patiodog wrote:Damn, it's like Parliament in here...
Quote:As far as I know, children who grow up without ever learning a language never learn any, if they grow past about 10 or 12 without verbal human contact. I don't know much more than that about their developement, though. Kind of makes you wonder how the first languages came about, I guess. I do know that children who grow up around pidgins, which are not fully developed conglomorations of words from different languages, develope a creole, which is like the pidgin in vocabulary, but unlike the pidgin, has rules and grammar and syntax. Eventually, the creole becomes a dialect.
I was thinking more in terms of how a lack of language would affect other mental capacities -- which, would, I suppose, be practically untestable, ethics aside. For instance, does the development of language help with the development of abstract spatial thought, or are these separate entities? Could Greystoke have made a machine without first learning to speak? That's more what I had in mind.
And for me it steers thinking away from vocabulary (which may be something of a red herring as it pertains to this subject) and back toward structure and syntax. After all, the syntax of mathematics -- and here I use the word "syntax" loosely (not having any firm grasp of its precise linguistic meaning), taking it to mean something akin to how logical relationships are encoded in language -- is not that different from language. Now, language is virtually assured to have evolved before mathematics (unless you count the sort of calculus a dog can do to catch a ball), but is it a necessary prerequisite to mathematics?
Just blabbing here...
I am no expert here, but my undersatnding is that there is a critical period for language learning, which occurs under three - and, if that period is missed (eg because of undiagnosed deafness - a sadly common thing here amongst outback Aboriginal people, at least to some extent {ie, child may not be COMPLETELY deaf}, because of non-attendance to ear infections) then the child's language is permanently affected, as are, it seems, other learning abilities. I am not sure about spatial stuff - I would imagine not, on the basis that a lot of kids we see with language-based learning disorders have excellent spatial skills.
The message seems to be that failure to acquire normal language means that the brain does not develop properly, causing problems in some other (probably related) areas - like literacy, numeracy etc.
Other claims were made, in the paper I just looked up, re behavioural problems - but I think thee could be adequately explained by other factors - like the environment that meant the deafness/illness went untreated in the first place, and frustration with learning and poor self-esteem amongst the affected children. (Kids KNOW, very fast, when they are, as they think of it, "dumb")
I use flurry to describe light fluffy snowflakes, and so does everyone els around here. It's a relatively new addition to my vocabulary, since it doesn't snow where I used to live, so for all I know, that could just be Midwestern.
