Language development

Question 1

Define Holophrastic

Answer 1

expressing complex ideas in a single word or in a fixed phrase.

Question 2

Define Telegraphic

Answer 2

speech during the two-word stage of language acquisition in children, which is laconic and efficient

Question 3

What is taxonomic assumption

Answer 3

a word learning bias that children use when they expect a new word to refer to objects that share characteristics

Question 4

What is U shaped learning?

Answer 4

a behaviour in which the learner first learns the correct behaviour, then abandons the correct behaviour and finally returns to the correct behaviour once again.

Question 5

What us Child directed speech (CDS)

Answer 5

a distinct way of speaking that adults use when communicating with infants and young children

Question 6

Define nativist

Answer 6

children are born with the innate ability to acquire language and thus are able to acquire the grammar of their native language by the age of three. (chomsky)

Question 7

What is fast mapping?

Answer 7

the process whereby a child learns a new word very quickly, often after only one exposure to the word.

Question 8

What is the Language Acquisition device (LAD)

Answer 8

instinctive mental capacity which enables an infant to acquire and produce language. (component of natvist theory)

Question 9

State the 4 stages of language development

Answer 9

Stage 1 = Babbling
Stage 2 = One word holophrastic
Stage 3 = Two word
Stage 4 = Telegraphic

Question 10

Describe the components of stage 1 of language development

Answer 10

Babbling
- 4-9 months
- Simple structure, CV syllables
- Change in sound discrimination skill: first sounds are universal, then more language specific
- Not independent of later speech development
- Phonetic content found in babbling overlaps with later speech

Question 11

Describe the components of stage 2 of language development

Answer 11

One- word holophrastic
- 9-18 months
- Names and objects in baby’s life
- CV syllables easier than CVC
- Deletion and substitution
- High frequency

Question 12

Describe the components of stage 3 of language development

Answer 12

Two- word
- 18-24 months
- Most often nouns
- Beginning of syntax

Question 13

Describe the components of stage 4 of language development

Answer 13

Telegraphic
- 3 word expressions
- Very quick progression

Question 14

Describe Phonology in reference to early speech perception

Answer 14

• Already before birth, foetuses hear sounds in womb
• Can’t hear individual words but can hear prosody (rhythm, stress etc)
• predisposed to listen to speech sounds and can distinguish them

Question 15

What are the 3 main components of early speech production

Answer 15

Universal = crying, cooing, laughing (both hearing and deaf children)
Babbling stage = Deaf children babble with their hands
One word stage = slow at first then rapid, fast mapping

Question 16

What are the components of CDS

Answer 16

• Also known as Motherese
• Phonological differences: slower, higher in pitch, exaggerated intonation, clearly segmented
• Shorter and simpler sentences
• Lots of repetition and diminutives
• The here & now

Question 17

Does CDS help?

Answer 17

Can facilitate learning bur may not be essential for it

Question 18

State the 4 theories of language acquisition?

Answer 18

1. Behavourist accounts (skinner)
2. Nativist/ innatist accounts
3. Constructivist/ cognitive accounts
4. Social accounts

Question 19

What is overextension?

Answer 19

Occurs when a child uses a single word to refer to multiple objects or concepts.

Question 20

What is underextension?

Answer 20

occurs when a child limits a word’s meaning to a subset of its normal usage

Question 21

Sate the 6 main predispositions that children bring to word learning?

Answer 21

1. Whole object
2. Shape bias
3. Mutual exclusivity assumption
4. Taxonomic assumption
5. Basic level category assumption
6. Noun- category bias

Question 22

Describe whole object in reference to word learning

Answer 22

Assumes the word is a label that refers to the whole object rather than its parts

Question 23

Describe shape bias in reference to word learning

Answer 23

Extend names to objects that are similar in shape rather than similar in colour, texture, function

Question 24

Define mutual exclusivity assumption

Answer 24

An object can only have one label
- Assigns a novel word to object they don’t have a label for already

Question 25

What is basic level category assumption?

Answer 25

Assume that a novel word refers to the basic level rather than the superordinate or subordinate

Question 26

What is Noun category bias?

Answer 26

Nouns are easier and quicker to learn than other synaptic categories

Question 27

What is the basline of the wug test?

Answer 27

This is a wug
Now there is another one
There are two of them
There are two ….

Proof that = young children have extracted generalizable rules from the language around them

Question 28

What are the 3 stages of morphological development

Answer 28

1. Holophrastic
   Right answer for the wrong reason
2. Rule-based
   Wrong answer for the right reason
3. Rules & expectations
   Right answer for the right answer

Question 29

Explain the critical age hypothesis

Answer 29

Certain types of behaviour need to develop within a critical, sensitive period for it to develop normally

Question 30

What is Chomsky’s perspective of synaptic development

Answer 30

Language acquisition is guided by an innate device called the LAD or universal grammar (UG)

• The LAD provides the rules and principles that allow a child to learn any language in the world

UG provides a limited range of options which can be set and explains why there is variation amongst languages

Question 31

How do you measure synaptic development

Answer 31

MLU = mean length of utterance (Brown)

Question 32

What is the MLU calculation

Answer 32

The mean number of morphemes rather than words

Question 33

What are the 5 stages if synaptic development

Answer 33

Stage 1 = Begin word combinations
Stage 2 = Add grammatical morphemes
Stage 3 = questions, negatives
Stage 4 = Some complex sentences
Stage 5 = More complex sentences

Question 34

Define the whole of Trueswells experiment on context use during synaptic processing?

Answer 34

• Do 5 year olds use context to help them with processing ambiguous information?

Experiment:
Ambiguous and unambiguous sentences
Put the frog that’s on the napkin in the box (easy)
Put the frog on the napkin in the box (difficult)

Dependent variables
Percentage of the looks at the incorrect destination (empty napkin)
Percentage of incorrect placements of objects (putting the frog on the napkin instead of the box)

Results - adults
Adults readily use context and synaptic information

Results - children
No evidence that children used discourse to disambiguate the input

Question 35

What were the conclusions of Trusewells experiment ?

Answer 35

In adults, semantic context biases the interpretation of the ambiguous sentence

Children do not use this semantic context “on the napkin” is always interpreted as destination