语言习得

维基百科，自由的百科全书

语言习得是人类语言发展的进程。第一次语言习得关系到儿童时代的语言能力发展，而第二次语言习得关系到成人语言的发展。历史上，理论与理论家们一直强调先天与后天是语言习得的最重要因素。但最近的研究者们认为生理与环境因素都很重要。最热门的争论是生物贡献是否包括语言容量（普遍文法）。五十年来，语言学家Noam Chomsky强烈支持儿童有先天的语言能力促进或约束语言学习。其它研究者如Elizabeth Bates, Brian MacWhinney, Catherine Snow, 和 Michael Tomasello设定语言学习仅从认知能力和学习者与周围环境的互动因素中得出。最近，非先天论者，Willliam O'Grady，指出从功效化、线性计算系统中得出复杂的关系现象。CHILDES语言数据库数据库为研究提供了方便。

[编辑] 先天论

先天语言学理论认为儿童从他们的自然能力中组织语言法则，但是如果没有其它人类则不能完全有效应用这种天赋。但这并不说明，儿童需要任何语言的正规教学。Chomsky认为儿童生来在脑中就有一种语言习得设备（language acquisition device LAD），他们生来就知道主要的语言学习方法，但也有许多不定项，如是否他们学习的语言的句子中必须有一种清楚的科目）。根据先天论，当年轻的孩子接触到语言是，他们的LAD自然而然为他们设定那些不定项以及推论出语法要点因为那些要点是天生的。

Mark Baker的工作, 《语言原子》（The Atoms of Language (2004)） 提到不仅有那些特定的LAD“不定项”，而且这些不定项可以组合成为语言的“元素周期表”。

另外，一些遗传基因学学习认为基因因素也参与认识视听样本的大脑中冗余系统。

普遍文法的概念是Chomskian观点的中心，即，所有语言拥有同样的基本底层结构,而语言把这种结构观画成了特定的不同语种的样式。另一种观点是没有语言婴儿就不能在人类环境中学习语言模式（刺激作用）。 心理学家，如哈佛大学研究家长与孩子互动的Catherine Snow指出儿童不必从说话时的乱句子中（语法不通）演绎出语言要素。许多研究指出不象普通说话，对小孩子的说话常常是慢、清楚、语法正确的和重复的。

[编辑] 后天论（经验说）

后天论包括竞争说与社会交互作用。社会交互作用学者，如Snow，著说推理认为成年人在儿童的语言习得过程中扮演了非常重要的角色,但是，也有一些研究人员认为那些社会交互作用主義所根據的實驗數據經常過度以歐美中產的家長與兒童的交互所代表. 不同的人類學的

Non-nativist theories include the Competition model and Social interactionism. Social-interactionists, like Snow, theorize that adults play an important part in children's language acquisition. However, some researchers claim that the empirical data on which theories of social interactionism are based have often been over-representative of middle class American and European parent-child interactions. Various anthropological studies of other human cultures, as well as anecdotal evidence from western families, suggests rather that many, if not the majority, of the world's children are not spoken to in a manner akin to traditional language lessons, but nevertheless grow up to be fully fluent language users. Many researchers now take this into account in their analyses. Furthermore, as any parent knows, children often pay scarce attention to what they are told to say, instead sticking to their own ungrammatical preferences.

Nevertheless, Snow's criticisms might be powerful against Chomsky's argument, if the argument from the poverty of stimulus were indeed an argument about degenerate stimulus, but it is not. The argument from the poverty of stimulus is that there are principles of grammar that cannot be learned on the basis of positive input alone, however complete and grammatical that evidence is. This argument is not vulnerable to objection based on evidence from interaction studies such as Snow's.

However, a powerful argument against Chomskian views of language acquisition lies in Chomskian theory itself. The theory has several hypothetical constructs, such as movement, empty categories, complex underlying structures, and strict binary branching, that cannot possibly be acquired from any amount of input. Since the theory is, in essence, unlearnably complex, then it must be innate. A different theory of language, however, may yield different conclusions. Examples of alternative theories that do not utilize movement and empty categories are HPSG and Construction Grammar. While all theories of language acquisition posit some degree of innateness, a less convoluted theory might involve less innate structure and more learning. Under such a theory of grammar, the input, combined with both general and language-specific learning capacities, might be sufficient for acquisition.