Learn Before
Early Onset of Language Learning
The process of learning a language starts remarkably early, with evidence suggesting it begins even before birth. Newborn infants already exhibit a preference for their mother's voice and can distinguish between the language their mother speaks and other languages. This indicates that foundational aspects of language acquisition are established in the prenatal or immediate postnatal period.

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Ch.7 Thinking and Intelligence - Psychology @ OpenStax
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Psychology @ OpenStax
Introduction to Psychology @ OpenStax Course
OpenStax Psychology (2nd ed.) Textbook
Related
Specific Language Impairment (SLI)
References for SLI in Preterm Born Children
Ease of Language Acquisition in Childhood
Skinner's Theory of Language Acquisition
Chomsky's Theory of Language Acquisition
Critical Period for Language Acquisition
Early Onset of Language Learning
Babbling Stage
One-Word Stage of Language Development
Overgeneralization in Language Acquisition
Cooing Stage
Early Communicative Gestures in Infancy
Vocabulary Growth and Language Skills in Early Childhood
Interactionist View of Language Acquisition
A developmental psychologist observes that children from vastly different cultural and linguistic backgrounds (e.g., urban Japan, rural Peru, and suburban Canada) all begin to babble, use single words, and then combine words into simple sentences at roughly the same ages. This cross-cultural consistency, despite significant differences in their environments and the specific languages they are exposed to, provides the strongest support for which of the following perspectives on language acquisition?
Biological Predisposition for Language Acquisition
Learn After
Infant Phoneme Discrimination and Perceptual Narrowing
Infant Preference for Audiovisual Synchrony in Language
A research study finds that newborns whose mothers frequently read a specific story aloud during the final trimester of pregnancy show a distinct preference for that story over a new one after birth, as measured by changes in their sucking patterns. What is the most accurate conclusion to draw from this finding regarding the initial stages of language acquisition?