1. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Wong Bee Eng
Department of English
Faculty of Modern Languages and Communication
Universiti Putra Malaysia
Wong Bee Eng

2. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Topics
Characteristics of first language (L1) acquisition
The Behaviourist Theory and L1 acquisition
Universal Grammar: the logical problem of L1 acquisition
The Language Acquisition Device (LAD): Argument from the poverty of the stimulus
Stages of L1 acquisition: phonological, morphological, syntactic and semantic development
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3. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
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4. First Language Acquisition
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
First Language Acquisition
The process of acquiring language among children is also known as emergence of language.
The outcome of this process is a grammar.
2 reasons for saying that the development of linguistic skills involve the acquisition of a grammar.
Source: O’Grady, W. & Cho, S. W. (2012), pp
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5. First Language Acquisition
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
First Language Acquisition
Adult users of language are able to produce and understand an infinite number of novel sentences – a basic requisite of normal language use -
which can only happen if they have acquired a grammar as children.
Another indication that children acquire a grammar, i.e. rules of a grammar, comes from their speech errors.
These provide clues about how the acquisition process works.
Source: O’Grady, W. & Cho, S. W. (2012), pp
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6. First Language Acquisition
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
First Language Acquisition
Since adults don’t talk the way children do, the errors made by children tell us that children don’t merely imitate what they hear.
They create rules of their own to capture regularities that they hear in their input.
Source: O’Grady, W. & Cho, S. W. (2012), pp
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7. First Language Acquisition
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
First Language Acquisition
Linguists and psychologists study, i.e. they identify and describe, the process of language acquisition by analyzing the emergence grammatical system of children.
They look to the study of the following to help them:
phonology
morphology
syntax
Source: O’Grady, W. & Cho, S. W. (2012), pp
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8. First Language Acquisition
Methods
Most studies focus on children’s early utterances, the order in which they emerge, the kinds of errors made.
2 Complementary Approaches of data collection
The naturalist approach
The experimental approach
Source: O’Grady, W. & Cho, S. W. (2012), pp
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9. First Language Acquisition
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
First Language Acquisition
Naturalistic approach: usually longitudinal
Observe and record children’s spontaneous utterances, e.g.
a. Diary study (researcher keeps daily notes on a child’s linguistic progress)
b. Regular taping sessions, often at biweekly intervals, an hour at a time, of the child interacting with his/her caregivers. Detailed transcripts are made for subsequent analysis. (see CHILDES – Child Language Data Exchange System)
Source: O’Grady, W. & Cho, S. W. (2012), pp
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10. First Language Acquisition
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
First Language Acquisition
Naturalistic studies
Advantage: Provides a lot of information of the emergence of grammar.
Disadvantages:
Certain structures and phenomena may occur rarely in children’s daily speech making it difficult to gather enough data to test hypotheses or draw firm conclusions.
Speech samples from individual children capture only small portion of their utterances at any given point in development (15% or less).
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11. First Language Acquisition
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
First Language Acquisition
Experimental Approach: usually cross-sectional
Researchers make use of specially designed tasks to elicit linguistic activity relevant to the phenomenon they wish to study.
The child’s production is used to formulate hypotheses about the type of grammatical system acquired at that point in time.
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12. First Language Acquisition
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
First Language Acquisition
Types of experimental studies
Use tasks that test children’s
comprehension (e.g. judge truth statements made about particular pictures or situations),
production (such tasks may be difficult for children), or
imitation skills (such tasks can provide important clues about grammatical development)
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13. First Language Acquisition
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
First Language Acquisition
Experimental studies
Advantage: They allow researchers to collect data of a very specific sort about particular phenomena or structures.
Disadvantages:
Difficult to design such experiments.
Children’s performance may be affected by extraneous factors, e.g. inattention, shyness, or a failure to understand what is expected of them.
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14. First Language Acquisition
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
First Language Acquisition
Better to use naturalistic observation together with experimental techniques.
Together they have advanced our knowledge of the process.
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15. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
PHONOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT
a. Babbling
b. The developmental order
Consonant inventory at age two
Stops Fricatives Other
p b m f w
t d n s
k g
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16. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Consonant inventory at age four
Stops Fricatives Affricates Other
p b m f v ʧ ʤ w j
t d n s z l r
k g ŋ ʃ
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17. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
c. Early phonetic processes
1. Syllable simplification – systematic deletion of certain sounds in order to simplify syllable structure.
e.g. delete [s] stop  [tɒp]
2. Syllable deletion – deletion of unstressed syllables.
e.g. spa ghe tti  [gǝ]
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18. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
3. Substitution processes – systematic replacement of one sound by an alternative that the child finds easier to articulate stopping e.g. sing  [tIŋ] change: s  t fronting e.g. ship  [sIp] change: ʃ  s gliding e.g. lion  [jaIn] change: l  j denasalization e.g. room  [wu:b] change: m  b
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19. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
4. Assimilation
The modification of one or more features of a segment under the influence of neighbouring sounds
Initial consonants voiced in anticipation of the following vowel. e.g. tell  [del]
To maintain the same place of articulation for all of the consonants or vowels in a word.
e.g. doggy  [gɒgi:] or [dɒdi:]
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20. Vocabulary Development
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Vocabulary Development
By 18 months, the child has a vocabulary of 50 words or more.
