8/10/2019 Skinner Languge Development

1/1

Skinner: How does a child learn language?

The main principle of operant conditioning, as dened by Skinner is positiveand negative reinforcement. Reinforcement is the process in which abehaviour is strengthened, and thus, more likely to happen again. PositiveReinforcement ismaking a behaviour stronger by following the behaviour with

a pleasant stimulus. For eample, a rat presses a lever and receives food.!egative Reinforcement ismaking a behaviour stronger by taking away anegative stimulus. For eample, a rat presses a lever and turns o" the electricshock.

Skinner viewed babies as #empty vessels$ which language had to be #put in to$.%e said children learn language from their environment and conse&uences oftheir actions 'a nurture view of language(.

Skinner would say that a child learns language through positive reinforcement)%is basic eplanation for the development of speech was that parents tend toreward infant vocalisations 'such as babbling( by giving the infant attention.

This increases the fre&uency of vocalisation. %e would suggest that the childwill not progress from babbling to language unless the parent$s shape thechild$s language behaviour.

*fter rewarding vocalisations for a while, parents become used to a child$sbabbling and pay less attention to it. This motivates the infant to vary thebabbling. Sometimes, by accident, the child produces more recognisablespeech sounds e.g. if an infant suddenly said #+adadada$, parents mightrespond ecitedly to this, thinking that the child is trying to say the word#+addy$. The response reinforces the child$s production of this type of speechsound. ther sounds that are less like actual speech tend to be ignored.%owever, parents soon get bored by repetitions of #+adadada$, and thismotivates the child to modify such sounds until the shaping process results in

recognisable words. This process continues, resulting in sentences ofincreasing compleity and grammatical correctness. -n addition, the use oflanguage is rewarded when a child asks for something and as a result,succeeds in getting it. Skinner did not claim that parents intentionally set outto shape the language development of infants, but that this happensnaturally)

*nother important feature of Skinner$s theory is the idea that children imitatespeech sounds and words spoken by caregivers and, provided this imitation isrewarded, learning will take place. This is how children learn new words.%owever, this theory assumes that without reinforcement, imitation will notresult in learning. This is a rather unconvincing eplanation for several

reasons

Some parents pay very little attention to the vocalisation of their infants,

who still develop language despite this / could use 0homsky 'the biologicalapproach here(

Shaping 'as described above( is a very lengthy process, whereas a child$s

language development, particularly during the second year of life is rapid bservational studies of parent1child conversations '2rown and %anlon,

3456( show that parents rarely reinforce correct grammar in a child$sspeech, but instead tend to focus on the truthfulness or accuracy ofstatements. This makes it less likely that shaping enables children to learngrammar.

The theory assumes that imitation without reinforcement will not lead to

learning 'eplain 2andura$s theory of language to show that this isunlikely(