Language development
Gender differences
0-1 years of age: An infant mainly uses non-verbal communication (mostly gestures) to communicate. For a newborn, crying is the only means of communication. Infants 1-5 months old have different tones of crying that indicate their emotions. Infants also begin laughing at this stage. At 6-7 months old, infants begin to respond to their own name, yell and squeal, and distinguish emotions based on the tone of voice of the mother and father. Between 7 and 10 months the infant starts putting words together, for example "mama" and "dada", but these words lack meaning and significance. Verbal communication begins at approximately 10-12 months, and the child starts to imitate any sounds they hear, for example animal sounds. The non-verbal communication of infants includes the use of gaze, head orientation and body positioning. Gestures are also widely used as an act of communication. All these stages can be delayed if the parents do not communicate with their infant on a daily basis. Nonverbal communication begins with the comprehension of parents and how they use it effectively in conversation. Infants are able to break down what adults and others are saying to them and use their comprehension of this communication to produce their own. 1–2 years of age: Verbal and nonverbal communication are both used at this stage of development. At 12 months, children start to repeat the words they hear. Adults, especially parents, are used as a point of reference for children in terms of the sound of words and what they mean in context of the conversation. Children learn much of their verbal communication through repetition and observing others. If parents do not speak to their children at this age it can become quite difficult for them to learn the essentials of conversation. The vocabulary of a 1–2 year old should consist of 50 words and can be up to 500. Gestures that were used earlier on in development begin to be replaced by words and eventually are only used when needed. Verbal communication is chosen over nonverbal as development progresses. 2–3 years of age: Children aged 2–3 communicate best in a turn-taking style. This creates a conversational structure that makes it easier for verbal communication to develop. It also teaches patience, kindness, and respect as they learn from the direction of elders that one person should speak at a time. This creates interactional synchrony during their preverbal routines that shapes their interpersonal communication skills early on in their development. Children during this stage in their life also go through a recognition and continuity phase. Children start to see that shared awareness is a factor in communication along with their development of symbolic direction of language. This especially affects the relationship between the child and the caregiver; it is a crucial part of self-discovery for the child when they begin to take ownership over their own actions in a continuous manner. 3–5 years of age: In this age group children are still learning how to form abstract thoughts and are still communicating concretely. Children begin to be fluent in connecting sounds, syllables, and linking words that make sense together in one thought. They begin to participate in short conversations with others. Stuttering can develop, generally resulting in slowed-down speech with a few letter enunciation errors (f, v, s, z). At the beginning of this stage toddlers tend to be missing function words and misunderstand how to use verb tenses.Over time they start including functional words, pronouns, and auxiliary verbs. This is the stage at which most children can pick up on emotional cues of the tone of adults' conversation. If negative feedback is distinguished by the child, this ends with fear and avoidance of the associated verbal and nonverbal cues. Toddlers develop the skills to listen and partially understand what another person is saying and can develop an appropriate response. 5–10 years of age: Much language development during this time period takes place in a school setting. At the beginning of the school age years, a child’s vocabulary expands through exposure to reading, which also helps children to learn more difficult grammatical forms, including plurals and pronouns. They also begin to develop metalinguistic awareness which allows them to reflect and more clearly understand the language they use. They therefore start to understand jokes and riddles. Reading is a gateway for learning new vernacular and having confidence in complex word choices while talking with adults. This is an important developmental stage socially and physiologically for the child. School-aged children can easily be influenced through communication and gestures. As children continue to learn communication, they realize the difference between forms of intentions and understand that there are numerous different ways to express the same intent, with different meaning. 10–18 years of age: By the age of 10, the child's cognitive potential has matured and they can participate fully and understand the purpose of their conversations. During this time, the sophistication and effectiveness of communication skills increase and understanding of vocabulary and grammar increases as a result of education. Adolescents go through changes in social interactions and cognitive development that influence the way they communicate. They often use colloquial speech (slang), however, which can increase confusion and misunderstandings. An individual’s style of interpersonal communication depends on who they are communicating with. Their relationships change influencing how they communicate with others. During this period, adolescents tend to communicate less with their parents and more with their friends. When discussions are initiated in different channels of communication, attitude and predispositions are key factors that drive the individual to discuss their feelings. This also shows that respect in communication is a trait in interpersonal communication that is built on throughout development. The end of this adolescent stage is the basis for communication in the adult stage. Language development and processing begins before birth. Evidence has shown that there is language development occurring antepartum. DeCasper and Spence performed a study in 1986 by having mothers read aloud during the last few weeks of pregnancy. When the infants were born, they were then tested. They were read aloud a story while sucking on a pacifier; the story was either the story read by the mother when the infant was in utero or a new story. The pacifier used was able to determine the rate of sucking that the infant was performing. When the story that the mother had read before was heard, the sucking of the pacifier was modified. This did not occur during the story that the infant had not heard before. The results for this experiment had shown that the infants were able to recognize what they had heard in utero, providing insight that language development had been occurring in the last six weeks of pregnancy.
Language development-13