Language development

Question 1

Hocket & Charles (1960)

Answer 1

differences that make our language special:

arbitrariness - no connection between sound and message

displacement - talking about things not present

productivity - create new utterances

duality of patterning - meaningless phonic segments combined to make something meaningful

Question 2

forms

Answer 2

phonology and syntax/morphology

Question 3

function

Answer 3

semantics and pragmatics

Question 4

phones

Answer 4

differences in sounds we use and how we use them

Question 5

phonemes

Answer 5

if a phone changed the meaning of a word

• infants born able to hear all phonemes - becomes specific to their own language

Question 6

phonological development

Answer 6

7 months - canonical babbling (reduplicated sounds)
10 months - babbling reflects sounds of the environment
1 year - variegated babbling (sounds like words)

Question 7

gaze following

Answer 7

18 months

checking where people are looking when they are speaking

Question 8

joint attention

Answer 8

9 months

2 or more people attend to something and are mutually aware of it
- predicts age of language production

Question 9

pointing

Answer 9

9-14 months

imperative - tell someone to do something
declarative - inform someone about something

index finger - predicts vocabulary development
open handed pointing - delay

Question 10

words

Answer 10

10-15 months - begin to produce words

slow until 50-100 words in lexicon
6 years - 10-14’000 words in lexicon
8-10 years - 12 new words per day

Question 11

errors in speech

Answer 11

spoonerisms - changes letters of two words

malapropisms - word replaces similar sounding word

Question 12

semantics

Answer 12

meaning of a word and how to use it

Question 13

errors of scope

Answer 13

semantic issues

underextentions (too little detail) or overextensions (too much detail - over applying)

Question 14

how children learn semantics/meaning of words

Answer 14

learn to make assumptions - more likely to mean the whole rather than a part of an object

associative learning - word used when the same object is present

social cues - if you have been looking for something, find it and someone says the word

linguistic cues - other words give clues about reference

mutual exclusivity - knowing what other words mean = vital

Question 15

McArthur-Bates communicative development inventory (CDI)

Answer 15

parental reports of language development

show vast individual differences

Question 16

SES and learning

Answer 16

large role in explaining differences in language development

less contingent talk

Question 17

Contingent talk

Answer 17

child directed speech that focus’ infants attention semantically (what infant is attending to) and temporally (in response to infants vocalisation)

Question 18

grammar

Answer 18

allows combination of words to convey different meanings

Question 19

syntax

Answer 19

organisation into larger structures (sentences)

who did what to whom
novel (made up words) can be used to test, adding into a sentence to see if they respond as if it were a word

Question 20

morphemes

Answer 20

forms of words

Question 21

inflectional morphemes (morphology)

Answer 21

marks:
tense
person
numer
possession

Berko (1958) - WUG test

Question 22

inflectional morpheme developmental trajectory

Answer 22

discover an inflection - errors of omission (wug not wugs)

over imply the inflection (he blewed up)

balance applying the inflections and remember exceptions

Question 23

Chomsky - Universal Grammar (UG)

Answer 23

nativist approach - can’t learn grammar by copying what they hear around them because:

poverty of stimulus problem
no negative evidence problem

Question 24

poverty of stimulus problem

Answer 24

can produce complex utterances without every hearing them before

Question 25

no negative evidence problem

Answer 25

don’t have direct feedback on their wrong grammar

Question 26

universal grammar (UG)

Answer 26

grammatical categories and principles (rules) used to generate grammatical sentences

suggested to be an innate system

Question 27

issues with UG

Answer 27

what innate knowledge makes up this system?

Question 28

constructivist approach to grammar

Answer 28

grammar is learnable:

imitation
analogies
generalisation

Question 29

pragmatics

Answer 29

ability to adapt our language to the context we are in

turn taking
understanding implicatures (some compared to all)
talking in different registers
narrative skills (things that aren't there)

Question 30

Development of pragmatics

Answer 30

early inclination to engage in turn taking (helps develop their lexicon)

Question 31

referential choice

Answer 31

struggle with how and when to use a word so refer to things in ambiguous ways (he/she)

Question 32

feedback

Answer 32

respond well to request for classification - helping provide detail

repairing utterances - add detail a child needs to get their point across

Question 33

scaffolding

Answer 33

child directed speech - motherease
following in - commenting on an object that has a child’s attention
adjust language for child
expansion - say it the correct way for them
clarification request - when they don’t understand they ask questions

Question 34

atypical development

Answer 34

delays in language effects other things

could come from:
hearing loss (need for cochlear implant)
cleft pallet - can’t produce sounds
learning difficulties

Question 35

Developmental language Disorder (DSD)

Answer 35

can’t be explained by any hearing loss of other developmental disorder
2/30 children affected
struggle to comprehend and produce speech