Language development - theories PDF

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This lecture will be given by Louise Malkin

We will focus on theories of how children learn structural language (phonology, lexical semantics and syntax) and we will discuss pragmatic language development....

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Theories of language development Outline: 1. Theories of language learning - Linguistic nativist theories (core knowledge) - Usage-based theories (modern socio-cultural theories) 2. Theories (& evidence): learning lexical semantics 3. Theories and evidence: syntactic development 4. Pragmatic language development Imagine human lives without language - video: ●

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can’t tell who she was, can’t explain what she wants to get across, takes time (asked how her dad died, gestures three, meaning shot three times but it is hard for people to understand, not everyone can) no access to language in the critical period that is why it is crucial to learn language during this period to understand and explain speech – because language is so complex

Language: ● ●

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No formal teaching but still manage to master all these language skills Phonemes (specific language that each letter has to differentiate letters from each other) - when learning language, spell out the letters to be able to read a word (like c-a-t = cat) What do children have to learn? Structural language - Phonology - Lexicon - Syntax Pragmatics

PHONOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT: Phoneme: ●

A difference in sound perceived by the speakers of a particular language as discrete and distinguishing one word from another. - k/g are phonemes (so ‘kill’ and ‘gill’ are different words). - r/l are phonemes in English but not in Japanese. ❏ Born with ability to discriminate sounds of any language. ❏ Ability declines during first year (e.g. Werker & Lalonde, 1998). - beginning more sounds etc but then as you get older, narrows down to fit the language you know. You don’t need all the other unnecessary sounds if not relevant to your language.

Infants learn phonemes through statistical learning: ●

Statistical learning = ability to implicitly learn the probabilities with which particular contexts predict the occurrence of certain items. - “c” not higher than “z” sound for say your first language is English - Each language has its own different sounds and tones to differentiate from different words/letters

Can see a little bit of pattern forming here – now figure out if see red triangle, what is the probability of seeing a brown diamond following this. It is 100% as seeing this data set, a triangle is always followed by a brown diamond -What about purple diamond, followed by red triangle – 66%, not 100% -Like language – forming statistical learning for language Video: Head turning task ● ● ● ● ● ●

Japanese vs US infants Japanese worst, US improve Both going through same –critical period Baby listening to us, taking statistics on language that they here. Distributions grow, stats are very different In English: loads of r’s and l’s In Japanese: different as high=known as Japanese l’s

Lexical semantics - Just means the meaning of words so how children learn the meaning of words The induction problem:

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Learning individual words to what the words match up to – like “ear” knowing it matches up to the ear when don’t know the meaning to the word

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How did she understand the word “skylos”? Could be anything, maybe parts of the dog, may not be the dog at all, could be talking about the girl in the picture

Theories of language learning: ● LINGUISTIC NATIVISTS: - Certain mechanisms only used for learning language. - Innate biases. - Word-learning & syntax-learning = separate - Innate syntactic representations à minimal input needed. ● USAGE-BASED THEORISTS: - Language learnt via mechanisms used in other domains: - 1 socio-cognitive (e.g. joint attention, Theory of Mind) - 2 pattern (statistical) learning - Sufficient input needed (also for syntax) - Syntax learning (initially) based around frequent words Enemy camps, adamant that the other camp is wrong – two theories of language learning 1. Believe that don’t come to the table completely empty handed – come with mechanisms to understand what's going on in the language system. one mechanism is responsible for each biases to understand how words can form into sentences. 2. Big difference=no specific mechanisms to master language but rather, the ways in which you learn language are the same ways you learn a range of skills. Not specific to language learning though is specific to humans (only humans can do these things) – skills not just to do with language development. 3. NOT A NATURE VS NUTURE TYPE THEORIES – do not debate it this way in an exam. LINGUISTIC NATIVISTS: ● Innate word learning biases (e.g. Markman, 1991). USAGE-BASED THEORISTS: ● Socio-cognitive skills (joint attention, intention-reading, Theory-of-Mind) Now onto the Nature of word learning for both of these theories Linguistic nativist theories of word learning: ● Innate word-learning biases (assumptions) 1) The whole-object assumption (Markman, 1991) one of the biases born with = ability to identify that they must be referring to the whole thing e.g. talking about something to do with the dog, not the whole of the dog but assume you are just saying the dog, not the parts to it

