When first reading through Clark and Hecht, I thought of my roommate who conducts similar card studies with three year olds at a school in San Francisco. The night before she went to conduct the study for the first time, she went through it with me. It was somewhat comical, having my best friend pretend I was a three year old, and asking me basic questions. However, I remember telling her that I am surprised young kids are so cooperative. I could see how they felt intimidated, judged, or influenced by the experimenter. The questions were so simple that I even questioned myself and wondered what exactly they were looking for. Regarding this experiment, I could see how kids could feel discouraged or swayed, especially in the groups that thought of suppletive words (like 'scissors' for something that cuts) and received feedback based on that. How much of the children's responses correspond to them figuring out what the experimenter wants along with their level of language? There have been numerous studies about humans - particularly babies - social skills with just recognizing facial expressions. How does that progress with language?
In addition to the psychological studies that demonstrate social recognition, I also think of the studies that demonstrate humans submission to authority (like Zimbardo and Milgram's experiments). This reading stated that children "relinquish their own innovations." I am curious to how age corresponds to the development or access of the "language center" but also how quickly children would adjust their word use based on who is correcting or not correcting their languages. How much does children's perception of authority influences what is considered proper language acquisition?
Great post! Loved the anecdote about how your roommate runs similar studies to those described in the Clark & Hecht paper. I was also interested in knowing more about different age ranges that were described in the paper. Could we possibly relate these back to developmental studies in psychology as you suggest (i.e. Sensorimotor, Preoperational, Concrete Operational, Formal Operational stages)?
ReplyDeleteGreat piece, Andi! Obviously, to some extent this problem can be solved by blinding the individuals to the results they are expecting, or using psychologists or others who are used to taking children ‘at face value’ (unlike the teacher-type figures your piece implicitly refers to). To some extent, though, I wonder if this desire to get the ‘right answer’ or ‘what the adult wants’ is true of all linguistics, in that children don’t passively process language in their heads when they speak but rather convey it to adults who then implicitly indicate their (dis)approval if only in their ability to comprehend what they are given.
ReplyDeleteYou also pose an interesting question – are children in environments where they are corrected more often/by more authoritative people more or less likely to pick up language quickly? I see cases for both sides: corrections allow people to refine their internal grammars more quickly, but also might hamper the creative instincts that encourage children to explore and come up with new linguistic innovations quickly.
Hi Andi,
ReplyDeleteYou bring up a really interesting point here—maybe we shouldn't just be taking the study at face value, but also looking deeper to see whether there are certain biases or expectations that influenced the results. I feel like this kind of analysis would go beyond just the study itself as well, but perhaps look into what kinds of adult figures impact the way children "grow out" of coining words as they gain a more mature understanding of language devices. I would be interested to see whether, when this experiment is conducted with other morphemes and maybe with different experimenters, whether the conclusions will differ—how much of our language and expression is influenced by the expectations placed upon us while we are delivering statements?
-Katherine