Emerging Linguistic Functions in Early Infancy

This paper presents results from experimental studies on early language acquisition in infants and attempts to interpret the experimental results within the framework of the Ecological Theory of Language Acquisition (ETLA) recently proposed by (Lacerda et al., 2004a). From this perspective, the infant’s first steps in the acquisition of the ambient language are seen as a consequence of the infant’s general capacity to represent sensory input and the infant’s interaction with other actors in its immediate ecological environment. On the basis of available experimental evidence, it will be argued that ETLA offers a productive alternative to traditional descriptive views of the language acquisition process by presenting an operative model of how early linguistic function may emerge through interaction

Integration of audio-visual information in 8-months-old infants

The results from a series of perception experiments designed to test 8-month-old infants’ ability to derive linguistic information from audio-visual events are reported in this presentation. Using a visual preference technique, groups of 8-month-old infants were tested on their ability to extract linguistic information implicit in short video sequences where the images displayed different puppets and the audio tracks presented sentences describing the puppets in naturalistic infant-directed speech style. To assess the relative importance of memory and attention factors, the prosodic and syntactic structure of the speech materials was systematically changed across different groups of subjects. The experimental results are interpreted in terms of the emergentistic acquisition model discussed in the paper presented by Lacerda et al. (“Ecological theory of language acquisition”)

Ecological Theory of Language Acquisition

This poster outlines an Ecological Theory of Language Acquisition (ETLA). The theory views the early phases of the language acquisition process as an emergent consequence of the interaction between the infant and its linguistic environment. The newborn infant is considered to be linguistically and phonetically naïve but endowed with the ability to register a wide range of multi-sensory inputs along with the ability to detect similarity between the multi-sensory stimuli it is exposed to. The initial steps of the language acquisition process are explained as unintended and inevitable consequences of the infant’s multisensory interaction with the adult. The theoretical model deriving from ETLA is tested using the experimental data presented in the two additional contributions from our research team (Gustavsson et al, “Integration of audiovisual information in 8-months-old infants”; Lacerda, Marklund et al. “On the linguistic implications of context-bound adult-infant interactions”). The generality of the ETLA’s concept is likely to be of significance for a wide range of scientific areas, like robotics, where a central issue concerns addressing general problems of how organisms or systems might develop the ability to tap on the structure of the information embedded in their operating environments

On the linguistic implications of context-bound adult-infant interactions

This poster presents a study of the linguistic information potentially available in adult speech directed to 3-month-old infants. The repetitive nature of the speech directed to young infants and the ecological context of the adult-infant natural interaction setting are analyzed in the light of the “Ecological theory of language acquisition” proposed by Lacerda et al. (2004, this volume). The analysis of transcripts of adult-infant interaction sessions suggests that enough information to derive general noun associations may be available as a consequence of the particular context of the adult-infant interactions during the early stages of the language acquisition process

Effects of Target-Word Frequency Rate on Sound-Meaning-Connection in Five to Fifteen Month-Old Swedish Infants

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of manipulating target-word frequency rate and target-word phrase position on sound-meaning-connection in five to fifteen month old Swedish infants. Three different test conditions, each one of them a film showing objects and corresponding phrases made of randomly generated artificial words, were designed. The structure of the first, high variability test condition included context-dependent information and the structures of the second and the third, low variability test conditions were characterised by frequent nonsense target-word rate, target-words occurring in phrase final position. The aim of the artificial input language was to ensure the novelty of test material, and to simulate the type of learning situation - when the semantic content of words is arbitrary - facing young infants in the beginning of language learning. Analysis of informants looking behaviour, prior to, and after exposure to the objects and the corresponding audio input, were performed. Results showed that the structure of high variability test condition and the structure of low variability test conditions were associated with significant between-group differences. This finding indicates that the nonsense phrases in low variability test conditions managed to 'explain' the objects just like semantically meaningful phrases do. When compared with past research, these findings seem to suggest that experience-dependent mechanisms may support, besides word segmentation, even more complicated aspects of language learning, such as acquisition of syntax.Eeva Klintfors är född Koponen.</p

Phonotactic and word accent cues for speech segmentation in Swedish one-year-olds

Two experiments were designed to examine 12-month-old Swedish-learning infants’ ability to use phonotactic and word accent cues to word boundaries. Twenty-five infants were tested using the so-called Visual Preference Procedure. The stimuli were CVC.CVC (experiment 1) and CVC.CVCCVC nonsense words (experiment 2). The word accent of the stimuli signalled either a single word-like unit or two separate units. Also, the cross-syllabic C.C clusters of the stimuli were either typically occurring within words or across word boundaries. The infants looking times at images of objects, presented along the nonsense words, were measured. Compared with results of similar experiments on English-learning infants, the results of the present study were not clear-cut: the infants did not specifically respond to word boundary cues. Instead, a preference for accent 2 stimuli and stimuli with typical word internal phonotactics was found.Eeva Klintfors är född Koponen

