An Investigation into the Differences in Written Language in Young Deaf People and Young Hearing People
Language acquisition and development is a process that Chomsky thinks comes innately to humans through a device called the LAD – Language Acquisition Device. His theory states that babies are born with the knowledge of basic rules of language structure and that humans come with an innate ability to pick up language. However, what happens if the child suffers from a disability that hinders their ability to hear the language around them?
For my language investigation I will be analysing the differences in written language in deaf people compared to hearing people. My investigation will consider grammar, lexis and cohesion. Being deaf puts a person at a huge disadvantage in terms of learning both written and spoken language because they cannot pick up information through being immersed within the language environment, especially if they were born deaf or lost their hearing at a very young age.
This disadvantage means that learning language is extremely difficult for them because the children often cannot hear themselves, let alone the person talking to them. Teaching the child(ren) words and concepts of life are often a slower process when compared to a hearing child who is more aware of their surroundings. Piaget's theories on language acquisition are mainly focused around "cognitive development" - the language they learn being controlled by the development of thinking. This means that the child would have to understand the concept in order for them to be able to correctly use the phrase: e.g. children who use phrases such as "more than" must have grasped the concept of it before they were able to use it in an utterance. I wish to challenge this theory in my investigation.
AimsI will be looking at the lexis and grammar used by a young deaf person and then will compare it to that of a hearing person of a similar age.
MethodologyMy case study will centre around my sister who had meningitis when she was almost a year old and became deaf as a result of it. She received a cochlear implant that allows her to hear in one ear but she mainly relies on lip reading and, in earlier stages of life, sign language. She picked up spoken and written language at a later age than hearing children through speech therapy and she received special help at school from specialised departments for deaf children. Her main form of communication with friends out of school was instant messaging because she did not need to rely on speaking and listening in order to converse. This provides an interesting case to test the theories mentioned above. Catherine has provided me with a diary that she kept from 2007 to present day and I will compare it to one of my own (from 2008 to 2010). I will be comparing them throughout the investigation, looking for both differences and similarities, along with points that prove or disprove theories of child language acquisition from Chomsky and Piaget.
Expectations
I expect that the language she uses will differ from my own (which is what I will be comparing her data to), especially grammatically because she could not pick up sentence structure and other language features from listening to people at a young age when she relied heavily on sign language and lip reading. This ties into Bruner’s theory of a Language Acquisition Support System (LASS) – Catherine relied heavily on direct interaction with her support system, which made her language acquisition process slower than a child who is able to pick up language from their LASS independently. I also expect that this means her vocabulary and understanding of concepts will be more limited than my own, meaning that perhaps some things she writes may not make sense because she does not understand the concept before trying to use the word.
I expect that the language she uses will differ from my own (which is what I will be comparing her data to), especially grammatically because she could not pick up sentence structure and other language features from listening to people at a young age when she relied heavily on sign language and lip reading. This ties into Bruner’s theory of a Language Acquisition Support System (LASS) – Catherine relied heavily on direct interaction with her support system, which made her language acquisition process slower than a child who is able to pick up language from their LASS independently. I also expect that this means her vocabulary and understanding of concepts will be more limited than my own, meaning that perhaps some things she writes may not make sense because she does not understand the concept before trying to use the word.
Analysis
GrammarThe most obvious difference between Catherine’s diary entries and my own is the use of grammar. Catherine’s grammar is less developed than my own and almost seems childlike. She mixes up tenses in sentences a lot which takes away from the coherence of the sentence: ‘I’m going on my own because mum couldn’t come as she has work to do!’ This agrees with Chomsky’s theory that children are born with a basic knowledge of language structure because she knows to put the verbs in the right places but because she does not understand the concept of tenses as well as we do, she often gets it wrong.
The data proves that Catherine understands the concept of prepositions and where to put them in a sentence, but she perhaps doesn’t quite understand the meaning of some prepositions or which ones to use in which context. For example, she wrote, ‘I started to write this of age 11 yrs old.’ The use of the preposition ‘of’ (instead of ‘at’) shows that she recognises that a preposition should be used but she uses the wrong one. This also occurs in the first diary entry where she writes, ‘helps each other of learning about deaf’, proving that this is not an anomaly. This somewhat agrees with Piaget’s theory of understanding the concept before using the phrase, but she doesn’t quite fully understand which preposition to use, disproving it to some degree.
