Music and Early Language Acquisition
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Date
2012
Journal Title
Frontiers in Psychology
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Frontiers Media
Abstract
Language is typically viewed as fundamental to human intelligence. Music, while recognized as a human universal, is often treated as an ancillary ability - one dependent on or derivative of language. In contrast, we argue that it is more productive from a developmental perspective to describe spoken language as a special type of music. A review of existing studies presents a compelling case that musical hearing and ability is essential to language acquisition. In addition, we challenge the prevailing view that music cognition matures more slowly than language and is more difficult; instead, we argue that music learning matches the speed and effort of language acquisition. We conclude that music merits a central place in our understanding of human development.
Description
Keywords
music, language, language acquisition, childhood development, musical development, music cognition, definition of music, emergent modularity
Citation
Brandt, Anthony, Gebrian, Molly and Slevc, L. Robert. "Music and early language acquisition." Frontiers in Psychology, 3, (2012) https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00327.