Week Eight - Language Flashcards
What is phonolgy?
The study of sounds in a language
What is a phoneme?
the smallest unit of sound in a language (44 in english)
Pronunciation of each phoneme differs according to surrounding phoneme
What is morphology?
The study of word structure and meaning
What are infections?
The endings of words (ed, ing)
What are derivations?
Adding chunks to add meaning (al - international)
What is a morpheme?
The smallest unit of meaning (un-break-able) - each is a morpheme
What are semantics?
The literal meaning of words and utterances
What are pragmatics?
Intended meaning of words and utterances (rules for what we can see) - vary between culture
What is grammar?
Rules for combining units of language
What is syntax?
Rules for putting words in order
What is intonation?
Prosodic contour of sentence (the way you go up and down as you speak)
- emphasise key words to show meaning
- can identify type of word via syllable (words spelt the same)
Language is?
An essential part of human being
Mastered very rapidly
What age do children start producing language?
12 months
Language allows infants to?
Express and learn information
Is there a critical/sensitive period for acquiring language?
no syntax ability if never learned language in first few years of life (can learn vocab)
Why can children learn a second language easier?
less is more - children limited ability/knowledge makes the task of acquiring language easier (accent is hardest to learn)
Theories of language can be either?
Nature or nurture
Nature theories?
Nativist
Nurture theories?
Behaviourist
Cognitive
Social interactionist
Statistical learning
What is the Behaviourist/Imitation theory of language?
Learn language like we do everything else
If you get rewarded - you will learn/do it more
What is the Nativist theory of language?
Suggests we are born ready to learn language (brain is preprogrammed)
Not all language is taught yet children acquire all parts
What is the cognitive development theory of language?
Language is just another cognitive skill
What is the Social/interactionist theory of language?
Language acquisition is facilitated by social cues and interactions (learn in a social context)
What is the Statistical theory of language?
Infants learn spoken language seemingly effortless (use recurring patterns and sequences in language to learn categories)
Learned ‘words’ from patterns/sequences in 2 minutes
Soon after birth, infants can discriminate?
Mother voice from foreign
Sounds that differ in only one respect
Males and females voice
What is babbling?
Closing/opening mouth while phonating (strings of consonant-vowel combinations)
4-8 months
rewarding for baby as parents respond and its fun to hear
A babies first word is often?
a noun (often a holophrase)
What is the vocabulary spurt?
Sudden rapid acquisition of new words (30-50) age 18-20 mo, continues for years.
Often fast mapping (associating a word with concept after brief exposure)
What is child-directed speech?
Language directed at infants by adults
- slow rate
- high frequency
- exaggerated
How does CDS help word learning?
attracts attention and maintains interest (high frequency & exaggeration)
Easier to process and focus on important words (slow, simple, repetitive)
Nouns often emphasised (concrete)
Cultural differences in CDS?
American: more verbal = better language comprehension & reasoning
Chinese: limited verbal = educational success
What does direction language at an infant do?
Directing more language at an infant creates greater social and intellectual competence - increases interaction with parent (more chance to learn)
Errors in language acquisition later in life?
overextension/overgeneralisation (single word used to label similar objects)
Underextension (single words used in restrictive way)
Mismatch (word mapped onto wrong concept)
What are some innate biases that aid word learning?
- whole of object bias: assume ir is the word for the whole thing
- mutual exclusivity bias: the new word must be the thing you don’t already know
- contextual cues: we saw the baboons at the zoo (must be an animal and be more than one due to plural)
Learning grammatical rules is often?
A U shaped curve (begin correctly, overgeneralise, then corrected)
- build on previous knowledge
intended meaning in children is?
Often ambiguous but depends on context
Until age 3, speech is what and then what is it?
Self-directed and then more socially oriented and directed to others (suit need of listener)
What contributes to vocab explosion?
Written language
How many words do we know by age 12?
20,000
What is metalinguistic awareness?
Ability to think about language as a system (can separate word from its meaning) - develops later as well as metaphors
