How do children learn language?

• Infants begin making sounds at birth. They cry,

coo, and laugh…but in the first year they don’t
really do much talking.
• Many believe that they can hear the sound
earlier.
• It could be argued that infants DO
communicate with others, but do not have
language
 What is Language?
• Think about your language…maybe you even
speak more than one! What makes a language?

• This is a broad concept…language is a system

that relates sounds or gestures to meaning.

– Language is expressed through speech, writing and

gesture.
There are four distinct elements to language

-Phonology refers to the sounds of a language

– Semantics is the study of words and their meaning

– Grammar refers to the rules used to describe the structure of a

language
• Which involves syntax or rules that specify how words are
combined to form sentences

– Pragmatics is the study of how people use language to

communicate effectively
The language environment for infants is not solely auditory. Much language exposure
comes from face-to-face interaction with adults
• Infants use many tools to identity words in
speech. They don’t understand the meaning of
the word yet, but they can recognize a word as
a distinct configuration of sounds.
• Parents and adults help infants master
language sounds by talking in a distinctive
style
Four Theories about Language Acquisition

1. Imitation (modeling)
2. Reinforcement (Rewards and Punishment)
3. Constructing grammar from input/experience
(1- 3 are all learning theories)
4. Absorption of a specific language into an
already existing general language structure in
the brain: “innateness hypothesis”
 The four Theories
• Imitation : Children memorize words and
sentences they hear from a language.
• Reinforcement: Children learn to speak by
being praised or corrected by adults.
• Input/Experience : Children figure out and
learn grammatical patterns from hearing adult
language patterns.
• Innateness Hypothesis
1. Children’s brains have a “language acquisition
device” that already contains the full range of structural
possibilities inherent in language (“universal
grammar”) . This device absorbs the specific language
the child hears.
2. Children use the structural patterns they hear and
discard the structural patterns they do not hear.
3. Children do not have to learn structural patterns. They
only have to choose between them.
Lenneberg’s Six Components of Innate Behavior

1. Emerges before it is necessary.

2. Is not the result of a conscious decision.
3. Is not triggered by external events.
4. Teaching and practice have little effect
5. There is a regular developmental
sequence
6. Emerges during a critical period of
development
 1. Language emerges before
it is necessary.

• Language emerges between the ages of 12

and 24 months while the child is completely
dependent on parents for survival.

• Although language will be an important

survival tool, it is important to survival at this
age.
2. Language acquisition is not the result
of a conscious decision.

• There is no evidence that children decide to learn

language.

• Early language is an spontaneous game that happens

between babies and their caretakers, not a
conscious goal.
3. Language acquisition is not triggered by
external events.

• There is nothing that causes the emergence of

language to begin. All children begin playing with
sound and language regardless of the context in which
they live.
• Children require input, but even children who do not
interact with others begin the stages of language
acquisition. Without external input they may not
succeed in acquiring language, but they still initiate the
same behaviors as isolated children.
 4. Teaching and practice have little effect on language
acquisition.

• Parents do not give lessons to their children to get

them to acquire language.
• Praise and correction do not occur with enough
frequency to account for language proficiency
• Praise and correction may have little effect on language
acquisition.
• Children produce language they have not heard from
others
• Children learn language too rapidly to logically derive
all linguistic rules from experience
 “Poverty of the Stimulus”
• If language is learned, then children should
only produce words and sentences they have
heard.

• If language is learned, then children should

only understand words and sentences they
have heard.
5. There is a regular developmental sequence to
language acquisition.

Language is acquired in a universal series of stages

regardless of the cultural and/or linguistic context
a. Babbling
b. Holophrastic speech (1 word)
c. Telegraphic speech (2 word)
d. Functional morpheme acquisition order
e. Acquisition of negatives
(Fernandez, Eva M.; and Cairns, Helen Smith. 2010. Fundamentals of Psycholinguistics. West
Sussex, PO19 8SQ: Wiley-Blackwell page 106-130)
(Steinberg, Danny D.; Sciarini, Natalia V. An Introduction to Psycholiguistics. Second Edition.
LHarlow CM20 2JE: Pearson Education Limited. Page:3-34)
 a. Babbling
• 4 to 12 months (true babbling after 6 months
consisting of single syllable at first, always consisting
of a consonant and a vowel)
• Babies begin with strings of sounds and by 12
months are babbling the full range of sounds used in
human speech.
• Syllables can be detected in babbling
• Intonation patterns can be detected in babbling
• Deaf children babble with gestures
 b. Holophrastic Speech
• At about 1 year
• The first stage of symbolic connection of
sounds with meanings
• One word sentences
e.g. Go!
e.g “afuf”
e.g. “ahbee”
 c. Telegraphic Speech
• 18 to 24 months
• Two word sentences
e.g. Mommy up.
e.g. Me go.
• Evidence of syntax – ordering two meaning
symbols
• Lack function words like articles, helping
verbs, etc.
 c. Functional Morphemes
• At 2 ½ to 3 years
• Add functional morphemes that adjust the meanings of
words
1. Addition of ing to verbs
2. Add prepositions in and on
3. Addition of “s”
1st to plural nouns
2nd to possessive nouns
3rd to present tense verbs
4. Addition of articles (a, an, the)
5. Forms of “to be” (is going ra th go)
 c. Acquisition of Negatives

