Williams Syndrome and Language Ability PDF

Williams Syndrome and Spatial Ability 15 Williams and Language Ability Experimenter’s Question: “What if you were a bird?” Williams answers: 1 - I would fly through the air and soar like an airplane and dive through trees like a bird. 2 - I would fly where my parents could never find me. Birds wa...

Williams Syndrome and Spatial Ability 15 Williams and Language Ability Experimenter’s Question: “What if you were a bird?” Williams answers: 1 - I would fly through the air and soar like an airplane and dive through trees like a bird. 2 - I would fly where my parents could never find me. Birds want to be independent. 3 - I would fly and if I liked a boy, I would land on his head and start chirping. 16 Williams Syndrome: spatial versus language ability 17 So what have we learned from SLI and Williams? • Language is not completely tied up with general intelligence: – It develops separately from other aspects of intelligence (SLI) – It can be spared when other abilities are affected by other syndromes (Williams Syndrome) 18 Language as a specialized system • Linguistic abilities develop within a limited window of time; this is in line with the development of other innate abilities in other species. • Linguistic abilities are not completely intertwined with other cognitive abilities. • Within the linguistic system, different domains of language are differentially impacted: we see this across several different kinds of phenomena. Motivates our study of each area as its own complex system. • First up: Phonetics (Chapter 5) 19