My own diary entries show a pretty much fully developed understanding of how to use language, and shows confidence in when to use plurals and singular words. However, Catherine sometimes mixes hers up, putting plurals where it should be singular: ‘1 months’, ‘had an ears damaged’. This once again challenges Piaget’s theory; the use of the plural in this case may suggest that she does not understand the concept of plurals, but she has seen people use plurals before (maybe in literature or in other people’s writing – proving Bruner’s theory of the LASS because she has acquired this concept of language from social conditions) and tried to use them in her own way. This relates to the theory of imitation – that children learn language through imitation, but this theory has been found incorrect. However, Catherine has imitated what she has seen/heard other people write/say and used it without understanding the meaning, so it shows that it is possible to learn words through imitation but the child would need to be taught the meaning of the word.
In Catherine’s 2009 diary entries, she has shown a major development in her grammar, not getting too many prepositions wrong, and her sentence structure is often very cohesive. However, it is evident that she has picked up the concept of the word ‘though’ (a subordinating conjunction) but doesn’t quite understand it. She uses it a lot when she doesn’t need to, causing her to sound like she’s contradicting herself: ‘we took funny pictures on webcam. Really funny, though.’ This sentence is not entirely coherent because the ‘though’ suggests that the first part of the sentence is negative or of lesser importance/relevance to the second part, but her intentions are to write about how funny the activity was, which she states in both parts of the sentence. This clearly suggests that she does not understand the meaning of the word but has perhaps heard/seen it from other people and has tried to use it in her own way. This is an example of Vygotsky’s theory of social interaction having an impact on language acquisition. His theory of the More Knowledgeable Other, which is, in this case, her peers using the word ‘though’, is proved here as Catherine has taken influence from them.
The data proves that Catherine understands the concept of prepositions and where to put them in a sentence, but she perhaps doesn’t quite understand the meaning of some prepositions or which ones to use in which context. For example, she wrote, ‘I started to write this of age 11 yrs old.’ The use of the preposition ‘of’ (instead of ‘at’) shows that she recognises that a preposition should be used but she uses the wrong one. This also occurs in the first diary entry where she writes, ‘helps each other of learning about deaf’, proving that this is not an anomaly. This somewhat agrees with Piaget’s theory of understanding the concept before using the phrase, but she doesn’t quite fully understand which preposition to use, disproving it to some degree.
My own diary entries show a pretty much fully developed understanding of how to use language, and shows confidence in when to use plurals and singular words. However, Catherine sometimes mixes hers up, putting plurals where it should be singular: ‘1 months’, ‘had an ears damaged’. This once again challenges Piaget’s theory; the use of the plural in this case may suggest that she does not understand the concept of plurals, but she has seen people use plurals before (maybe in literature or in other people’s writing – proving Bruner’s theory of the LASS because she has acquired this concept of language from social conditions) and tried to use them in her own way. This relates to the theory of imitation – that children learn language through imitation, but this theory has been found incorrect. However, Catherine has imitated what she has seen/heard other people write/say and used it without understanding the meaning, so it shows that it is possible to learn words through imitation but the child would need to be taught the meaning of the word.
In Catherine’s 2009 diary entries, she has shown a major development in her grammar, not getting too many prepositions wrong, and her sentence structure is often very cohesive. However, it is evident that she has picked up the concept of the word ‘though’ (a subordinating conjunction) but doesn’t quite understand it. She uses it a lot when she doesn’t need to, causing her to sound like she’s contradicting herself: ‘we took funny pictures on webcam. Really funny, though.’ This sentence is not entirely coherent because the ‘though’ suggests that the first part of the sentence is negative or of lesser importance/relevance to the second part, but her intentions are to write about how funny the activity was, which she states in both parts of the sentence. This clearly suggests that she does not understand the meaning of the word but has perhaps heard/seen it from other people and has tried to use it in her own way. This is an example of Vygotsky’s theory of social interaction having an impact on language acquisition. His theory of the More Knowledgeable Other, which is, in this case, her peers using the word ‘though’, is proved here as Catherine has taken influence from them.
