Language Development Flashcards
ibbotson and tomasello disputed…
chomsky’s theory of an innate grammar module
- principles and parameters theory replaced this with rules that interact with cultures to produce variations in language
stages of vocabulary growth
- 12mo- production of first word
- 15mo- 25 words/fragments
- 2y- about 300 words
- 5yo- 10-15,000 words and vocabulary bursts (10-20 new words a day)
- 18yo- 60,000 words
main stages in language development
babbling (4-9mo)
holophrastic (9-18mo)
two-word (18-24mo)
telegraphic (24-30mo)
babbling stage
meaningless, speechlike vocalisations with simple reduplicated CV structure
becomes more language-specific over time
holophrastic stage
consists of relevant names/objects, and nouns are easier to produce
high frequency of demonstrative words, e.g., this, that, there…
two-word stage
different from idiomatic expressions, most often nouns
lack of grammatical markers and beginning of syntax
telegraphic stage
three-word expressions
absence of function words, auxiliary verbs, prepositions, and tense
quick progression
foetuses and hearing in the womb
can hear impoverished sounds due to high frequencies being blocked by amniotic fluid
- prosody, stress, rhythm, intonation and duration
evidence of early speech perception
1yo using categorical perception- sensitive to speech sounds
evidence of early speech production
crying, cooing, and laughing as involuntary responses to emotional states
- vocal play between 4-7 months
fast mapping
children learn new words for objects after one experience of exposure
how do newborns contribute to communication?
- head turning to noise
- discriminate between sounds and mother’s voice
how do 1-4mo contribute to communication?
- smiling, cooing, sounds
- laughter starts to occur
how do 4-9mo contribute to communication?
- different responses to different information
- vocal play and babbling
- intentional communication between 8-10mo
how do 8-12mo contribute to communication?
- interpretable reaction to some words
- showing and pointing
- recognition of around
what do CDS and motherese show?
contribution of the parent to communication
phonological differences in motherese
higher pitch, exaggerated intonation, segmented, slower
lots of repetition and diminutives to acquire noun morphology
is CDS essential?
can facilitate language learning, by marking syntactic boundaries, but it is not essential
language acquisition theories
- behaviourist accounts
- nativist
- constructivist/cognitive
- social accounts
behaviourist accounts (skinner)
language is used in response to stimuli and learned by children through imitation and reinforcement
- poverty of stimulus
- children often use ungrammatical language
nativist accounts (chomsky, pinker)
language capacity is innate (LAD) and children learn worldwide universal grammar without explicit instruction
constructivist and cognitive accounts (piaget)
language learning is driven by cognitive development of mental schemas
social accounts (vygotsky, bruner)
language has a social origin; high importance of social interaction and learning
adults model concepts and culture to children
errors with word learning
overextension- all animals are called doggie
underextension- only roses are called flowers
mechanisms for word learning
low-level mechanisms, e.g., classical conditioning
conceptual prerequisites, e.g., children know basic ontological categories
linguistic prerequisites, e.g., children assume words have meaning
predispositions
children have innate assumptions when assigning meaning to sounds
types of assumptions
- whole object
- shape bias
- mutual exclusivity
- taxonomic assumption
- basic level category assumption
- noun-category bias
whole object
assumes the word is a label referring to the whole object rather than its parts
shape bias
extend names to objects that are similar in shape over other functions
mutual exclusivity assumption
an object can only have one label
taxonomic assumption
novel words referring to something will also refer to similar things, leading to overextension
basic level category assumption
assumes a novel word refers back to the basic level, rather than superordinate or subordinate
noun-category bias
nouns are conceptually easier to learn than other syntactic categories
evidence of rule-based morphological development
wug test- applying the plural rule to produce the correct phonological form
stages of morphological development
- holophrastic- right answer, wrong reasons
- rule-based- wrong answer, right reasons (overgeneralisation of rules)
- rules and exceptions- right answer, right reasons
U-shaped morphological learning
instance-based
overgeneralisations
exceptions
critical age hypothesis
biological events related to language (e.g., lateralisation) can only happen during a limited period of maturation
- during this period, linguistic input is vital for normal language development
linguistic theory of syntax
grammar is developed by analysing grammatical and ungrammatical sentences
suggests children are born with a linguistic capacity
what is LAD?
provides the rules and principles to learn any language in the world
only input is needed to trigger LAD operation
chomsky believed language acquisition is guided by…
LAD or universal grammar (UG)
UG
limited number of principles common to all languages, which provides the range of parameters to explain variation in human language
how do children use LAD?
using the input, must decide which parameter is appropriate for their language
opposition to LAQD
usage-based learning, where children use general cognitive abilities, learning mechanisms, and knowledge of social situations
clear correlations between _____ and _______ development
lexical, syntactic
first grammatical knowledge occurs when words are combined
stages of syntactic development
- beginning of word combinations
- add grammatical morphemes
- questions and negatives
- complex sentences
multiword utterances
arises when children know around 50 words at 2yo
MLU
observes the mean number of morphemes to assess syntactic and phonological development
pragmatics- using context
adults:
- use context (integrating discourse and syntactic information)
- semantic context biases interpretation
children fail to use discourse or semantic context in language processing
