Introduction to Cognitive Psychology - Department of Psychological ...

Professor Greg Francis 8/15/12Around 18 monthsChildren learn simple rules of syntax All dry. All messy. All wet. I sit. I shut. No bed.All hell breaks looseAfter mastering 2-word strings, toddlers go crazy onlanguageConsider changes in language (year;month) (2;3) Play checkers. Big drum. I got horn. No pee. See baby. See pretty.Content is similar for all languages objects appear, disappear, move,… people do things, see things,… ask questions, who, what, where,... (2;5) Now put boots on. Where wrench go? What that paperclip doing? (2;7) Ursula has a boot on. Shadow has hat like that. (2;9) Where Mommy keep her pocket book? Show yousomething funny. (2;11) Why you mixing baby chocolate? I finishing drinking allup down my throat.Purdue University (3;1) You went to Boston University? Doggies like to climb up.Purdue UniversityErrorsThree year olds make lots of grammaticalerrors that is because there are lots of opportunities forerrors but pick any particular grammatical rule and youfind most three year olds obey it most of the time this is amazing because there lots of cases that youwould expect would be difficult to learnExpected errorsConsider a child hearing adults talk and howthey might incorrectly apply what they learnOut of 66,000 sentences, children never madethese errorsHe seems happy. -->Does he seem happy?He is smiling. -->Does he be smiling?He did eat. -->He didnt eat.He did a few things. -->He didnt a few things.Purdue UniversityPurdue UniversityErrorsChildren do make errors, but the errors are consistentwith rules of languageChildren often over generalize a rule -s to pluralize a noun» Mouses, leafs -ed to make the past tense of a verb» My teacher holded the baby rabbits and we patted them.» Hey, Horton heared a Who.» I finded Renee.» Once upon a time a alligator was eating a dinosaur and thedinosaur was eating the alligator and the dinosaur was eatenby the alligator and the alligator goed kerplunk.Purdue UniversityOvergeneralizationThese past tense forms sound wrong because Englishhas around 180 irregular verbs inherited from other languages These past-tense forms are not derived from rulesIrregular forms have to be memorized, word by wordIf a child cannot remember (in its lexicon) s/he defaults to the ruleThese errors are for the most difficult parts of alanguage to learn Because they dont follow the normal rulesPurdue UniversityPSY 200: Intro. to Cognitive Psychology 3