Key concepts and terms associated with language development include:
- Babbling—an infant’s spontaneous production of speech sounds; begins around
4 months old. - Holophrase—one-word utterances that convey meaning; characteristic of a 1-year-old.
- Telegraphic speech—meaningful two-word sentences, usually a noun and a verb,
and usually in the correct order uttered by 2-year-olds. - Overgeneralization or overregularization—application of grammatical rules
without making appropriate exceptions (“I goed to the store”). - Behavioral perspective—language is developed by imitating sounds we hear
to create words. - Nativist perspective—idea that the human brain has an innate capacity for acquiring
language (language acquisition device) possibly during a critical periodof time after
birth, and that children are born with a universal sense of grammar (Noam Chomsky). - Social interactivist perspective—babies are biologically equipped for learning
language, which may be activated or constrained by experience.
Linguistic relativity hypothesis—our language guides and determines our thinking
(Whorf ). It is more accurate to say that language influences thought.
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