Language Disorders in Children: Overview of Language and Early Word Learning

Vocabulary flashcards covering language concepts, Hockett's design features, language components, and early semantic development based on lecture notes.

Communication

Sending and receiving of information, ideas, feelings, or messages.

Speech

Oral expression of language.

Language

A system of abstract symbols and rule-governed structures, the specific conventions of which are learned.

3 Interdependent Systems of Human Communication

The three interconnected components of human communication: Content, Form, and Use.

Semantics

The study of meaning, including word meanings, specific vocabulary, word relationships, and basic concepts.

Phonology

The study of how sounds are used within a language, including phoneme boundaries and categories, coarticulation, and phonotactic rules/constraints.

Morphology

The study of words and word formation, focusing on morphemes as units of meaning.

Free Morphemes

Units of meaning that can stand alone as independent words (e.g., "home").

Derivational Morphemes

Morphemes added to words to create new forms or words (e.g., "-stead", "-y", "-ly").

Inflectional Morphemes

Morphemes that alter a word's form to indicate grammatical details without changing its basic word class (e.g., plural "s", possessive "s").

Syntax

The study of word order and grammatical rules governing how words can be combined in phrases and clauses to convey meaning.

Pragmatics

The study of how language is used within a culture, including rules about communication, social scripts/schemas, inferences/reference, body language, and prosody.

Speech Chain

The sequence of stages involved in transmitting a message from one brain to another: Idea -> Language Form -> Motor Speech Output -> Sound waves -> Hearing -> Auditory Processing.

Arbitrariness

A Hockett design feature stating that there is no inherent relationship between the physical form of a symbol or word and its concept or referent.

Semanticity

A Hockett design feature describing the capacity of language symbols to convey specific meanings.

Duality of Patterning

A Hockett design feature where meaningless sound segments are combined to form meaningful words, phrases, and sentences.

Productivity

A Hockett design feature referring to the ability to create new and unique meanings of utterances from previously existing utterances and sounds.

Displacement

A Hockett design feature referring to the ability to communicate about things beyond the immediate present or location ("the here and now").

Traditional Transmission

A Hockett design feature stating that while the general capacity for language is innate, specific details such as vocabulary and structural rules are learned.

Recursion

Phrasal nesting or embedding phrases within phrases, allowing a sentence to theoretically be infinitely long.

Stages of Early Word Use

The rough timeline of early lexical development: First Words stage (12-18 mos, 0-20 words), One Word Stage (18-24 mos, 20-50 words with vocabulary explosion), and Two Word Stage (~24 mos, 50+ words with early syntax).

Referent

The real physical entity, object, or concept that a word or symbol represents.

Semantic Representation

The mental representation of a word's meaning stored in memory.

Phonological Representation

The mental representation of a word's sound sequence stored in memory.

Basic Level Terms

Intermediate-level terms whose meanings are acquired before superordinate or subordinate terms (e.g., acquiring "house" before "building" or "cabin").

Superordinate Term

A broad category term that is higher level and less specific than a basic level term (e.g., "building").

Subordinate Term

A narrow, highly specific category term that is lower level than a basic level term (e.g., "cabin").

Prototype

An average or typical member of a particular category (e.g., a robin for the category of bird) that is perceptually driven and accessible in memory.

Overextensions

The use of words with overly inclusive meanings (e.g., using "cookie" for any round object such as a coin, doughnut, wheel, or moon).

Underextensions

The use of words with overly restricted meanings (e.g., believing that a word like "dog" applies only to one specific personal pet).

Vocabulary Spurt

A period of rapid word learning occurring around 18 months, coinciding with the 2-word stage, during which a child adds an average of 9 new words per day.

Fast Mapping

A process whereby children hear and understand words in the absence of direct teaching by inferring meaning from context and using deductive reasoning.

Syntagmatic-Paradigmatic Shift

A developmental change around age 7 in how children process and associate words, moving from sequential, mixed-category connections to organized, same-category grammatical groupings.