TOPIC 1: LANGUAGE ACQUISITION
1. Linguistic
Linguistic: the scientific study of language, including its structure (grammar), meaning (semantics), sound
(phonetics), and how it is used in social contexts (sociolinguistics).
A linguist is a scientist who studies human language the same way a biologist might study the song of a
particular species of bird
● What are they communicating by babbling
● Do humans know how to speak from birth? or do they need to learn it from someone?
● how do they physically produce their sounds
● How are they coding the message
● How old are they when they start to babble? or to speak?
● Are there speaking features by all humans in the world?
● or do they vary according to where they Live/sex/age?
● What is learnt/acquired first? and what last?
→ these are some of the questions that a linguistic pose when it comes to the human being
2. (Human) language
● What is a language?
Language refers to the grammar and other rules and norms that allow humans to make utterances and
sounds in a way that others can understand. It is a systematic means of communicating ideas or feelings by
the use of conventionalized signs, sounds, gestures, or marks having understood meanings.
● Are languages acquired or learnt?
The answer depends on the context and the stage of life in which a person is exposed to the language.
1. Language is acquired in early childhood
- Language acquisition refers to the natural, subconscious process of gaining the ability to
understand and produce language, typically during early childhood.
- Children acquire their first language without formal instruction by being immersed in a
language-rich environment.
- This process is driven by innate human abilities, often referred to in theories like Noam
Chomsky's "Universal Grammar."
2. Language is learned later in life
- Language learning usually refers to the conscious effort to study a language, often in a
classroom setting.
- This applies to second (or additional) languages learned after the critical period of early
childhood.
- It involves explicit instruction, grammar rules, vocabulary drills, and practice.
In summary:
● First languages are acquired.
● Second (or additional) languages are often learned
However, with enough immersion and natural exposure, even a second language can be "acquired" rather
than "learned" in a traditional sense. The distinction lies more in the process and context than in the
language itself.
● How is this process developed?
First language (L1) Second language (L2)
● Developed naturally and unconsciously ● Often involves formal instruction or guided learning.
● The child listens first, then starts repeating sounds, ● Requires practice, understanding of grammar rules,
forming words and sentences. and sometimes translation from L1.
● Occurs in a social and emotional context ● Can be influenced by motivation and learning
● It can be broken into stages: environment.
- Pre-talking
- Babbling
- Holophastic
- The two-word stage
- Telegraphic
- Later multiword
Factors influencing language development
● Age (younger learners generally acquire languages more naturally)
● Environment (rich linguistic exposure speeds up acquisition)
● Motivation (especially for second language learners)
● Cognitive abilities (memory, attention, and analytical skills)
● Social interaction (dialogue and real-world usage are key)
● Are there any differences OR similarities between learning your mother tongue (L1) and
other --subsequent-- languages (L2/Ln)?
Similarities
Aspect Explanation
Basic cognitive mechanism Both rely on memory, pattern recognition, and interaction with input.
Stages of development Learners often progress from basic understanding and production to more complex structures.
Importance of exposure Rich and meaningful exposure is key for both L1 and L2/Ln development.
Role of social interaction Conversations and real communication help cement language use in both.
Potential for fluency With enough exposure and use, both can lead to native-like fluency (though harder for L2).
Differences
L1 (mother tongue) L2 (subsequent languages)
Age of acquisition Learned from birth, during critical period (0–7 years Often learned later, after critical period
typically)
Environment Natural, immersive, constan Can be natural or formal; often limited or
structured
Conscious effort Mostly subconscious Often requires conscious study and memorization
Pronunciation Near-native by default Accents are common, especially if learned later
Speed of learning Rapid, especially in early years Usually slower and more effortful
Error correction Happens naturally through interaction Often corrected formally by teachers or
self-monitoring
Motivation Innate and necessary for communication May vary depending on context (e.g., school, job,
travel)
Fossilization risk Rare Common—learners may permanently retain
incorrect forms
● And between adults and children?
Similarities
Aspect Explanation
Need for exposure Both require consistent input and interaction to make progress
Depend on motivation Interest and purpose help drive learning in both groups
Can benefit from immersion Natural environments accelerate learning for both
Pass through stages Both go from simple to more complex use of language over time
Differences
Children Adults
Brain plasticity High—ideal for natural language acquisition Lower—but still capable of learning, just with
more effort
Accent and Often achieve native-like accents easily Rarely achieve native-like accents, especially if
pronunciation learning starts late
Learning approach Implicit and intuitive—through play, context, More explicit—rely on rules, logic, and
and social cues structured learning
Speed of acquisition Slower start, but deep and natural mastery over Faster early progress (especially in vocabulary and
time grammar), but plateau is common
Fear of making mistakes Low—kids experiment freely High—adults may fear embarrassment, which
slows practice
Memory type Rely more on procedural (unconscious) Rely more on declarative (conscious) memory
memory
Motivation source Often intrinsic (to communicate and belong) Often extrinsic (job, travel, academic goals)
Correction response More flexible—adapt quickly to feedback More resistant—mistakes can become fossilized
● Regarding their first language, what do children learn at home and what at school?
