Lecture 5 - Language development Flashcards
Language
Using words to convey messages, communication system with words as the unit combined to a message
Communication
Using language, facial expression and other methods to convery a message
Phanology
Sounds and the rules by which they are combined, prosody, intonation, tone, stress, rhythm
Semantics
Word meanings and word combinations, vocabulary and beyond
Grammar
Morphology – root words, prefixes and suffixes e.g., grammatical markers –ed
Syntax – rules that govern how words are combined to make sentences
Pragmatics
Appropriate and effective communication, social use of language, using language in contextually appropriate ways, nonliteral meaning
Sounds of your language
Word meanings combined to make sense
What should theories be able to do?
Empiricism (or behaviourism)
Nativism
– Language is innately specified (rather than learned)
– Main proponent Chomsky (see also Pinker and others)
Information processing: Statistical learning (others too)
Social interactionist
Empiricism
Keep proponents
Beliefs
Key proponents: Skinner, Bandura
Language is learned
Imitation and reinforcement
BUT:
– Children don’t hear all of the language that they produce
– Reinforcement for incorrect as well as correct utterances (Pinker, 1994)
– Doesn’t explain consistency in developmental trajectories, not all children hear the same language
Chomsky - basic principles
A nativist approach: Language is innate, species specific
Focus on grammar
Language acquisition device (LAD): Innate system that allows child to produce and comprehend grammatically consistent sentences
LAD contains universal grammar, rules common to all languages
Children acquire grammar spontaneously and with limited exposure to language
Stongly nativist
Evidence for nativism
Children learn language quickly and well
Children learn language even when input is limited -> Deaf children
There is a time when children are biologically predisposed to learn language – Critical period
The brain
– The brain is specialised for language
– Younger children recover better from brain damage
Evidence against nativism (species specific): animals can learn language
Evidence for nativism - deaf children
Absence of systematic sign language input, children spontaneously develop communication systems with vocabulary and syntax
Drive to create language
Homesign -> child object shown then gesture -> develop to more established sign (initial method of communication without sign language input)
Establishment of a special educational needs school in Nicaragua brought together deaf children and adolescents
Senghas & Coppola (2001) – Over a couple of decades: Homesign → Nicaraguan sign language
Cospeech gesture -> parents gesture with speech
Pidgins to Creoles
Pidgins → Creoles parents to children (Bickerton, 2008)
– Pidgin = simplified language, mixture of two or more simplified languages
– Creole = stable natural language, develops from a pidgin and becomes a first language for children
Creole languages developed a long time ago – we don’t really know what happened (Hoff, 2005)
Both nature and nurture explain this?
Developed through parents with different language through slavery needing to come together to develop communications -> passed on to children that they develop more complex version
Enviroment -> when children came together and had to produce and interpret language
Difficult to be sure of Creole language development because didnt track this a long time ago how it developed
Are children or adults better at learning languages
Proficiency determind by age acquisisition/ exposure begins
- ASL learners (Singleton & Newport, 2004)
- Foreign language learners (Hakuta et al., 2003)
- ERP and fMRI indicate second language processing less lateralised in older than younger learners (Neville & Bruer, 2001)
Evidence for nativism- Critical period
Genie never acquired normal language
– Discovered age 13 in 1970
– Had been confined to one room
– Neglected in every way
– Minimal exposure to language but did learn language
Genie used as evidence for the critical period hypothesis
Critical vs. sensitive periods
Have to learn language in this point or impossible to learn afterwards
Never recovered from lack of language -> suggest critical period
Also examples in feral children
Without input -> little development
Now think more of sensitive -> more susceptible to learning at this time
Evidence for nativism- Brain
Early studies of aphasia suggested that there are dedicated brain areas for language
Broca: Grammatical processing and speech production
Wernicke: Lexical comprehension
BUT Broca’s and Wernicke’s areas not solely or mainly responsible for specific language functions
Brain damage
Areas of brain for language -> suggest prewiring to proccess
Language functions more associated with left than right hemisphere
Younger children recover better from damage than older
BUT brain is plastic and develops/changes – especially young brains (sensitive period)
Left-localisation is associated with effective language processing but it is not necessary
Younger children recruit other parts of brain to aid the development and interpretation of language
Not deterministic -> dont have the area that is best for a purpose -> recruit other parts
Evidence against nativism - comparative research
Not species specific?
