Language Acquisition Theories and Research

Introduction
Language Acquisition is the process by which humans perceive and learn language and the
rules associated with it, while also using the knowledge to produce words and sentences, thus
helping them to communicate. In addition to being central to communication, acquiring a
language is also closely tied to our perceptions and experiences in the world. In order to
ensure efficient production and communication of messages, each language follows
Grammar, a systematic set of rules that determine how our thoughts can be expressed.
Grammar includes; Phonology, Syntax and Semantics. Phonology refers to the study of the
most basic units of speech .i.e. phonemes, how they affect meaning and how they should be
used in words and sentences. English in itself contains 52 different phonemes. Syntax refers
to the rules that guide the order of words and phrases that can be used to form meaningful
sentences. Semantics focus on the references and implications of the order of words and
phrases in a sentence and how changes in the way of saying a sentence changes with its
context.
Language Acquisition is considered one of the most important milestones in the cognitive
and social development of an individual. Infants from birth to 3 to 8 months are receptive to
sounds from all languages and produce babbling sounds from a variety of languages. By the
age of 1, however, their receptivity to sounds from different languages diminishes and they
begin to specialize in the language to which they are exposed. After the age of 1, they
produce sounds similar to actual words and eventually gather a vocabulary of more than 50
words by the age of 2. This development then moves to ‘telegraphic speech’ in which the
child conveys the message using one or two words and leaving out the part of the sentence
that is not really important, for example, ‘I am drinking milk’ becomes, ‘drinking milk’
(Volterra et al., 2003). By the age of 5, he begins to understand the basic rules of grammar.
In this assignment, I will be discussing two researches pertaining to the topic and some major
approaches to the concept of Language Acquisition and their implications.
1. The State of Emergentism in Second Language Acquisition; Second Language
Research, Vol. 19; 2003
This research presented by Kevin R. Gregg, a researcher affiliated with Momoyama
University, Japan, is an argument between the Chomskian approach to Language
Acquisition and Emergentism.
Pioneered by Noam Chomsky in the second half of the 20th century, Nativism is an
approach that upholds the belief that humans are biologically programmed to
understand the Universal Grammatical structures found in every language. By virtue
of a LAD (Language Acquisition Device), or a lexicon, Chomsky believed that
children easily grasp the grammatical syntax of their native language, thus absorbing
new lexical items into their corresponding word class and syntactic context
(Chomsky, 1975).
However, this approach has been highly challenged then, because, it in no way
suggests that children are born with a lexicon and majority of linguists agree on the
 fact that all lexical items are learnt from input from the social environment. Keeping
this in mind, Kevin R. Gregg propounds the concept of Emergentism over Nativism.
This is a relatively new concept that refers to “a general approach to cognition that
stresses the interaction between organism and environment and that denies the
existence of pre-determined, domain-specific faculties or capacities.” Emergents
claim that ‘simple developmental processes, attested in cognition are sufficient to
bring about the emergence of complex language representations’. Major propagators
of this approach, like Brian MacWhinney and Ellis, claim that, “The complexity of
language emerges from relatively simple developmental processes being exposed to a
massive and complex environment.” (MacWhinney, Ellis, 1999)
They believe, ‘Language Acquisition is a cognitive process that emerges from the
interaction of biological pressures and the environment. Neither nature, nor nurture
alone is capable of triggering learning.’
Thus, ‘From this perspective, the basic idea is that, the grammatical rules and other
formal aspects of language ‘emerge’ (that is, are constructed and abstracted) from
language use and experience rather than being innate or learned as ‘abstract
structures’. (Second Language Acquisition Theories, by R. Mitchell, M. Fyles, E.
Marsden)
This also includes a model by the name of the ‘CREED MODEL’ proposed by N.C.
Ellis. It stands for, ‘Construction-based, Rational, Exemplar-Drived, Emergent,
Dialectic’ and is based on the Associative-Cognitive Learning of Language.