Common words refer to
Entities – people, food/drinks, animals, clothes, toys, vehicles, other (e.g. bottle, key, book)
Properties – e.g. hot, dirty, here, there
Actions – e.g. up, sit, see, eat, go, down
Personal-social – e.g. bye, no, yes, please, thank-you
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21. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Noun-like words – largest class, followed by verb-like words, and adjective-like words.
Over the next few years – children learn between words a day.
By age 6, they have 13,000-14,000 words.
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22. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
3 Strategies for acquiring word meaning The Whole Object Assumption A new word refers to a whole object The Type Assumption A new word refers to a type of thing, not just to a particular thing. The Basic Level Assumption A new word refers to objects that are alike in basic ways (appearance, behaviour, etc.)
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23. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Contextual clues Ability of the child to make use of contextual clues to draw inferences about the category and meaning of new words. e.g. Children can use the presence or absence of determiners to differentiate between names and common nouns.
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24. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Meaning Errors Overextensions The meaning of the child’s word is more general or inclusive than that of the corresponding adult form. e.g. the word dog is frequently overextended to include horses, cows, etc. Underextensions The use of lexical items in an overly restrictive fashion. e.g. the word kitty might be used to refer to the family pet, but not to other cats.
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25. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Dimensional terms Terms describing size and dimensions are acquired in a relatively fixed order. 1st group of adjectives – big , small (can be used for talking about any aspect of size – height, area, volume, etc.) 2nd group - tall, long, short, high, low (can only be used for a single dimension – height-length) Other modifiers – thick-thin, wide-narrow, deep-shallow – more restricted in use – describe secondary or less extended dimension of an object.
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26. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
MORPHOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT
Overgeneralizations or Overregularizations
e.g. *mans
*runned
*felled
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27. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
DEVELOPMENTAL SEQUENCE
A. Typical developmental sequence for non-lexical morphemes
1. -ing
2. plural –s
3. possessive – ’s
4. the, a
5. past tense –ed
6. third person singular –s
7. auxiliary be
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28. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
B. Some Determining factors
Frequent occurrence in utterance-final position (children tend to notice elements that occur at the end of an utterance)
Syllabicity (they tend to notice morphemes e.g. –ing, which are syllables on their own, than those that are single consonants, e.g. –s)
Absence of homophony (this tends to hasten acquisition of a word)
4. Few or no exceptions in the way it is used (all singular Ns form possessive with –s but not all verbs form past tense with –ed; exceptions can hinder acquisition process)
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29. B. Some Determining factors
Allomorphic invariance (the suffix –ing has the same form for all verbs, while the –ed has 3 main allomorphs; the latter can slow down morphological development)
6. Clearly discernible semantic function (the plural –s expresses easily identifiable meaning, but 3rd person singular –s makes no obvious contribution to meaning of a sentence; thus the latter is acquired more slowly)
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30. Word formation processes
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Word formation processes
Derivation and compounding emerge early in the acquisition of English.
First derivational suffixes are the most common ones in adult language.
Children’s creativity with compounds shows a preference for building words from other words.
Ending Meaning
Word
/-ness/ state
sadness
/-ing/ activity
running
/-er/ doer
/-ie/ diminutive
teacher
doggie
Child’s word
Intended meaning
car-smoke N-N
exhaust
firetruck-man N-N
fire fighter
cup-egg N-N
boiled egg
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31. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
The 2 processes that apply most freely in English, i.e. the formation of a noun by the addition of the agentive affix –er to a verb (a derivational process) and compounding, are the first to emerge. e.g. A person who swims is a ___________. A house for a dog is a ___________.
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32. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
SYNTACTIC DEVELOPMENT
I. The one-word stage
A child begins to produce one-word utterances
(holophrases = whole sentences)
between the ages of 12 months and 18 months.
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33. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
A basic property of these one-word utterances is that they can be used to express the type of meaning that would be associated with an entire sentence in adult speech.
E.g. dada can mean I see daddy.
Children seem to choose the most informative word that applies to the situation at hand.
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34. Semantic relations in children’s one-word utterances
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Semantic relations in children’s one-word utterances
Semantic relation Utterance Situation Agent of an action dada as father enters the room Action or state down as child sits down Theme door as father closes the door Location here as child points Recipient mama as child gives mother something Recurrence again as child watches lighting of a match
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35. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
II. The two-word stage
a. Within a few months of their first one-word utterances, children begin to produce two-word mini-sentences.
b. The vast majority of two-word utterances employ an appropriate word order, suggesting a very early sensitivity to this feature of sentence structure.
