The evolution of language acquisition in children has long been a topic of interest, with the idea of ‘ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny’ suggesting that child development mirrors that of our human ancestors. However, the author is skeptical of this theory, arguing that our ancestors were not ‘on their way’ to modern humans. The process of learning language is twofold, involving specialized mental processes or general-purpose learning tasks. Babies as young as three days old prefer the rhythm of their caregivers’ language, which they become familiar with before birth. By four years old, most children have acquired over 1,000 words and the rules of their native language. A breakthrough in understanding language acquisition occurred in 1996, with the discovery that infants use transitional probabilities between syllables to identify words in a continuous stream of sound. This finding was surprising, as eight-month-old infants demonstrated the ability to calculate and use transitional probabilities after only two minutes of exposure.
https://lithub.com/how-babies-and-young-children-learn-to-understand-language/