2. The Brain Science of Bilingualism, Naja Ferja Ramirez and Patricia Kuhl,
Young Children, Vol. 72, 2017.

This research focuses on the concept of language acquisition in children and

emphasizes in particular on Bilingual Learning. It is said that learning begins from the
last 10 weeks of pregnancy, when the baby is in the utero. The research says that
infants before birth and within a few hours are able to identify the sounds of their
mother’s language. During the 6 months after birth, infants are given the term
‘Citizens of the world’ in the sense that they are highly sensitive to sounds from many
different languages. This ability however diminishes when they are a year old. Their
sensitivity to non-native languages reduces when they begin to specialize in detecting
the sounds from the language they are most exposed to. At this point they begin
producing sounds from the language that they are most exposed to. If a child is
exposed equally to two different languages, then he/she will pick up sounds and
eventually words from both the languages. The theory of ‘Nature’ and ‘Nurture’ is
seen in the initial years of an individual’s life as it is seen that though the children are
adept at picking up words from the languages they are exposed to, interaction and
reinforcement play an extremely important role in building their proficiency in
speech. In case of both monolingual and bilingual children, it is noticed that their
language growth is directly related to the quantity and quality of speech they hear in
each language.
The concept of code mixing, which refers to a child mixing both the languages in
order to convey a message, is discussed here. A question rises, however, about
whether learning two different languages at once causes grammatical and syntactical
confusion. However, when the language development of monolingual and bilingual
children was observed, it was seen that, their vocabulary and grammatical growth
follow the same trajectory. Bilingual children divide their time between both the
languages and learn fewer words and sentences in each language. But when compared
to monolingual children who learn one language thoroughly, their development of
language is seen to be on the same level. Since, the initial years of an individual’s life
are considered to be the most critical in learning a language, DLL or Dual Language
Learners are encouraged. DLL’s are the individuals who are learning a second
language while continuing to develop the first. It is seen that, DLL’s face a mismatch
between the language learning experiences they require to develop both languages
and prepare for school and the current reality in which access to either or both
languages are limited. This research ends on the note that, all babies have the potential
to become bilingual, if only both the languages are given equal importance by their
care-givers and if opportunities to develop and enrich both the languages are
provided.

Personal Insights and Opinions

According to me, as the Emergents claim, learning a language cannot be contributed

to any single factor. The concept of tabula rasa comes into play, when an infant
grasps sounds from any language he is exposed to. Since the mind is free of any prior
information, it is highly sensitive to anything it is subjected to. At first, it is a
cacophony of different sounds and the baby grasps all that it can. Later on, only what
is conditioned through repetition and reinforcement takes up most of the baby’s
attention. This causes the baby to specialise in only what it is exposed to. Since it
forms the basis of all that an individual will learn and experience for the rest of his
life, these years are critical. And when an individual is isolated form social
interactions in these initial years, their learning of language is incomplete and can
deeply affect their capacity to learn it in the future. For example; Genie, who was
born and had lived in isolation, held captive in a room, till she was found in her
adolescence.

When one learns a language later in life, he faces difficulties. The most basic of these
lie in phonemes. An English-speaking person, who has never heard r pronounced in
French, finds it initially difficult. Similarly, a Japanese person, in whose native
language r doesn’t even exist, will face some difficulties in pronouncing English
words. There is, however, an innate ability in humans that helps them to learn
languages. Based on the concept of Learning Approach to language propounded by
Skinner, children aged 1-2, make babbling sounds that resemble simple words which
are then reinforced by their parents, and hence learnt. On the other hand, the
Interactionist Approach explains why children learn words and sentence structures
that they have never heard before. They learn to associate and generalise different
grammatical and syntactic rules in order to form new sentences.
This further attests that, there exist simple developmental processes in our cognition,
that facilitate the learning of languages.

An experiment carried out in the Stockholm, Sweden, further attests the concept of
prenatal learning. Research has proven that the linguistic journey of an infant begins
in the utero, in the last 10 weeks of pregnancy and continues after birth. The infant
learns to identify sounds from its mother’s language, mostly loud vowel sounds. In
the experiment that was conducted, 30 hour old infants were given a pacifier that was
connected to a computer. Different sounds from the native language of the infant, as
well as other non-native languages were played. The infants interest seemed to pike
when they heard sounds from non-native languages and they sucked longer on the
 pacifiers, while they sucked regularly when sounds from their native languages were
played (Lagerkrantz, Moon). An MEG scan (magneto-encephalography) on babies
while they listened to different sounds attests that the babies’ brains exhibited higher
activity when they heard unfamiliar sounds compared to when they heard familiar
sounds (Ramirez et al, 2017).
Bilingual individuals are said to possess a greater ability to learn new languages,
while also considerably lessening chances of Alzheimer’s.

In conclusion, I would focus on the capacity of humans, out of all species to learn different
languages. In order to ensure that this ability is used to the highest potential, one must
encourage DLL’s and those who wish to learn different language and thus, create
opportunities for them to engage their abilities.

References:
1. Feldman, Robert S. (2008) Understanding Psychology, 8th Edition. New York:
McGraw Hill.
2. Ciccarelli, Saundra K. White, J.Noland. (2018) Psychology, 5th Edition. India:
Pearson.
3. Gregg, Kevin R. (2003) Second Language Research, The State of Emergentism in
Second Language Acquisition. Vol. 19, No. 2. Sage Publications. Retrieved from,
JSTOR.com.
4. Ramirez, Naja Ferja. Kuhl, Patricia. (2017) The Brain Science of Bilingualism,Young
Children, Vol. 72. NAEYC. Retrieved from, JSTOR.com.

By,
Annette John
181011
FYBA - B