Linguistic nativist theories of word learning ● Innate biases (assumptions) 1) The whole-object assumption (Markman, 1991) 2) Mutual-exclusivity assumption (Markman & Wachtel, 1988) Evidence for mutual exclusivity assumption: What are the two adults doing and observe the baby. -

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18 months – presented with a familiar object (a duck) along with a novel item (neverseen it before) therefore no label to this. Present duck accompanied by the wordduck, present novel item to strange word to manage to figure out which item you are talking about (so familiar word and item paired – strange word don’t understand so must go with the strange item never seen before) Two year old – mutually exclusive assumption – each object must only have one name therefore if don’t understand the word you are saying, it must go with the object you don’t recognise. Linguistic nativists = are coming to the table with innate biases = mutually exclusive assumption

18-month-olds (Markman & Wachtel, 1988; see Diesendruck& Markman, 2001, for 24-month-olds) - 2 Objects (1 familiar + 1 unfamiliar) 1) Show me the  Modi 2) Show me one of them Example ‘mutual-exclusivity’ test - video Usage-based (socio-pragmatic) theories: ● Argue that socio-cognitive development is critical for word learning. ● Joint attention ● Intention-reading. ● Understanding what others know

Key thing is what we have in our skill set as humans – our ability to do a range of skills through different abilities that we have What is joint attention?

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Must both be aware of the events AND that each other are aware of the event – child and adult Both focussing on the same thing

Gaze-following and word-learning: 16-19 months olds (e.g. Baldwin, 1991). - Argued that this is one of the systems that children use to understanding the meaning of an object/word - What we have here – adult put items on the table. Waits till child puts an item up and identify the name of the objects therefore must make sure they pick different objects and focus on the object they are holding to label the word to the item that they are holding (and focused on) – like “oh, a bucket“ - Child then looks back at you when you say this means that the child is listening to what you are saying Intention-reading and word-learning:

Now have a range of things here. Now say “let's find the gazzer“ -

Happy tone – found Children pays attention = can read the responses =usage theory

c) 100% 24-mth-olds understood that novel word = object adult looking for (Tomasello & Barton, 1994: Study 2) . Knowing what others know: ● ●

Child knows adult knows label of familiar object. Child can assume (using intention-reading) that the adult intends the novel object when the adults asks her to “show me the NOVEL WORD.”

(compare and contrast two theories of word learning) Syntax: ● Rules for combining words into sentences. ● Infinite number of sentences à can express an infinite number of ideas.

Easier to learn a second language when you are younger Theories of language learning: LINGUISTIC NATIVISTS: ● Syntax and lexical learning are separate processes (separate cognitive modules) ● Syntax learning is underpinned by underlying hierarchical rules universal to all language. ● (e.g. Chomsky, 1965, 1981, 1995). USAGE-BASED THEORISTS (socio-cultural): ● Syntax closely intertwined with the lexicon. ● Syntax learnt using mechanisms used in other domains (e.g. Tomasello, 2000), such as: ● 1 Pattern (statistical) learning. ● 2 Social cognition: (Joint attention & Theory of Mind) ● Input frequency very important. - Ling nativists - Suggestion – different biases to enable different parts of language, different mechanisms for different parts of language so potentially, ability to learning language and sentences as different mechanisms are in different parts - Usage – a range of different skills, wouldn’t expect that sentence and word learning be inseparable (wouldn’t see separation Is syntax based on words? ●

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Holophrases = rote-learning of common phrases - FORM: Ifindit - MEANING: object.retrieved - FORM: Wheredaddygone - MEANING: tell.me.Daddy.location Lexically-based phrases ‘find X’; ‘Where X’ (Lieven et al., 1997; Pine et al., 1998). More word-based syntax: PUSHER push PUSHEE (not Subject-Verb-Object)

