Between Psych and Linguistics: Language Learning and Overgeneralization

In this week’s reading, we observed Clark and Hechts’ study of children and acquiring language coining devices such as the use of –er. I found the findings from the study quite interesting, especially the stages with which children come to correctly use –er to produce agent and instrument nouns. Specifically, I am reminded of developmental psychology and the many stages of growth through which children go. In young children, for example, the problem of overgeneralization is especially pervasive.

In overgeneralization, children often take concepts just like –er, and use them too much. In one study, children, after enough exposure to the –ed suffix, used –ed to try and make everything past tense. For example, a child would correctly say words like “created” and “talked,” but said “eated” and “runned” instead of “ate” and “ran.” It is cases like these that I find really interesting: what really goes on in a child’s head when they realize that they can’t just tack suffixes onto words to change the tense?

Clark and Hecht note an important point – children don’t necessarily differentiate between other linguistic concepts outside of the current generalization. As with the typewriter example, where a child said that her mother was the typewriter and the typewriter was the “typewrite,” the major confusion in the child’s mind might not be inherent to the coinage strategy as much as another core misunderstanding. In this case, it is the failure to know that –er can be used for instruments as well as agents.

Understanding how to trace these errors and their roots, I believe, can be very telling for both psychologists and linguists alike. Perhaps if we were to fully map out the possible fallacies that children encounter as they acquire language, we can develop a better understanding of how humans learn language in general. Further, I wonder if we can use these finding to create better ways to teach English (among other languages) to non-native speakers.