PSYC 310 Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: Steven Pinker, Kim Kardashian, Linguistic Competence
9 Apr 2018
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Nativist perspective of language learning (summary: humans are born with the capacity for language. Particularly, the ability to develop grammatical structure: research by steven pinker shows that children know grammatical rules (e. g. , plural, past tense) without having directly modeled it. They were given a new word, and seen if they understand how to make a plural: an important developmental trend is that children first use correct exceptions, then they engage in overgeneralizations of a grammatical rule. Kids who have never learnt a language till a certain period of time, will they be able to acquire language after. Discover in 1970 at 13 years of age. Never spoken to or allowed to speak. After intervention, she learned some words, but her grammatical understanding never exceeded that of a 2. 5-year-old. This suggests that exposure to a language early in life is critical for the normal development of language, especially complex grammar.
