imitation (n.)

An application of the general sense of this term to LANGUAGE ACQUISITION, where it refers to children’s behavior in copying the language they hear around them. The importance of the notion is twofold. First, it has been shown that imitation cannot by itself account for the facts of language development (despite a popular view to the contrary – that children learn language by imitating their parents): FORMS such as *mouses and *wented, and SENTENCES such as *Me not like that, show that some internal process of construction is taking place. Second, the skills children show when they are actually imitating are often different, in important aspects, from those they display in spontaneous SPEECH PRODUCTION, or in COMPREHENSION. The relationship between imitation, production and comprehension has been a major focus of experimental and descriptive interest in acquisition studies.