vowel sounds.
Holophrastic Stage
From 12 months - a child begins to make their first words and starts to associate meaning with these words. Meanings are very general and many can be associated with one word.
Two Word Stage
From 12 - 18 months - a child develops a greater understanding of syntactic and semantic elements and creates two-word constructions.
Telegraphic Stage
From 24 to 30 months - a child communicates by using combinations of content words, often omitting grammatical words.
Multi-word Stage
From 30 months - a child begins to use grammatical function words alongside content words, with increasingly complex sentences.
Semantic Overgeneralisation
The process where a child over applies a semantic meaning of one word across a range of different signs.
Semantic Undergeneralisation
The process where a child under applies semantic meaning and may not recognise the connection between signs and their meanings.
Multi-lingualism
The ability to communicate in more than one language.
Code Switching
Alternating between two or more languages in a single interaction.
