Language Development

Definition

Language development is the process by which children come to understand and communicate language during early childhood.

Description

From birth up to the age of five, children develop language at a very rapid pace. The stages of language development are universal among humans. However, the age and the pace at which a child reaches each milestone of language development vary greatly among children. Thus, language development in an individual child must be compared with norms rather than with other individual children. In general girls develop language at a faster rate than boys. More than any other aspect of development, language development reflects the growth and maturation of the brain. After the age of five it becomes much more difficult for most children to learn language.

Receptive language development (the ability to comprehend language) usually develops faster than expressive language (the ability to communicate). Two different styles of language development are recognized. In referential language development, children first speak single words and then join words together, first into two-word sentences and then into three-word sentences. In expressive language development, children first speak in long unintelligible babbles that mimic the cadence and rhythm of adult speech. Most children use a combination these styles.

Infancy

Language development begins before birth. Towards the end of pregnancy, a fetus begins to hear sounds and speech coming from outside the mother's body. Infants are acutely attuned to the human voice and prefer it to other sounds. In particular they prefer the higher pitch characteristic of female voices. They also are very attentive to the human face, especially when the face is talking. Although crying is a child's primary means of communication at birth, language immediately begins to develop via repetition and imitation.

Between birth and three months of age, most infants acquire the following abilities:

• seem to recognize their mother's voice
• quiet down or smile when spoken to
• turn toward familiar voices and sounds
• make sounds indicating pleasure
• cry differently to express different needs
• grunt, chuckle, whimper, and gurgle
• begin to coo (repeating the same sounds frequently) in response to voices
• make vowel-like sounds such as "ooh" and "ah"

Between three and six months, most infants can do the following:

• turn their head toward a speaker
• watch a speaker's mouth movements
• respond to changes in a tone of voice
• make louder sounds including screeches
• vocalize excitement, pleasure, and displeasure
• cry differently out of pain or hunger
• laugh, squeal, and sigh
• sputter loudly and blow bubbles
• shape their mouths to change sounds
• vocalize different sounds for different needs
• communicate desires with gestures
• babble for attention
• mimic sounds, inflections, and gestures
• make many new sounds, including "p," "b," and "m," that may sound almost speech-like

The sounds and babblings of this stage of language development are identical in babies throughout the world, even among those who are profoundly deaf. Thus all babies are born with the capacity to learn any language. Social interaction determines which language they eventually learn.

Six to 12 months is a crucial age for receptive language development. Between six and nine months babies begin to do the following:

• search for sources of sound
• listen intently to speech and other sounds
• take an active interest in conversation even if it is not directed at them
• recognize "dada," "mama," "bye-bye"
• consistently respond to their names
• respond appropriately to friendly and angry tones
• express their moods by sound and body language
• play with sounds
• make long, more varied sounds
• babble random combinations of consonants and vowels
• babble in singsong with as many as 12 different sounds
• experiment with pitch, intonation, and volume
• use their tongues to change sounds
• repeat syllables
• imitate intonation and speech sounds

Between nine and 12 months babies may begin to do the following:

• listen when spoken to
• recognize words for common objects and names of family members
• respond to simple requests
• understand "no"
• understand gestures
• associate voices and names with people
• know their own names
• babble both short and long groups of sounds and two-to-three-syllable repeated sounds (The babble begins to have characteristic sounds of their native language.)
• use sounds other than crying to get attention
• use "mama" and "dada" for any person
• shout and scream
• repeat sounds
• use most consonant and vowel sounds
• practice inflections
• engage in much vocal play