Extent to which - ability to learn words and phrases -

Starting to use verbs more flexibly like how well she uses nouns Then develop onto some phrases/verbs that child is talking about – a bit more flexibly here though it will be a very limited range of verbs she is familiar with to use

Evidence for lexically-based syntax: ●

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Production - e.g. Akthar & Tomasello, 1997: Exp 2; Brooks & Tomasello, 1999: Exp 1; Tomasello & Brooks, 1998; Dodson & Tomasello, 1998, cf. Braine, Brody, Fisch, Weisberger & Blum, 1990; Dittmar, Abbot-Smith, Lieven & Tomasello, 2014. Comprehension using ‘act out’ - Akthar & Tomasello, 1997: Exp 2 & 3 (although see Fisher, 1996).

Usage base vs linguistic? =usage base theory support -

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Semantics and syntax Look at this in a lab setting – would it be okay to bring children into the lab and make them say words that are already familiar with like pushing, stroking etc? a good starting point? No, it wouldn’t be. Will be doing – introducing to children new action words to understanding this and therefore making sentences – if they are intertwined or relatable in any way. Do less well in words that aren’t already familiar to you –therefore knowledge of words = intertwined – evidence for usage base theory Comprehension – ask children to do specific actions, children again, do better when familiar verbs are used. 2 year olds are children are compliant/easy (they do as you say)?? No, it can be tricky when it comes to unfamiliar verbs. Or ignoring what you do/say.

Evidence against: ● ● ●

Other ways to measure this: Implicit way of measuring these things (for pre-language) so without them responding to what you are telling them to do – like eye gaze. If child can interpret this novel phrase, “dog is whelping the lion” – if understanding, children will be looking to the picture on the left more than the other. More attention there. Different ways to view this – first they state that children aren’t getting these novel words but if using eye gaze instead of physically showing, that children, even when very young, understand these novel words as it is unusual to see.

Theories of syntax learning - patterns (statistical) learning: Rules of combining words into sentences = syntax If word learning and syntax are separable this would provide support for… linguistic nativist theory. (Debate the extent to which also use statistical learning) ?? Statistical learning and syntax: ● ●

Implicit statistical learning related to degree of syntactic priming in typically-developing primary school aged children (Kidd, 2012, Developmental Psychology) Related to comprehension of passives (e.g. ‘it has been washed by Mum’) and relative clauses (e.g. the man who I saw yesterday) (Kidd & Arciuli, 2016, Child Development) .

Believe stat learning is key to understanding how words are put into sentences, to what extent how much…words are -

Input Recorded what teachers were saying simple “dog is nice” to complex words “I like this dog because…”. Use complex when children understand syntax etc usage based theory

Theories of syntax learning - input frequency very important: ●

The role of input in syntax acquisition - Relationship between the degree to which children’s sentence comprehension improves (42 – 50 mths) and the proportion of multi-clause sentences (and mean number NPs per sentence) (Huttenlocher, Vasilyeva, Cymerman & Levine, 2002) - Patterns in the input can also explain error patterns in early child language (Rowland, Pine, Lieven & Theakston, 2005; Kirjavainen, Theakston & Lieven, 2009).

According to a usage based theory, input frequency is very important. Ofc other theory says it is important too but usage based theory does believe that being exposed to loads of different ones is important. Joint attention and syntax: ● ● ●

Levels of early shared attention is correlated with later sentence production Typical development (e.g. Tomasello, Mannle & Kruger, 1986) Children on the autistic spectrum - correlated with syntax (e.g. Rosenthal Rollins & Snow, 1998) - predicts syntax development many years later (e.g. Sigman & Ruskin, 1999; Gillespie-Lynch et al., 2015).

