INFANCY Cognitive and Language Development

Cognitive Development

Learning: A Definition  Change in behavior  Change must be relatively stable.  Change must result from experience.

How Soon Do Infants Start Learning?  Learning in the Womb  De Casper  Cat in the Hat  Newborn Learning  Sameroff’s experiments

Piaget: The Sensorimotor Period  Refers to the coordination of motor activities with sensory inputs.  Capacity to look at what they’re listening to  Object permanence: Capacity to view the external world as permanent  Inability to represent world internally

Neo-and Post-Piagetian Research  Playing is Learning  Playing gives babies clues as to what they should do and when they should do it.  Consequences of Maternal Depression  Youngster lags behind in emotional, language and social development

Bruner on Modes of Cognitive Representation  We “know” something in three ways:  Enactive: doing it  Ikonic: picture or image of it  Symbolic: language

Continuity in Cognitive Development from Infancy  Decrement and Recovery in Attentiveness  Two components of attention indicative of intelligence in youngsters:  Decrement of attention  Recovery of attention

Language and Thought

Language  Language: a structured system of sound patterns that have socially standardized meanings.

The Functional Importance of Language  Two contributions:  Communication: The process by which people transmit information, ideas, attitudes and emotions  Facilitation of thought and other processes.

Language as Container of Thought  Thought takes place independently of language  Words are only necessary to convey thought to others.

Language as a Determinant of Thought  Language develops parallel with, or prior to, thought.  Conceptualization: Grouping perceptions into classes or categories based on similarities.

Theories of Language Acquisition

Nativist Theories  Noam Chomsky et.al.  Human beings begin life with the underpinnings of later speech perception and comprehension.  “Pre-wired” by their brain circuitry for language use

Chomsky’s Theory of Language Development  Language Acquisition Device  All languages possess:  Surface Structure  Deep Structure  Transformational grammar biologically built in.

Other Nativist Studies Other Nativist Studies n The Twins’ Early Development Study (TEDS) n The Cambridge Language and Speech Project n Genetics of Developmental Dyslexia n International Molecular Genetics Study of Autism

Arguments for Nativist Theories  Children Acquire Language with Little Difficulty  Adult Speech is Inconsistent, Garbled and Sloppy  Children’s Speech is not a Mechanical Playback of Adult Speech.

Learning and Interactionist Theories  Caretaker Speech  Interactional Nature of Caretaker Speech  Motherese

Language Development

Communication Processes  Nonverbal Communication or Body Language  Physical movements  Gaze  Pointing  Paralanguage

The Sequence of Language Development  From Vocalization to Babbling  Babbling  Receptive Vocabulary  Holophrases  Overextension  Two-Word Sentences  Telegraphic Speech

Bilingualism  Critical period of language acquisition: prior to onset of puberty  Best time to learn a new language is early in life.