Lingustics, Education, Psychology - Essay Example

Linguistics, Education, Psychology Introduction Language development is a process that begins at a very early age. This has been researchedby several researchers and as a result there are several theories proposed by them. In general, a person begins to acquire language by learning it as it is spoken and by mimicry. As the development of language progresses it moves from simplicity to complexity. At the initial stage an infants start without language, however in a few months children can read lips and discriminate speech sounds. In general, we hear children making simple words which may not necessarily have any specific meaning. As they age, words acquire meaning, and connections between words are formed and then later on they begin to form simple sentences which are joined together to create logical meaning. As the child grows up, new meanings of words and sentences and new associations are created and vocabulary increases as more words are learned (Wikipedia, 2007). This paper compares various studies of typical language development which has contributed, and continues to contribute, to knowledge in this area. On an average a normal child become remarkably capable communicators during the first three years of their life. However there can be difference fir one child to another as it invariably depends on how the parent or the care taker interacts with them. During the first three years of children use body language, sign language, painting, drawing and mark-making; and oral expression and sometimes a combination of these to express their needs. In fact it can be said that child starts learning right from the womb where they have been acutely active listeners where they learned to recognize the speech patterns, tunes and tones of the languages especially of the mother and other people in the home (The National Literacy Trust, 2007). Though most children begin to vocalize and gradually verbalize at different ages and at different rates, the first language acquisition generally happens without much conscious instruction from parents or caretakers. The complexity and difficulty increases with increase in age (Wikipedia, 2007). In education and psychology, learning theories aid in understanding the process of learning which is also applicable to language development. There are basically three main perspectives in learning theories, constructivism, cognitivism and behaviourism. Constructivism views learning as a process in which the learner actively constructs or builds new ideas or concepts based upon current and past knowledge. In other words, "learning involves constructing ones own knowledge from ones own experiences" (Ormrod, 2003). Constructivist learning, is therefore a very personal effort, whereby internalized concepts, rules, and general principles may reasonably be applied in a practical real-world context. Behaviourism is another educational theory based on the works of B. F. Skinner and Ivan Pavlov. These scientists are well known for their studies in animal behaviour. According to the behaviourists believe, organisms need reinforcements to keep them interested and that the use of stimuli can be very effective in controlling behaviour. For instance, a child learns a language through repeating or reinforcing. For the behaviourist, environment directly shapes behaviour, and complex learning requires a series of small, progressive steps. The behaviourist theory of education is probably by far the most commonly practiced, because the behaviours of the learners can be easily viewed and therefore measured, which is itself a basic premise of the scientific method. The concept of language development has initiated several arguments and as a result several theories have emerged. For instance, linguists do not agree on what biological factors contribute to language development, however most of them do agree that the ability to acquire such a complicated system is unique to the human species. Besides, the ability to learn language may have been evolved from the ancestors through the evolutionary process. They also assume that the foundation for language may be passed down genetically. Social interaction is a precondition for the development of language which is agreed by all linguists. It is important that children are allowed to interact with other people to be able to develop their basic skills with language. In other words, it is important for children to spend time and effort with other people that allow them to communicate socially in a particular language. There are a few theories on the basic principles based on which children develop language. One of the theories says that language is acquired through imitation. However, this lacks enough evidence and is not accepted widely. The most accepted theories in language development are based on the psychological and functional aspects. While the psychological explanations focus on the mental processes, the functional explanations look at the social processes involved in learning the primary language (Wikipedia, 2007). While this type of development is typical form of language development, children with impaired mental and physical status find it difficult to acquire language as fast as normal children. In case of such speech and language disorders in children lifelong impairments can severely impact on many aspects of life such as learning, education, behaviour, relationships and self-esteem (The University of Sheffield, 2007). It is especially true with children born with significant biological impairments such as blindness, deafness, and severe motor deficits. However, these children also attain a range of basic abilities, such as representational thinking and language competence, in ways different from those experienced by children without such limitations. Experience prove that a good understanding of these problems can provide guidance for interventionists in their attempts to facilitate the adaptive development of young children with a wide variety of special needs, as well as in their efforts to extend constructive support to their parents (Decarie, 1969; Fraiberg, 1977; and Gleitman, 1986). Theories of Language Development Behaviourism The earliest theories about language development assumed that children acquire language through imitation. It is based on this theory that Skinner, the Behaviourist theorist, suggested that children learn language through reinforcement. While various experimental studies has shown that children who imitate the actions of those who associate with them during their first year of life are the ones who learn to talk more quickly. However, there is also evidence that imitation alone cannot explain the complete concept of