Language Acquisition Flashcards
describe results of study investigating when hearing begins? (Lecanuet et al., 1995)
at 29 weeks of age: when a noise is introduced, there is an obvious heart rate response from infants = starting to pick up on sounds
what is transnatal learning?
encoding information before birth and recognising it after birth
describe results of De Casper & Spence (1986) study into whether babies actively process speech before birth?
- 2/3 days after birth
- babies altered sucking pattern to hear familiar passage but not unfamiliar one
- change in sucking irrespective of whether mother or unfamiliar read the Cat in the Hat
describe the 2 conditions in De Casper & Spence (1986) study into whether babies actively process speech before birth?
group 1: more they sucked on dummy = played cat in the hat
group 2: more they sucked on dummy = played unfamiliar passage
n Christophe & Morton (1998) investigating whether babies can tell 2 languages apart, what 2 language comparisons did they use?
english vs dutch (similar in prosody)
or
english vs japanese (diff prosodic pattern)
describe results of Christophe & Morton (1998) study into whether babies can tell 2 languages apart
babies could tell difference between english and Japanese but not english and dutch
can use prosody to distinguish languages
what is a phoneme?
smallest sound unit that carries distinctiontions between one meaning and another (b and p)
what are phoneme boundaries?
a physical parameter, such as voice onset time, changes perception from one phoneme to another
in regards to phonemes, what is it crucial for infants to do?
- tell apart different phonemes (b and p)
- perceive different variants of same phoneme as same
describe principle behind Eimas et al’s (1971) study into infant’s early discrimination of speech sounds?
- shown same voice stimuli again and again
- high stimulus response initially, gradually wanes
- new sound stimulus
- greater response = dishabituated and recognised this as different sound
describe results of Eimas et al’s (1971) study into infant’s early discrimination of speech sounds?
babies who heard p increased sucking rate
babies who heard b did not increase sucking rate
describe conclusions of Eimas et al’s (1971) study into infant’s early discrimination of speech sounds?
infants as young as 1mo have a built in mechanism for distinguishing speech sounds, can be used as building blocks for language acquisition
what is phonetic discrimination in native and foreign languages?
- newborn babies have potential to make any phonetic discrimination
- adults do not have this same ability (unable to hear phonetic distinctions that occur in other languages)
what was the research question in Werker & Tess (1984) study into how language experience shapes infant’s speech perception?
can english babies discriminate between hindi ‘da’ and ‘da’?
describe the conditioned head turn paradigm?
- whenever there is change in auditory stimulus
- electric toy is lit up and activated
- infants trained to look at toy whenever they hear a change in anticipation
- target items played
- observer who can’t hear sounds judges whether infants heard a stimulus change based on their actions
describe results of Werker & Tess (1984) study into how language experience shapes infant’s speech perception?
by 10 months: baby stops hearing differences between 2 sounds and is no longer universal listener
6-8 months: infants able to discriminate between hindi contrasts
what is a problem with perceptual narrowing?
relies on experimental evidence that is very limited in its linguistic and geographic diversity
has perceptual narrowing been found in face recognition?
yes:
- all good at distinguishing faces from own face
- 6 mos good at distinguishing faces monkey faces
- other race effect = better at distinguishing faces from own race
when does the other race effect begin?
1 year
describe the preferential listening paradigm?
- infant sits on caregivers lap
- on each trial, one of the side lights flash
- when infant orients to light, sound comes from that speaker
- experimenter records how long infant looks at ‘source’ of sound as a measure of infant’s preference
how are infants able to tell when one word ends and the next begins?
- infant directed speech
- syllable stress
- ability to attend to transitional probabilities
how does infant directed speech help infants be able to tell when one word ends and the next begins?
- higher in pitch
- exaggerated intonation contours
- shorter utterances
- longer pauses
- simplified sentence structure
what are the exceptions to words with a strong-weak stress pattern in english?
guitar and belong
describe results of Jusczyk, Cutler & Redanz (1993) study into infant’s sensitivity to syllable stress?
at 9 months, infants spent longer listening to strong-weak lists of words (typical of english language), must be sensitive
what is a transitional probability?
probability of one syllable following another
- certain sequences of syllables will occur more often than others
- more commonly occurring sequences likely to be words
give an example of the invented words used in Saffran et al (1996) & Johnson & Jusczyk (2001) study into transitional probabilities?
pa/ki/bu
ti/ba/du
/go/la/tu
da/ro/pi
describe results of Saffran et al (1996) & Johnson & Jusczyk (2001) study into transitional probabilities?
- listened to longer to part words compared to coherent words
- novelty preference when heard different words
what 3 steps must be achieved in order to comprehend words?
1) identify word from speech stream
2) remember what word sounds like so you can recognise it when you hear it again
3) link word with some consistent event
what 5 steps must be achieved in order to produce words?
1) identify word from speech stream
2) remember what word sounds like so you can recognise it when you hear it again
3) link word with some consistent event
4) repeat sound of word
5) say word in appropriate context
when does speech comprehension emerge?
6-9 months
when does speech production emerge?
12 months
what are the 3 ways we measure comprehension?
1) parental reports - communicative development inventory
2) home observations/recordings
3) in lab, ask infant to choose named object from array (Golnikoff et al., 1987) or preferential looking
at 6 mo, what is the range of words understood by typically developing children?
70-270 words