Home:
● Basic communication skills
● Pronunciation and intonation
● Social language use (pragmatics)
● Vocabulary related to daily life
● Cultural references
● Emotional connection to language
This is the foundation for all later language development. It's usually unconscious and deeply rooted in
real-world experience
School:
● Standard grammar and usage
● Academic vocabulary
● Reading and writing
● Listening and speaking skills
● Language variation awareness
● Metalinguistic awareness
School reinforces language as a tool for thinking, reasoning, and learning—not just for communication.
Language features
● Sign/code (semiotics)
To talk about element A, we use B
- Speech is the most important communication tool for human beings
- “There is no single society where a communication system has been developed without oral
language” (Cassany et al., 2003, p. 35)
- What is code? :
1. articulation: made of different elements, each one contributing with a particular meaning
2. articulation: made of different elements, each one does not contribute with a particular meaning
Book catalogue number at the library. What makes the reference unique is the number and the
numerical order itself
3. Double articulation: these signs contain both 1st and 2nd articulation meanings within a
particular code
→ Advantage: with very few elements, we can create infinite messages
● A language is a system
A language is called a system because it is made up of organized and structured elements that work together
to create meaning. Like any system, it has rules and parts that function in coordination.
1. structure and rules (grammar)
Language has rules about how words are formed and arranged:
- Example: in english we say “she eats an apple”, not “Eats she apple an”
- These rules guide word order, verb tense, agreement…
2. components that work together
Language includes different parts:
- Sound (phonology): how words sound
- Words (morphology): how words are built
- Sentences (syntax): how words form sentences
- Meaning (semantics): what words/sentences mean
- Use (pragmatics): how language is used in context
Each part interacts with the others like in a machine or a system
3. predictability and consistency
- Consistency: native speakers follow shred patterns
- Prediction: we can understand and procedure new sentences we’ve never heard before because we
know the rules
4. it can be studied scientifically
Since language behaves systematically, it can be studied like a science (this is what linguistics does).
● Another important traits
1. reflexiveness: The ability to speak about our own language/speech
2. prevarication: The ability to convey information that does not reflect the reality (i.e., to convey
false messages).
3. vocal/auditory channel: Thanks to the phono-articulatory system, speakers can hear whatever
they convey. Therefore, they have the opportunity to correct their messages and receive complete
feedback. Other animal species do not possess this ability.
4. arbitrariness: The link between our speech signs and the elements they are denoting from reality is
completely arbitrary. This may also happen in other species. For instance, bees use certain
movements to convey different messages (i.e., where the nearest flower is). However, in their case,
these dances are determined by genetics. In our case, these are the result of society agreements
(within our community of speakers).
5. displacement: The ability to refer to elements which are distant in time or space, or to talk about
imaginary elements.
6. productivity: The ability to create new messages, in order to refer to new events or experiences
3. Nature vs. nurture
Nature Nurture
It’s genetics!!! It’s experience!!!
The genetic information and structure of the plant guarantee The way I take care of the plant, the environment where I have
that it will always grow blue flowers planted it, etc. will be crucial for it to grow blue flowers
Nature (biological/innate factors) Nurture (environmental/social factors)
Belief Humans are born with a natural ability to acquire Language is learned through interaction, imitation,
language. and experience.
Supporters Noam Chomsky and others. Behaviorists like B.F. Skinner.
Key concept "Universal Grammar" – an inborn set of rules or ● Children learn by listening to others.
structure that all human languages share. ● Social interaction and feedback help shape
language use.
● Quality and quantity of exposure matter (e.g.
talking to infants helps them develop faster).
Evidence ● All children go through similar stages of
language development.
● Children can create grammar even if
exposed to poor or limited language input
(e.g. invented sign languages).
Today, most experts agree that language development is a mix of both:
● Nature gives us the brain structure and capacity for language
● Nurture provides the input and interaction needed to activate and shape the ability
How is a language developed
Language development happens in stages, especially during early childhood:
1. pre-talking stage: Also known as the cooing stage, infants produce soft, vowel-like sounds such as
“ah,” “oh,” and “uh.” These sounds are not yet intentional communication but show an early
response to human voices.
2. babbling stage: Infants begin to combine consonants and vowels into repetitive syllables such as
“ba-ba-ba” or “da-da-da.” Though these combinations resemble speech, they do not carry meaning
yet.