how children learn to talk. A very good example of this is when a child says “I goed to the home” – they are very skilfully inventing the past tense of ‘go’ based on the rules they are taught. Skinner suggested that when a parent or the care taker shows enthusiasm and appreciation for something a child tries to say, it encourages the child there by repeat the words and gradually learn from it. However, there are some loopholes in this theory as it fails to account for children’s inventions of language. Some researchers argue that it is not just by hearing language around them that a child learns the language. For instance, if the language used is interactive, and if it is used responsively then it may lead to learning outcomes. It is also clear that babies need to hear language to develop this on there own. This point is of great importance in relation to young children with poor language experience. Adults need to spend at least half an hour every day in meaningful play, talk and listening with their child. This is a precondition for learning language. Parents play an important role in forming the child’s language.  Though learning language is pre-programmed in some way in the human system it emphasize that it is important to learn a specific language from the people around us.  Mothers for instance, typically adjust their speech to fit the child’s level and hence this phenomenon is called motherese.  This idea of motherese as explained by Snow and Ferguson (1977) and later on by Trevarthen (1995) accentuated, tuneful, accentuated speech to babies and repeating the primary language to young children was presumed as a basic human need. However, research conducted by Bee 1989, indicates that though motherese can be used to explain how aspects of individual children’s environments help or hinder them from talking, it does not explain the underlying causes of language acquisition (David, et al, 2003). Skinners Verbal Behaviour (1957) is a comprehensive article that deals with most aspects of verbal behaviour. However, its treatment of the learning of grammatical behaviour has been challenged repeatedly (Graham, 2005). Chomsky (1959) claims that behaviourist models of language learning basically lacks the ability to explain various facts about language acquisition, such as the rapid acquisition of language by young children, which is also referred to as the phenomenon of “lexical explosion.” Additionally, a childs linguistic abilities may appear to be radically underdetermined by the evidence of verbal behaviour offered to the child in the short period in which he or she expresses those abilities. By the age of four or five under normal circumstances, children have an almost unlimited capacity to understand and produce sentences which they have never heard before. Chomsky repeatedly argued that the clime that language learning depends on the application of reinforcement is not completely true. Language in general is learned without being taught, and behaviourism does not have an explanation for this. Chomskys own presumptions about the psychological realities underlying language development included the hypothesis that the rules or principles underlying linguistic behaviour are abstract and innate. In other words these principles can be applied to all human languages and are part of individual’s native psychological endowment as human beings (Graham, 2005). Mentalist (mental states in-the-head): Mentalistic accounts tend to have a strong nativist inclination. In general they tend to assume, and sometimes even explicitly to embrace (Fodor 1981), the hypothesis that the mind has at birth or innately a set of procedures or internally represented processing rules which are deployed when learning or acquiring new responses. On the other hand behaviourism, is anti-nativist and appeals to theorists who deny that there are innate rules by which organisms learn (Graham, 2005). Chomskys theory says that humans are born with a special biological brain mechanism which is unique and is called a Language Acquisition Device (LAD). Chomskys is a specialist in linguistics, and psycholinguists which continue to contribute much to our understanding of languages and how children acquire them. His theory is termed as Nativist. The main contribution of his work has been to show that childrens language development is much more complex than the Behaviourists, who believed that children learn language merely by being rewarded for imitating (The National Literacy Trust, 2007). Chomsky (1965) in his argument presented a series of arguments that called for an innate syntactic component of the language faculty, which is important for language acquisition by children and also form the core of adult language competence. This theory is based on what is called as “universal grammar” (UG). Chomsky’s (1965) arguments have been repeatedly modified and developed by Chomsky himself and by other authors over the past years (Chomsky, 1986; Hauser et al., 2002; Jackendoff, 2002; Pinker, 1990, 1994). In fact the theory of UG is the most common theory of language acquisition outside the field of language acquisition research. Unfortunately, the theory has never met with the full agreement of the research community and many criticisms have been levelled against it ever since it was developed. Chomsky (1965) said that children are born with an inbuilt Language Acquisition Device (LAD) and as a result of this language then simply emerges as the child matures. Based on this argument, Slobin (1985) proposed that just as newborns come into the world ‘programmed’ to look at interesting, particularly moving, objects, in the same way babies are pre-programmed to pay attention to language. One problem with this theory is that children seem to have great proficiency in acquiring whatever language/s they hear around them for the first time and during their first year of life. However, the pre-programming does not need to be thought of as tied to a specific language. Chomsky as others indicates the basis of interactions with familiar adults and older children from the earliest days of life. Parents and practitioners need time to enjoy ‘protoconversations’ and as we will see later, research has shown that treating babies as if they understand talk and involving them in conversational exchanges are essential experiences on which later abilities are founded (David, et al, 2003). One problem with Chomskys theory is that it does not take enough account of the influence that thought or cognition and language has on each others development. In other words this theory lacks the ability to explain the link between the though process and language. Cognitive Further to Chomskys theory, Piaget based his central interest in childrens