Corey Rapa

Professor McDermott
Psych 350
February 23, 2014
Reflection Response 2
1.) The fact that children all over the world can learn their specific cultural language in just a
few years is evidence that there is a lot going on behind the scenes. New born infants, whose
bodies are constantly working and growing, also have the mental capability to not only process
language but also perfect it. As described in the TED Talk entitled The Linguistic Genius of
Babies, these infants are able to learn and reinforce language skills through interaction. By
simply speaking to these young children, from about 7 years of age and under, it has been found
that they can master sounds and over time get better at distinguishing their cultural language.
This skill however doesnt stay with us as we age and after year 7 a systemic decline in
capability begins.
When it comes to this language process that infants have, the most important element is
the social aspect. There have been experiments where children would receive stimuli from audio,
video and interpersonal communication in order to determine if there were any exceptions to the
way the infants learned and took in information. Each time it was determined that children were
not improving unless there was some form of direct social contact. This contact seems to be
important in that it allows two key things to happen, imitation and reinforcement. As mentioned
in lecture, these elements are essential due to the fact that they can lead to better language
production and recognition. By seeing their caregivers speaking on a daily basis these infants are
able not only to observe the movements of the adults mouths but they also reinforce the
necessary letter sounds in basic words. Which is why the first words of a child are often a
simplistic word or phrase that they have heard multiple times before.
2.) A. Though learning a second language may be something that most children or adults are
forced to do in moving through their education, there are some serious benefits that arise from
taking bilingualism seriously. This ability to learn a second language may be possible during
adolescence and adulthood, but it has been found that within the first year of life this ability is at
its peak. Infants that havent yet reached their first birthday and are raised in a bilingual
household have an advantage in learning and also in cognitive ability. As aging occurs it is
common to see that cognitive flexibility will decrease, but while studying individuals who have
spoken two languages since childhood this decrease goes away. In having two languages at hand
and switching between them at will these individuals are constantly using their brains more
efficiently. This fosters the ability to switch between tasks easier and monitor the environment
better than others.
As stated in the article entitled Why Bilinguals Are Smarter, Bilingualism doesnt just
help with improving cognitive skills not related to language [it also] shields against dementia in
old age (Yudhijit Bhattacharjee). Though there is still research being done to determine the
degree of these long term benefits in individuals who learn a second language later in life, there
is sufficient evidence that they would also experience these benefits during late adulthood. It has
been found that the switching between languages is important to this because it calls on the
brains executive functions repeatedly. By doing this bilinguals are keeping their brains fit
which helps to delay the onset of disorders like Dementia and Alzheimers, and even when these
disorders occur they are not as bad in bilingual individuals.
2.) B. As mentioned above there can be enormous benefits from not only the exposure to but also
the development of a second language, but it is not yet certain if these benefits are based on
learning at a certain time in life. As long as this holds true then it is fair to believe that learning a
second language, at any point, is beneficial to some extent. Due to this I feel that learning a
second language should remain an option in High School and higher education, with a stronger
emphasis during Elementary and Middle School. If this were to happen then the initial exposure
would occur at a young age when children would be able to process certain aspects of another
language easier and would also have a foundation for the future. With the world being very
globalized and conscious of other languages this ability would prove useful in many other ways.