3. holofrástica stage: In this stage, children begin using single words (holophrases) to express whole
ideas or sentences. The same word may mean different things depending on context and tone.
4. two-word stage: Children start combining two words to express simple ideas and relationships.
These combinations show early syntax and meaning.
5. telegraphic stage: Utterances become longer and more sentence-like but omit grammatical
function words (e.g., “is,” “the”). The speech resembles a telegram: essential content words only.
6. later multiword stage: Children begin to use more complete and complex sentences. Vocabulary
expands rapidly, and utterances show clearer grammar and intention.
4. Theories of language acquisition
1. Behaviourism (B.F. Skinner 1904-1990)
● A very popular theory for a great part of the 20th century
● Antecedents: Behavioral psychology (Pavlov’s dog)
● A process of stimulus and response: habit forming.
● Language is learned by imitation.
● The child produces a sound and the caretaker reinforces that action positively.
● The general process of positive reinforcement will take to full language abilities.
Limitations of the theory:
The language stimulus transports very little information
● Poverty of stimulus problem
● Plato’s problem / Induction problem
How could it be that children produce structures they have never heard (but which resemble the underlying
logic of their mother tongue)? (has ponido*)
Languages must therefore be the product of our mind
2. Innatism (N. Chomsky 1928)
● Chomsky’s theory as a response to behaviorism.
● Children do not only imitate, they also create their own rules.
● Universal Grammar (UG)
- Proposed in the 80s
- “genetically determined part of language faculty”
- An attempt to develop a set of rules that could be used to produce, or generate any sentence of any
language (even if we have never heard them before)
- 2 layers
- Deep structure (the content that the speaker aims to convey)
- surface structure (the grammatical forms used to convey that content)
Together with David McNeill, he developed the theory of Language Acquisition Device (LAD):
Depending on the input certain rules (parameters) will be activated and other not
INPUT → genetic provision on needed → OUTPUT
Limitations of the theory:
● Languages do not have so many features which can work as switches
- There may be exceptions to the rule
- There are about 6000-8000 languages in the world. It’s difficult to posit that such universal rules
exist if not all of them have been analyzed (absence of evidence ≠ evidence of absence)
● It does not account for the process of acquisition
● It seems as if language acquisition would take place in laboratories (and not as part of social
interaction)
● No active role of the child is recognized. They are just passive subjects who receive linguistic input
● No longer accepted in language acquisition
3. Cognitivism (J. Piaget 1896-1980)
● Also known as developmental cognitive theory
● It shares certain aspects with Chomsky's innatism
- Language → Symbolic system to convey meaning
- Competence vs. Performance
- Surface and deep structure
● According to Piaget, it is linguistic performance that offers the most informative data about
language acquisition
● Children’s cognitive abilities are considered different from those of the adult
● Understanding these capacities is essential to comprehend how language acquisition takes place
● Linguistic errors provide a window to mind structure
Evidence for Evidence against
● Lexical explosion: at the end of the 2nd year, when ● Correlation is not causation
the sensorimotor stage is developing ● Curtiss (1981), Curtiss et al. (1979): Girls with
● 2-word combination → End of sensorimotor stage Turner’s syndrome did bad at the conservation tasks,
● Transitioning from 1-word utterances to word chains but did not have any difficulty in using the language
is related to the “chunking” cognitive ability ● Genie’s extreme case: semantics and cognition on one
● Production of grammar morphemes comes when the side, syntax and morphology separately
grammatical meaning encapsulated by those ● We still need to acknowledge the influence of the social
morphemes is understood environment, as it is not stressed enough in this theory
- Children will not start producing the past
forms if they have not yet understood the
permanence of objects
4. Socio-interactionism (L.Vygotsky 1896-1934)
● Thinking and Speech, Vygotsky’s main publication, appeared in English in 1962 for the first time,
but it did not become popular until the 70s
● Context: Soviet Union, in favour of the Revolution, influenced by Marxist philosophy
● Core of the theory: individual learning and higher order psychological development (reasoning,
problem solving) are always framed within a given social environment
● Piaget’s opposite argument: it is language that enables thinking and higher order
● mental abilities (not the other way round)
● 2 main concepts
- Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD): current stage (able to do it without any help) → tutor’s
stage (unable to do it even with help provision/explanation)
- Connection between internal and external processes
- In the first years, the child uses the language just for communication (not as a thinking tool). As
they grow older…
- Language and thought become more and more intertwined
- Private speech → Cognitive tool, problem resolution strategy
● Bruner continued with Vygotsky’s work in the West (Europe and USA)
● Language differs from other kinds of behaviours → It has some specific rules (Gleason, 2001)
● These rules derive from communicative needs
● The environment triggers certain cognitive processes
- Halfway between behaviourism and innatism
