Ability to communicate through speech, written words, gestures Language Ability to communicate through speech, written words, gestures

Learning Language What was one of your first words? Typically what are babies first words? How many words do you think you know now? Probably around 80,000. Children learn their native languages much before learning to add 2+2. Benefit to teaching sign to babies? There are over 6,800 languages that exist today.

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007 Phonemes & Morphemes Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007

Phonemes Morphemes The smallest units of sound in language Ex: Bat= b, a, & t (3) Ex: Chat= ch, a, t (3) English has about 40 phonemes Sometimes difficult to learn new language Let’s Practice Chops Habits Throat Block The smallest unit of meaningful sound Can be a word or part of a word Can also be parts of words like prefixes or suffixes…”s” means plural How many morphemes does cats have?

Stages of Language Acquisition

Early Stages of Language Acquisition Babbling Stage One-Word Stage “Naming Explosion” The Two-Word Stage Telegraphic Speech Stage

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007 Babbling (4 months) Stage of language acquisition where babies can produce most all of the sounds heard in any language. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sDocL7AfIRo Infants have the natural ability to produce language sounds. Children worldwide seem to learn language by going through similar stage Babbling reveals household language https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnZVpc3T60I Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007

One-Word Stage One Word Stage Ages 1-2 Stage in which children speak mainly in single words. “Mama” “Milk” instead of “I want milk” By 18 mos, learning at least a word/day. The Naming Explosion 16-24 months Period of rapid vocabulary growth “What’s that?!” “What’s that!”

Two-Word Stage One Word Stage Age 2 Stage in which children speak mainly in two-word sentences. “Mama Milk” or “Me Thirsty” Basic grammar rules first appear Telegraphic speech: contains nouns & verbs (“want juice,” “big doggy”)

How is language acquired? B.F. Skinner vs. Noam Chomsky

Language Development Operant Learning (Behaviorism) Skinner PERSPECTIVE PSYCHO- LOGIST CHARACTERISTICS Operant Learning (Behaviorism) Skinner Explain language development through learning principles: association, imitation, reinforcement (next unit) Inborn Universal Grammar Chomsky “Language Acquisition Device” Rate of learning is too fast to be explained by learning alone. We are prewired to learn language. Kids naturally overgeneralize: “holded” “tooken” Inborn Readiness Statistical Cognitive Neuroscientist Network learning: gradual changes in network connections based on experience. Infants discern word breaks by stat. analyzing which syllables most often go together (think babbling twins). Critical period for learning language = 7yrs Easier to learn 2nd language as a child How difficult is your foreign language later in life?

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007 Issues with Language Aphasia Communication disorder that results from damage to the temporal lobe that contain language Broca’s Aphasia inability to speak words Wernicke’s Aphasia inability to form language comprehension Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007 30

Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis aka linguistic determinism

Language Influences Thinking Words may not determine what we think, but they do influence our thinking Many bilinguals report they have a different sense of self depending on which language they speak English has a rich vocab for self-focused emotions such as anger While Japanese has more words for interpersonal emotions such as sympathy Bilingual children, who inhibit one language while using the other, can better inhibit their attention to irrelevant information

Thinking in Images To a large extent thinking is language-based. When alone, we may talk to ourselves. However, we also think in images. Example: Picturing yourself studying or practicing a free-throw shots will help with test scores and basketball skills OBJECTIVE 15| Discuss the value of thinking in images.