Child Psychology Primer by George Hollich

Author:George Hollich
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Child Psychology, Psychology
ISBN: 9781515133476
Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
Published: 2015-08-21T04:00:00+00:00

7.6. Why does this matter? What are the advantages of sign language and bilingualism?

If you thought that language was all about sounds, you might be surprised to learn that children who are deaf still learn language, but that language is sign language. Sign language is not just a few random hand shapes either; it is a true language with grammar that lets its speakers express a full range of nuance and expression. The progression of learning sign language is similar to spoken language as well, with one critical difference: Deaf children start by vocally babbling, but because of the lack of auditory feedback, they stop making vocal sounds. Instead, they begin babbling with their hands—making shapes that slowly come to match those of the signers around them. In almost every other respect, sign language development follows the same pattern as spoken languages. This remarkable synchrony across modalities has led scientists such as Noam Chomsky to suggest that human language is an innate module. Much like an elephant’s truck, language is a specific human adaptation that helps us survive. While there is controversy about the contents of this module, unquestionably human children learn language with remarkably little training, while our pets and chimpanzees (some of our closest evolutionary relations) do not learn full language, despite extensive training.

Interestingly, some parents have begun teaching their hearing children some signs as well. Their hope is that their children will learn to express themselves at younger ages (because signs are often easier for children than speaking), and the research seems to bear this out. Children who learn a few signs communicate earlier and tend to have larger spoken vocabularies at age 2 than children who do not learn signs. That said, by 3 years of age this advantage has disappeared—probably because the parents are not teaching children the full sign language with grammar and its power to express new thoughts.

To give children a lasting advantage, parents might consider teaching them a full second or third language, be it sign or a spoken language. While some might be afraid that raising a child bilingual would hurt language development, the available evidence suggests that bilinguals acquire a larger total vocabulary, and they certainly have less difficulty learning as children than when they are older. In fact, functional magnetic resonance imaging studies suggest that languages learned when young use overlapping brain areas as compared to languages learned at older ages.[34] Children also don’t seem to get confused about which language is which or have any difficulties with pronunciation or complicated arbitrary grammatical properties—two major obstacle for older adults. So, when it comes to language, early exposure is better.

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