Increasing the odds: applying emergentist theory in language intervention

Abstract

Purpose: This review introduces emergentism, which is a leading theory of language development that states that language ability is the product of interactions between the child's language environment and his or her learning capabilities. The review suggests ways in which emergentism provides a theoretical rationale for interventions that are designed to address developmental language delays in young children.

Method: A review of selected literature on emergentist theory and research is presented, with a focus on the acquisition of early morphology and syntax. A significant method for developing and testing emergentist theory, connectionist modeling, is described. Key themes from both connectionist and behavioral studies are summarized and applied with specific examples to language intervention techniques. A case study is presented to integrate elements of emergentism with language intervention.

Conclusions: Evaluating the theoretical foundation for language interventions is an important step in evidence-based practice. This article introduces three themes in the emergentist literature that have implications for language intervention: (a) sufficiency of language input, (b) active engagement of the child with the input, and (c) factors that increase the odds for correctly mapping language form to meaning. Evidence supporting the importance of these factors in effective language intervention is presented, along with limitations in that evidence.

Figure 1

Emergentist theories of child language acquisition have been advanced by the interplay of the theories with evidence from connectionist models, behavioral or experimental evidence, as well as validation of the theories and models with brain imaging techniques such as fMRI.

Figure 2

A representation of Rummelhart and McClelland’s early (1986) connectionist model of how a verb stem (such as “show”) can be related to production of the past tense form (“showed”) through weighted connections between two layers of neuron-like units. Reprinted with permission from RETHINKING INNATENESS: A CONNECTIONIST PERSPECTIVE ON DEVELOPMENT, edited by Jeffrey Elman, Elizabeth Bates, Mark H. Johnson, Annette Karmiloff-Smith, Domenico Parisi, and Kim Plunkett, published by MIT Press.