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Related Concept Videos

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Children master language quickly and with relative ease, supported by both biological predisposition and reinforcement. B. F. Skinner (1957) proposed that language is learned through reinforcement, while Noam Chomsky (1965) argued that language acquisition mechanisms are biologically determined.
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Related Experiment Video

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Experience is Instrumental in Tuning a Link Between Language and Cognition: Evidence from 6- to 7- Month-Old Infants' Object Categorization
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The logical problem of language acquisition: a probabilistic perspective.

Anne S Hsu1, Nick Chater

  • 1Department of Cognitive, Perceptual, and Brain Sciences, University College London Department of Cognitive, Perceptual, and Brain Sciences and ESRC Centre for Economic Learning and Social Evolution (ELSE), University College London.

Cognitive Science
|May 14, 2011
PubMed
Summary

Children may learn language restrictions through statistical inference, but some rules require more than just data. This study quantifies data needs for learning linguistic patterns, revealing which rules need innate knowledge.

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Area of Science:

  • Linguistics
  • Cognitive Science
  • Computational Linguistics

Background:

  • Natural language contains ungrammatical patterns despite apparent linguistic rules.
  • The acquisition of these linguistic restrictions by children is debated, questioning the need for innate knowledge.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To extend the minimum description length (MDL) principle for estimating data requirements in learning linguistic restrictions.
  • To provide a quantifiable method for analyzing language learnability.

Main Methods:

  • Utilizing probabilistic inference and the minimum description length (MDL) principle.
  • Developing a practical methodology to estimate linguistic data needed for learning specific restrictions.

Main Results:

  • Some linguistic rules are statistically learnable from language experience alone.
  • Other rules appear to necessitate additional learning mechanisms, such as innate constraints or extra cues.

Conclusions:

  • The MDL approach offers a novel tool for explicit and quantified arguments on language learnability.
  • Findings suggest a spectrum of learnability for linguistic restrictions, impacting theories of language acquisition.