Nativist theories - These theories suggest that all humans have an inbuilt or innate capacity for language acquisition.

Social Interaction theories - These theories suggest that to acquire and develop language skills a child must have social and verbal interaction.

Cognitive theorists - The cognitive theorist believes that language is acquired as part of a wider development of understanding and cognitive ability.

BF Skinner (1957) having performed experiments using rats and pigeons discovered that they could perform a variety of tasks, as long as they were broken into stages, and received rewards for 'correct' actions.  From this Skinner formed his 'Operant Conditioning Theory'.  This was then applied to human learning, claiming that children learn language through the simple process of imitation and reinforcement.  Skinner also claimed that no complicated internal mechanisms were needed for language acquisition and that children learning language was virtually the same as lab rats learning to complete tasks.

Eric Lenneburg (1962) argued against Skinner's theory, in that children who are unable to speak due to illness are able to gain a normal comprehension of language without the ability to imitate adults, or by having their utterances reinforced.  Hart and Risley (1995) argued that differences in social classes in the USA and the verbal interaction received by children in these classes can have an influence on their social and economic development in their later life. 

Noam Chomsky - is a linguist and nativist theorist.  He argued against Skinner's interactional theory and suggested that children acquire language because all humans have an innate ability to speak.  Essentially he stated that the human brain is 'hard-wired' for language.  The LAD (Language Acquisition Device) enables a child to hear and extrapolate the rules of their own language and understand the words and structures.  Chomsky suggested that all languages have a Universal Grammar, stating that under the surface of all languages a similar grammatical structure is present.  Looking at features of child language acquisition, such as virtuous errors and overgeneralization, Chomsky noted that all children created these features without having heard adults use the same language and he concluded that there must be more than interaction and imitation at work to explain this phenomenon. 

Theorist Steven Pinker, looked at Chomsky's work and further developed the LAD idea and created his own PPT (Principles and Parameter Theory).  This theory essentially states that by hearing the principles and parameters of the individual’s native language, the rules become fixed.  In a sense Pinker is saying that the PPT is the software used by the LAD hardware to create language.  Once the parameters are defined through hearing speech, the principles become defined and are retained.  In the light of cognitive theories about child language acquisition, Chomsky has reflected on his own work and moved towards the ideas put forward by cognitive theorists.

Lenneburg, who worked as Chomsky's colleague added to the LAD theory stating that there must also be a 'critical period' when the LAD needs to be 'activated' with a sufficient amount of input, or the child's language development may be impaired.  This relates to 'feral - children', such as 'Genie'.  A child who was 'found' in 1970 and who had never had any positive interaction to develop language acquisition.  Forced to keep quiet, she never developed the ability to vocalise langauge properly, suggesting as per Lenneburg's idea, that she had passed the 'critical period' of activation and input; however, it should be noted that she did acquire the ability to communicate through sign language.  ASL (American Sign Language) does have grammatical rules, not the same as English, but still as Genie was able to acquire this ability and communicate with those around her, the interactional theory by Skinner is given more weight, as she would have learnt ASL through imitation and positive reinforcement by her care givers.

Jean Piaget - a cognitive theorist suggested that language development is due to a wider development in cognitive ability and that a child cannot articulate ides or concepts that they are uanble to understand.   Piaget argued that if a child needs to understand a concept such as the past, to be able to use language terms to refer to it.  Also the concept of seriation ( the ability to place items in a series, such as ascending or decending orders) needs to be understood before a child could learn to use superlatives and comparatives.  Object permanence features in this idea too.  The idea that the object still exists even if it is not visible needs to be understood too, so that the child comprehends that everything has it's own separate identity and will still exist even when the child cannot see it.

Lee Vygotsky -  a Russian pyschologist had similar views to Piaget.  He stated that langauge has two roles, one for communication and the other as a tool for further developing understanding, as he believed that language and thought become related in a relatively short period of time.  He also believed that collaborative play has an influence and essential part in a child's early development.  In instances where the emphasis is put more on play than teaching a child is required to stretch their cognitive abilities in and understanding new concepts or ideas without even realising  they are being taught.  Vygotsky said "What a child can do in co-operation today, he can do alone tomorrow".

(theorist research from another blog) 

I will look at the language change in modern writing from TV programs set in older eras such as around the 1920’s and I will look at comparable issues within these programs and comparable audiences.

 I am planning to collect three scenes from three different TV programs that are period dramas these could be selected from a few options such as:

Downton abbey

Mr. Selfridge

Peaky blinders

House of Elliot

 I am planning to pick a comparable scene from three programs such as a pregnancy or a family feud and see how the scenes compare to each other as the characters may be of different class and wealth. They must have comparable audiences so that the show would be aimed at the same type of people otherwise the writing would change and be suited to another type of audience. This will also help me see the language change in modern writing from an older era. I plan to collect this data by searching the Internet for scripts of the shows however these may not be accessible and if not then I will have to watch the scene myself and transcribe it and I could even use the subtitles for aid however these may not always be accurate.

