CLA (Spoken acquisition)

• Stages of spoken acquisition:

  1. Pre-Verbal stage
  2. Holophrastic stage
  3. Two-Word stage
  4. Telegraphic stage
  5. Post-Telegraphic stage
• Pre-Verbal Stage

  • Biological noises = crying, laughing
  • Cooing = 'ababa'
  • Babbling = 'mamabadoo'
  • Apparent in children from 0-12 months
• Holophrastic stage


  • Start to form words (30 word limited vocabulary)
  • 60% non-verbal communication
  • 'Teddy' = they want it
  • 'More' = asking for more
  • Apparent for 12-30 months
• Two-word stage


  • After 30 months --> understands syntax
  • Demonstrates relations with 2 words
  • Children start to do vocabulary spurts and naming explosions
• Telegraphic stage 


  • Children start to string two or more words together
  • 'Luke want that' ; 'Dada, Luke play with ball'
  • Children become less dependent on babbling and cooing
  • Virtuous errors become easily corrected
• Post-Telegraphic stage


  • Children are 3-4 years old at this point
  • Begin to use co-ordinating/sub-ordinating conjunctions ('and'/'because') leads to constructing compound sentences
  • Children are fluent and comfortable with speech at this point - still open to virtuous errors
• Reduplication


  Repetition of sound - 'abababa'
• Under-extension 


  Applying a word to fewer instances - minimises words meaning

  
  

  Example: A child may call just apply the word 'toy' to one toy
• Over-extension


  Applying a word to multiple concepts - broadens words meaning

  
  

  Example: A child may use the word 'dog' and apply it to all four-legged animals
• Behaviourism:

  • Developed by Skinner
  • Believed that children learnt language by imitation and exposure
  • Suggested that behaviour should either be rewarded or ignored - these are known as positive and negative reinforcement
• Reinforcement

  Positive - rewards and pleasant consequences, which increase likeliness of behaviour repeating

  Negative - an unpleasant or aversive stimulus, which strengthens behaviour if stimulus is removed (not punishment)
• Nativism:

  • Criticised Skinner's theory of behaviourism - 'complete balderdash'
  • Developed by Chomsky
  • Believes that it is an innate ability that children automatically learn language regardless of IQ - LAD
  • LAD = Language Acquisition Device
• Case Study: Genie Wyllie (1970)

  • Isolated from the world for 13 years - limited to pre-verbal stage
  • Lacked imitation and exposure of outside world and therefore couldn't perform certain skills (e.g. walking, swallowing, speech)
  • Incarcerated to a potty chair
  • Freed by scientists at age 13 and put into foster care at age 18
  • Registered to a hospital - after 7 months Genie began to develop skills and progress in language acquisition - reached telegraphic stage
  • Limited to telegraphic stage due to critical period
• Nature vs Nurture

  Nature = behaviour is determined by genetics

  Nurture = behaviour is determined by environment
• Virtuous errors 


  Mistakes made by children when they are first learning language - not necessarily incorrect
• Lenneberg's Critical Period (1967)


  States that the first few years of life (2-12) are crucial for a child to acquire language - emphasises neuroplasticity (ability of neural network)
• Case study: 'Jim' (1977)


  • Bard & Sachs published a study of a child named Jim
  • Jim had deaf parents but was not deaf himself
  • Exposed to various uses of language (TV or radio) but he passed the critical period - only learnt oral communication
  • Jim spoke with incorrect syntax and his language development was under the expected amount due to little interaction
  • Began to take speech therapy which helped him acquire language
  • Still had frequent input of language from listening to the radio
• Case study: 'Viktor' (1800s)


  • Viktor was found in the wilderness after living alone in the forest for 3-8 years - age 12
  • Taken into care by Itard who began educating him in language - lack of ability
  • Had a mouth deformity and scratches from potential abuse
  • Itard taught Viktor through sensory stimulation and picture cards (text-image cohesion)
  • Viktor also reached critical period at 13 years old meaning he was capped with his language - never progressed to actual speech
• The Wug Test: (Nativism)

  • Jean Berko Gleason created the 'Wug test'
  • Children were given a picture of a bird-like created called a wug
  • Asked to state things (e.g. 'what the pluralised word for wug is?)
  • This tested pluralisation and overgeneralisation
  • 76% of 4-5 year olds and 97% of 5-7 year olds could correctly pluralise
  • Test suggested that children don't imitate in order to learn language - language is innate (LAD)
• Interactionism:

  • Proposed by Bruner
  • Suggested that adults talk to children in a specific way through CDS (child directed speech) which is adapted to support acquisition process
  • This is known as SCAFFOLDING
  • Bruner also coined the term 'Language Acquisition Support System' (LASS), responding to Chomsky's LAD
• Purpose of child-directed speech (CDS):

  • Attract and hold babies attention
  • Helps children to break down language and understand concepts
  • Makes conversation more predictable
• Features of CDS

  Grammatical:

  • Frequent and long pauses
  • More questions (and the answer)
  • Nouns rather than pronouns
  • Plural pronouns

  Phonological:

  • Higher or melodic pitch
  • Slower and clearer speech
  • Mitigated imperatives - (e.g 'Shall we look?')

  Lexical:

  • Repetition
  • Use of diminutives (often adding suffix)
  • Recasts (expansion and expatiation)
  • Politeness features
• Framing


  The repeated use of the same word in several syntactic context

  
  

  "Here's a ball. It's a big ball. Throw me the ball!"
• Expansion 


  Refers to recasting the child's utterance into the correct one

  Child: "Baby highchair"

  Parent: "Baby's in the highchair"
• Expatiation


  An expansion but with added information to the child's comment

  Child: "Mummy sock?"

  Parent: "Is that Mummy's sock? Yes it's too big for you!"
• Katherine Nelson (1973)


  Found that children at the holophrastic stage whose mothers corrected them on word choice and pronunciation actually advanced slower than those with mothers who were accepting of their mistakes.
• Clark & Clark's research (Interactionism)


  Research suggests that children who are only exposed to adult speech (not CDS) do not re-acquire the same STANDARD of language as those who have parents that speak with CDS
• Vygotsky (Interactionism)


  Suggested that children need an more knowledgeable other (MKO) to learn language - enables children to progress beyond their zone of proximal development (ZPD)
• Object permanence 


  The idea that children begin to be observant with objects that are not physically visible to them - 18 months
• Cognitivism:

  • Developed by Piaget
  • Sees language as 1 part of child's cognitive development
  • Believes a child has to understand a concept before they can acquire language that is revolved around that concept
  • This is known as SERIATION
  • This is when a child reaches an intellectual stage where they can compare objects and concepts with language
• Seriation


  When a child begins to understand a concept before acquiring language that is revolved around that same concept
• Cognitive Development Stages:

  1. Sensorimotor (0-2 years)
  2. Pre-operational (2-6/7 years)
  3. Concrete operational (7-11/12)
  4. Formal operational (11-16+)
• Usage Based Theory to Language Learning

  • Proposed by Tomasello
  • Suggest that children use their intention-reading skills and pattern finding capabilities to acquire language

  Intention reading = when a child understands the context in which things are being said through words, environment etc.

  Pattern finding = when a child understands particular word pairings (e.g. 'more' coupled with 'food')
• Mean Length Utterance (MLU)


  Refers to average length of sentences that a child typically uses

  (e.g. If a child's statements consist of 1 word then their MLU would be 1)