Child Language Acquisition - Interaction with Caregivers Exam Answer
“Interaction with caregivers is the most important influence on a child’s language development”
Evaluate this view of children’s language development.
Question 4:
https://filestore.aqa.org.uk/resources/english/AQA-77021-SQP.PDF
Interaction with caregivers is considered a very important part of Child Language Acquisition; however whether or not it is the most important is a question that divides linguists. Some believe that language is an innate ability, such as Chomsky. However others, like Skinner, believe children develop through their exposure to child-directed speech – the way in which adults speak to children. Joey, from Data Set 1, is clearly in the post-telegraphic stage due to his ability to use interrogatives, auxiliary verbs and negation.
Bruner believed that child-directed speech was a contributor to a Language Acquisition Support System (LASS) which children use to acquire language. This means they rely on the words and actions of caregivers who provide them with ritualised scenarios and contexts to help prepare them for conversation. This can be seen when Joey’s caregiver encourages him with the interrogatives ‘what shall we play with’ and ‘are we going to cook dinner’, showing that the caregiver wants Joey to think about what he is doing and phonetically respond. This leads to the creation of adjacency pairs when Joey responds ‘ok (.) I’ve got my saucepan’ and later attempts to mimic a server/waiter by saying ‘what would you like today (.) sir’. Joey has presumably been to a restaurant at some point which is likely where he picked up the formal address ‘sir’. This shows that the adults around Joey and the context his caregiver provided him has shaped his pragmatic awareness and expanded his vocabulary. He is now able to use this to perform Halliday’s imaginative function through role play. This shows that caregiver interaction is very important.
This can also be seen through the caregiver method of positive and negative reinforcement, as theorised by Skinner in his behaviourist theory. This is when a caregiver uses child-directed speech to repeat lexis back to children so they learn to pronounce it correctly. This occurs when Joey uses the assimilation ‘crawns’ instead of ‘prawns’ and the caregiver responds with ‘no (.) not crawns (.) prawns’. Skinner believed this is the case as we are all born as blank slates and so rely on caregivers to talk to us and provide us with the lexis we need to build up routines in our heads that we will eventually be able to communicate verbally.
Deb Roy filmed this happened when his son learnt to say the concrete noun ‘water’ after previously pronouncing it as the reduplication ‘gaga’. Every time the child requested ‘gaga’ the caregiver would provide it and say ‘here’s your water’ which the child was eventually able to say. This shows a child’s semantic awareness outstrips their phonetic ability and so it is their caregivers that they focus on and use to help them understand and develop this ability. Therefore, caregiver interaction is very significant.
Whereas, Joey still makes virtuous errors. He uses the non-plural version of the verb ‘to be’ with the plural noun ‘books’, leading him to say ‘that’s my daddy’s books that is’. The contraption ‘that’s’ and the possessive ‘daddy’s’ shows he is advanced in his lexis but is still able to overgeneralise, and this can’t be a result of caregiver interaction as it can be assumed Joey has never heard an adult say ‘that’s my daddy’s books that is’. This shows children may have natural abilities to pick up grammatical rules and apply them before they’ve even heard an adult say them. This was studied by Berko-Gleesen in the ‘Wug Test’, where children were able to change the tense, manner and amount of a lexis that didn’t even exist. This shows that children are able to adapt words to context without the influence of a caregiver. It can also be relevant to play as joey uses the assimilation ‘saucy pan’ whilst pretending to cook. However, this could be a result of potential playful child-directed speech his caregivers use around him or the lazy norms that society has accepted as an everyday part of people’s language. Not all virtuous errors are a result of the child, some are the way society allows us to be lazy or humorous with our language.
Another theorist who did not believe caregiver interaction was the most important was Chomsky. Chomsky, in his nativist theory, stated that we are all born with a Language Acquisition Device (LAD) that allows us to hear what is spoken around us and naturally apply it to our own speech. This can be seen through Joey’s use of the pre-modified noun ‘cooker book’. Usually we would call this a cook book, but because Joey has potentially never heard this said before he has over-generalised and used the typical verb ending ‘er’. This shows Joey did not require caregiver interaction to pick up on and apply a grammatical rule. He is also able to correctly use interrogatives – ‘do you know what happens to it’ – which he has presumably learnt through rising intonation until he can correctly do it himself, as all interrogatives are different so Joey had to learn to put the words together himself to request what he needed. Scientific evidence for a LAD is the gene FoxP2 which was discovered to be in our DNA in 2001 and helps us acquire language. People with defects in this gene struggle to talk. This shows caregiver interaction would not be considered important if we didn’t have a LAD in the first place.
However, Chomsky’s theory is dated and children still can’t learn to talk without a caregiver, even if they do have a LAD. This is proven by a feral child Genie who grew up without a caregiver and was never spoken to until after puberty. Genie was able to reach the holophrastic stage but never picked up syntactic development and so couldn’t apply grammar. This shows we have a Critical Acquisition Period (CAP) that lasts from birth to puberty in which we must be spoken to by a caregiver or our LAD is useless. This is evident through how Joey, a three year old, is able to use more advanced vocabulary than Genie as caregiver interaction has enhanced his pragmatic awareness and he is able to say multi-clausal declaratives e.g. ‘do you know what happens to it (.) it breaks’ that include the concept of cause and effect. This shows caregiver interaction is important as a child without a caregiver can only develop lexis, not grammar.
To conclude, both caregiver interaction and children’s ingrained abilities are crucial to language development and it could be theorised that you cannot have one without the other. Having a LAD means you can actually learn to talk but caregiver interaction allows you to apply this to real-life contexts, which is just as important or communication is useless. This shows caregiver interaction is hugely significant, but requires the presence of a LAD (e.g. FoxP2).
