Language Acquisition and Cognitive Science

Language Acquisition and Cognitive Science

1. Modulatory

   • children language using "mental organ", some of whose principles of organization are not shared with other cognitive systems such as perception, motor control and reasoning.

2. Human Uniqueness

   • None "animal language" appears to have the combinatorial rule system of human language, wich symbols are permutes into an unlimited set of combinations, each with a deterinate meaning, so this makes human unique

3. . Language and Thought

   • This is an intriguing hypotesis, but virtually all modern cognitive scientists believe it is false. Babies can think before they can talk. Cognitive psychology has shown that people think not just in words but in images

4. Biology of language acquisition

   • Evolution of language
     • It is the small change in human language over time. It involves the origin of languages and can be considered analogous to biological evolution, like our vocal track, larynxes, etc. Presumably language evolved in the human lineage for 2 reasons: our ancestors developed technology and knowledge of the local environment in their lifetimes and were involved in extensve reciprocal cooperation.
   • Dissociations between laguage and general intelligence
     • Humans evolved brain circuitry, mostly in the left hemisphere surrounding the sylvian fissure that appears to be designed for language.There are syndromes showng the opposite dissociation, where intact language coexist with severe retardation, these cases show that language development dpes not depend on fully fuctioning general intelligence.
   • Maturation of the language system
     • Newport and Gleitman suggests, the maturation of language circuits during a child's early years may be a driving force underlying the course of language acquisition. Successful acquisition of language typically happens by 4 years,it is guaranteed for children up to the age of six, is steadly compromised from then until shortly after puberty.

5. THE COURSE OF LANGUAGE ACQUISITION

   • Language acquisition begins very early in the human lifespan, and begins, llogically enough with the acquisition of languages sound patterns.

6. BETWEEN THE LATE TWO'S AND MID THREE'S

   • Children language blooms into fluent grammatical conversation so rapidly that it overwhelms the researchers who study it

7. WHAT IS LEARNED

   • Linguistic theory
     • is an essential part of the study of language acquisition
   • Linguistic research
     • 1.It must characterize the facts of English, and all the other language whose acquisition we are interesed in explaining.
     • 2.Since children are not predisposed to learn english or any other language, linguistics has to examine the structure of other languages

8. Input

   • to understand how children learn language, we have to know what aspects of language they have access to
     • positive evidence
       • . The term "positive evidence" refers to the information available to the child about which strings of words are grammatical sentences of the target language.
     • negative evidence
       • It refers to information about which strings of words are not grammatical sentences in the language, such as corrections or other forms of feedback from a parent that tell the child that one of his utterances is ungrammatical
     • Motherese
       • Parents and caretakers in most parts of the world modify their speech when talking to young children. People in general use several registers in different social settings. Speech to children is slower, shorter, in some ways simpler, higher-pitched, more exaggerated in intonation more fluent and grammatically well formed
     • Prosody
       • Prosody humans speech has a pattern of melody, timing, and stress called prosody. Motherese have an exaggerated prosody of its own: a rise and fall contour for approving, a set of sharp staccato bursts for prohibiting, a rise pattern for directing attention, and smooth low legato murmurs for comforting
     • Context
       • Children do not hear sentences in isolation, but in a context. No child has learned language from the radio; indeed children rarely if ever learn language from television. . The reason is that without already knowing the language, it would be difficult for a child to figure out what the characters in the unresponsive televised words are talking about.
     • What and when children learn
       • learn People do not reproduce their parent's language exactly, rhe difference between parents language and the one their children ultimately acquire is small. we can conclude that most children have mastered their mothers tongue some time in their threes. Human language is something close to full mastery, and in a short period of time