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The pre-linguistic phase is the time period before children say their first
meaningful words which lasts from approximately 0-13 months.(Shaffer,et al.,2002).
During this phase, infants will bring attention to objects non-verbally by pointing
and touching. Accordingly, infants communicate by crying,cooing,and babbling (Siegler,&Alibali,2005).
Before infants learn spoken language, they can respond to sound and speech. During
this phase, caregivers tend to speak to infants in higher pitches and tones which can be refered to as prosity (motherese
or baby talk). This baby talk however varies from culture to culture.
Babies usually respond to these higher pitches in speech by matching the pitch
of the person who is speaking to them. They will often respond non-verbally by expressing mood change, smiles,or bright
eyes.
Infants as early as three days old can distinguish and pay attention to speech(Shaffer,et.al,2002).
From very early on infants can discriminate different rhythms within words
that have more than one syllable (Sansevini,Bartoncini,&
Giovanelli,199, as cited in Shaffer et al 2002).
During
the pre-verbal stage, many infants make vocal sounds which help them earn language.
•0-2 month olds usually make reflexive crying and vegetative
sounds to communicate (Allyn, & Bacon, 2005). One
month old infants can discriminate consonant sounds like ba da and ta, and •two month old infants
can recognize that a particular vowel is still the same sound when spoken at different pitches. (Jusczyk, 1995; Marean,
Werner, & Kuhl, 1992,as
cited in Shaffer, et al.,2002).
Infants will also repond
vocally during this phase. At age 2-6 months babies begin to babble, and at about 4 months babies will add consonant sounds
to their babbles.
Babbling is important for
infants because it helps them learn the sounds of speech. The babbles of infants have been found to be universal and
they have also been found to match linguistic rhythms(Pettito,et.al,2004).
During the end of the pre-linguistic
phase at about 7-8 months infants will start to learn turn taking in speech.
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Reflexive crying, vegatative sounds (coughs, sneezes), Sounds reflecting their physical state.
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Cooing and laughter. Early consonants develop, sounds from the back of throat, laughs and giggles form (to
the enjoyment of parents).
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4-6 months
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Vocal play, babbling gets more adult-like, range and pitch play,, bilabial trills are common (raspberries).
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6-12 months
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Reduplicated babbling ex: mamama, pitch control develops, ability to sound out some consonants and vowels.
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9-18 months
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Non-reduplicative babbling, varying of consonants and vowels.
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