Language development

Question 1

What are the critical periods for developing language?

Answer 1

• children who are not exposed to language (deprived) never acquire more than rudimentary language, despite of therapy
• babies can distinguish all phonemes, but by 18 months, we lose the ability to distinguish those we have not heard

Question 2

At what age should we learn a second language to be fluent?

Answer 2

7

Question 3

Describe the Behaviorist Approach.

Answer 3

• Language development occurs through the principles of learning including association and reinforcement and habit forming
• children modify their language through imitation and reinforcement from parents

Question 4

What are some criticism of the Behaviorist Approach?

Answer 4

• learn words too fast for them to be learned through reinforcement

Question 5

Describe the Nativist Approach.

Answer 5

• language as basic instinct hardwired into our brains
• language develops in children exposed to it, no teaching or training of reinforcement required

Question 6

What are some criticism of the Nativist Approach?

Answer 6

• the underlying feature of the language acquisition device are not entirely universal
• languages without nouns or verb phrases, or tenses

Question 7

Describe the Connectionist Approach.

Answer 7

• concerned with word associations
• linkages depend on the relative strength of synaptic connections in the relevant parts of the brain

Question 7

Is language development uniquely human?

Answer 7

Many ave tried to learn chimps language (either spoken or ASL)
- some conflicting results
- spoken language cannot be learned be chimps
- ASL somewhat learned, but only basic sentences (one chimp learned > 1000 signs, but makes signs in rapid sequences with no meaning)
- using a lexigram board, a chimp at 8 y/o is comparable to a 2 y/o, and unlikely to improve

Question 8

What is Specific Language Impairment Syndrome?

Answer 8

Developemental delay in the acquisition of language with no other developmental delay
Genes: FOXP2, CNTNAP2, KIAA0319

Question 9

What is William’s syndrome?

Answer 9

Mild to moderate intellectual disability, but highly verbal relative to their IQ, overly sociable, having what has been described as a “cocktail party” type personality
- genes: deletion of 27 genes one of two chromosome7

Question 10

What is Developmental Language Disorder?

Answer 10

Umbrella term to describe children whom experience language difficulities that create barriers to communication or learning, and whose problems are unlikely to be resolved by 5, and whose problems are not associated with known biomedical conditions (brain injury…)
Extremely common

Question 11

Which disorders are DLD associated with?

Answer 11

Autism spectrum disorder, intellectual disability, sensory-neural hearing loss, ADHA, dyslexia ect

Question 12

What are some of the long term impacts of DLD?

Answer 12

• 4 x more likely to have maths difficulities
• 2x more likely to be unemployed in adulthood
• lower education attainment
• 2x more likely to develop emotional problems, and behavioral difficulities
• difficulities in establishing peer relationships

Question 13

Are there a genetic suceptibility to DLD?

Answer 13

Yes

Question 14

Explain the neurobiology of DLD.

Answer 14

Structural alterations in traditional cortical language areas, and in traditional cortical-subcortical connectivity

Question 15

What are some environmental modulators of DLD?

Answer 15

• premature birth/low birth weight
• birth complications
• poor nutrition
• maternal smoking (during pregnancy)
• being a younger sibling
• lower maternal education

Question 16

What are the Shape Coding System?

Answer 16

A system using shapes to code grammar rules (for visualization): helps DLD children