Theories of Language Development. Flashcards
What are the major theories of language acquisition?
Learning, nativist, and social interactionist theories are the major theories of language acquisition.
According to _________ language development (like the development of other complex behaviors) is the result of __________________.
Learning theory
imitation and reinforcement.
In contrast to learning theory, _______proposes that humans are biologically programmed to acquire language.
nativist theory
According to Chomsky’s version of nativist theory, humans have a _______ which is an inborn linguistic processor that enables children to understand language and speak in rule-governed ways.
language acquisition device (LAD)
Evidence for Chomsky’s theory is provided by studies showing that all languages have the ____________and that all children pass through the _______________ at similar ages.
Same basic underlying grammatical structure
Same stages of language acquisition
Finally, ________ proposes that language acquisition depends on a combination of _____________.
social interactionist theory
biological and social factors
According to the social interactionist view, “______, a strong desire to _________and to be understood by them, and a ___________combine to help children discover the functions and regularities of language (Berk, 2013, p. 367).
native capacity
understand others
rich language environment
One source of evidence for the role of social factors is research showing that caregivers often ________when talking to young children and that this speech facilitates language development (Bukatko & Daehler, 2012).
use child-directed speech
_______________is also referred to as parentese and involves speaking slowly and in a high-pitched voice, using a restricted vocabulary and simple repetitive sentences, placing exaggerated emphasis on key words, and focusing on present events.
Child-directed speech
LInguists distinguish how many major components of language?
5
What are the five major components of language?
Phonology
Morphology
Syntax
Semantics
Pragmatics
What is Phonology?
Phonology refers to the rules for using phonemes, which are the smallest units of sound in a language. Each language has a limited number of phonemes. English has about 50 phonemes (e.g., c, t, th).
What is Morphology?
(b) Morphology addresses the rules governing the use of morphemes, which are the smallest units of language that have meaning. Free morphemes are minimal units of meaning that stand alone as words (e.g., test, certain), while bound morphemes must be combined with at least one other morpheme (e.g., pre in pretest, un in uncertain).
What is Syntax?
Syntax refers to rules that determine how words can be combined into sentences. These rules sometimes vary in different languages. For example, in English, an adjective precedes a noun while, in Spanish, an adjective follows a noun. Syntax allows us to recognize that sentences with a different level of complexity and order of words have the same meaning: For instance, it allows us to recognize that “The client signed the consent form” means the same as “The consent form was signed by the client.”
What is semantics?
Semantics is concerned with the meaning of words, phrases, and sentences and focuses on their literal meaning (e.g., the dictionary definition a word). For example, from the perspective of semantics, if a person says, “I’m so hungry, I could eat a horse,” this would mean the person actually wants to eat a horse.
What is Pragmatics?
Pragmatics refers to the use and meaning of verbal and nonverbal language in different social contexts. Pragmatic skills include adhering to conversational rules (e.g., turn-taking, staying on topic), using language that is appropriate for the listener or situation (e.g., using different language when talking to an employer or a child), appropriately using and understanding body language (e.g., gestures, facial expressions), and appropriately using and understanding non-literal language (e.g., idioms, slang, humor, sarcasm).
What is first way that infants communicate with their caregivers?
Crying
How many cries are there?
3
What are the types of cries immediately following an infant’s birth?
a low-pitched rhythmic cry that signals hunger or discomfort
a shrill, less regular cry that signals anger or frustration
a loud high-pitched cry followed by silence (which is due to breath-holding) that signals pain.
What does a low-pitched rhythmic cry signal?
hunger or discomfort
What does a shrill less regular cry that signals?
Anger or frustration
What does a loud high-pitched cry followed by silence (which is due to breath-holding) signal?
Pain.
What has research produced regarding the best way to respond to an infant’s crying?
Inconsistent results.
Bell and Ainsworth (1972) reported that, when mothers in their study responded quickly and consistently to their crying infants during the infants’ first few months of life _______
the infants cried less in subsequent months.
Van IJzendoorn and Hubbard (2000) failed to replicate the Bell and Ainsworth study with a larger sample and found that, when mothers ignored their crying infants during a nine-week period, the infants___________
cried less frequently during the next nine weeks.
To reconcile these inconsistencies among researchers regarding parents responses to babies’ crying, some experts suggest that the optimal response depends on the
severity of a distressed infant’s cries“If a parent responds quickly to severe distress but less promptly to minor upset, the infant may learn to regulate the latter type of distress on his or her own and hence end up crying less overall” (Siegler, DeLoache, & Eisenberg, 2003, p. 73).
What are the Language Milestones as it relates to The development of language? How many milestones are there?
- Cooing
- Babbling
- Echolalia
- first words
- holophrastic speech
- telegraphic speech
In terms of Language milestones what is Cooing?
How long does it last?
What sounds do they make?
1. Cooing begins at six to eight weeks of age and involves repeating vowel-like sounds (e.g., “ooo” and “aaaeeeooo”).
When does Babbling begin?
. Babbling begins at three to six months of age with the utterance of single consonant-vowel combinations such as “ba” and “goo.”
What is followed by Babbling?
This is followed by canonical (reduplicated) babbling, which is the repetition of consonant-vowel combinations such as “mamamama” and “babababa.”
What is followed by canonical babbling?
Infants exhibit variegated babbling which is more complex and consists of different consonant-vowel combinations in a single utterance – for example, “bamagubu.”
A child’s babbling initially includes sounds from all languages but, by about______, it narrows to the sounds and intonation patterns of the child’s native language.
