WHY DO INFANTS BEGIN TO TALK - LANGUAGE AS AN UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCE

Scholars have addressed a range of questions about language developmen t, but for some reason have neglected to ask why infants begin to talk . Biologists often prefer 'how' to 'why' questions, but it is possible to ask about the immediate consequences of developing behaviours - an acceptable strategy for attacking causation - and psycholinguists can study the immediate consequences to the infant of behaviours that lea d to linguistic competence. This process is demonstrated with a series of illustrative proposals as to the short- and long-term consequences of vocal learning and utterance storage, two developmental phases tha t lead to talking, as well as the act of talking itself. The goal is t o encourage investigation of behavioural dispositions that nudge the c hild, by degrees, towards proficiency in the use of spoken language.