cognitive development. He theorised that language was just one of childrens ways of representing their familiar worlds, a reflection of their thought, and that language did not contribute to the development of thinking. Cognitive development in a child precedes that of language (The National Literacy Trust, 2007). Further, Piaget argued that language is an example of symbolic behaviour, and no different from other forms of learning. Nelson (1985) and others, used this cognitive development theory to explain that language is an extension of the child’s existing meaning making capacity. Bruner (1983) stressed the importance of opportunities for babies to interact with, and observe interactions between, others specially the parents. This idea is supported by research showing that mothers who behave as if their babies and young children understand language from the beginning and make eye contact with them and engage in dialogues, responding to their babies’ reactions (kicking, waving arms, smiling, etc) are laying the foundations of conversation (David, et al, 2003). Different from Chomsky and Piaget, Vygotskys main concern was the relationship between the development of thought and that of language. He developed his arguments in different ways as he was keen on finding out the ways in which different languages might have impact on a persons thought process. He claimed that what Piaget saw as young childrens egocentric speech was in fact private speech, the childs way of using words to think about something, a step on the road from social speech to thinking in words. On the other hand, Vygotskys theory views language first as social communication, gradually promoting both language itself and cognition. Theorists who also followed this tradition and whose ideas can contribute to our understanding include his contemporary Bakhtin, and Bruner (The National Literacy Trust, 2007). However, Karmiloff and Karmiloff-Smith (2001) argue that none of these theories about language is, on its own, adequate in explaining language development and learning in the first three years of life, and that we need to take account of each of them for their ability to explain part of the story (David, et al, 2003). Conclusion Language theory research informs us that young childrens language development is influenced by several factors. As we can see from the above theories, there are several loopholes from in each of these theories and there is no one theory that could be a holistic one. Childrens babbling during their first year includes the sounds of every world language and crib talk demonstrates their intense interest in the sounds they hear around them. Studies have proven that although children with a hearing loss will stop babbling, if they grow up in a home with parents who can sign, they will follow the same patterns of development using their first language - signing - and will sign their first word at around the same age that hearing children speak theirs. Between the age of two and three most of the children are able to use language to influence the people closest to them, indicating the links with brain development and their growing ability attract others and gain their attention. In other words they are beginning to understand the minds of their parents, and their siblings and express their feelings in much more clearly than they used to do in the first year of their life. Research has also shown that, there is a difference in the speed in which boys and girls acquire language. These studies point out that boys acquire language more slowly than girls, which means the girls may stop learning through hands-on exploration. There are also some critics of earlier theories who suggest that children, their behaviours and their attempts to make sense are often lost when the causes of language development are thought to be a different concept of the child. These contemporary researchers and theorists recognise the fact that children are active learners who skilfully use their worlds. Their language development is part of their holistic development, emerging from cognitive, emotional and social interactions. Adults also plays their respective role, actions and speech which help in the language development process. Finally, based on this paper, it can be concluded that there is need for extensive research on basic processes in early language development in typical populations which can further be explored in case of atypical population. A holistic research is the need of the hour. References Wikipedia, (2007) Language development, Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., Retrived on 12 June 2007 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_development The National Literacy Trust, (2007) Theories about how young children acquire and develop language, Retrived on 12 June 2007 from http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/talktoyourbaby/theories.html Ormrod, J. E., (2003) Educational Psychology: Developing Learners, Fourth Edition. p. 227. The University of Sheffield, (2007) Atypical and Typical Language Development, Retrived on 12 June 2007 from http://www.shef.ac.uk/hcs/research/language Decarie, T.G. 1969 A study of the mental and emotional development of the thalidomide child. Pp. 167-187 in Determinants of Infant Behavior, Volume 4. B.M. Foss, ed. London, UK: Methuen. Fraiberg, S. 1977 Insights From the Blind: Comparative Studies of Blind and Sighted Infants. New York: Basic Books. Gleitman, L.R. 1986 Biological pre-programming for language learning. Pp. 120-151 in The Brain, Cognition, and Education. S.L. Friedman, K.A. Klivington, and R.W. Peterson, eds. Orlando, FL: Academic Press. Graham, G. (2005) Theories About Language Development, Retrived on 12 June 2007 from http://www.standards.dfes.gov.uk/eyfs/resources/downloads/rr444_49-50.pdf David, T., Goouch, K., Powell, S. and Abbott, L. (2003) Birth to Three Matters: A Review of the Literature, Nottingham, Queen’s Printer. Ps 49-50. Chomsky, N., (1965). Aspects of the Theory of Syntax. MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. Chomsky, N., (1986). Knowledge of Language: Its Nature, Origin, and Use. Praeger, New York. Hauser, M.D., Chomsky, N., Fitch, W.T., (2002). The faculty of language: what is it, who has it, and how did it evolve? Science 298, 1569–1579. Jackendoff, R., (2002). Foundations of Language. Oxford UniversityPress, Oxford. Pinker, S., (1990). Language acquisition. In: Osherson, D.N., Lasnik, H. (Eds.), Language: an Invitation to Cognitive Science, vol. 1. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA. Pinker, S., (1994). The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language. William Morrow & Co/ Penguin, New York, NY/London, UK. Read More