A mother notices that her child sometimes says things that she has never heard adults or her siblings say. She is confused, as she believes that the child learns language by imitating people in her family and immediate surroundings. Her belief resonates with:

Correct option is D

The mother’s belief aligns with Behaviourism, a theory proposed by B.F. Skinner. Behaviourism suggests that language learning occurs throughimitation, repetition, and reinforcement. According to this theory, children learn to speak by mimicking the language they hear around them, and their verbal behavior is shaped through positive or negative reinforcement by caregivers and the environment. The mother's surprise at her child producing novel utterances indicates her reliance on this perspective, as Behaviourism does not account for spontaneous or creative language production, which points to limitations of this theory.

Information Booster:

• Behaviourismemphasizes the role of the environment in shaping behavior.
• Language is learned throughstimulus-response associations.
• Positive reinforcement encouragesdesired language behaviors.
• It does not fully explain theinnate abilityto generate new sentences.
• This theory is foundational but is now often complemented by other perspectives.

Additional Knowledge:

• (a) Constructivism:Proposed by Jean Piaget, it emphasizes that children construct knowledge actively through interactions and experiences. In language learning, this involves understanding rules and structures through discovery.
• (b) Multilingualism:Refers to the ability to speak and understand multiple languages. It focuses on acquiring and managing more than one linguistic system rather than how language is learned fundamentally.
• (c) Nativism:Advocated by Noam Chomsky, this theory posits that humans are born with aninnate abilityfor language, called theLanguage Acquisition Device (LAD). It explains why children can produce sentences they have never heard before.
• (d) Behaviourism:Focuses solely on the observable aspects of behavior and does not account for internal cognitive processes.