1. No in front of sentence
“No I go.”
2. Negative between subject and verb
“I no go.”
3. Correct grammatical integration
 6. There is a critical period for
language development.
• Childhood stages are quite regular
• Ability to acquire language after puberty declines in all
humans regardless of cultural and/or linguistic context
• People who learn a language after puberty retain their
first language accent.
• Deaf individuals who learn to sign after puberty sign
significantly differently than those who learn before.
 Language Development and
Lateralization of the Brain

Lenneberg hypothesized that the acquisition of

language is tied to the lateralization of the brain,
which begins at about 2 years old and proceeds
until puberty.
 Isabelle and Genie
ISABELLE GENIE
• found at 6.5 years • found at 13 years

• cognitively delayed • cognitively delayed

• no aural linguistic input • no linguistic input

• lived with deaf mom in isolation

• chained in dark room
• at 8.5 yrs, achieved normal
language skill
• learned complex vocabulary but
never acquired syntax
FIRST LANGUAGE ACQUISITION“What/How do
babies acquire?”

• Sound production/babbling
• Phonological acquisition
• Morphological/Syntactical acquisition
• Semantic development
 Acquisition of Sounds

• Few weeks: cooing and gurgling, playing with sounds. Their

abilities are constrained by physiological limitations.
• 4 months: distinguish between [a] and [i], so their
perception skills are good.
• 4-6 months: children babble, putting together vowels and
consonants. This is not a conscious process. Experiment
with articulation
• 7-10 months: starts repeated babbling.
• 10-12 months, children produce a variety of speech
sounds. (even ‘foreign’ sounds)
 Acquisition of Phonology

• Early stage: Unanalyzed syllables

• 15-21 months: words as a sequence of phonemes.
• Mastery of sounds differing in distinctive features (e.g.,
voicing)
• Duplicated syllables: mama, dada - CV is main syllable
structure. They reduce = banana [na.na] 2 syllable
words
• Early mastery of intonation contours (even in non-tone
languages)
• Perception comes before production (‘fis’ or ‘fish’?)
 Acquisition of Words/Meanings

• Begin with simple lexical items for

people/food/toys/animals/body functions
• Lexical Achievement:
– 1-2 years old200-300 words
– 3 years old900 words
– 4 years old1500 words
– 5 years old 2100 words
– 6-7 years old2500 words
– High school grad40,000 – 60,000 words!
• “5,000 per year, 13 words a day” --Miller & Gildea
 Acquisition of Syntax& Semantic Relations

• At about 12 months, children begin producing words consistently.

• One-word stage (holophrastic stage):
• Name people, objects, etc.
• An entire sentence is one word
• Two-word stage:
• Approximately 18-24 months
• Use consistent set of word orders: N-V, A-N, V-N…
• With structure determined by semantic relationships
– agent+action (baby sleep)
– possessor+possession (Mommy book)
• Telegraphic stage (only content words)
A. The Development of Speech Production
• Vocalization to Babbling to Speech
1. Vocalization to Babbling
2. Babbling to Speech
3. The Acquisition Order of Consonant and Vowels
• Early Speech Stages: Naming, Holophrastic, Telegraphic, Morphemic.
1. Naming: one-word utterances
2. Holophrastic Functions: one-word utterances
3. Telegraphic speech: two- and three-word utterances
4. Morpheme acquisition
• Later Speech Stages: Rule Formation for Negatives, Questions, Relative Clauses, Passives,
and other Complex Structure
1. Negation formation
2. Question Formation
3. Passive Formation
4. Other Problems
 B. The Development of Speech
Comprehension
• Fetuses and Speech Input
• Newborns (Neonates) and Speech Input
• Speech Comprehension Occurs without
Speech Production: The Case of Mute-Hearing
Children
• Normal Children Speech Comprehension
• Relative Paucity of Comprehension Studies
 C. The Relationship of Speech Production,
Speech Comprehension and Thought
• Speech Comprehension Necessarily Precedes
Speech Production
• Thought as the Basis of Speech
Comprehension
 D. Parentese and Baby Talk
• Parentese
• The Characteristic of Parentese
• Baby Talk
• The Effect of Parentese and Baby Talk in
Language Learning
E. Imitation, Rule Learning, and Correction

• What is Learned by Imitation

• Productivity by Rule
• The Frequent Futility of Correction
 E. Learning Abstract Words
• In acquiring the meaning of words, children begin
with the concrete and go on to the abstract.
• They start from physical objects ( ‘mama’, dog;)
and ‘direct activities’ (run, jump, play, give) then
move to relations and statives (‘on, sitting).
• Then it follows by words involving mental
experiences and relations (happy, hurt, hungry,
want) before they come to produce utterances
like, Mary hurt. ‘John thirsty’.
F. Memory and Logic in Language Learning
Memory
• It is widely believed that children also store in memory a
multitude of ordinary phrases and sentences, which can serve
them for analysis later.
• Two basic types of memory operate in language learning:
associative learning, where a connection is formed between an
object and the sound-form name of that object, and episodic
memory (where whole events or situations are remembered
along with phrases and sentences that others have spoken).
• Later, they would also learn how to use those phrases with
various degrees of politeness in various situations.
 Cont…
Logic
• Children use inductive logic
• Young children use deductive logic