Lecture 13:Language development in children- Dr.Reem AlSabah
Psycholinguistics
1. Nastiti Adi Hapsari 12-121
Ludgardis Venny C. A. 12-125
Agnes Febrian Harlan 12-127
Andi Lintang Pertiwi 12-143
2. Psycholingustics is a study of language
and the mind.
This explores what goes on human’s mind as an individual
acquires, comprehends, produces, and stores
language.
3. Psycholinguistics Evidence
The mind cannot be directly observed
1. Observation of spontaneous utterances
more informative
learn from child’s mistake, e.g. saying foots
instead of feet
2. Psycholinguistics experiments
‘lexical decision task’
recognizing a word as being a word, e.g.
vleesidence
4. Acquiring Language
• Language has all the characteristics of
maturationally controlled behavior.
• Animal behavior
natural : dogs bark
unnatural : dogs are taught to beg
• Individuals will reach the maturation, so they
are biologically ready to learn the behavior
from their surroundings.
5. The Content-Process Controversy
• Each person is innately programmed to speak.
• Children are social beings who have a great
need to interact with those around them.
- the social nature of language
- the role of parents
• Humans are naturally ‘tuned in’ to language.
They instinctively pick out speech sounds, and
know how to build them into linguistics
grammars.
6. The Rule-governed Nature of Child Language
The learning
processes of children
are more complex
because they are not
simply imitating what
they hear going on
around them.
• A child might first use the
mere word “what” in a
phrase with a single verb,
example:
- What mummy doing?
- What daddy doing?
• Then only gradually extend
it to other verbs, as in:
- What kitty eating?
- What mummy sewing?
7. Learning the Meaning of Words
• When children have to learn not only the
syntax and sounds of their language, but also
the meaning of words.
• Undergeneralization
Snow = white, meanwhile paper ≠ white
• Overgeneralization
small things: crumb
shiny things: moon
8. Doing It by Hands
• Sign language = used for them who can’t hear
• Sign language is important for children to start
acquiring it young.
• In Nicaragua, a community of deaf youngsters
has invented its own sign language.
9. Recognizing Words
Listeners were asked to interpret the following
sentence:
- Paint the fence and the ?ate gate
- Check the calendar and the ?ate date
How do speakers make the guesses?
10. • Serial processing
the liistener check through the possible
candidate one after the other
• Parallel processing
the possibilities are considered
subconsciously at the same time
11. Understanding Syntax
The boy kicked the ball threw it back.
Most people feel that there is something wrong
with it, that there is a word left out
somewhere, and that it would preferably be:
The boy who kicked the ball threw it back
The boy kicked the ball, then threw it back.
12. Speech Production
• Speech production involves at least two types
of process
- Words selection
- Integration to syntax
• Useful clues to those processes:
- Slips of the tongue
- Pauses (where the speaker stops to think)
14. Selection errors tell us how individual words are stored
and selected.
Assemblage errors indicate how whole sequences are
organized ready for production.
For example, mistakes nearly always take place within a
single ‘tone-group’.
Example:
antidote for ‘anecdote’, confusion for ‘conclusion’
15. Speech Disorders
speakers have some speech,
but speech a rather odd kind.
e.g. Rabbit = apple and rhubarb
speak fluently but tend to
make no sense.
e.g. I can’t mention the tarripoi.
a state where someone talks
with no grammar.
e.g. “Why.. Errr.. No.. Barbara
wife.... And..., oh...”
Aphasia
Fluent Aphasia
Agrammatism
16. Language and the Brain
• Left : controls right side more
powerful and dominant
• Right : controls left side
Hemisphere
Right
Left