AoS 2 - Child Language Acquisition

Question 1

Babbling Stage

Answer 1

• 6-12 months
• Babies begin to make sounds that resemble adult language, start to gain control over physiology/speech organs
• make consonant vowel combination
• often use CVCV (mama) or general reduplication (oink-oink)
• experiment with lips and tongue, prosodics and paralinguistics

Question 2

Holophrastic Stage

Answer 2

• 12-18 months
• begin to associate words with meaning
• use content words, usually concrete nouns, begin to use verbs/adjectives
• personal greetings eg. ‘hello’, ‘ta’
• use paralinguistics/gestures to convey meaning
• tend to overgeneralise semantically

Question 3

Two-word Stage

early telegraphic

Answer 3

• 18-24 months
• begin to develop understanding of syntax and semantics
• combine two words, usually a noun and a verb eg. ‘mummy eat’ or two nouns ‘teddy chair’

Question 4

Telegraphic Stage

Answer 4

• 24-30 months
• communicate meaning by joining content/open-class words, function words still mostly omitted
• develop further understanding of syntax and semantics, however sentences still lack complexity
• begin developing sentences with 3+ words

Question 5

Multi-word Stage

Answer 5

• 30+ words
• children begin to use function words in combination with content words
• demonstrate higher knowledge of syntax and semantics - fixed word order, beginning to form more complex sentences
• acquire new vocabulary extremely rapidly

Question 6

development by subsystem: P&P CVCV

Answer 6

• children use two-syllable CVCV patterns - often used in CDS (simplifying)
• kitten - kitty, stomach - tummy, mother/mum - mama/mummy

Question 7

development by subsystem: P&P addition

Answer 7

• when a vowel is added at the end of a word
• dog - doggie, cat - cata

Question 8

development by subsystem: P&P reduplication

Answer 8

• When a phoneme is repeated (can be CVCV, but not only)
• biscuit - bicbic, oink-oink, mama

Question 9

development by subsystem: P&P deletion

Answer 9

• When a child drops a consonant altogether, particularly word-final consonants
• cat - ca, dad - da

Question 10

development by subsystem: P&P cluster reduction

Answer 10

• when a child drops a consonant in a consonant cluster (easier to pronounce)
• train - tain, sleep - seep

Question 11

development by subsystem: P&P substitution

Answer 11

• when a child replaces a consonant with another that is easier to pronounce
• legs - wegs, friend - fwiend

Question 12

development by subsystem: P&P assimilation

Answer 12

• when a consonant in one word is changed because of the influence of another consonant in the same word
• tub - bub (influence of final /b/)

Question 13

development by subsystem: P&P word-initial and word-final consonants

Answer 13

• it is easier for children to pronounce word initial consonants, harder to pronounce word-final consonants
• /t/ at start of teddy is easier than /t/ at end of sit

Question 14

development by subsystem: morphology - inflections

Answer 14

• children begin to add inflections to lexemes as early as 20mths
• earlier: present -ing, plural -s, possessive -s
• later: past -ed, 1st p present -s, aux to be

Question 15

development by subsystem: syntax - interrogatives

Answer 15

• initially form by placing HRI at end of declarative senctence (18m) eg. go walk/
• begin to use question words/wh- words (18-24m) eg. what mummy doing/
• form questions with subject-verb inversion, aux verbs (24m+) can I see it/

Question 16

development by subsystem: syntax - overgeneralisation

Answer 16

• children apply grammatical rules too widely (called virtuous error)
• using past tense -ed on irregular verb eg. ‘eated’
• using plural -s on certain words eg. ‘sheeps’ or ‘tooths’

Question 17

development by subsystem: semantics - overgeneralisation

Answer 17

• when children use a known word too broadly for things with different but related meanings
• eg. children know the word ‘dog’, and call every four-legged animal, like a horse, a dog

Question 18

development by subsystem: semantics - undergeneralisation

Answer 18

• when children use a word in a very restricted way
• eg. child uses the word ‘cat’ for their cat, but don’t recognise other cats as ‘cats’

Question 19

theories - behaviourism

Answer 19

• linguist B.F. Skinner
• nurture, caregiver-focused
• language is developed through nurture - caregiver models and child imitates
• caregiver must correct language, use positive reinforcement and conditioning

Question 20

theories - nativism

Answer 20

• linguist Noam Chomsky
• nature, biology-focused
• all humans have biological predisposition for language learning
• proposes existence of innate language acquisition device (LAD) that must be triggered by exposure - allows for fast, efficient language acquisition
• universal grammar - set of universal rules for all language learning

Question 21

theories - interactionism

Answer 21

• linguist Lev Vygotsky
• nature & nurture
• highlights interplay between biological factors, cognitive development, evironmental stimuli and social interaction in language acquisition
• language acquired through innate ability and suitable socialisation and exposure to language - including CDS (caregiver)

Question 22

theories - usage-based theory

Answer 22

• theorist Michael Tomasello
• cognitive ability and social behaviours account for language learning
• exposure to tailored language experience from cargeiver and general cognitive abilities lead to language and grammar acquisition
• CDS!!!

Question 23

theories - critical period hypothesis

Answer 23

• theorist Eric Lenneberg
• children must have sufficient exposure to language before puberty to successfully acquire language
• after puberty, challenging to learn language at a native level
• supported by cases of ‘wild’ children (genie, victor)