Section 2: Language Development in Socio-Cultural Context

• Socio-cultural factors are prevalent in the development of language abilities and narrative styles:

  
  

  Lev Vygotsky believed that the social-cultural context highly impacts a child’s cognitive development

  • A child in poverty not having as much interaction with parents due to demand of work compared to child with more stability

  Jean Piaget believed that the socio-cultural context didn’t have such a direct impact as cognitive stages by age
• Socio-economic status: controversial but social scientists believe it has effect on language development

  • Difficult to isolate one among several factors:
  • Opportunity
  • Parental income
  • Parental educational level
  • Parental literacy level
  • Quality of community resources
  • Access to resources
• Code switching is common phenomenon in multilingual groups:

  • Unlike pidgin, code-switching is used when both individuals are competent in both languages
  • Code-switching includes recognition of the phonology and syntax of the language
  • The combination of languages (like Spanish and English) is specific to a certain cultural and ethnic situation: the children of Spanish-speaking immigrants in the US.
• Although controversial, cultural factors that may also affect language development include:

  • Differences in non-verbal cues (ex. Some cultures reject eye contact when interacting with elders)
  • Differences in reading intentions (ex. People don’t read in groups as much, but rather seek other entertainment, like movies)
  • Varying social conventions, such as greetings (ex. Bowing in Japan)
  • Social rules about inclusion and exclusion in peer groups (ex. In Mexico, using native language of elders is respectful)
• Some studies suggest that cultural factors can influence the type of oral narratives that children tell. These can be a mixture of the following styles, or heavily weighted towards one:

  • Open-ended narratives, or a situation that remains unresolved because of circumstances
  • Narratives focused a central topic
  • Analogy and metaphor