language development language seems to be a uniquely human ability, suggesting an evolutionary...

Language Development

Language seems to be a uniquely human ability, suggesting an evolutionary foundation

Arguments against a purely genetic explanation

Productivity of novel phrases and statements

Variety of languages and grammatical structures

Language Development

Auditory Processes

Before infants can learn language or even perceive speech sounds, they need to be able to discriminate generally sounds of different frequencies

Auditory Processes

Like with vision Newborns hear sounds better at

low frequencies By 6 months, higher frequency

sensitivity is as good as adults Overall sensitivity increases until

10 years, but higher frequency sensitivity does not improve after 4 or 5 years

Preverbal Infancy Language acquisition works through

the perception of speech and its sounds

Must learn to parse the stream of sound into phonemes, syllables, words, and phrases.

Phoneme - is the smallest unit of sound that when changed, changes meaning

Categorical Perception

Infants can discriminate when two sounds are the same or different phonemic category

Phonemes are distinguished by their “voice-onset time” between lip opening and voicing by vocal cords


Eimas, Siqueland, Jusczyk & Vigorito (1971) - 1- and 4-mo-olds perception of the distinction between /b/ and /p/

Adults - VOT of less than 25 msec, perceive /b/


Eimas, Siqueland, Jusczyk & Vigorito (1971) - familiarized infants to 20 msec VOT (/b/) and tested them with either 40 msec (/p/), 20, or 0 (/b/)

Phonemic Discrimination

In the Japanese language, adults have trouble pronouncing and even discriminating between /r/ and /l/

They are not used in their language Young Japanese infants can

discriminate between these sounds

At some point they lose this ability (6-12 mos.)

Discriminating 2 Hindi syllables

Early Sounds 2 months - Cooing

One syllable sounds, like ‘ah’ and ‘oo’

Associated with positive emotions

6 months - Babbling Strings several instances of same

sound together, like ‘bababa’ This babbling is similar across

different cultures and languages

Early Sounds

End of First Year Stop duplicating and begin to string

different sounds together Include changing intonation and pitch These sounds and strings are very similar

to their first words Even deaf infants display babbling

Suggesting a biological mechanism But, they are delayed in babbling and

production of proper syllables

Nonverbal Language

Gestures first seem to be use around 8-10 months

Used to indicate requests, for example, wanting a toy

Might be related to physical development

Around 11-12 months, gesture start to be used for referential communication

To indicate items or events in environment Example, holding up a toy to show it

Nonverbal Language

End of first year, get combination of gestures and vocalizations

Then, gestures start to fall out and get transition to their first words.

First Words When they first appear shows

considerable variability, from 9 months to 16 months

First words are typically of items that are familiar and important in their day-to-day lives

Bates (1979) and Barrett et al. (1986) ‘no’ when rejecting an object ‘bye’ when putting down a telephone ‘papa’ when the doorbell rings

Lexical Development

Once child begins to talk, its vocabulary and usage expands dramatically and quickly

Acquiring words is easier than attributing them with the right meaning

Lexical Development

By 18 months, infant typically has on average 50 words it can produce and 100 words it can understand

0102030405060708090

100

6 8 10 12 14 16 18

Age (months)

# of words

Production Comprehension

Lexical Development

Answering Questions What’s That? Who’s That?

Asking Questions What? (what is that) Where?

Comments Gone (empty cup) Hot (pot on stove) Cut (band-aid on daddy)

Lexical Development

Errors in first words usage

Overextensions Using “Daddy” for every male More common in production than

comprehension Underextensions

Using “Duck” for a toy duck but not a real one

First Word Combinations

Occurs around age 2 Tend to leave out fillers

“Mommy apron” Types of combination seem to be

common across languages Even as sentences grow to three

and four words, they can be characterized as telegraphic speech

They leave out fillers (a, the, and)

Grammar Development

To change a verb to past tense, we add “ed”

Children overregularize Add “ed” to words where it is not required For example, “lose” becomes “losed”

instead “lost” This also happens for adding “s” for

plural Infant learn the grammar rules and they

apply them religiously and have to learn the exceptions

What are Bilinguals

• Individuals who have knowledge and use of more than one language

• How much do you need to know?

• Have native-like control of two languages

• Limits the number of bilinguals

• Fluent in one language and can produce meaningful statements in the other

What are Bilinguals

• Daily bilinguals vs. dormant bilinguals

• Balanced vs. Dominant bilinguals

• Compound bilinguals

• two linguistic codes stored in one meaning unit

• Coordinate bilinguals

• each code stored in separate meaning units

• Subordinate bilinguals

• code for L2 is interpreted through L1

What are Bilinguals

• Additive bilinguals

• Can enhance L2 proficiency without losing L1 proficiency

• Both languages valued by society

• Subtractive bilinguals

• L2 acquired at expense of L1 proficiency

• Simultaneous bilinguals are more likely to be balanced

What are Bilinguals

• Distinctions fall along continuum, such as proficiency

Proficiency

• Linguistic competence

• knowledge of language rules

• Performance competence

• use of language in the appropriate social context

Proficiency

• Does proficiency refer to knowledge or usage?

• Is knowledge limited to grammar or does it include pragmatics and socio-cultural aspects?

• How is motivation and emotions related?

Proficiency• Two factors to determine whether balanced or

dominant

• proficiency in each language

• comparison of proficiencies across languages

• Problems:

• What is the norm for a native speaker?

• variations in vocabulary and knowledge

• Can monolinguals and bilinguals be compared on same scale?

• Are assessments of proficiency for one language valid for another?

Age - Acquisition• Are children more efficient L2 learners?

• Does one need to start learning L2 before a certain age?

• Need to consider

• route of acquisition

• rate of acquisition

• attainment of L2 proficiency

Age - Acquisition• Route of acquisition

• adult L2 learners acquire grammar in similar order as children L2 learners

• Rate of acquisition

• when control for exposure amount to L2, adults outperform children

• however, with 3 month exposure, teenagers (12-15) > adult (>15) > children (3-10)

• after 10 month exposure, children = adult

Age - Acquisition• Age of attainment of L2 proficiency

• some evidence of critical period for L1 among deprived and deaf children

• decline in L2 performance in older acquirers

• due to biological/neurological factors?

• is it possible for older to acquire native proficiency?

Age - Acquisition

• Age of attainment of L2 proficiency

• disagreement over closure age

• evidence for critical period from negative correlation between age arriving in country and performance

• decline has been shown to start at 5 and close at 15

Age - Acquisition• Age of attainment of L2 proficiency

• other factors besides age including intensive instruction, high motivation, and lots of L2 exposure

• further, aptitude may play a role

• finally, others have suggested there is no closure and that the decline is continuous

• instead, interactions between L1 and L2 constrain L2 accuracy

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