Lecture 1: Introduction To Language Development

Question 0

When do children acquire the basics of language?

Answer 0

By the age of 5

Question 1

What does a child have to acquire?

Answer 1

Form, meaning, grammar, use, speaking and understanding

Question 2

What are some challenges children may come across whilst acquiring language?

Answer 2

• Syntax (noun, and count noun),
• Morphology (plural ‘-s’, affixes/prefixes etc.),
• Idioms (“playing cat and mouse”)
• Abstract words (nouns: ‘dream’, and ‘love’; coordinating conjunction: “and, “like”)
• Learning the past tense (regular and irregular)
• Over generalisation of rules (e.g. “My teacher holded the baby rabbit”)
• Over generalisation of transitive and intransitive
• Going beyond ‘what’s been said’

Question 3

What are transitive and intransitive words? Explain how they’re over-generalised.

Answer 3

• Transitive verbs are verbs that have an object to receive the action. E.g. “I rode that bike”
• Intransitive verb are verbs that do not have an object to receive the action. E.g. “I laughed”

Question 4

What do you over generalisation errors suggest

Answer 4

That language is rule governed and creative.

Question 5

In regards to pragmatics, what are areas that children find difficult?

Answer 5

• Pragmatics in comprehension: reading between the lines
• Pragmatics in production: turn taking, relevance, other person’s knowledge and intentions (theory of mind)
• Imaginary dialogue: you: “so are you going out on another date with Dave tonight” me: “I’m washing my hair”

Question 6

What do researchers who study language acquisition need to explain?

Answer 6

How children
• learn so many words
• acquire apparently rule governed behaviours in morphology and syntax
• go beyond what is said and integrate knowledge of persons intentions, body language, facial expression, and intonation

Question 7

What are the language milestones?

Answer 7

• Cooing: 2 to 3 months
• Babbling: 4 to 6 months
• Single words: 12 to 15 months
• Word combinations: 18 to 24 months
• Simple sentences: 24 to 36 months
• Complex sentences: 36 months and over

Question 8

What are the language milestones for death child exposed to native signing models?

Answer 8

Deaf children exposed to native signing models acquire language milestones at the same age as typically developing children. For example, babbling is 4 to 6 months; single words 12 to 15 months et cetera.

Question 9

What is child directed speech?

Answer 9

Child directed speech is a registered that is used by mothers and all carers when addressing young children.
Children prefer child directed speech to adult directed speech as it attracts and maintains the infants attention.

Question 10

What is child directed speech (CDS) also known as?

Answer 10

“Baby talk”
“Motherese”
“Parentese”
“Baby talk register” (btr)

Question 11

What are the grammatical features of child directed speech?

Answer 11

Consists of shorter well formed utterances.
Consists of fewer false starts, incomplete sentences, and hesitations.
Includes fewer complex sentences and subordinate clause.

Question 12

What are the prosodic features of child directed speech?

Answer 12

Has a high pitch.
Has exaggerated intonation.
Has a slower tempo.

Question 13

What are the semantic features of child directed speech?

Answer 13

Meaning is highly redundant (give more information than is required).
It is closely related to immediate context.
Consists of a restricted set of vocabulary.
There is lots of repetition.

Question 14

According to the attachment theory, why is attachment important?

Answer 14

Young children need to develop a relationship with at least one primary caregiver in order for social and emotional development to proceed normally.

Question 15

What is joint attention? Briefly, why is it important?

Answer 15

It is the process of sharing one’s experience of observing an object or event by following gaze or pointing gestures.
It’s important because it is critical for social, language, and cognitive development.

Question 16

When does joint attention appear/emerge?

Answer 16

From about eight months, the child is able to follow the line of regard of a parent if the adult first establishes eye contact and then turns their head.

Question 17

At what age can children correctly located the target object that an adult looks that, without a clue of a head turn? (Joint attention)

Answer 17

At 12 months, the child can correctly locate target objects that adults look at, without the clue of a head turn.

Question 18

When does a child start pointing?

Answer 18

Just before their first birthday.

Question 19

Why is pointing a very important gesture?

Answer 19

It means “if you look there, you’ll know what I mean”. Therefore, pointing can convey an almost infinite variety of meanings.

It is also considered a universal gesture; as it’s widespread across cultures.

Question 20

What are some gestures that can be observed in toddlers?

Answer 20

• Showing:the toddler will hold an object tightly so partner may view it
• Giving: the toddler will hold an object in the open hand for their partner to take
• Pointing: the toddler will point to objects or events of interest
• Requesting: The toddler will lean and reach for desired objects

Question 21

Describe the development of canonical babbling.

Answer 21

Initially produce vowel-like sounds.
At two months they begin to make imprecise syllables that sound like “goo” or “gaaaa”.
Speech continues to broaden until six months or so.
Infants squeal, growl, and blow through their lips as well as “gooo”.
Infant’s sounds sound accidental and biologically driven.

At 10 months CANONICAL babbling emerges. Sounds/babbles are well formed and they are rhythmically duplicated syllables example
As the child reaches their first birthday, some children begin to use these syllables to name objects or people.
Although the syllables may not be real words, children’s consistent parenting of such syllables with particular reference makes them words in the functional sense.

Question 22

When does canonical babbling emerge?

Answer 22

7 to 10 months

Question 23

At what age does intentional communication develop?

Answer 23

8 months

Question 24

Describe the development of intentional communication.

Answer 24

Early social exchanges include attention to face whilst feeding, bouts of sucking that alternates with the caretaker speech, and smiling.

3 MONTHS: turn taking vocalisations followed by turn taking in gesture games like pattycake.

8 MONTHS: infants use familiar patterns of eye gaze, gesture, and babble for communicative purposes.

Prior to this, the infant would look and stretch out to an object it wants, then vocalise frustration if it remained out of reach.
Now it will will extend its arm to the object, and will switch their eye gaze between the object and adult. If the child is ignored they will make a fuss.

At this stage, the child will also comment on an object by holding it out whilst looking at an adult in the eye. Soon use pointing gesture to direct the adult’s attention to more distant objects.

No longer any question about the intention and communicative nature of such behaviour.

Question 25

When do first word emerge?

Answer 25

14 months

Question 26

Describe the development of first words?

Answer 26

90% of eight month old understand at least five words.
90% of 14 months old have spoken the first words.

Children’s early words symbolise people, activities, states, social routines, and objects.

Vocabulary grows is quite slow. Only a few words each month are learnt. However each word contributes to the overall understanding of sounds and meaning of the language. New knowledge support further word learning.
Two years: rate of vocabulary growth increases. 297 words spoken by 24 month olds.
Differences in vocabulary size at this age a long lasting and are related in large part to the amount and diversity of the language the child hears.

Question 27

When do word combinations emerge?

Answer 27

16 - 30 months

Question 28

Describe the development of word combinations.

Answer 28

Children begin to combine words into short phrases.
Advancements in vocabulary size and composition, as well as cognitive ability to combine symbols, lay the foundation for this attainment.

2 word combinations evolve into to 3 words.
Can later capture the basic clause structure of SVO sentences.

Question 29

When do noun and verb inflections emerge?

Answer 29

16 - 30 months

Question 30

Describe the development of noun and verb inflections.

Answer 30

Utterances are less telegraphic.
Children include grammatical inflections to vary basic meaning and mark syntactic relationship.

Can indicate (in order): plurality (-s), possession (-‘s), progressive aspect (-ing), past tense (-ed).

74% of 30 month olds use regular past tense -ed.
Consistent usage not typical until 48 months.

Question 31

When do complex sentences emerge?

Answer 31

28 to 45 months.