Language Acquisition

Paper Summary:

Examines differing concepts of the rationalist and the empiricist theorists on how language is acquired. Compares the two approaches as applied to children's first language acquisition. The minds of young children. Structure-oriented & process-oriented groups. Environmental factors. Social interaction vs. cognitive theories. Semantic learning characteristics. Current research.

From the Paper:

"The fierce debate between the rationalist and the empiricist theorists on the issue of language acquisition has captured the imagination of the linguistic world for decades. Even though each group has produced results that contribute to the research on language acquisition, the complete process of language acquisition still remains a mystery. While the rationalists' concept of specific language mechanisms in the brain has prevailed for many years, new research by connectionist theorists has tilted the balance towards the empiricists' approach.
In this paper, the two competing approaches will be examined and compared in detail. Their application in children's discourse will be explored to assess their validity. Finally, the work..."

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