PSC 141 Exam 2

Five aspects of language development

Phonology - the sound of a language

Morphology - the structure of words

Syntax - grammatical rules

Semantics - expressing meaning

Pragmatics - how language is used

Productive and expressive language

The expression of language

Language generativity

Using the finite set of words in our vocabulary, we can compose an infinite number of sentences and ideas

Pragmatic development

acquiring knowledge of how language is used, which includes understanding a variety of conversational conventions

Babbling

begins at about 6 months. Consists of producing syllables made up of a constant followed by a vowel

Holophrases

one word sentences

Telegraphic speech

two word utterances in which nonessential elements are missing

Fast mapping

children learn new words based on very little input

Syntactic bootstrapping

using the grammatical structure of whole sentences to figure out meaning

Current theoretical issues in language development

Role of nature vs nurture

Nativist

Behavioral

Social-interactionist

Critical period for language development

Between ages of 5 and puberty

The immaturity of the brain and cognition is early childhood is highly adaptive for acquiring human language

Evidence for a critical period

deaf children and feral children

children learning additional languages early in childhood better able to master grammar/speak without an accent

Connectionist views of language development

Information needed to acquire language is contained in language itself

General purpose learning mechanisms allows us to make associations between related concepts

Language development occurs as the result of the gradual strengthening of connections in the neural network

Infant directed speech

A distinct mode of speech used by adults in talking to infants and young children, even while recognizing that they cannot talk back

"Parentese"

Categorical speech perception

infants and adults can perceive speech sounds as belonging to discrete categories

DeLoache et al. (2010)

do babies learn from baby media?

- focus on vocab

- sales based on parent testimonials, but there is no systematic empiricism to prove that the programs work

- vocab should be improving, regardless of video or not

- conducted a longitudinal study done in the homes with random assignment

- DVD condition: asked to play the DVD at least 5 times a week for 4 weeks

- all kids received a pretest

CONDITIONS

1. video w/ interaction - parents watched with and interacted naturally

2. video w/o interaction - kids watch without interaction from parents

3. parent teaching - no videos, parents receive word list and teach kids

4. control - no DVD or word list, kids get pretest and posttest

RESULTS:

groups 2, 3, and 4 saw no significant different

Kuhl, Tsao, and Liu (2003)

By first birthday children's speech perception seems to have become specialized for their own language

Phonemic contrast ability becomes like that of adults

The development of folk biology

Within the first year of life, infants are able to distinguish between:

Animate and inanimate objects

Agents and non agents

Preference for biological motion

Animism - attributing life and consciousness to physical objects

Spatial orientation

understanding the placement of objects in space with themselves as the reference point

Dead reckoning

Cognitive maps

Spatial visualization:

visual/mental operations, such as mentally rotating a figure or adjusting a tilted object to bring it to an upright position

Spatial cognition

the ability to infer rules from and make predictions about the movement of objects in space

Sex differences in spatial cognition

Males typically outperform females

Children's understanding of time

Infants have an understanding of temporal sequencing

Young children are for the most part living in the present

One of the first ways children come to understand time is through recurring events

Theory of mind

a basic understanding of how the mind works and influences behavior

A child's theory of mind includes knowledge of perceptions, psychological states, and actions

Basic social-cognitive skills underlying theory of mind

Treating others as intentional agents

Taking the perspective of another

false belief problems

Three year old children have some understanding of how beliefs and desires affect behaviors

Knowing what other people are thinking, and incorporating their perspective is necessary in theory of mind tasks

Deception

Lying is a big milestone in development that indicates that a child has some idea of what another person knows

Baron-Cohen's theory of mind systems

hypothesizes that there are two complementary systems involved in theory of mind that develop over the first five years of life

Intentionality detector

- Interprets moving objects as having some volition or intention

Shared-Attention Mechanism

Involves triadic (three-way) interactions or representations, such as those thatbabies and their parents engage in during joint-attention episodes

Eye-direction detector

Detects the presence of eyes or eye-like stimuli, determines whether the eyes arelooking toward it or toward something else, and infers that if an organism's eyesare looking at something, then that organism sees that thing

Theory of Mind Module

Roughly equivalent to belief-desire reasoning and is reflected by passingfalse-belief tasks

Autism

Children with autism have difficulty with theory of mind and false-belief tasks

They often have more interest in objects than in people and have challenges with socialrelationships, adapting to new situations, etc.

Neurodiversity

Social learning theory

Observation and imitation are the primary mechanisms of development

Reciprocal determinism

Mimicry

The duplication of a behavior without any understanding of the goal of thatbehavior

Teaching (instructed learning)

A more experienced person is instructing a less experienced person

Emulation

Different means are used to achieve same end - goal is understood

Imitation

Same means are used to achieve same end - goal is understood

Mirror neurons

Activated when watching others:

Have emotions

Engage in goal-directed behavior

Engage in non-goal-directed behavior

Self-awareness

Uniqueness of self-awareness

Frontal lobes- Develops around 18 months

Effects of self-awareness:- Increased morality- Better self-regulation

Homophily

Young children tend to prefer people similar to them