Universal Grammar

If you studied a foreign language in high school, you probably noticed – learning a language is hard! How can babies pull off this trick with so much ease? In this video, we'll talk about why this is so puzzling and how babies are able to solve the problem of learning a language despite very limited input!

0:00 – Intro
3:33 – How do babies learn language?
4:09 – Verbal Behavior
6:48 – The puzzle of structure
13:21 – Poverty of the stimulus
18:15 – Universal grammar
22:14 – The critical period
32:33 – Key concepts

Sources:
Markie & Folescu (2021). Rationalism vs. Empiricism. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/f...
Chomsky (1959). A review of B. F. Skinner’s Verbal Behavior. https://doi.org/10.4159/harvard.97806...
Lenneberg (1967). The biological foundations of language. https://doi.org/10.1080/21548331.1967...
Everaert, Huybregts, Chomsky, Berwick & Bolhuis (2015). Structures, not strings: Linguistics as part of the cognitive sciences. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science...
Johnson & Newport (1989). Critical period effects in second language learning: The influence of maturational state on the acquisition of English as a second language. https://doi.org/10.1016/0010-0285(89)...

Genie Wiley: TLC Documentary.    • Genie Wiley - TLC Documentary (2003)