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
suggests that language acquisition could occur through a more
complex kind of conditioning
syntactic development: capacity of the child to organize words into
grammatical sentences, seems to be influenced by the child’s exposure to
complex and varied speech by both parents and other adults, like teachers
 challenges the inference of the poverty of the stimulus argument
that a child’s future speech isn’t affected by the degree of their
exposure to correct and varied speech early in life
minimalism: the theory that language acquisition occurs through a method
in which a person incorporates only those characteristics that are absolutely
necessary
 parameter setting: the process by which one acquires a particular
language, by selecting the parameters of that particular language
among the options offered by universal grammar, accounts for the
differences between languages
concealing function of language: the aspect of language that allows it to
conceal the communicated meaning from those who don’t speak it while
revealing that meaning to those who do
 allows it to function as a sort of code
code model of communication: communication begins with the stage of the
speaker’s thoughts being encoded into speech, and the listener subsequently
decoding the speech stimulus into meaning
 correct interpretation of the speech stimulus requires that the
speaker and listener share sufficient mutual knowledge of the
situation
inferential model of communication: communication can be classified as a
series of intentions and inferences; the speaker has certain intentions in
communicating through speech, and the listener must make certain
inferences to properly decode that speech
 conversation maxims: certain rules (like striving to be clear and
truthful) that a listener must assume that the speaker is following
in order to make correct inferences about meaning
 co-operative principle: the assumption that the speaker is striving
to be both truthful and relevant that allows the listener to infer the
intent of the speaker