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36. Some patterns in children’s two-word speech
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Some patterns in children’s two-word speech
Utterance Intended meaning Semantic relation Baby chair The baby is sitting agent-location on the chair. Doggie bark The dog is barking. agent-action Hit doggie I hit the doggie. action-theme Sam water Sam is drinking water. agent-theme Daddy hat Daddy’s hat. possessor-possessed
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37. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
III. The telegraphic stage Early sentences are mainly words from the major grammatical categories of nouns, verbs, and adjectives. The missing elements are determiners, prepositions, auxiliary verbs, and the bound morphemes that go on the ends of nouns and verbs. These are the grammatical morphemes.
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38. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
It is possible that these grammatical morphemes are omitted because they are not essential to meaning.
Another reason is children have cognitive limitations on the length of utterance they can produce, independent of their grammatical knowledge.
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39. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Given such limitations, children may sensibly leave out the least-important parts.
Such words may not be stressed in adults’ utterances and therefore children may be leaving out unstressed elements.
Other researchers also suggest that children’s underlying knowledge does not include grammatical categories that govern the use of the omitted forms.
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40. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
IV. Later development
The development of different sentence forms
Expressing negation
Asking questions
Yes/No questions – can be answered with either
yes or no.
Wh-questions – begin with wh-words such as
who, where, what, why, when, how.
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41. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Development of different sentence forms
Expressing negation – children’s negative sentence form, in order of development
Stages
i. Sentences with external negative marker
e.g. No … wipe finger
No the sun shining
ii. Constructions with internal negative marker but no auxiliaries
e.g. I can’t see you
I don’t like you
I no want book
iii. Constructions with auxiliaries
e.g. I didn’t did it
Tom won’t let go
No, it isn’t
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42. Children’s question forms, in order of development
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Children’s question forms, in order of development
Yes/No questions
Wh-questions
I ride train?
Who that?
Sit chair?
What daddy doing?
Mommy milk?
Where milk go?
Yes/No questions
and Wh-questions
1. Constructions with external question marker
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43. Children’s question forms, in order of development (cont.)
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Children’s question forms, in order of development (cont.)
Yes/No questions
Wh-questions
2. Constructions with
auxiliaries
but no
subject-auxiliary
inversion in
Yes/No questions
Wh-questions
Does the
kitty stand
up?
What you did say?
Will you help
me?
Why kitty can’t run?
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44. Children’s question forms, in order of development (cont.)
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Children’s question forms, in order of development (cont.)
Yes/No questions
Wh-questions
3. Subject-auxiliary inversion
Yes/No questions
Wh-questions -
What you doed?
What does coffee taste like?
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45. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
The Development of Complex Sentences
After the development of grammatical morphemes and different sentence forms is well under way, the next grammatical development is the appearance of sentences that contain more than one clause.
There are many different types of complex sentences, and some appear in children’s spontaneous speech much earlier than others do.
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46. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Children’s complex sentences, in order of development
1. Object complementation
Watch me draw circles.
I see you sit down.
Wh-embedded clauses
Can I do it when we get home?
I show you how to do it.
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47. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Children’s complex sentences, in order of development (cont.) 3. Coordinating conjunctions He was stuck, and I got him out. When I was a little girl I could go “geek-geek” like that, but now I can go “this is a chair.” 4. Subordinating conjunctions Here’s a set. It must be mine if it’s a little one. I want this doll because she’s big.
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48. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Individual Differences in Grammatical Development Children differ in both the rate and course of grammatical development. Differences in rate are the most obvious. Some children produce multiword utterances at age 18 months, whereas others do not start combining words until they are 2 years old. Differences in the kinds of multiword utterances children produce – some children rote-learn these as wholes; other children combine separate words from the start.
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49. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Some children pay more attention to syllables and phonemes; others pay more attention to the overall prosodic “tune” (Peters, 1997).
The tune approach or holistic approach or top-down approach, results in many unanalysed chunks.
e.g. Idontwanna (for I don’t wanna)
The other approach is the analytical or bottom-up approach.
In this approach, children break down speech into smaller units and then combine them.
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50. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Most children use both top-down and bottom-up strategies, and most children include both unanalyzed chunks and smaller units in their early sentences.
However, children vary in how much they rely on one strategy versus the other, and the route to syntax some children take seems to be extremely holistic or extremely analytic (Hoff, 2001: 223).
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51. What makes language possible?
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
What makes language possible?
The role of adult speech - caregiver speech
The role of feedback – recasts
The role of cognitive development
The role of inborn knowledge
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52. Is there a critical period?
BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
Is there a critical period?
Normal linguistic development is possible only if children are exposed to language during a particular time frame or critical period.
Evidence for the existence of such a period – from studies of individuals who do not experience language during the early part of their lives, e.g. Genie.
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53. BBI 3209 Language Acquisition
References
O’Grady, W. & Cho, S. W. (2012). First Language Acquisition (pp ). In O’ Grady, W. & Archibald, J. Contemporary Linguistic Analysis: An Introduction (Seventh Edition). Toronto: Pearson Canada.
Hoff, E. (2009). Language Development (Fourth Edition). Belmont: Wadsworth Cengage Learning.
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