As my data will be collected from different tv channels there may be a slight difference in the type/style of program that I am collecting data from and the programmes will have different subjects to them and will therfore may make it hard to get similar issues throughout all of these shows.

Chomsky

Noam Chomsky thinks that every child has the ability to speak and language. However he suggests that they will not be able to learn a new language just through copying/imitating because they use irregular language and structure of speech.

https://aggslanguage.wordpress.com/chomsky/

http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&ved=0CCkQFjABahUKEwj0nNvdkvbHAhXH1hoKHc8nDhc&url=http%3A%2F%2Fsocial.ocr.org.uk%2Ffiles%2Focr%2FSkinner%2520languge%2520development.doc&usg=AFQjCNEy39xVB-4WXCGkyXQbZMU-7y394g

http://users.ecs.soton.ac.uk/harnad/Hypermail/Thinking.Psychologically96/0097.html

Betty Birner. (). Is english changing ?. Available: http://www.linguisticsociety.org/content/english-changing. Last accessed 22nd July 2015.

This article highlights all the possible reasons for how and why the English language is changing. It is hinted that through the use of new technology and products which we have to adjust to, we also accommodate our language to terminology of these items. We are also influenced by other languages so we may use foreign words which are becoming more popular, however as well as this it suggests accents from other languages also have an effect of the way we might pronunciation certain words. Finally one of the most significant affects I think would be age, different age groups old, young eg can have very seperate ways of speaking due to their surroundings and how they have grown up, we may believe that the older generation are closer to RP because they haven't been as heavily influenced by new and up coming 'trends' or even technology as much as an ever changing younger generation.

Deborah Cameron . (2007). What language barrier ?. Available: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/oct/01/gender.books. Last accessed 3rd August 2015.

This article main theme is Tannens difference theory comparing male and females language used, and furthermore suggesting that they speak different languages. However as stated in this article we look out for differences in the language of different genders simply because they are different genders and we actively seek this, showing that we could be missing the simple similarities that they share but because of general stereotypes we might bypass this.

Lauren Lowry . (2013). Talking to young children makes a big difference !. Available: http://www.hanen.org/Helpful-Info/Articles/Talking-to-Young-Children-Makes-a-Big-Difference!.aspx. Last accessed 4th August 2015.

This article shows an investigation that took place to measure whether children can develop their language and speech through the parents/people around the children talking to them. Even though the children may not understand these words they are being exposed to a variety of vocabulary, this can enhance or maybe quicken the child's development of their language and speech, however it is known that children's own education develops in their own time so some children may just develop the same amount of vocabulary but at a later learning stage.

Emily Sohn. (2011). Is this the end of men or the beginning of women ?. Available: http://news.discovery.com/human/genetics/women-men-workplace-110920.htm. Last accessed 11th August 2015.

In this article Sohn mentions how women's roles in society is changing, going from the traditional housewife mother figure during the war period now going into a more dominating role such as more females graduating college and receiving higher paid/important jobs that traditionally the man would have taken. This can be seen as threatening to the man however due to the basic physiology of the body some certain roles are more suited to a particular gender therefore there will never be a complete take over of one gender however it may go through peaks and troughs of a slightly overpowering gender even if it's by the slightest fraction.

John McWhorter. (2013). Is texting killing the english language ?. Available: http://ideas.time.com/2013/04/25/is-texting-killing-the-english-language/. Last accessed 11th August 2015.

This article has been adapted from a TED talk, it is said that texting is more similar to the spoken language rather than the written language as it is less formal and more of a way of casually communicating without actually speaking. Texting has caused language used to become very lazy and non standard, adapting our everyday speech to similarly do the same as it is becoming more natural to us and more commonly used by the people around us. For example lol is a shortened textism for laugh out loud, this was used possibly for humour reasons and because it it quick and simple to type out and this has also transferred into our everyday language that when we hear someone speak "lol" it doesn't shock us as this has become the 'norm'.

Mini investigation

For my investigation I have decided to see if the dominance theory applies to natural speech between male and females. I wanted to investigate this as the Zimmerman and West theory states the males are more dominant than females and do this through the use of interruptions and or overlaps during conversation, this could also like to Tannen’s pairing theory of competition vs co-operation suggesting males compete during conversation whereas females are co-operative and support each other through speech.

Hypothesis-  I predict to find that the male participant in my data will be more dominant than the females.

Methodology-  I randomly selected two different natural speech transcripts from the internet and made sure each one had one male and one female participant. Too make sure I avoided bias I didn’t read all possible transcripts available I picked the first two I found with a male and female. This was done so that I did not specially select transcripts which would contain the ideal amount of data I am counting that would be in favour of my hypothesis.

