PSY BEH 11B Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Surface Roughness, Deep Structure And Surface Structure, Universal Grammar

• School: UC-Irvine
• Department: Psychology and Social Behavior
• Course: PSY BEH 11B
• Professor: Linda Levine

Document Summary

Found that babies exposed to sign languages from birth acquire spoke languages. Theories concerning the contribution of innate factors and environmental factors to language learning. Behaviorism view on how children learn language. The same way we learn any other skill: through reinforcement, shaping, etc. Language acquisition depends on inborn, species-specific knowledge that"s different from general intelligence and learning. Hypothesized: language must be governed by universal grammar. All languages are based on humans" innate knowledge of set of universal and specifically linguistic elements and relationships. Surface structure: sound and order of words.