Children's spoken language development Flashcards
When does the vegetative state occur, and what are its features?
0-4 months, reflex crying noises
When does the cooing stage occur, and what are its features?
3-6 months, open-mouthed vowel sounds
When does the babbling stage occur, and what are its features?
6-12 months, repeated consonant vowel sounds and combinations of these eg. gagagagaga
When does the proto-word stage occur, and what are its features?
9-12 months, babbling seems to match actual words therefore is a grey area between pre-verbal and grammatical stages
When does the holophrastic stage occur, and what are its features?
1 year, Using one word to signpost things, includes more complex and functional aspects of language
When does the two-word stage occur, and what are its features?
Around 18 months, two word utterances that make up mini sentences, beginnings of syntax
When do a child’s first recognisable words usually appear?
12 months (holophrastic)
What happens once a child reaches 18 months old?
They have a productive vocabulary of around 50 words that they can say, but understand many more
What happens when a child reaches 24 months old?
Most children will have a 200 word productive vocabulary
What happens when a child reaches 36 months old?
Most children will have a 2000 word productive vocabulary
How did Nelson (1973) classify the early words of children?
Naming words, action words, social words and modifying words - largest category was naming words, with around 60% of a child’s first 50 words being nouns
What does Bloom (2004) argue about the noun bias in children’s early vocabulary?
The noun bias merely reflects the relative frequency of nouns in the language (nouns outnumber verbs by about 5:1 in most dictionaries
What is overextension?
Applying a label to more referents than it should, eg. saying ‘sea’ for any body of water - children have a limited productive vocabulary
What patterns did Saxton (2010) observe?
Food and drink, family, animals, body parts, clothing, vehicles, games and routines, toys, familiar objects, actions, descriptions, sound effects
What is underextension?
When a label only covers a narrow extent of a word’s meaning eg. can recognise a banana IRL but not in a book
What forms of overextension did Rescorla (1980) note?
Categorical overextension, analogical overextension, mismatch or predicate statements
What is an example of a categorical overextension?
‘Apple’ is used to refer to any round fruit
What is a hyponym?
A word whose meaning is included in the meaning of another eg. apple is a hyponym of fruit
What is a hypernym?
A word to name a broad category that includes other words eg. hypernym ‘fruit’ includes the hyponym ‘apple’
How often were Analogical overextensions found in Rescorla’s research?
15% of cases
What is an analogical overextension?
relates to the function or perception of an object eg. a scarf may be labelled a cat when a child strokes it
How often were mismatches / predicate statements found in Rescorla’s research?
25% of cases
What is a mismatch / predicate statement?
Statements that convey abstract information eg. pointing at a doorway and saying ‘cat’, because the cat normally sits there
What three stages did Aitchison (1987) identify in children’s acquisition of words?
Labelling, packaging, network building