Children Creating Language: How Nicaraguan Sign Language Acquired a Spatial Grammar

TLDR

Language is thought to arise from a combination of environmental exposure and innate abilities, with the innate component becoming apparent when the environment is severely impoverished. This study examined the language production of a generation of deaf Nicaraguans who had no prior exposure to a developed language. Researchers tracked the evolving use of spatial modulations in the emergent Nicaraguan Sign Language across successive cohorts, determining that the systematic changes were introduced by children aged ten or younger. Within two decades, successive cohorts of young children collectively systematized the grammar of the new sign language, demonstrating that children not only learn but also create language.

Abstract

It has long been postulated that language is not purely learned, but arises from an interaction between environmental exposure and innate abilities. The innate component becomes more evident in rare situations in which the environment is markedly impoverished. The present study investigated the language production of a generation of deaf Nicaraguans who had not been exposed to a developed language. We examined the changing use of early linguistic structures (specifically, spatial modulations) in a sign language that has emerged since the Nicaraguan group first came together. In under two decades, sequential cohorts of learners systematized the grammar of this new sign language. We examined whether the systematicity being added to the language stems from children or adults; our results indicate that such changes originate in children aged 10 and younger. Thus, sequential cohorts of interacting young children collectively possess the capacity not only to learn, but also to create, language.