Theories on Language

Acquisition and
Development

Members:
Jelyn Aquiño
Cristal Mae Patani
Gracelyn Peñaranda
Joy Ann Espadon
What is language
acquisition?
 Language acquisition is a process
which starts 3 months before birth
(Elman et al. 1996; Karmiloff and
Karmiloff-Smith 2001) and gradually
leads to the child’s mastery of his/her
native language/s, at around
adolescence.
 Language development is the
process through which children
acquire the ability to process speech
and communicate. During this
process, a child may slowly
understand basic linguistic patterns
and expand their vocabulary
gradually before achieving fluency.
 Theories of
Language 04 Interactionist
01 Behavioural
Theory
Theory Acquisition

Cognitive 03 Nativist
02
Theory Theory
 Behavioural
Theory
Behaviourism proposes that we are a
product of our environment. Therefore, children
have no internal mechanism or ability to
develop language by themselves. BF Skinner
(1957) suggests that children learn the
language first by imitating their caregivers
(usually parents) and then modifying their use
of language due to operant conditioning.
 Cognitive Theory

The Cognitive theory of language acquisition

suggests that the primary drives behind our
actions are our thoughts and internal
processes. Jean Piaget (1923) assumes that
children are born with relatively little cognitive
ability, but their minds develop and build new
schemas (ideas and understanding of how the
world works) as they age and experience the
world around them.
Piaget's Four
Stages of
Cognitive
Development
• Sensorimotor Stage

• Pre-operational Stage

• Concrete Operational Stage

• Formal Operational Stage

 • Sensorimotor
Stage
This takes place from birth to around
two years of age. At this stage, the child
is developing sensory coordination and
interacting with their environment by
feeling and playing with things. Their
use of language extends primarily to
babbles and few spoken words.
 • Pre-operational
Stage

Takes place from ages two to

seven. At this stage, children are able
to use language with a better grasp of
grammatical structure, context, and
syntax. Child thinking at this stage is
still very egocentric (their
understanding of the world is limited
to how it affects them).
 • Concrete Operational Stage

It takes place from ages seven to

eleven. At this stage, children
understand concepts such as time,
numbers, and object properties and
gain reasoning and logic, which allows
them to rationalise their beliefs and
speak in greater detail about their own
thoughts and the world around them.
 • Formal Operational
Stage

This takes place from twelve years old to

adulthood. At this stage, children can engage
in higher reasoning and think and speak
about the abstract, such as hypotheticals,
morals, and political systems. Language is
essentially unlimited, as there is no cognitive
limit to one's understanding of the world at
this stage.
 Nativist Theory
by Noam Chomsky

Nativist theorists argue that children

are born with an innate ability to
organize laws of language, which
enables children to easily learn a native
language. They believe that children
have language-specific abilities that
assist them as they work towards
mastering a language.
 Interactionist
Theory
Jerome Bruner (1961) believed that
children are born with an ability to
develop language but they require
regular interaction with their caregivers
or teachers to learn and understand it to
a level of full fluency. This idea is known
as the Language Acquisition Support
System (LASS).
Piaget’s Constructivist Theory

Piaget’s constructivist theory argues that

language is constructed by following
cognitive development. In other words,
people develop their language skills and
construct overall knowledge based on their
own experience.
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