Analysis-

	Male	Female
Cooperative overlap	2	1
interruptions	1	0
No. of words avrg per turn	10	18

 

Conclusion/evaluation- Overall from my data pool there is evidence from the data I collected and the data does support my hypothesis as males interrupt and overlap one more time each than females do therefore this suggests that the males are more dominant from the transcripts that I analysed. The data show us that women have a higher number average of words per turn therefore this may highlight why males interrupted and overlapped more because they had less air time a maybe felt the need to say something that couldn’t wait or to possible get their point across. However the males mostly cooperatively overlapped therefore they weren’t trying to compete with the females, this isn’t representative for Tannen’s pairing of cooperation vs competition as the males are more cooperative than the females show by the data collected. The males may feel as if they need to be more cooperative with the females due to their higher amount of air time so if the males interrupted they might fee that it would have to relevant and appropriate to the conversation and to what the female was saying previously. However as I only collected two transcripts this is a huge limitation to my investigation as this isn’t an accurate representation of the wider population therefore the hypothesis may not be legitimate to apply in general  as it has limited evidence for this hypothesis even though it is supported. Also in my transcript I only had two participant’s one male and one female, this is also a limitation as if there were more participants involved of mixed gender the data collected may be significantly different. This could be because one or even both genders might behave differently when there are more people involved within the conversation for example a male might feel the need to dominate the conversation more if there were a higher number of females present at that time or even if there was a higher number of males one male may interrupt more to enforce his dominance over the other participants.

To improve this investigation next time I will need to analyse and collect data from a higher number of transcripts that also contain a varied number of mixed gender participants. This would create a wider pool of data to collect from, effectively giving me more accurate data. As well as measuring how many times males and females interrupt and overlap along with the number of words per turn, I could also further investigate Tannen’s pairing theory by analysing whether the participants stick to the adjacency pairs of a question and an answer or a statement and an answer and then see if any participants or how many break the adjacency pairing, showing competition rather than cooperation.

TRANSCRIPT 1

 

SALLY: so how's your new job going

JOHN: well (.) you know (.) all right

SALLY: what you doing then

JOHN: this week I've just been on the phones      *SALLY: what (.) selling

JOHN: no they're doing like a survey (.) what people think of the the service and all that

SALLY: that's a bit off (.) so you've got to deal with all the moaning and complaining all the flak

JOHN: no (.) no it's just like a questionnaire were your goods delivered on time yes or no

SALLY: d'you think you'll stick it     *JOHN: next week I'm with the regional manager out on the on the road (.) that'll be all right

SALLY: I was on the phones at the Town Hall (.) dead boring

JOHN: tell me about it

SALLY: so what's your mate doing

JOHN: who

SALLY: you know what sisface (.) had the Mohican           *JOHN: Oh Gizmo

SALLY: yeh

 

 

 

TRANSCRIPT 2

 

M: What vegetables?

W: Vegetables, bloody expensive vegetables                    *M: Yeah, but when you see the

W: Ridiculously expensive, I’ve hardly vegetables, they’re always like eaten any vegetables since I’ve been here

too bloody expensive

M: Yeah

W: You’ve got to start going to the lunch specials with the salads.

Twitter Investigation

 

For my twitter investigation I decided to analyse a selection of tweets from one male and one female account.

For this investigation I can apply the deficit theory, this states that women have more air time that is filled with many things such as empty adjectives, tag questions, more emotive language , filler etc.

I decided to collect data from five of one woman’s tweets at random and five of one male tweets at random also and analysed the amount of technology in the tweets such as video links an emojis.

Emojis could be seen as a new version of the deficit theory as the emojis convey emotions and can be seen as a form of a weak communication.

Methodology:

To make sure this investigation isn’t bias I selected every 5^th tweet to collect m pool of data from.

I found from my data that the female has 12 cases of using technology whereas the male only uses 5, I also analysed the word count the female had a count of 76 whereas the mal significantly less with 35. Finally the last thing I counted was the number of nonstandard English used in the tweets, females used 2 and males used 7. However this data may not be as reliable as to make this information relevant we could have measured whether these cases were in the form of being creative/ on purpose for effect or by accident.

From this data we can conclude that our hypothesis is correct as women use more emotions through the use of technology, however this may just be in proportion to the word count which is higher than the males. 16% of women’s tweets contained technology as a source  to demonstrate their emotions whereas in 14% of males tweets contained technology so in relation to the word count there isn’t much significant difference in the data.

The transcript I decided to analyse was the Geordie shore video.

From this video you could apply the deficit theory.

I chose to collect data about the amounts of fillers and air time that both participants use and in this video, Vikki has the most air time at 67% of the conversation, it is also filled with fillers such as "like" use continuously throughout. The majority air time could have been taken by the woman because the conversation about her wedding therefore she could have felt more passionate about this than the man was possibly.

I could have also collected data on interruptions and overlaps of the male and female. This would have linked to the dominance theory as it is stated that the male would interrupt women's speech more as a sign of dominance and power. You could call an investigation like this 'An investigation to analyse whether males are more dominant in natural speech than females'