Essay about How Do Humans Acquire Language - 1294 Words

How Do Humans Acquire Language? nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;Humans live in a world full of communication. Humans possess a native language that separates them from other animals. Language is developed within the first few years of a person’s life. By the time one is a child; he can speak and understand almost as well as an adult. Children world-wide exhibit similar patterns of language acquisition even though they may be learning different languages. How humans learn even the most complicated languages has perplexed the minds of many scientists. Two of the most popular beliefs on language acquisition today are held by Skinner and Chomsky. Their opposing belief on how humans acquire language has become the two standard views on this†¦show more content†¦Skinner believed language acquisition to be a learned behavior. He suggested that children learned language through observation rather then biological predisposition (Gazzaniga and Heatherton 373). Berry acknowledges Skinner’s theory on operant co nditioning, which is a behavior that is immediately reinforced (115). For example, when an infant imitates the pattern of syllables of the mother, the mother will immediately express joy and delight. However, as speech continues to develop only closer approximations of the speech will be rewarded. Berry points out that with systematically applied rewards the child learns to repeat the word or phrase (115). Gazzaniga and Heatherton highlight that Skinner also believed people cross-culturally used the same type of speech patterns which helped a child to learn the language. He said it was easier for a child to learn when parents repeated words and used slower speech (373). Chomsky believed that humans acquire language through an instinctive knowledge. He thought that there was deeper meaning to words and that was how people learned them so easily (Gazzaniga and Heatherton 374). When someone hears a sentence they do not merely hear the words, instead they acquire a certain understanding of the meaning of the words. Gazzaniga and Heatherton add that his major theory was that every human was born with a language acquisition device (LAD) that allowed them to learn any language. HeShow MoreRelatedHow Do Humans Acquire Language?1332 Words   |  6 PagesHow Do Humans Acquire Language? Humans live in a world full of communication. Humans possess a native language that separates them from other animals. Language is developed within the first few years of a person s life. By the time one is a child; he can speak and understand almost as well as an adult. Children world-wide exhibit similar patterns of language acquisition even though they may be learning different languages. How humans learn even the most complicated languages has perplexedRead MoreLinguistic Nativism: There’s Something Between the Ears Language is something that humans use and1300 Words   |  6 PagesLinguistic Nativism: There’s Something Between the Ears Language is something that humans use and encounter every day. Whether it be writing a paper, reading an email, talking to your best friend on the phone, or asking someone for directions, the use of language is broad and heavily intertwined with experiencing the world in the human condition. But the question of how humans come from being silent babies to speaking children is still unanswered. 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