Week 12

Question 1

Time course of babbling

Answer 1

First few months: non speech sounds (cries, yells, vegetative sounds or gurgles)
Laranyx drops and matures around 3-4 months, start to get some isolated vowels

Question 2

Reduplicative babbling

Answer 2

Infant repeats one consonant-vowel pairing at a time

Question 3

Variegated babbling

Answer 3

Different CV pairings follow each other in rapid succession, word like
12 months=first word, babbling can continue

Question 4

Development of speech/language

Answer 4

Speech perception way before spoken words or comprehension
2 month olds can discriminate speech sounds
Start out as generalists but then commit to native language around 6 months
Before learning meaning must find words (segmentation)

Question 5

Word segmentation by infants

Answer 5

Saffron, Newport, aslin (1996):expose infants to made language
Then test whether infants recognized syllables
Infants preferred novel string
It was as if they could calculate probabilities of sequences

Question 6

Perceptual “magnet” effect

Answer 6

Kuhl: experience “sets the infants levels”- warping of perceptual space near phonemic category centers based on mere exposure to native language

Question 7

Development of speech production and perception

Answer 7

Production: vegetative sounds are followed by babbling which gives way to words
Perception: fetuses learn sound of mothers voice in last trimester, much learning happens before first word