Abstract
Communication between humans is based on shared intentionality and cooperative structures. Both gestures and language are learned within shared intentionality. Infants are able to obtain their wish from their primary care persons by, for example, crying, a kind of vocal intentional movement. Later they use communicative pointing gestures. In proto-conversations infants vocalize to express their basic moods and begin to share behavioral interactions. Children are born with a model of dialogue and an inborn sense of the “virtual” other.
A genetic disposition for language learning ability exists. Infants and toddlers are able to bring this language learning system into action allowing the child to recognize words and sentences of each of the over 6000 spoken languages, in whatever language the child is born. The significant care persons offer an additional support system for the acquisition of language. This development depends on the appropriation of functions that exist not only in genes but are rooted in the local culture. The child learns to speak in a communicative, prelinguistic context and simultaneously learns what is customary and reasonable in his particular social setting as well as what is valued by his adult interaction partners. Parents play a far more active role than just being a language model for the child’s language acquisition. Language is a systematic procedure to communicate with others, influence foreign and own behavior, draw attention, and create shared realities with other persons.
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Notes
- 1.
For a review on infant’s intersubjectivity, see Trevarthen and Aitken (2001).
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Steck, A., Steck, B. (2016). Communication. In: Brain and Mind. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-21287-6_8
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