Term Paper: Language Development Hypotheses
The language development is the complex process not only from the linguistic standpoint but also from psychological and social one, because it occurs in the course of the interaction and communication between people.
Today, the language development has multiple interpretations and different theories offer different interpretations of the language development. Therefore, the language development may be viewed from different perspectives.
However, there is no homogeneous view on the language development and different theories offer different explanation of the language development. At this point, it is possible to refer to the social interactionist theory based on works of L. Vygotsky, who developed the idea of the language development through socio-cultural interaction between individuals. In fact, the development of the social interactionist theory contributed to the development of the socially-oriented perspective on language as the consequence of the social interaction between individuals.
The social interactionist theory holds the premise that the language development occurs through the social development of an individual and his/her interaction with his/her social environment. From the beginning of the life, people start interacting with their social environment. Babies interact with their parents and start acquiring language from their parents.
As they start saying first words, they receive a positive feedback from their parents that encourages them to use these words over and over again and learn new words from their parents. Steadily, the scope of the social interaction increases and individuals start interacting with other meaningful adults as well as their peers. As their social interactions expand, they start learning from other people new language patterns and words. Thus, they develop their language skills and abilities.
In the course of their further development and education, they enhance their language skills and abilities. For instance, during professional training they learn specific language which they use in their work. For instance, health care professionals learn professional terms and medical concepts which they use in their work. Hence, they expand their language skills and abilities during their learning and training through interaction with educators and other students.
From the social interactionist perspective individuals interact with each other and they apparently need language to maintain their interaction effectively. Therefore, language turns out to be a facilitator that contributes to the effective communication and interaction between individuals. In fact, the social interaction occurs in the natural way from the beginning of life since individuals are social beings and they interact with each other. In such a situation, they use language to communicate with each other. The more developed their language skills are the more effectively they communicate. This is why people keep progressing and developing their language skills and abilities to maintain the effective communication and interaction with each other. In such a way, the language development
comprises an integral part of the development of social relations of individuals.
In this regard, the social interactionist theory justifies the dependence of the language development on the social environment of individuals since people cannot develop their language skills and abilities without the interaction with other people. At this point, proponents of the social interactionist theory draw numerous examples, when children, who were deprived of the possibility to communicate and interact with people and grew up in isolation from the society had substantial problems in their language development, while in many cases they just could not speak at all.
These cases prove the significant role of the social environment and social interaction in the language development of individuals. At the same time, the social interaction determines, to a significant extent, the language development of individuals because through social interaction individuals learn new language patterns and create new language patterns that help them to interact with other people.
On the other hand, the social interactionist theory does not provide the adequate explanation of the steady progress of the language development of individuals. In fact, the social interactionist theory links the language development to the further progress of social relations of individuals in the course of their development (Gargiulo, 2006). Hence, their communication skills and their language development become more and more complex.
In such a way, the social interactionist theory does not give the adequate explanation of different stages in the language development in relation to the cognitive development of individuals. Instead, the language development turns out to be the result of the social experience of individuals (Gargiulo, 2006). The poor social experience leads to the poor language development, while the rich social experience leads to the rich language development.
However, the social interactionist theory does not take into consideration the psychological peculiarities of individuals and fail to explain clearly why people may be substantially different in their language development and language skills. Instead, the theory just explains variations in the language development by different social interactions of individuals and different social relations of individuals. In this regard, researchers (Moerk, 1994) point out that the language development depends not only on the social experience of individuals but also on their individual psychological peculiarities and traits of character. In addition, the social interactionist theory fails to explain the innate ability of people to use language for communication.
Nevertheless, the social interactionist theory has a number of strengths along with the revelation of the social background of the language development (Vygotsky, 2011). In this regard, it is worth mentioning the revelation of the progress of individual language development through communication with other individuals. The social interactionist theory stands on the ground that complex social interactions lead to the development of complex language skills and abilities and, therefore, stimulate the enhancement of individual language skills and abilities. In such a way, individuals can accelerate their language development through the development of their social interactions.
Furthermore, the social interactionist theory helps to reveal the mechanism of the language acquisition from parents to babies and children at the early age, when the need to interact with parents and other people virtually forces individuals to use language to communicate their ideas and desires to their social environment.
In fact, the mechanism of the language acquisition and development determined by needs of people to interact with each other explains the further language development because needs of individuals grow more and more complicated in the course of time and they develop more and more complex social interactions that stimulate their further language development (Moerk, 1994).
In such a way, the social interactionist theory offers the basic model of the language development through the social interaction, when individuals developing certain language skills to reach the target social interaction receive a positive feedback from others, if they use the right language pattern, preserve it and use it over and over again. Moreover, individuals develop more complex language patterns expecting receiving a positive feedback from others.
On the contrary, if they fail to receive a positive feedback in response to certain language pattern, they abandon this language pattern and do not use it anymore, unless they receive a positive feedback from others (Vygotsky, 2011). This mechanism helps to understand how the language is acquired and how the language development evolves in the course of the development of social interactions of individuals. The social interactionist theory emphasizes the social background of the language development which is one of the crucial elements of many other language development theories.
At the same time, the social interactionist theory offers its own interpretation of the impact of the social interaction on the language development of individuals.
Thus, taking into account all above mentioned, it is important to place emphasis on the fact that the social interactionist theory develops the socially-oriented perspective on the language development. According to the social interactionist theory the language development occurs through the social interaction between individuals and is fully dependent on such interaction. Any breaches or failures to interact with the social environment of individuals can cause substantial problems in the language development as were many cases of children, who grew up in isolation from humans or lacking communication and interaction with people.