Word Frequency Influences Sound-Meaning Associations

Two experiments were designed to examine 12-month-old Swedish-learning infants’ ability to use phonotactic and word accent cues to word boundaries. Twenty-five infants were tested using the so-called Visual Preference Procedure. The stimuli were CVC.CVC (experiment 1) and CVC.CVCCVC nonsense words (experiment 2). The word accent of the stimuli signalled either a single word-like unit or two separate units. Also, the cross-syllabic C.C clusters of the stimuli were either typically occurring within words or across word boundaries. The infants looking times at images of objects, presented along the nonsense words, were measured. Compared with results of similar experiments on English-learning infants, the results of the present study were not clear-cut: the infants did not specifically respond to word boundary cues. Instead, a preference for accent 2 stimuli and stimuli with typical word internal phonotactics was found.Eeva Klintfors är född Koponen

Ambient language effects on babbling: pitch contours in Swedish and American 12- and 18-month-olds

Results of a previous listening test have indicated that tonal word accent contours present in 12- and 18-monthers’ babbling may provide listeners with perceptually reliable cues to ambient language. In particular, Swedish 18- and, to some extent, 12-monthers were judged to produce more grave accent-like vocalizations than were American English children in the same age-groups.      The present experiment was carried out to evaluate the phonetic substance underlying these listener judgments. It was expected that utterances that had been judged as grave in the listening test would display F0 characteristics typical of Swedish grave accent words, i.e., two-peaked contours with a marked second tone-peak. F0 measurements were made of the same disyllabic babbles that had been used in the listening test.      Results indicated that vocalizations that had been judged as having the grave accent in the listening test differed from those that had not been judged as having the grave accent. Specifically, vocalizations judged as grave displayed higher F0 in the second vowel of the disyllabic vocalizations. Essentially, then, the result supported the view that Swedish 18-monthers (and, to a lesser extent, 12-monthers) may just be beginning to gain command of the tonal aspect of the word accent contrast, and that the relevant tonal contour can be reliably detected in listening.Eeva Klintfors är född Kopone

Assessing the Relevance of Prosodic and Phonotactic Cues on Parsing the Speech Stream by Young Language-Learners

This is a study about how one-year-old Swedish-learning infants presumably use probabilistic information, such as prosody and phonotactic regularity, in segmentation of speech. The variables studied were the Swedish tonal word accents I &amp; II and the distributional regularities of within-word and between-word consonant clusters in Swedish infant-directed speech. The results – which were not as clear-cut as the results obtained in earlier experiments on English-learning infants – suggest that 12-month old Swedish infants might be sensitive to prosodic cues to word boundaries: in experiment 1, altering the phonotactics of the stimuli reversed the infants’ preference for word accent types. However this was not confirmed in experiment 2, instead there was a general preference for listening at the accent II words. The results also suggest that 12-month old Swedish infants might not use phonotactic cues to word boundaries to the extent as expected: in experiment 1 and 2, altering the word accent types did not reverse the infants’ preference for phonotactics. Instead, both in experiment 1 and 2, there was a general preference for listening at the within-word stimuli. When compared with earlier research these findings indicate that infants, besides being able to integrate multiple statistical cues to word boundaries, might early in life be assisted by pattern-recognition in speech segmentation.Eeva Klintfors är född Koponen.</p

Ordens uppkomst : Multisensorisk information som ett led i uppkomst av förbindelser mellan ord och betydelse hos spädbarn

This thesis presents four experimental studies, carried out at the Phonetic laboratory, Stockholm University, on infants’ ability to establish auditory-visual sound-meaning associations as a precursor of early word acquisition. Study I reports on the effect of linguistic variance on infants’ ability (3- to 20-months) to establish sound-meaning associations. The target-words embedded in phrases, based on an artificial language, were presented along with visually displayed puppets. Study II investigates the role of attribute type on infants’ ability (3- to 6-months) to establish sound-meaning associations. Two-word phrases, based on the same artificial language as in Study I, were presented along with visually displayed geometrical objects. The words implicitly referred to the color and shape of the objects. Study III examines infants’ ability (12- to 16-months) to predict phonetic information. The subjects were tested on their ability to associate Swedish whole words and disrupted words to familiar objects. Study IV investigates infants’ ability (6- to 8-months) to detect concurrence and synchrony in speech and non-speech. The infants were exposed to Swedish speech sounds presented with corresponding articulatory events, the sound of hand-clapping presented with synchronized hand-clapping movements, and the sound of hand-clapping presented with synchronized articulatory events. The results picture the subject as sensitive to distributional properties of auditory and visual information (Study I and II) but still unable to predict phonetic information, in the beginning of the second year of life (Study III). The infants’ conceptual behavior is outlined as a general-purpose perceptual process influenced by perceptual salience (Study IV). These results are related to a working hypothesis based on the Ecological theory of language acquisition (Lacerda &amp; Sundberg, 2006), and Lindblom (Lindblom, 1990; Lindblom &amp; Lacerda, 2006).För att köpa boken skicka en beställning till [email protected]/ To order the book send an e-mail to [email protected]</p