Anatomy Shared Article Research

This blog exists for the Anatomy students at Tree of Life Christian School. We will be reading various scientific articles, summarizing our research, and then commenting on others' summaries. We hope to broaden our view of the current research surrounding the human body, and to help others see how truly amazing the design of the human body is.

Monday, May 25, 2009

Why Babies don't Talk like Audults

We often don't ask ourselves why babies don't speak like all adults. It is commonly believed that children learn to talk by imitating what they hear from other, older people. However, the theory that babies simply copy and regurgitate what the hear does not explain why young children are not as articulate as adults. Babies and toddlers often talk in one or two word phrases like, "Me want cookie" or "kittie"; most adults speak in complex, grammatically correct sentences, making it unlikely that babies copy exactly what they hear, because if they did, they too would speak in complex, multi-word sentences. Over the years, scientists have produced two possible theories hoping to explain why young toddlers speak in short phrases if they are in fact coping what they hear. One such theory is called the mental developmental hypothesis which says that babies speak in "baby talk" because their brains are immature and cannot process complex adult speech.This hypothesis states that babies don't speak more complicated sentences until their brains are ready and more mature. The second theory, the stages-of-language hypothesis, says that the levels of progress in child speech are necessary stages in language development. Basically, children will not speak in multi-word, complex sentences until they have first mastered small, basic phrases and sentences and have learned a certain number of words. The main difference between the mental development hypothesis and the stages-of-language hypothesis is that with the mental development theory, the patterns in learning how to talk are directly related to the child's level of mental development and maturity, while with the stages-of-language theory, learning a language should not depend on the child's level of mental development, but on time.
In 2007, researchers studied adopted children from non-English speaking countries and found that even older children with more mature brains than babies first spoke in single words and short phrases.Compared to children born in the United States, the children adopted from non-English speaking countries started putting words into complex sentences around the same as native born children, and this was once their vocabularies reached the same size. Scientists do, however, acknowledge that there is a period when children are younger that makes learning a new language easier compared to older adults trying to learn a new language. This discovery-that is is not whether your brain is more mature but how many words you know- explains why babies do not talk as articulately as adults. It is not because their brains are immature but that babies have just begun learning words and need time to build their vocabularies.
I never really wondered why babies and toddlers don't talk like adults, and I found this article very interesting because it attempted to explain why this is. I think the fact that non-English speaking adopted children and American born children both starting speaking when their vocabularies were the same size shows that there is truth in the stages-of-language hypotheses. Like anything people do, whether learning a language or learning a sport, one can't move onto the next stage before first mastering the first stage. I do, however, believe that learning how to speak and how quickly it happens has something to do with babies' brains and how developed they are, and I also believe that there is a critical learning period that makes learning to speak or read easier for children than for adults.

3 Comments:

Blogger Todd T said...

I had never really wondered why babies and toddlers don't speak as articulately as adult either, but I find both of these possible reasons quite interesting. It is kind of strange to think that as children, when we learn a language, we become more articulate when our vocabulary reaches a certain level.

Tuesday, June 02, 2009 6:53:00 PM  
Blogger sarahjihyeonkim said...

I never heard people said that why babies don't speak like audults. I can understand about non-English country child and the babies who borned in US. When I read article, I was feel like I'm the liitle babies because the process of leaning language is kind of same. For example, the babies listen older people and repeat that sentences and I learn from my friends and teachers' speaking.

Tuesday, June 02, 2009 8:22:00 PM  
Blogger Joy S. said...

I never even thought about that before, but it is interesting. The non-English speaking comparison to English speaking children research does show some validity to the languege theory. I'm more in awe of the baies brain. They learn spech from their parents, but they cannot speak it until they master the basic first. So there brains are like double processing everything!

Tuesday, June 02, 2009 9:26:00 PM  

Post a Comment

<< Home