The document discusses several theories of language acquisition: 1. Imitation theory claims that children learn language by imitating the speech they hear from others. 2. Reinforcement theory asserts that children learn language through positive and negative reinforcement from adults when they use language correctly or incorrectly. 3. The active construction theory claims that children analyze the language input around them to form hypotheses about grammatical rules and construct their own grammar.

1. 1- Language Acquisition & Language
Learning
2- Theories of Language Acquisition
(Psycholinguistics)
Level-6

2.  *Language acquisition is the process by which humans acquire the
capacity to perceive and comprehend language, as well as to produce
and use words and sentences to communicate.
 Language acquisition is one of the essential human traits, because non-
humans do not communicate by using language.
 Language acquisition usually refers to first-language acquisition, which
studies infants' acquisition of their native language. This is distinguished
from second-language acquisition, which deals with the acquisition (in
both children and adults) of additional languages.
1- Language Acquisition

3.  Language acquisition is a process whereby children become
speakers of their native language.
 Language acquisition is a process by which language capabilities
of a person increases.
Language acquisition simplified

4.  1. Mentalist-------------Noam Chomsky
 2. Behaviorist---------B. F. Skinner
Two main schools of psycholinguistics

5.  Some early observation-based ideas about language acquisition were
proposed by Plato, who felt that word-meaning mapping in some form was
innate.
 Additionally, Sanskrit grammarians debated for over twelve centuries
whether humans' ability to recognize the meaning of words was God-given
(possibly innate) or passed down by previous generations and learned from
already established conventions: a child learning the word for cow by
listening to trusted speakers talking about cows.
History of Language Acquisition

6.  LAD= Language Acquisition Device.
 Chomsky argues that language acquisition is an innate structure, or function, of the
human brain. He believes that there are structures of the brain that control the
interpretation and production of speech. Children do not need any kind of formal
teaching to learn to speak.
Factors that Chomsky used to support his theory:
 There is an optimal learning age. Between the ages 3 to 10 a child is the most likely
to learn a language in its entirety and grasp fluency.
 The child does not need a trigger to begin language acquisition, it happens on its
own. The parent does not need to coax the child to speak, if it around language
production, the child will work to produce that language on its own.
 It does not matter if a child is corrected, they still grasp the language in the same
manner and speak the same way. During one stage, a child will make things plural
that are already plural.
CHOMSKY’S VIEW ON LANGUAGE
ACQUISITION

7. B.F Skinner viewed babies as ‘empty vessels’ which language had to be ‘put in
to’.
Skinner also viewed language acquisition as a cognitive behavior.
Operant conditioning: child goes through trial-and-error in other words they
tries and fails to use correct language until it succeeds; with reinforcement and
shaping provided by the parent’s gestures (smiles, attention and approval)
which are pleasant to the child.
Skinner in Verbal Behavior (1957) differentiated between two types of verbal
responses that a child makes :
 Verbal behavior that is reinforced by the child receiving something it wants.
 Verbal behavior caused by imitating others.
SKINNER’S VIEW ON LANGUAGE
ACQUISITION

8.  Similarities
 Both scholars have different views and theories on the same study which is
how all humans manage to obtain grammar.
 Subject of their study is children.
Differences
SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES BETWEEN CHOMSKY’S
AND SKINNER’S THEORY
Chomsky’s Theory
1. Innate biological ability that all humans
possess. He believed that every child has a
‘language acquisition device’. (LAD)
2. innate learning mechanism enables a child
to figure out how the language works
(Traxler 2012)
Skinner’s theory
1. Learning process involves the shaping of
grammar into a correct form by the re-
enforcement of other stimulus.
2. Approaches child as a blank slate that is filled
up by knowledge gained through experience
(Traxler, 2012)

9. Language Acquisition
v/s
Language Learning
Language Acquisition
1. Language acquisition is mostly passive.
Babies learn rules while listening to the
people around them.
2. Grammar structures is not very much
important.
3. Some people never learn how to read or
write but still speak their first language
fluently.
Language Learning
1. Language learning is an active process.
2. We need to learn vocabulary and
grammar in order to achieve goal. Most
people will need an instructor, either a
teacher at school or the instructions of a
course book or audio course.
3. Many people will never reach anywhere
near fluency with any second language.

10. Various theories and approaches have been emerged over the years to study
and analyze the process of language acquisition. Main schools of thought,
which provide theoretical paradigms in guiding the course of language
acquisition are:
1. Imitation theory
2. Reinforcement theory
3. Active construction of a grammar
2- Theories of Language Acquisition

11.  Imitation theory claims that children learn language by learning to speech
around them and producing what they hear.
 According to this theory, language acquisition consists of memorizing the
words and sentences of some language.
 But the idea that acquiring a language is a process of learning to imitate the
speech of others is at least partly true. Because of the largely arbitrary nature
of the connection between the way a word sounds and what it means,
children cannot guess what the words of their target language are.
 Children must hear those words used by other speakers and then reproduce
or “imitate’ them.
1-Imitation theory

12.  Reinforcement theory asserts that children learn to speak like adults because
they are praised, rewarded or otherwise reinforced when they use right
forms and are corrected when they use wrong forms.
 Reinforcement is of two types:
1) POSITIVE REINFORCEMENT:
 Positive reinforcement results in increase of repetition process. For example,
a child cries for candy, he receives the candy and learns that crying results in
candy.
2) NEGATIVE REINFORCEMENT:
 Negative reinforcement results in reduction of repetition process. For
example, a child cries for candy, but he is slapped and he learns that slap is
the consequence of crying. As a result the child ceases crying for the
accomplishment of his desires.
2-Reinforcement theory

13.  This theory claims that children actually invent the rules of grammar themselves.
 Their inventions are based on the speech they hear around them; this is their input or
data for analysis.
 Children listen to the language around them and analyze it to determine the patterns
that exists. When they think they have discovered a pattern, they hypothesize a rule
to account for it. They add this rule to their growing grammar and use it in
constructing utterances.
 This theory explains what the imitation and reinforcement theories cannot explain
alone. Within this framework children’s mistakes are expected to occur and follow
nonrandom patterns, because the child is forming utterances according to
grammatical rules, although the rules are often different from those adults use.
3-Active construction of a grammar