My Understanding of “Wolf Child” Story and “Poverty of Stimulus” Argument

【Abstract】： Poverty of stimulus argument holds the view that the linguistic input received by children is insufficient to explain children's language competence of their first language. Therefore， nativists insist that children’s first language acquisition rely on the innate language knowledge， which has been used to reinforce Chomsky's theory of a Universal Grammar. However， “Wolf child” story seems to oppose this argument. The paper mainly talks about the author’s understanding of “wolf child” story and “Poverty-of-Stimulus” argument from the perspective of language acquisition.

【Key words】： “wolf child” story； “poverty of stimulus” argument； linguistic input； universal grammar

1. Introduction

In the first half of the twentieth-century， behaviorism dominated psychology and education. Behaviorism asserted that the children’s language learning was a result of the process of imitation， practice， reinforcement and habit formation. Chomsky’s （1959） attack on behaviorism’s views on language learning and stressed the active contribution of the child and minimized the importance of imitation and reinforcement. He claimed that the child’s knowledge of his mother tongue was derived from a Universal Grammar which specified the essential form that any natural language could take （Rod Ellis， 1999）. To be specific， Universal Grammar （UG） was described as an innate language faculty to contain general principles underlying all languages. The children’s task is to discover how the language of their context made use of those principles. Chomsky’s theory of UG was considered as an explanation for how children learn their first language （L1）.

2. Analysis

According to Yang （2004）， nativists represented by Chomsky assert that human beings are born with an innate language knowledge， and one of the most powerful argument is the poverty of stimulus argument. Poverty of stimulus argument is the core point of generative linguistics and also the foundation of the innateness theory.

In the light of the poverty of stimulus argument， though children are exposed with insufficient and incomplete language input， they can still ultimately master a profound and complex language knowledge system. This gap between the acquired language knowledge and language input makes generative linguists come to the conclusion that it is the language acquisition device （the UG） that make contribution to the language acquisition success. However， with a deeper development of the language acquisition field， many researchers has begun to question this argument. There is opposing theoretical and empirical evidence shows that language acquisition relies greatly on language input. And the “wolf child” story is a good case in point.

The “wolf child” story happened in India. In 1920， people in Indian found two girls who were nurtured by wolves in the forest of Calcutta. The older one was about 8 years old， and younger one was about one and a half. The two girls were sent to an orphanage， but they were found to behave and live like wolves， and they could not learn to behave like human beings. They did not understand human language， and they could not even pronounce a single language syllable. In order to change them into real human beings， people took good care of them and taught them patiently. and the younger girl learned quicker than the older one. After two months teaching， the younger girl can pronounce “bhoo （water）”. But， unfortunately， she died less than a year. For the older girl， it took her 25 months to learn the first word “ma”. She acquired only 6 words in 4 years， and after 7 years her vocabulary increased to 45 words. The older girl died when she was 16 years old. She could not learn to speak like human beings till her death and her IQ only equaled to a three -year-old child.

Based on the “wolf child” story， firstly， we can see that the “poverty of stimulus” argument held by the nativists fails to work here. If the language acquisition device or UG works， the wolf children would be able to acquire the language she has been exposed to； However， it is not the case. Even with patient education by people and sufficient language input， the wolf children failed to speak like a real human being. This can serve as evidence to prove that maybe language knowledge is not all inherent， and social environment matters a lot.

Secondly， language acquisition by older learners is more difficult than for younger learners in the “wolf child” story， which shows that language acquisition can not be successfully achieved by children only with the language acquisition device or UG after the critical period for language acquisition.

3.Conclusion

From the above analysis of “wolf child” story and “poverty of stimulus” argument， we can draw a conclusion that language input plays an important role for children’s language acquisition， and the “poverty of stimulus” argument held by nativists in language acquisition field is too extreme. Language acquisition cannot be a success only depend on the UG.

Actually， various theories of language acquisition from different perspectives have emerged in recent decades， such as cognitive psychology theory， connectionism theory， processability theory， interaction theory， sociocultural theory， and so on. All theories of language acquisition prove that language acquisition is quite a complex process with many factors interplay together， such as linguistic， social， biological， cognitive， and so on.

References

[1]Chomsky， N. 1959. Review of Verbal Behavior by B. F. Skinner. Language 35：26-58.

[2]Chomsky， N. 2009. Language and mind[M]. Beijing： China Renmin University Press.

[3]Ellis， R. 1999. Understanding Second Language Acquisition[M]. Shanghai： Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press.

[4]楊小璐，2004，關于刺激貧乏論的爭論[J]，《外語教學與研究》36（2）：131-136。