File 8 Flashcards
innate
determined by factors present from birth
innateness hypothesis
hypothesis that humans are generally predisposed to learn and use language
linguistic universals
property believed to be held in common by al natural languages
universal grammar
theory that posits a set of grammatical characteristics shared by all natural languages
critical period
time when children must have exposure to language and must build the critical brain structures necessary in order to gain native speaker competence in a language
neglected children
child who is neglected by caretakers, often resulting in in lower exposure to language as a child
feral children
child who grew up in the wild without care by human adults, often with animals
homesign
rudimentary visual-gestural communication system that is developed and used by deaf children and their families when when a signed language is not made available for their communication
imitation theory
child language acquisition theory that claims that children acquire language by listening to speech around them and reproducing what they hear
active construction of a grammar theory
theory of child language which says that children acquire a language by inventing rules of grammar based on the speech around them
connectionist theories
claims that children learn language through neural connection in the brain
social interaction theory
claims that children acquire language through social interactions
child-directed speech
speech used by parents or caregivers when communicating with young children or infants
high amplitude sucking
used to study sound discrimination in infants from birth to sex months. infants are given a special pacifier that is connected to a sound generating system
conditioned head-turn procedure
experimental technique usually used with infants between 5 and 8 months. Conditioning phase the infant learns to associate a change in sound with activation of visual enforces. Testing phase when the infant looks to the visual reinforces immediately after a change in sound
voice onset time
length of time between the release of a consonant and the onset of voicing, when the vocal folds start vibrating
articulatory gestures
movement of a speech organ in the production of speech
babble
phase in child language acquisition during which the child produces meaningless sequences of consonants and vowels
canonical babbling (repeated)
the continuous repetition of sequences of vowels and consonants by infants
variegated babbling
production of meaningless consonant-vowel sequences by infants
one word stage
stage which children can produce only one word at a time
telegraphic stage
phase during child language acquisition in which children use utterances composed of content words
plurals
when children learn the plural of words such as men rather than saying mans.
overgeneralization
relationship between child and adult application of rules relative to certain contexts
negatives
when children place the word “no” in front of sentences to negate them
interrogatives
kind of sentence that expresses a question
complexive concept
term used in the study of child language acquisition
overextension
relationship between child and adult perception of word meaning
underextensions
application of a word to a smaller set of objects than is appropriate for mature adult speech or the usual definition of a word
relational term
type of relationship between adjective and noun reference where the reference of the adjectives is determined relative to the noun reference
deictic expressions
word or expression that takes its meaning relative to the time, place, and speaker of the utterance
attention getters
word or phrase used to initiate an address to children
attention holders
tactic used to maintain children’s attention for extended periods of time
conversational turns
contribution to a conversation made by one speaker from the time that takes the floor from another speaker to the time that she passes the floor to the other speaker
bilingual
state of commanding 2 languages; linguistic competence in two languages
multilingual
state of knowing three or more languages
simultaneous bilingualism
bilingualism when both languages are acquired from infancy
sequential bilingualism
bilingualism when the second language is learned as a small child
second-language acquisition
acquisition of a second language as a teenager or adult
code switching
using words or structural elements from more than one language within the same conversation
