Describe the interactionist perspective of language development. Discuss the biological and cognitive contributors to language as well as environmental supports for language development

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Proponents of the interactionist viewpoint believe that both learning theorists and nativists are partially correct: language development results from a complex interplay among biological maturation, cognitive development, and an ever-changing linguistic environment that is heavily infl uenced by the child's attempts to communicate with her companions.

Like the nativists, then, interactionists believe that children are biologically prepared to acquire a language. However, the preparation consists not of an LAD or LMC but a powerful human brain that slowly matures, allowing children to gain more and more knowledge, which gives them more to talk about.

There is ample support for links between general cognitive development and language development. For example, words are symbols, and infants typically speak their first meaningful words at about 12 months of age, shortly after they display a capacity for symbolism in pretend play and their deferred imitation of adult models. Furthermore, infants' first words center heavily on objects they have manipulated or on actions they have performed—in short, on aspects of experience they can understand through their sensorimotor schemes.

Long before infants use words, their caregivers show them how to take turns in conversations, even if the only thing these young infants can contribute when their turn comes is a laugh or a babble.

Cross-cultural research points to a nearly universal tendency of parents and older siblings to address infants and toddlers with very short, simple sentences that psycholinguists call child-directed speech, or motherese.