Interactionism

Interactionism

1. Theory

   • Take on the "nurture" side of "nature vs nurture". Interactionalists believe that a child is born tabula rasa (blank slate) and learns language based on interaction with their caregivers.
   • Child directed speech (CDS)- the process of talking to a child

2. Bruner

   • The main interactionalist. He created the LASS (Language Acquisition Support System) to "scaffold" a child in learning a language (structuring responses in order to help a child use language more accurately)

3. Catherine Snow

   • She argues that language acquisition happens due to interaction between the mother and her child. She coined the term "motherese" to describe the language used by mothers to talk to children. Interactions with the father use "fatherese" and with others use "otherese".

4. Grice

   • In 1975, Grice proposed a set of maxims to define cooperative principles (features which must be present in conversation)
     • 1) The maxim of quantity- the contributions must carry the right amount of information
     • 2) The maxim of quality- the contributions must be truthful
     • 3) The maxim of relation- the contributions must be relevant to the discussion
     • 4) The maxim of manner- the contributions must be clear and lack ambiguity

5. John Snarey

   • Argues that mothers and fathers interact with their children differently. He says that "roughhousing" with the father teaches self control and that violence is unacceptable.
   • Parts of the fatherese process:
     • Tickling, wrestling and throwing the child in the air
     • Chasing
     • Loud volume
     • Bouncing rather than cuddling and rough rather than gentle
     • Encouragement of competition
     • Promotion of independence over security
     • Less simplification of speech
     • Challenging the child to expand language and linguistic skills

6. Snow and Bruner

   • Argue that caregivers may use the following strategies as part of the scaffolding and CDS process:
     • Recasting and reformulation- the caregiver repeats what the child says containing anything needed to make a grammatically standard utterance
     • Expatiation- expressing what the child says giving more information
     • Exaggerated prosodic cues- varying intonation and pitch
     • Overarticulation- the caregiver stretches out vowel sounds
     • Expansion- the caregiver expands the sentence to make the utterance more complex

7. Rhades

   • Adds that the following are also part of the scaffolding and CDS process
     • Higher frequency of interrogatives or imperatives
     • Pausing between words
     • Repetition of what the child and caregiver say
     • Focus on what the child is saying
     • Melodic short and simple sentences
     • Slower speech

8. Challenging Interactionism

   • De Villiers and De Villiers
     • State that it is rare for caregivers to give direct feedback about the correctness of their language, so it must be something more innate
   • Myozor
     • Believes that CDS helps to aid social development, but not linguistic development. For example, it may teach a child to take turns in conversation, but not aid their ability to use correct forms
   • Chomsky
     • He in particular takes issue with Bruner's research. In 1959, he published a paper criticising Bruner's theory on a number of flaws. Chomsky questions how children produce utterances that are grammatically non-standard to the point where no caregiver would have said them - errors often happen that are not present in the template
   • Cliffe Pye
     • Researched how different cultures learn language. His research detailed that children acquire language at roughly the same time and that not all cultures use CDS. For example, Samoan families do not speak to their children until around 18 months. This implies that language acquisition may be more innate.