There were two theorists, Skinner and Watson, who studied the development of language in young children, which became known as the behaviorist theory. Thus, they and others who believe solely in this theory are known as behaviorists. Behaviorists believe that organisms come into the world as "blank slates." That means that when babies of all species are born into the world they do not have any knowledge whatsoever; they do not know anything and they can't do anything. Also, behaviorists believe that their theory's basic principles apply to all species.

One very important principle of the behaviorist theory is that the role of the environment is of utmost importance in proving their theory. They believe that the process of learning has only occurred if there has been a change in behavior. Also, behaviorists basically study the relationship between stimuli and responses, and actual mental proces

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The two theories are completely opposites in that behaviorists believe that all spieces are born as "blank slates." However, in complete contrast, nativists believe that children are born pre-wired to be geared to learn to speak. For this reason, the behaviorist theory is very much on the nurture side, and the nativist theory is all the way over on the nature side. Another difference is that the behaviorist theory spreads all the way across to all species, therefore, saying that all species can learn to speak. However, nativists believe that only humans can acquire language.

Chomsky developed the concept of the language acquisition device with the inspiration of two facts. The first fact is that children master complex linguistic rules and procedures in a very short time. The second is that there are similarities in the stages of children's language development across cultures. In other words, even when environments are very different, children still acquire language the same way. Therefore, nativists believe that even when a " poverty of content" exists in a certain environment, children still learn to speak because of their language acquisition device.

The behaviorist theory and the nativist th

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