Studies show many experts believe that there is no significant difference between the age when a boy begins to communicate verbally and when a girl begins. (SW)

In Skinner's analysis of verbal behavior, three categories of environmental control over instances of verbal behavior appear to be relevant to the study of infant vocal development: the mand, the tact, and the echoic categories. Procedures used in the remediation of language deficiencies and procedures found in work in the area of language…

To the question of whether Chomsky's hypothesized Language Acquisition Device (LAD) in young children is an adequate and feasible model of language acquisition, this paper answers that LAD should be reformulated so as to include semantics; that "informant presentation" rather than "text presentation" is responsible for language…

This paper, one in a series investigating day care services, is based on two assumptions concerning verbalizations of preschool children: (1) the complexity of verbalizations is more important than the quantity; and (2) the quality of care is directly related to the occurrence of the complexity of verbalizations. The higher the occurrence of…

A withdrawn adolescent, an outpatient at a mental health clinic, was the subject for this case report. Baseline data were collected on the frequency of the subjects' verbalizations. The subject was then instructed to record his own verbal behavior. The subject "earned" his way out of the mental health clinic by increasing his verbal behavior to an…

This analysis of the structure of children's narratives deals with material gathered from 96 children, aged 3 1/2 to 9 1/2 years, in conversations about events in which they were personally involved. Elements of the narratives and the structural relationship of these elements are examined. Three elements are discerned: (1) chronological…

This paper represents an effort to explain the language development of the child within the analytic frame of overtly observable data and without recourse either to mathematical models or to postulating hypothetical underlying forms. From longitudinal studies of two-year old children conducted by the author as well as from similar data reported in…

Study examined speech complexity among 22 sets of parents and their school-age children during two time periods approximately one year apart. Parents and children were videotaped while completing a block design task and their conversations were transcribed. Speech patterns were found to differ at the two times. (Author/BN)

Examined the relationship between infants' early verbal imitation, when the ability to copy behaviors first emerges, and their lexical development during the second year of life. Twenty infants were examined longitudinally at ages 10, 13, 17, and 21 months. Suggests that infants' early imitation of words not in their repertoires predicts and may…

FIVE STUDIES ARE REPORTED OF OPERANT CONDITIONING AND LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT PRINCIPLES IN READING. THE FIRST STUDY OUTLINED THE RATIONALE AND PRINCIPLES UNDERLYING THE PROJECT. THE SECOND STUDY INITIATED AND REFINED APPLICATIONS OF REINFORCEMENT PROCEDURES FOR STUDYING EFFECTS OF DISCRIMINATION TRAINING ON READING. STUDY NUMBER THREE DEMONSTRATED…

This study examined three potential situational determinants of children's question-asking: (1) the presence or absence of a peer; (2) whether or not the children are given tactual access to the materials being used to induce questions; and (3) whether these materials are presented three-dimensionally (as objects) or two-dimensionally (as…

A study was conducted to determine criteria to measure successful language development and to determine what factors might be considered to be the determiners of this development. Subjects were 16 children, aged 3 years 3 months, selected on an intuitive basis from the 64 children in the older age group to represent the full range of development,…

The speech of two mothers to their infants between three and eighteen months was analyzed. Simplicity of speech was about the same at all ages, not showing abrupt change as children began to talk. It is suggested that mothers used a conversational model and changes reflect children's growing conversational ability. (CHK)

This research review sought to discover the forms of family verbal interaction that nurture language development in infants and toddlers, the function of different family members in this process, and the role of environmental factors in language development. Results indicate that speech to a child is significantly different from speech to an…

To study maternal behaviors as related to social class differences, 30 middle class and 30 working class white mothers were observed at home on two separate days with their 10-month-old firstborn baby girls. Predesignated behaviors which occurred during 5-second intervals were recorded by an observer. Total observation time was 4 hours for each…