PSYC2009 Life-span Developmental Psychology - Language and Education

Flashcards covering key concepts related to language and education across the lifespan, from infancy to adulthood.

What are the three components of language?

Form, Content, and Use

What are the basic units of sound that can change the meaning of a word?

Phonemes

What are the basic units of meaning that exist in a word?

Morphemes

What are the systematic rules for forming sentences?

Syntax

Understanding the meanings of sentences requires knowing what?

Semantics

What are the rules for specifying how language is used appropriately in different social contexts?

Pragmatics

What is prosody?

How the sounds are produced, including the melody of speech with pitch and intonation

What is Universal Grammar?

A system of common rules and properties for learning any of the world’s languages

What is the Language Acquisition Device (LAD)?

Areas of the brain that sift through language, apply universal rules, and tailor the system to the specifics of the language spoken in the child’s environment

What is the nativist perspective regarding language development?

The environmental stimulus of language input is too impoverished to support the linguistic output that we see emerge. The capacity for acquiring language has a genetic basis

What is the learning perspective on language development?

Children learn the words they hear spoken by others and are more likely to start using new words if they are reinforced.

What is the interactionist perspective regarding language development?

Children’s biologically-based competencies and language environment interact to shape the course of language development.

What is Speech and Language Impairment (SLI), also known as Developmental Language Disorder (DLD)?

Speech and/or language difficulties that are not associated with a known biomedical condition

What is Dyslexia?

A neurodevelopmental disorder, listed under “specific learning disorder” in DSM-5, characterized by difficulties with oral and written language.

At what age do babies typically start babbling?

4-6 months

When do babies start making sounds?

0-3 months

When do babies typically say their first words?

1-2 years

What is cooing?

Repeating vowel-like sounds, typically around 6 to 8 weeks of age

When do infants start producing consonant sounds?

3 to 4 months of age

What is babbling?

Repeating consonant-vowel combinations, typically around 4 to 6 months of age

What is the term for an infant's ability to detect a target word in a stream of speech around 7 1/2 months of age?

Word segmentation

What is joint attention, as it relates to language development in infants?

Infants begin to use social and linguistic cues to learn words.

What is syntactic bootstrapping?

Using the structure of a sentence to learn the meaning of a new word

What are holophrases?

Single words that often convey an entire sentence’s worth of meaning, typically used by infants around 12 to 18 months of age

What is Vocabulary spurt/Naming explosion?

The rapid and quickened rate of word learning, which happens rapidly around 18 months of age

What is overextension in language development?

When a child uses a word to refer to a broader range of objects than is appropriate (e.g., using 'doggie' to refer to all four-legged animals).

What is underextension in language development?

when a child uses a word to refer to a narrower range of objects than is appropriate (e.g., using 'doggie' to refer only to basset hounds like the family pet).

What is over-regularization?

Overapplying syntactic or language rules (e.g., breaked, two tooths)

What is telegraphic speech?

Early combinations of two, three, or more words that emphasize the semantic relationships among words

What is mastery motivation?

Striving for mastery or competence

What is metalinguistic awareness?

Knowledge of language as a system.

What is the alphabetic principle?

The idea that letters in printed words represent the sounds in spoken words in a systematic way

What is emergent literacy?

Developmental precursors of reading skills in young children

What are fixed and growth mindsets?

A fixed mindset that believes abilities are static while a growth mindset believes abilities can be developed

What is selective optimization with compensation (SOC)?

Older workers can use selective optimization with compensation (SOC)