Newsgroups: sci.lang
From: Andre@shappski.demon.co.uk (Andre Shapps)
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!das-news2.harvard.edu!news2.near.net!news.mathworks.com!udel!gatech!howland.reston.ans.net!news.sprintlink.net!peernews.demon.co.uk!shappski.demon.co.uk!Andre
Subject: Re: Children and languages
References: <208064050wnr@shappski.demon.co.uk> <D4oGwM.Iup@spss.com> <660255414wnr@shappski.demon.co.uk> <1995Feb28.141959.1@ctdvx5.priv.ornl.gov>
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Date: Thu, 2 Mar 1995 23:45:51 +0000
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In article: <1995Feb28.141959.1@ctdvx5.priv.ornl.gov>  s25@ctdvx5.priv.ornl.gov 
writes:
> 
> > Presumably there is no experimental way of testing for this, so the theory 
> > (hypothesis?) must have been arrived at theoretically, but no one has been 
able 
> > to show me how.
> 
> Unless I am misunderstanding you, there is a very easy way of testing the
> theory: determine whether there is any difference in the rate at which
> children acquire language skills among the various languages of the world.
> 
> You might define "acquires language skills" by way of certain milestones,
> such as the age at which the child speaks its first word, age at which it
> is able to speak in complete sentences, etc. From everything I've read
> (and if you insist, I will post a reference) the average age at which these
> milestones are reached for spoken language are constant across all
> languages and cultures.
> 
> John

Yes I thought of that kind of thing, but I would have thought that cultural 
differences would have such a big effect that any differences in the learning 
difficulties of the language itself would be rendered insignificant.

Sorry if this point's already been made by now. My newsreader's a bit ropey and I 
think I missed a couple of days while I figured a way around a bug.
-- 
Andre Shapps