With training in sign language or artificial language (visual symbols) animals can acquire vocabulary: Chimpanzees, orangutans, gorillas, parrots, dolphins…
If its only our brain set up like that -> how can some animals develop language
Parrot (Einstein) -> used some degree of language
Kanzi
Observed researchers training his mother in the use of symbols to communicate (youtube)
Seemingly remarkable comprehension
Motivation: Conversation (Greenspan & Shanker, 2004) or getting what he wants (Seidenberg & Petitto, 1987)
Learnt symbolic relationship between words and symbol/ images
Can’t really go beyond what a child can do -> cannot use grammer to begin to string the individual units together
Mastery of grammar ≤ 2 year old
Nativism/ Chomsky- Critique
Universal grammar
Grammar could be innately determined
This is inconsistent with the learning and experimentation that we see as children develop e.g., errors that children make suggest that learning occurs and is gradual, not just ‘switched on’
Ignores the quality of the language input
Doesn’t consider pragmatics or social influences on language development
Is language development the result of interactions between the child’s innate capacities and experience of language/learning?
Information processing - statistical learning - Jenny Saffran
Learn through irregularities in environment
Keeping track of patterns in environment -> what things come together or what leads to what (cry -> parent comes)
Babies looking for causal relationships
Implicit way -> dont actively seek this
Child processes statistical regularities in the input → language learning (e.g., Saffran et al., 1996)
Implicit learning, not the result of direct instruction
Social interactionist approach
Drive to understand/communicate and rich language environment combine to → language learning
Therefore, social competency and language experiences shape development
Speech perception before words
Methods of understanding
Infant methods (head turn, novelty, familiarity)
Sensitive to stress patterns, role in parsing words animal (Jusczyk, 2001)
Phoneme = smallest sound unit that can signal a change in meaning e.g. “pa” vs. “ba”
Phonemes are different across different languages
Infants quickly become specialists in their own language…
Infants specialise
Compared English 6-8m, 8-10m, 10-12m on discrimination of non-English contrasts (Hindi Ta/ta and Salish ki/qi)
Sounds not relevant to English: performance declines with age (vs. Hindi/Salish infants)
6 months -> can hear the difference between words in all languages
10 months -> tuned to perceive language in native language, can no longer tell difference between words in other languages-> becoming specailist in own language
Production before words
Cooing - 2 months
Vowel sounds
Babbling - 6 months
Consonant–vowel
Universal timing
Range expands babbling
Proverbal gestures
Protodeclarative = bring object to others’ attention Protoimperative = getting someone else to do something (e.g., give me that)
Phonological development
First words limited by sounds that can be pronounced
Related to semantic (meaning) development
Understand more than can say
Phonological strategies – Minimal words (stressed syllable) – Add ending consonant – Adjust vowel length – Add unstressed syllables – Produce full word, correct stress pattern – May still need to refine sounds – Mostly complete by age 5 (onset of reading)
Later development: Refine syllable stress patterns – related to meaning
Realtion between words
Meaning of sentences
Mapping phonoligical form to meaning
Association
Semantic development
Vocabulary acquisition enables phonology (sound) semantics (meaning)
Very wide normal variation
About 12 months is average spurt -> inmitially keywords then spurt to more sentences
Though if you look very closely it is very rapid but is still gradual not a jump
Fast mapping -> point at the object and say word -> adding to words you know -> instrimental in improving language
How words fit together in categories -> network