A lot of evidence that suggests that children diagnosed at a young age will have trouble with joint attention, less likely (Critically evaluate linguistic nativist vs. usage-based theories of syntactic development). Pragmatics - how people use language to communicate: ● Pragmatics pure – ability to understand the conversations, how success at doing this. What is important is to be able to stay on topic. ● Topic - Conversation and other contingent: Imagine ...These are all perfectly reasonable answers – staying on topic - Person A: “Kent will probably be grid-locked after a no deal brexit!” - Person B: “I am so worried about what’s going to happen to us!”, “Chin up! Just think of those blue passports”, “What’s Brexit?” ● Conversation: Respond in a way that you are aware of the topic and building on the topic of the conversation if it is all going well like playing ping pong ● Conversation: Minimal responses - However, not always nice, contingent answers given, especially coming from children. - Person A: “I’ve built a tall treehouse on Minecraft”

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Person B: “Oh wow that’s nice” Above = cuts the conversation as hard to respond and continue the conversation. Think about how you are built onto the conversation so that it does flow. Conversation: Non-contingent - Person A: “I’ve built a tall treehouse on Minecraft” - Person B: “I am much better at football than my brother is” - It doesn't relate to the topic so how do you respond to it? It will be difficult to do so. Conversation: Monologuing - Person A: “I’ve built a tall treehouse on Minecraft” - Person B: “Yeah I built one and what was going on exactly in this particular world - I think I deleted it now - it was a bit RUBBISH – is I seem to have built this WEIRD END portal – there was nothing dangerous down there…except for a few wolves and then I just tried to kill them and then I just said to my mum “oh if you win the tournament you get this prize” and suddenly I just built a new –I built a tunnel, out of the end where you burrow up and you put your head up and there’s a nice house! I thought “I’m gonna win it, if I get there first before my mum does”. And then I was like try putting lighting and stuff in it but then after that it melted”. - This is not an appropriate response as it doesn’t allow the person to respond and talk about themselves as well. Context: referential communication

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“can you pass me the screwdriver” this will be a problem as there are different types. However, sometimes will be appropriate as if you have shared knowledge, you will understand without having to understand. What you have visual access too as well as common ground on knowledge. Like knowing that one screwdriver doesn’t work – therefore, wouldn’t pass this one and will choose one of the other ones.

Understanding what someone knows: ● ● ●

You walk with a friend. You point to a bike in front of the University library. What is your communicative intent?

Can have different meanings depending on who it is and therefore the context on the topic of the conversation which can be difficult to interpret what it is you are trying to say in that circumstance.

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Understanding reference at 18 months – joint attention To interpret what someone is trying to say to them – Engaging in an activity with an adult. First is a puzzle game, second adult=different game with the child. One of the adults comes in, points to the item that can relate to both of the game but the child interprets the item as the game they played with that specific adult – therefore, starting to understand the concept of shared knowledge. put a piece on the floor that relates to both of the games, child interprets that the piece is from the game they just played. To the game he just played with the adult who pointed the object on the floor.

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Infants responded differently, using the experience they had shared with that particular E to interpret her point (see also Moll et al., 2008). Referential communication paradigm:

Interpreting verbal reference: ● When interpreting linguistic reference (e.g. ‘the duck’) even three-year-olds do take into account a. what the speaker can see (e.g. Nilsen & Graham, 2009). b. How the speaker perceives an object

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(e.g. Moll & Meltzoff, 2011). However, even adults show inconsistencies with this (e.g. Brown-Schmidt, 2009, Psychonomic Bulletin) .

Imagine 2 ducks, experimenter can only see one. Child just needs to just say to explain but if judge what the other person can see, will be able to tell them and refer to which one the adult can see by saying small/big duck. Pragmatics: ● Using / understanding reference: Taking context into account (e.g. what the partner knows) ● Conversation→ is the listener interested? How much information should I give? ● Do we need to have acquired ‘Theory of Mind’ to be good at pragmatics? ● Theory of Mind litmus test = ‘Sally / Anne’ false belief (around 5 years) Language learning mechanisms: ● Statistical learning i s clearly used to learn phonology and to segment words from the speech stream. ● Socio-cognitive skills -> probably necessary for pragmatic language proficiency (e.g. Resches & Perez Pereira, 2007), clearly beneficial for learning word meanings; some relations to syntactic development. ● But do we need ‘Theory of Mind’?? ● Input frequency c learly beneficial. ● Comprehension of (non-lexically-specific) sentence structures (syntax) remarkably early...