Evaluate this view of children’s language development.
Question 4:
https://filestore.aqa.org.uk/resources/english/AQA-77021-SQP.PDF
Interaction with caregivers is considered a very important part of Child Language Acquisition; however whether or not it is the most important is a question that divides linguists. Some believe that language is an innate ability, such as Chomsky. However others, like Skinner, believe children develop through their exposure to child-directed speech – the way in which adults speak to children. Joey, from Data Set 1, is clearly in the post-telegraphic stage due to his ability to use interrogatives, auxiliary verbs and negation.
Bruner believed that child-directed speech was a contributor to a Language Acquisition Support System (LASS) which children use to acquire language. This means they rely on the words and actions of caregivers who provide them with ritualised scenarios and contexts to help prepare them for conversation. This can be seen when Joey’s caregiver encourages him with the interrogatives ‘what shall we play with’ and ‘are we going to cook dinner’, showing that the caregiver wants Joey to think about what he is doing and phonetically respond. This leads to the creation of adjacency pairs when Joey responds ‘ok (.) I’ve got my saucepan’ and later attempts to mimic a server/waiter by saying ‘what would you like today (.) sir’. Joey has presumably been to a restaurant at some point which is likely where he picked up the formal address ‘sir’. This shows that the adults around Joey and the context his caregiver provided him has shaped his pragmatic awareness and expanded his vocabulary. He is now able to use this to perform Halliday’s imaginative function through role play. This shows that caregiver interaction is very important.
This can also be seen through the caregiver method of positive and negative reinforcement, as theorised by Skinner in his behaviourist theory. This is when a caregiver uses child-directed speech to repeat lexis back to children so they learn to pronounce it correctly. This occurs when Joey uses the assimilation ‘crawns’ instead of ‘prawns’ and the caregiver responds with ‘no (.) not crawns (.) prawns’. Skinner believed this is the case as we are all born as blank slates and so rely on caregivers to talk to us and provide us with the lexis we need to build up routines in our heads that we will eventually be able to communicate verbally.
Deb Roy filmed this happened when his son learnt to say the concrete noun ‘water’ after previously pronouncing it as the reduplication ‘gaga’. Every time the child requested ‘gaga’ the caregiver would provide it and say ‘here’s your water’ which the child was eventually able to say. This shows a child’s semantic awareness outstrips their phonetic ability and so it is their caregivers that they focus on and use to help them understand and develop this ability. Therefore, caregiver interaction is very significant.
Whereas, Joey still makes virtuous errors. He uses the non-plural version of the verb ‘to be’ with the plural noun ‘books’, leading him to say ‘that’s my daddy’s books that is’. The contraption ‘that’s’ and the possessive ‘daddy’s’ shows he is advanced in his lexis but is still able to overgeneralise, and this can’t be a result of caregiver interaction as it can be assumed Joey has never heard an adult say ‘that’s my daddy’s books that is’. This shows children may have natural abilities to pick up grammatical rules and apply them before they’ve even heard an adult say them. This was studied by Berko-Gleesen in the ‘Wug Test’, where children were able to change the tense, manner and amount of a lexis that didn’t even exist. This shows that children are able to adapt words to context without the influence of a caregiver. It can also be relevant to play as joey uses the assimilation ‘saucy pan’ whilst pretending to cook. However, this could be a result of potential playful child-directed speech his caregivers use around him or the lazy norms that society has accepted as an everyday part of people’s language. Not all virtuous errors are a result of the child, some are the way society allows us to be lazy or humorous with our language.
Another theorist who did not believe caregiver interaction was the most important was Chomsky. Chomsky, in his nativist theory, stated that we are all born with a Language Acquisition Device (LAD) that allows us to hear what is spoken around us and naturally apply it to our own speech. This can be seen through Joey’s use of the pre-modified noun ‘cooker book’. Usually we would call this a cook book, but because Joey has potentially never heard this said before he has over-generalised and used the typical verb ending ‘er’. This shows Joey did not require caregiver interaction to pick up on and apply a grammatical rule. He is also able to correctly use interrogatives – ‘do you know what happens to it’ – which he has presumably learnt through rising intonation until he can correctly do it himself, as all interrogatives are different so Joey had to learn to put the words together himself to request what he needed. Scientific evidence for a LAD is the gene FoxP2 which was discovered to be in our DNA in 2001 and helps us acquire language. People with defects in this gene struggle to talk. This shows caregiver interaction would not be considered important if we didn’t have a LAD in the first place.
However, Chomsky’s theory is dated and children still can’t learn to talk without a caregiver, even if they do have a LAD. This is proven by a feral child Genie who grew up without a caregiver and was never spoken to until after puberty. Genie was able to reach the holophrastic stage but never picked up syntactic development and so couldn’t apply grammar. This shows we have a Critical Acquisition Period (CAP) that lasts from birth to puberty in which we must be spoken to by a caregiver or our LAD is useless. This is evident through how Joey, a three year old, is able to use more advanced vocabulary than Genie as caregiver interaction has enhanced his pragmatic awareness and he is able to say multi-clausal declaratives e.g. ‘do you know what happens to it (.) it breaks’ that include the concept of cause and effect. This shows caregiver interaction is important as a child without a caregiver can only develop lexis, not grammar.
To conclude, both caregiver interaction and children’s ingrained abilities are crucial to language development and it could be theorised that you cannot have one without the other. Having a LAD means you can actually learn to talk but caregiver interaction allows you to apply this to real-life contexts, which is just as important or communication is useless. This shows caregiver interaction is hugely significant, but requires the presence of a LAD (e.g. FoxP2).
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