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Introduction to Human Behavior

April 13, 2023

Presented By:Insiya MurtazaUswah MunawarSaad JumaniSaroosh Zahid

LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT

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Facts on Language Development

Research indicates babies listen to their mother's voice during the last few months of pregnancy. Babies show the ability to pick out mothers voice from among other female voices.

This is intensified, when for example mothers read to the baby while its in the womb.

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Non-Verbal Communication Children acquire new ways to communicate from

the time they are born.

Initial communication is limited to eye contact, hand movements, gestures etc.

They are also attentive to the human face, particularly

the eyes.

According to Darwin, emotional expressions are universal.

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Verbal Communication

Stages Pre linguistic Stage -vegetative noises and crying predominate

Cooing-producing vowel like sounds

Canonical babbling-the infant begins producing more speech-like syllables (4 to 10 months)

The range of vocalizations grows dramatically ( 6 to 8 months)

Babbling at the next stage often consists

reduplicated syllables like "bababa" or

"dadada" or "mamama.“ ( 10 to 12 months)

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Linguistic stage -The first words make their appearance (9 to 15 months)

Over generalization:Children may "over generalize" their first words to refer to items

beyond their usual scope of application. Example: A child might call all men "Daddy," or all

animals "doggie," or all round objects "ball.“

Under generalization: Children may fail to associate connections between similar objects.

Example: A child might call only her own striped ball "ball," and stay silent about all the rest.

Stages

Continued..

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The nature of the child's first 50 words is quite similar across cultures: the child often names foods, pets, animals, family members, toys,

vehicles and clothing.

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HOW CHILDREN ACQUIRE LANGUAGE?

Theories

Innate Imitation

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Nature Aspect

•Children are born with innate knowledge of the rules governing language.•All humans have a language acquisition device (LAD).

•The LAD contains knowledge of grammatical rules common to all language. •The LAD also allows children to understand the rules of whatever language they  are  listening to.

Noam Chomsky

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Nurture Aspect

•Vygotsky - children learn by solving problems with the help of other people, such as parents and siblings.

•Skinner -Children imitate what they see and hear. They learn from punishment and reinforcement .

•Piaget – Language development is connected to a child's cognitive development. As the child moves through the different stages of cognitive development, his language skills change as well.

Nature AND Nurture

•Language development is the result of genetics and the environment.

•The human body is built in a way that gives the creative mind many ways to communicate.

• But without external interactions, humans can not develop any language skills above what animals do

•Example: Genie “wild child”

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References:

Encyclopedia of Childhood and Adolescence, Apr 06, 2001 by Jill De Villiers, Ph.D. Smith College

http://www.ehow.com/about_6469505_major-theories-language-development.html

http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/course/85-211b/language_acq.html

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_g2602/is_0003/ai_2602000341/pg_6/?tag=content;col1

http://www.duke.edu/~pk10/language/psych.htm

http://languagedevelopment.tripod.com/id15.html

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Questions