language acquisition

Question 1

innate

Answer 1

humans are genetically predisposed to acquire and use language

Question 2

innateness hypothesis

Answer 2

a hypothesis that a humans are genetically predisposed to learn and use language

Question 3

imitation theory

Answer 3

Theory claiming that children learn language by listening to speech around them and reproducing what they hear

Question 4

reinforcement theory

Answer 4

theory claiming children learn to speak like adults rewarded or otherwise reinforced when they use the right forms

Question 5

active construction of a grammar theory

Answer 5

theory claims that children actually invent the rules of grammar themselves

Question 6

connectionist theory

Answer 6

theory that claims that assume children learn language by creating neural connections in the brain

Question 7

social interaction theory.

Answer 7

assumes that children acquire language through social interaction with older children and adults

Question 8

linguistic universals

Answer 8

Basic features shared by all languages; such as “noun”and “verb” concepts

Question 9

universal Grammar

Answer 9

Set of structural characteristics shaped by all languages

Question 10

critical period

Answer 10

period of time in an individuals life during which a behavior in this case language-must be acquired
in other words; acquisition will fail if attempted before OR after this period

Question 11

Neglected Children

Answer 11

a child who is neglected by care takers, often resulting in significantly lower exposure to language as a child

Question 12

feral Children

Answer 12

child who grew up in the wild without care by human adults, often with animals

Question 13

home sign

Answer 13

home sign gestures are communicative gestures that are invented by deaf children and the people they communicate with where sign language isn’t available

Question 14

child directed speech

Answer 14

slow and high pitched language that contains many repetitions and simplified syntax, exaggerated intonation and a simple and concrete vocab

Question 15

high amplitude sucking

Answer 15

infants are given a special pacifier that is connected to a sound generating system. Each suck generates a noise, and soon the infants learn that their sucking is what creates the noise

Question 16

conditioned head turn procedure

Answer 16

2 phases: conditioning and testing.
conditioning= child learns to associate a changes in sound with the activation of visual reinforces
testing= test to see if the child looks to the visual reinforcers before they are activated

Question 17

articulatory gestures

Answer 17

gestures used to create different sounds; ie bringing both lips together

Question 18

babble

Answer 18

producing sequences of vowels and consonants

Question 19

repeated/ canonical babbling

Answer 19

continuous repetition of sequences of vowels and consonants

Question 20

variegated babbling

Answer 20

production of meaningless consonant vowel sequences by infants

Question 21

holophrastic stage

Answer 21

one word stage: stage in 1st language acquisition during which children can produce only one word at a time

Question 22

telegraphic

Answer 22

the speech of young children; usually due to the omission of function words

Question 23

overgeneralization

Answer 23

in the study of child language acquisition, a relationship between child and adult application of rules relative to certain context: process in which children extend the application of linguistic rules to contexts beyond those in the adult language

Question 24

complexive concept

Answer 24

a term used in the study of child language acquisition. a group of items (abstract/concrete) that a child refers to with a single word for which it is not possible to single out one unifying property

Question 25

overextension

Answer 25

the study of child language acquisition , a relationship between child and adult perception of word meaning: the child’s application of a given word has a wider range than the application of the same word in adult language

Question 26

underextension

Answer 26

application of a word to a smaller set of objects than is appropriate for mature adult speech or the usual def of the word

Question 27

relational term

Answer 27

see relative intersection: type of relationship between adj and noun reference where the reference of the and is determined relative to the noun reference

Question 28

deictic expression

Answer 28

word or expression that takes its meaning relative to the time place and speaker of the utterance

Question 29

attention getters

Answer 29

word or phrase used to initiate an address to children

Question 30

attention holders

Answer 30

tactic used to maintain children attention for an extended period of time

Question 31

conversational turns

Answer 31

the contribution to a conversation made by one speaker from the time that she takes the floor from another speaker to the time that she passes the floor on another

Question 32

bilingual

Answer 32

state of commanding 2 languages; having linguistic competence of 2 languages

Question 33

multilingual

Answer 33

the state of commanding three or more languages; linguistic competence in three or more languages

Question 34

simultaneous bilingual

Answer 34

bilingualism in which both languages are acquired from infancy

Question 35

language mixing

Answer 35

using words or structural elements of from more than one language within the same conversation

Question 36

second language acquisition

Answer 36

acquisition of a second language as a teenager or adult

Question 37

foreign accent

Answer 37

an accent that is marked by the phonology of another language or other languages that are more familiar to the speaker

Question 38

fossilization

Answer 38

process thru which forms from a speakers non native language usage become fixed; generally in a way that would be considered ungrammatical by a native speaker- and do not change, even after years of instruction

Question 39

transfer

Answer 39

the influence of ones native language on the learning of subsequent languages; this can inhibit or facilitate the learning of a second language

Question 40

sequential bilingual

Answer 40

bilingualism in which the second language is acquired as a young child