3.Checklist of objectives for The Critical Period Hypothesis, Theories of Innateness, and Brain and Language

Be able to identify explanations that have and have not been offered for why it might be that feral children such as Victor and Genie were never able to fully acquire language.

• In both cases, they already seemed to have intellectual disabilities

• They were both in environments where they didn’t hear speech or get to practice speech

• Both experienced trauma

Be able to identify major areas in which Genie’s language acquisition was particularly weak (or strong).

• Genie case highly controversial as evidence for a critical period

• Possible preexisting intellectual disability

  • Sleep spindle research supports this idea

• Abusive environment may have contributed to overall cognitive deficits

• In other words, perhaps even with the proper linguistic environment, Genie’s language may have been impaired.

  • This is not very compelling evidence for a critical period for exposure

Be able to identify the age range, according to Johnson and Newport, during which Korean and Chinese immigrants most successfully learned a second language.

• Also be familiar with the measure Johnson and Newport used to assess proficiency

• acquisition level lower if start learning 2nd lang after 11 yrs

• grammatical rules more difficult to learn

• measurement used to assess proficiency = grammaticality judgment tasks

Be able to apply Singleton’s (1995) findings concerning adult success in learning a second language to a specific example that you are given

• 5% of adults learning a 2nd language do it with complete mastery

Regarding the Snow and H-H (1978) article, be able to answer questions about its basic findings and implications for the critical period hypothesis.

• Best at learning dutch → past the supposed start of critical period hypothesis (adolescents and adults)

• Worse → children still in critical period who were slowest

  • Goes against critical period hypothesis

Regarding the Hartshorne et al. (2018) study (massive study of 2/3 million English learners), be able to identify a) the difference between learning rate and ultimate attainment, b) the age at which learning rates began to decline, c) the age at which ultimate attainment last achieved the highest levels, and d) why there is a difference between those two ages.

ADDDDDDDDDD

Be able to distinguish between examples of linguistic universals and common linguistic constraints

• Linguistic universals—all languages have

  • Nouns and verbs

  • Consonants and vowels

  • Negative, question, past/present

• Common constraints

  • Not all languages are SVO or SOV or VSO

    • Must most are, ~95%

      • SVO: the man opened the door

      • SOV: the man the door opened

      • VSO: open the man the door

Know the general relationship and order of development of pidgins and creoles, and their implications for theories of innateness.

• Pidgin was developed first as a combination of many languages, due to the forced community with lack of common language, to use common words to communicate with each other.

• creole were formed by the kids who developed pigeons, they then apply full grammatical rules to the language, full of grammatical

  • Demonstrates innateness → children were able to create and apply phonetic rules without learning them. Have to believe that children have a LAD active when doing this, since they are still in critical period.

Be able to identify the mechanism of Chomsky’s Universal Grammar, sometimes described as a set of inborn “switches”, that allows children to learn the specific rules and structures of their native language

• also be able to identify a description of how that mechanism works

  • PARAMETERS = inborn "switches," as we get input from environment, interacts w/ circuit board & turns on switch that's connected to many other switches that will also turn on

    • once switch for SVO turned on by exposure to language, also turn on switch for prepositions: "in bed"

    • once switch for SOV turned on, also turn on switch for POSTpositions: "bed in"

Be able to identify a description of Pinker’s nativist argument, based on negative evidence, for why language acquisition must have an innate component.

1. Positive evidence alone will not allow children to learn grammar

2. They do not get negative evidence, if you add negative evidence you can learn grammar

3. Therefore part of learning language must be innate (via chomsky's parameters, activates the switch)

Be able to identify a description of Pinker’s nativist argument, based on negative evidence, for why language acquisition must have an innate component.

a. Furthermore, be able to identify descriptions of research that supports Pinker’s assumptions concerning negative evidence.

ADD

Be able to identify a description of Pinker’s nativist argument, based on negative evidence, for why language acquisition must have an innate component.

b. Be able to identify ways in which empiricists such as Elman have responded to Pinker’s nativist argument regarding negative evidence.

ADD

Based on evidence from the KE family (whose FOXP2 gene mutation causes changes in Broca’s area physiology), and evidence from patients with damage to Broca’s area, be able to identify the most apt (i.e., covers all evidence) description of the function of Broca’s area

• FOXP2 gene may have mutated 100,000 years ago in humans

  • Produced larger Broca’s area

  • Allowed for the planning and comprehension of complex sequences (such as long strings of sound)

• KE family of London: Mutation of FOXP2 (different from regular) gene runs in family—as does language impairment

  • Implies the existence of a specific gene that codes for language abilities only!

  • Had troubles → Articulation (trouble moving tongue, Defying sounds/ understanding speech, Understanding and producing grammatical inflections , Grammatically judgements

Be familiar with Geschwind’s model of language processing in brain (especially the order in which linguistic information travels between different areas in the left hemisphere)

1. Starts with the visual (or auditory complex) aka seeing th words on the page

2. Moves to Wernicke’s aka associating sound with meaning , what words do i need to say

3. Broca then takes those symbols/words into a sequence and applies grammar

4. Motor cortex programs the mouth to move to articulate those words

Be able to identify results and conclusions of Caramazza and Zurif (1976) test of Broca’s and Wernicke’s aphasics on their ability to match pictures correctly to reversible (e.g., The cow was kicked by the pig) and non-reversible sentences (e.g,, The fence was kicked by the pig)

• Wernicke’s patients:

  • Poor performance on reversible sentences

  • Poor performance on non-reversible sentences

• Broca’s patients:

  • Poor performance on reversible sentences

  • Very good performance on non-reversible sentences

• Conclusion: Both areas play a role in comprehension, but impairment from Wernicke’s aphasia is more severe.