Developmental Psychology Lecture Notes - Language Development

# Developmental Psychology Lecture Six - Language Development ## Learning objectives * You should be able to demonstrate: * A basic understanding of language development during childhood * A basic understanding of the relevant theoretical views ## Content covered * The components of lan...

# Developmental Psychology Lecture Six - Language Development ## Learning objectives * You should be able to demonstrate: * A basic understanding of language development during childhood * A basic understanding of the relevant theoretical views ## Content covered * The components of language * Main theories of language development * Stages of spoken language acquisition in infants and children ## What do we mean by language? "The method of human communication, either spoken or written, consisting of the use of words in a structured and conventional way". "The system of communication used by a particular community or country" - (Oxford English Dictionary) ## Components of language * **Phonology** - rules regarding building blocks of speech sounds /f/ /b/ /o/ /m/ /a/ * **Semantics** - how concepts are expressed in words * **Grammar** * **Syntax** - rules regarding how words form sentences (e.g. in English, subject-verb-objects order, adjective-noun order, definite article-noun order, etc.) * **Morphology** - grammatical ‘markers' embedded into words (e.g. in English, verb tenses defined by "-ed”, adverbs defined by "-ly”, plural by "-s”, in Latin languages and German, gendered words by "o/a/e") ## Synthetic languages * Morphological markers convey high specificity, allowing for structure to remain short and with highly flexible word order. * E.g. *Deu-mas todas* ## Analytic languages * Very few morphological markers and 1-2-1 mapping of words to concepts, causing more reliance on word order and explicit word use to convey meaning. * E.g. *She gave all the jewellery to me* ## Pragmatics * Rules for effective communication, e.g. turn-taking, cultural nuances, formal vs. informal settings ## Theories of language development - Behaviourist approach * A traditional view * Acquired through operant conditioning (e.g. Skinner) * Reinforcement and modelling * Does not account for infants' creation of novel utterances, and huge vocabulary in early childhood. * A - antecedents → B - behaviours C - consequences ## Theories of language development - Nativist approach * A traditional view * Noam Chomsky (1957) - Language Acquisition Device (LAD) * Innate system, uniquely human * Universal grammar - rules can apply to all language forms. * Biological time frame for language development * Main argument - Poverty of Stimulus (Chomsky, 1980) * Revived in Fodor's Modularity of Mind (1983) * Evolutionary basis included to the theory (separate, specialised modules in the mind are the result of an evolutionary process - high specificity of function and sensitivity to only certain inputs) ## Support for Nativist view * Deaf children developed novel language * Animals unable to develop as complex language * *Cavia aperea* make 10 different calls (Monticelli & Ades, 2013) * Individual courtship calls from male *Cavia porcellus* (Verzola-Olivio et al., 2021) * Guanabara Bay vs. Sepetiba Bay “accents” in *Sotalia guianensis* (de Andrade et al., 2015) * Specific areas of the brain linked to language * But is less localised than initially thought * Sensitive period for language development * E.g. Genie ## Limitation of Nativist view * Difficulty in specifying universal grammar * Grammatical development is gradual and extends into middle childhood. * Where is LAD when considering brain structure? (Broca's area, Wernicke's area) ## Theories of language development * Interaction between innate abilities and environment * Information processing * Connectionist or neural network simulations * Make sense of language using general cognitive abilities * Brain skilled at detecting pattern * Damage to left hemisphere causes language problems, but also difficulty with other 'patterns', e.g., music * Social interaction * Innate desire to understand and be understood * Stimulating language environment important ## Stages of language development * **Prenatal** - speech can be heard in utero * **Newborns** - perception of phonemes * **2-3 months** - start cooing * **4-6 months** - start babbling * **9-18 months** - first words * **18-24 months** - telegraphic speech (two words) * **Early childhood** - huge increase in vocab (~ 10,000 words by 6 years) * **Middle childhood** - vocab expands to ~ 40,000 words by age 11 years ## Phonological development * **First words** * Partly influenced by which phonemes are easier to say - repeated consonant-vowel combinations, e.g., *mama*, *dada* * Linked to semantic development * **Developing pronunciation** * 'Minimal words' (stressed syllable), e.g., 'ju' * Then add * End-consonants, e.g., 'jus' * Unstressed syllables, e.g., ‘raw-be' (strawberry) * Adjust vowel length, e.g., 'peees' (please) * **Later development** * Mostly complete by 5 years * Some subtle stress patterns continue to develop into adolescence ## Semantic development * **Understanding precedes production** * Recognition vs. recall * **Common first words** * Object, e.g. 'ball', 'dog', 'car' * Action, e.g. 'bye-bye', 'more', 'up' * State/Modifier, e.g. 'big', 'my', 'all gone' * **First 50 words dominated by object words** ## Semantic development - early pre-school years * **Huge spurt in vocabulary (18-24 months)** * **'Fast-mapping'** * Link new word with conceptual meaning (‘koob') * **Individual and cultural differences** * Referential vs expressive styles * Object centred vs social phrases * **Under- and over-extensions** * (Their teddy is the only teddy entitled to be called 'teddy' in the world) * **Invented words** * Compounding, e.g. car-man (male mechanic) * Convert verbs to nouns, and vice versa, e.g. colourings (to refer to pencils) or cooker (to refer to a cook) ## Semantic development - later development * **Continuing vocabulary spurt** * Grade 1 ~10,000 words * Grade 2 ~20,000 words * Grade 3 - 40,000 words * **Reading - exposure to words** * **Sarcasm and irony** * **Figurative language** * Proverbs ## Grammatical development * 18 months up - telegraphic speech * 'More jus', 'daddy gone', 'my ball' * 2-3 years - three or more word sentences * Start to conform to adult structure but inconsistent * **Acquiring grammatical morphemes** * Occurs in same order for most children * Linked to complexity ## Morphemes * Present tense progressive 'ing' - e.g., 'she eating' * Prepositions 'on' then 'in' - e.g., 'on table'; 'in car' * Noun plural 's' - e.g., 'sweets' * Irregular past tense - e.g., 'we held'; 'I ate' * Regular past tense - e.g., 'I walked' * Auxiliary verb uncontractible 'be' forms - e.g., 'is she singing?' ## Acquiring grammatical morphemes * **Overregularisation** * Initially learn irregular form (probably memory) * E.g. 'I held', 'two feet' * Once you learn the general rule, you tend to over-apply * E.g. 'I holded', 'two footses' * "I knowed that already" - "I knew, Maria" - "So, did you too?!" ## Complex grammatical forms * Production of negatives appears in same order in different languages * Non-existence - e.g. 'no milk' * Rejection - e.g. 'no play catch' * Denial - e.g. 'that not your ball' ## Later grammatical development * Passive voice, e.g. 'the car was stolen by Bob' * "The girl was watered by the flower" (Adam and Cowan, 2021) ## How does grammatical development happen? * **Cognitive development** * **Semantic bootstrapping** * Cannot explain some languages * **Direct observation** * Connectionist models * Not a comprehensive account * **Innate ability** * Language-making capacity * **Environmental effect** * Parental 'expansion' and 'recast' * Not consistent/regular enough ## Pragmatic development * **Social rules governing conversation** * Turnabout (early childhood) * Shading (from ~ 5 years) * **Illocutionary intent** * E.g. indirect requests, ‘I need a crayon' * Basic understanding by age 3, develops into middle childhood * **Referential communication skills** * Clarity of communication * Take listeners' needs into account * E.g. using gestures on the telephone * Improves over pre-school and middle school years