Lexis The lexis that I use in my diary entries is very well developed, choosing more adventurous adjective and adverbs (for a child of 12) such as ‘violently’ and ‘immensely’. Such words are not evident in Catherine’s diary entries. Instead, she uses quite basic modifiers for an 11 year old: ‘cool’, ‘lovely’. This may be because Catherine’s first language was British Sign Language (BSL) and, because she did not become deaf until around 2 years of age; she was not exposed to learning BSL from birth. Sign language takes more effort than speaking (coordinated movement of hands, arms, body and face) and so the ‘articulation of individual signs is about 1.5 times slower than for words’.[4] This could suggest that, because, as proven by Scarborough and Dobrich (1990), children who are delayed in experimenting with language at a young age develop slower than normal, Catherine’s lack of developed vocabulary is down to starting to learn language at a later age, and having to be taught it rather than experimenting with it as a baby. This could also link in to Lenneberg’s theory of the Critical Period – the window of time in which a child ‘readily’ learns language and any attempts to learn language after this timeframe may be unsuccessful or impossible. Catherine’s late start in language acquisition makes her language development slower because she missed about three years of her ‘critical period’.
Catherine, at the time of these diary entries, was clearly influenced by language in society changing around her. She often communicated with her friends via instant messaging when she wasn’t at school and the result of this is evident in her diary entries from the beginning. She uses phonetic spelling and number homophones: ‘cuz’ and ‘2moz’. This shows that she understands the concept of these techniques and this is probably because she had first-hand experiences of using these, since she was using instant messaging so often. She also uses slang words, like ‘innit’ which suggests that she has acquired the language of her generation through immersion and reinforcement from her peers, supporting Skinner’s theory that children learn language through reinforcement. She also uses it in the right context, suggesting that she fully understands the concept of slang and the meanings of the words. This agrees with Chomsky’s theory of having an innate ability to pick up language, and also with Piaget’s theory of understanding the concept in order to use the phrase. Slang is not used in my own diary entries (except the use of the initialism ‘btw’ although this could have just been used to save time rather than because of my idiolect) and this could be because of differences in our surroundings – slang may be part of Catherine’s sociolect and not mine, we went to different schools, etc.
There are more spelling mistakes in Catherine’s entries than my own, suggesting a slower development of language acquisition. She writes down ‘differculty’, which is a phonetic spelling, which is something you might expect to see in a child of a younger age who is still learning how to spell; more specifically in the ‘Consolidation Stage’ of writing development, which a child should normally reach at 6 – 8 years old. The phonetic spelling also supports the theory that starting to learn language at a later age means learning language at a slower rate, again supporting Lenneberg’s concept of the ‘Critical Period’ – because she missed a few years of her critical period, she learns language at a slower rate.
Catherine, at the time of these diary entries, was clearly influenced by language in society changing around her. She often communicated with her friends via instant messaging when she wasn’t at school and the result of this is evident in her diary entries from the beginning. She uses phonetic spelling and number homophones: ‘cuz’ and ‘2moz’. This shows that she understands the concept of these techniques and this is probably because she had first-hand experiences of using these, since she was using instant messaging so often. She also uses slang words, like ‘innit’ which suggests that she has acquired the language of her generation through immersion and reinforcement from her peers, supporting Skinner’s theory that children learn language through reinforcement. She also uses it in the right context, suggesting that she fully understands the concept of slang and the meanings of the words. This agrees with Chomsky’s theory of having an innate ability to pick up language, and also with Piaget’s theory of understanding the concept in order to use the phrase. Slang is not used in my own diary entries (except the use of the initialism ‘btw’ although this could have just been used to save time rather than because of my idiolect) and this could be because of differences in our surroundings – slang may be part of Catherine’s sociolect and not mine, we went to different schools, etc.
There are more spelling mistakes in Catherine’s entries than my own, suggesting a slower development of language acquisition. She writes down ‘differculty’, which is a phonetic spelling, which is something you might expect to see in a child of a younger age who is still learning how to spell; more specifically in the ‘Consolidation Stage’ of writing development, which a child should normally reach at 6 – 8 years old. The phonetic spelling also supports the theory that starting to learn language at a later age means learning language at a slower rate, again supporting Lenneberg’s concept of the ‘Critical Period’ – because she missed a few years of her critical period, she learns language at a slower rate.
Conclusion and Evaluation
My original hypothesis for this investigation was that there would be significant differences in the level of language used in deaf and hearing people because of the disability barrier of deaf children not being able to acquire language from their surroundings as naturally as hearing children, challenging Bruner’s LASS and Vygotsky’s theory of social interaction having an impact on language development. I collected my data from old diary entries of my sister and compared them to some of my own.