9 months of age
Infants who are congenitally deaf begin to babble at about the same time as or slightly later than hearing infants do. However, they babble ______, their babbling consists of a more______, and their vocalizations ____________unless they are provided with hearing aids or cochlear implants.
less frequently
limited range of sounds
decrease and eventually stop
When deaf and hearing infants are regularly exposed to American sign language (ASL) soon after birth, they begin to exhibit _______. It consists of repetitive hand movements that replicate components of ASL (Petitto & Marentette, 1991).
they begin to exhibit manual babbling at about 6 to 8 months of age
When does Echolalia begin? What does it involve?
Echolalia begins at about 9 months of age and involves repeating speech sounds and words uttered by another person without understanding their meaning.
Children are able to understand words by about _____of age but don’t say their first words to express meaning until_______. First words usually refer to familiar people and objects (e.g., “mommy” and “cup”) and actions such as “up” and “go.” Beginning at about _________, children exhibit a rapid increase in vocabulary, which is referred to as the vocabulary spurt.
8 or 9 months
10 to 15 months of age
18 months of age
When do they use holophrastic speech? What is it?
Children begin to use holophrastic speech between 12 and 15 months of age. It involves using a single word to express an entire thought, with the meaning of the word depending on the context and the child’s tone of voice. For example, when a child says “juice,” she may mean “I want juice,” “I finished my juice,” or “I spilled the juice.”
When do children begin to use telegraphic speech? What is it?
Children begin to use telegraphic speech between 18 and 24 months of age. It consists of two content words (nouns, verbs, and adjectives) and omits articles, conjunctions, and other function words. “Want juice,” “doggie gone,” and “good boy” are examples of telegraphic speech. This is followed by phrases containing three or more words and then complete sentences.
Information about a ______________ has been obtained from studies of children who were raised in social isolation and deprived of exposure to spoken language, children who learned second languages at different ages, and children who were deaf or hard-of-hearing and learned sign language at different ages.
critical period for language acquisition
Studies have confirmed that there is a _______between age of exposure to spoken or signed language and language proficiency.
strong negative relationship
While some studies suggest that the critical period for first-language acquisition may extend into late childhood or early adolescence, others indicate that there are ______________of language:
different critical periods for different aspects
Full proficiency with grammar, syntax, and phonetics requires_________, while ____________are less affected by age of exposure (e.g., Newport, Bavelier, & Neville, 2001).
early exposure to language
semantics and vocabulary size
For example, Friedmann and Rusou (2015) found that the critical period for the acquisition of syntax in a first language is
_____________
the first year of life.
There is also evidence that, with regard to the timing and content of language milestones, the acquisition of spoken and sign language “show____________” (Mayberry, 2010, p. 283). [Note that most investigators interested in language acquisition use the terms “critical period” and “sensitive period” interchangeably.]
parallel developmental trajectories when the acquisition begins at birth
Experts agree that exposure to language from _____is essential for language development which, in turn, supports cognitive, socioemotional, and other areas of development.
birth
There is _______ among experts, however, about whether the optimal exposure for deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) children is access to spoken language with cochlear implants or hearing aids, access to American sign language (ASL) or other sign language, or a combination of the two (Hall, Hall, & Caselli, 2019).
Disagreement
While some professionals conclude that sign language may inhibit the development of auditory and spoken language skills (e.g., Geers et al., 2017), many others argue that theapproach is most effective.
combined (bimodal-bilingual)
Professionals who endorse the combined approach point out that (a) studies finding that exposure to sign language has negative effects on the acquisition of spoken language_________, (b) cochlear implants and hearing aids _________for DHH children and can cause_______ (c) cochlear implants are ordinarily not implanted ___________while infants can be exposed to sign language from birth, and (d) there is evidence that sign language______ the acquisition of spoken language (e.g., Hall, Hall, & Caselli, 2019; Humphries et al., 2019).
are methodologically flawed
vary in terms of their benefits
language deprivation
until children are 12 months of age or older
benefits
For example, Hall (2017) points out that there is evidence that ____________can have significant language deficits compared to their hearing peers while children with cochlear implants who were exposed to sign language since birth obtain scores on standardized language tests that are comparable to scores obtained by hearing peers.
non-signing children with cochlear implants
At about two or three years of age, children make several language______
errors
_____________ occurs when a child uses a word too broadly. For instance, a child might use the word “doggie” not only to refer to dogs but to all furry, four-legged animals.
Overextension
occurs when a child misapplies rules for plurals and past tense. For example, a child might say “foots” instead of “feet” and “telled” instead of “told.”
Overregularization
Language Brokering: As defined by Morales, Yakushko, and Castro (2012)________ “is the act of translating and interpreting within immigrant families by children and adolescents for their parents, other family members, and other adults” (p. 520).
language brokering
Studies on the effects of language brokering have produced
mixed results.
Positive brokering effects include the development of strong _______skills and high levels of ___________________.
interpersonal
self-confidence and academic self-efficacy
Negative effects of Brokering include elevated levels of
anxiety, frustration, and embarrassment.
Language brokering has also been associated with role reversals within the family that force parents to become overly dependent on the child and, in high-frequency language-brokering families, with _____________ (e.g., Hua & Costigan, 2012; Umana-Taylor, 2002).
greater parent-child conflict
Code-switching refers to “bi- and multilingual speakers’ within a single interaction or conversational turn” (Tseng & Cashman, 2015, p. 1).
use of more than one language or language variety
Bi- and multilingual speakers are often unaware of their code-switching but, when they consciously use it, it is often for a specific reason. For example, they may use code-switching to compensate for a ___________ in one language, foster ________, express an ___________, or _____________.
language deficiency
rapport and solidarity
emotion or attitude
strengthen or soften a request