Following close observation of the diary entries, it is very clear that there are differences and a number of theories can be applied as explanations for these. Some theories were confirmed and some were disproved. For example, the existence of an innate ability to learn language (Chomsky’s LAD) was demonstrated but his theory of children being born with the knowledge of basic language structure can be debated because Catherine showed awareness of certain sentence structures but not others (e.g. Subject/object/verb was often correct but she was unsure about prepositions). However, the theory was supported with my own diary entries because, by age 12, I had developed knowledge of a wide range of sentence structures. Other theories were supported, such as Lenneberg’s theory of the ‘Critical Period’ (Catherine’s slower rate of language development as a result of missing a few years of her critical period) and some were challenged, like Piaget’s theory of understanding the concept before actively using the language.
Throughout the investigation, it was clear that learning language at a later age puts you at a major disadvantage and has repercussions in later years. Catherine’s level of language is one that you might expect to find in a child of a younger age (typically seven or eight years old) rather than one that is about to start secondary school. However, there are many variables during the time that could have affected the results. For example, her level of education would have been slower than my own (despite sharing a ‘language acquisition support system’ during infancy) and there have been changes in education on the whole since 2008 – for example, styles of teaching are very different today as they might have been four years ago, meaning that some of this data could be anomalous or outdated. For instance, nowadays teachers are putting more emphasis on learning phonics than they used to increase reading ages of children and improve their language development faster. Another reason this data could be anomalous would be because I didn’t compare it to any other case studies or data of other deaf children.
In conclusion, it is clear that a deaf child’s language is not as well developed as a hearing child’s. This is because the deaf child is unable to be completely immersed in the language and must be manually taught some aspects of language that children would otherwise pick up themselves through their peers, parents and carers (LASS). As well as learning language at a slower rate, in this particular case study, Catherine started learning spoken and written English at a later age than normal children (British Sign Language was her first language) and the effects of this prove the theory that learning language at a later age affects your language development for your whole life and that children who learn language later – in any context (disability, bad parenting, etc.) – develop slower than other children, as well as proving Lenneberg’s theory of a ‘Critical Period’.
Following close observation of the diary entries, it is very clear that there are differences and a number of theories can be applied as explanations for these. Some theories were confirmed and some were disproved. For example, the existence of an innate ability to learn language (Chomsky’s LAD) was demonstrated but his theory of children being born with the knowledge of basic language structure can be debated because Catherine showed awareness of certain sentence structures but not others (e.g. Subject/object/verb was often correct but she was unsure about prepositions). However, the theory was supported with my own diary entries because, by age 12, I had developed knowledge of a wide range of sentence structures. Other theories were supported, such as Lenneberg’s theory of the ‘Critical Period’ (Catherine’s slower rate of language development as a result of missing a few years of her critical period) and some were challenged, like Piaget’s theory of understanding the concept before actively using the language.
Throughout the investigation, it was clear that learning language at a later age puts you at a major disadvantage and has repercussions in later years. Catherine’s level of language is one that you might expect to find in a child of a younger age (typically seven or eight years old) rather than one that is about to start secondary school. However, there are many variables during the time that could have affected the results. For example, her level of education would have been slower than my own (despite sharing a ‘language acquisition support system’ during infancy) and there have been changes in education on the whole since 2008 – for example, styles of teaching are very different today as they might have been four years ago, meaning that some of this data could be anomalous or outdated. For instance, nowadays teachers are putting more emphasis on learning phonics than they used to increase reading ages of children and improve their language development faster. Another reason this data could be anomalous would be because I didn’t compare it to any other case studies or data of other deaf children.
In conclusion, it is clear that a deaf child’s language is not as well developed as a hearing child’s. This is because the deaf child is unable to be completely immersed in the language and must be manually taught some aspects of language that children would otherwise pick up themselves through their peers, parents and carers (LASS). As well as learning language at a slower rate, in this particular case study, Catherine started learning spoken and written English at a later age than normal children (British Sign Language was her first language) and the effects of this prove the theory that learning language at a later age affects your language development for your whole life and that children who learn language later – in any context (disability, bad parenting, etc.) – develop slower than other children, as well as proving Lenneberg’s theory of a ‘Critical Period’.
