Does Skinners theory back up Rachaels first words?
Rachaels first words support Skinners theory because the majority of Racheals words are words that would often be repeated in her daily routine by her parents/careers, meaning that she would be able to imitate them and learn them for rewards. Eg her parents would probably often say to her 'more?' as in if she wants more food etc. and she would repeat it learning that when she says it, she would be rewarded by getting more.
Words such as 'mummy' and 'daddy' also support Skinners theory, when she repeats the words she would be rewarded by the parents going to her etc. They are words that would most likely be the most often heard in her daily routine too.
But also; one of Rachaels first words is 'wassat' which shows she is trying to repeat words she has heard, the missing sounds are the least stressed words which shows that she is listening and trying to repeat the words by listening to the sounds made. Skinners theory said that children learn through language by repeating words and then receiving rewards (positive reinforcement), and this supports it as she is clearly trying to repeat words that she has heard before.

Child language acquisition:
What does this say about how a child learns language?
The words in the categories tell us that children learn nouns quicker than any other category. This may be due to these words being used more often. Nouns are probably more incorporated within the child's daily routine, meaning they hear them more and can more easily put the word and object together. For example. two of the child's first words are 'sock' and 'shoe' this could be explained by every time a parent and the child leave the house, the parent could say 'now we must put on your shoes' and then carrying out the action of putting on the child's shoes places the object and the word together for the child. Being able to have a physical meaning behind the word that the child can associate together is probably more easily remembered/learnt than a word that is more of a concept, eg something being too hot.

The lack of adjectives could be down to the idea that before the child can communicate their satisfaction/dissatisfaction or preferences they first must learn the words that get them what they need. Satisfaction/dissatisfaction can also be shown be sounds or body language, not necessarily words, for example crying if they're too hot or hungry. But words such as 'poo', 'toast', 'cup', 'spoon' etc can not be communicated by a sound easily, or at all. If the child wants toast or a cup etc it must learn to ask for one, by saying the one word of what it is wanting it can convey their meaning. This could be another reason why nouns are by far the biggest category of learnt words.

However; there are also a lot of personal words such as 'hello', 'hiya', 'no', 'yes', 'ta' and 'please'. This is probably due to the parents trying to teach their child basic politeness. When giving the child something, the parents might now allow the child to take the object until they say 'ta'. This makes the word important to the child, as they will soon learn to get what they want they must say 'ta'. The same for 'please'. They are also very common words to be heard in everyday language, again repeating the idea that repetition is an important factor for children when learning new words.

'Ta' is obviously short for 'thank you' this shows us that children may learn their language is smaller sounds and then build them up to make the full word. At the age the child is when they say 'ta' they may not have developed the sounds needed to say the full 'thank you'. Later on as they hear the words 'thank you' more, they may start to learn how to make the necessary sounds needed. The child also says 'wassat' as in 'whats that' put together, again repeating the idea that children need to learn the sounds to make the words they are trying to communicate. Over time as the child hears the words more often they may become more familiar with the sounds and be able to say the two words separately.

Twitter discussion: 

We choose this screenshot of Twitter to look at because it is a little amount of data for us, meaning we can analyse it in more detail. One tweet that we looked at was a 'promoted' tweet which shows up on every ones twitter feed, this shows influential power as they are trying to persuade everyone who see's the tweet to read it and advertise their site. Within that tweet there are links to other websites making it easier for the audience to find the site and easily navigate their way through all the pages. The tweet also uses the phrase 'you must get this' which includes the imperative 'must', which the suggest consequences if you don't, but there aren't any. But the effect on the reader makes what evers being advertised sound like they need to have it, no choice.

One person featured a few times in the screenshot used a lot of The Game of Thrones jargon as well, which you wouldn't be able to understand having not read/seen it.

Retweets also shows influential power because people think they are worth being retweeted for their followers and the tweet or maybe the person writing the tweets has influenced them into making that decision. 

Analysis: In The Apprentice there are many more interruptions and overlaps than the Lower Than Atlantis interview, this is probably down the competition of The Apprentice meaning the participants are all fighting for their right to stay in the show. The Lower Than Atlantis interview however; is more informal and a chance for their fans to find out more about them, and for the band to update them on their current work and future plans, therefore it's not competitive. Also in The Apprentice, particularly participant 'P' pushes all the blame onto this fellow player 'L', in a very forceful way by saying she's 'trouble', creating a hostile environment, compared to the Lower Than Atlantis interview which is friendly and warm.
In both transcripts there is a more dominant participant, in The Apprentice it is 'P' who interrupets and speaks a lot more than other participants, in the interview is it is 'M' who is the lead singer of the band, this suggests both of these have higher levels of confidence and perhaps even a bigger role to play in the purpose. 'P''s purpose is to save himself as he seems to be the target of the most criticism, even though he tries to push it on to 'L' and 'M' because he is probably the most well recognisable and the fans can connect with him more than other members.

M: My name is Hans
D: And my name is Jock
M: And we are from Iron Maiden ya.(0.5) Uh, not really(0.5) I'm Mike and this is(0.5) Declan Heart the third (1)
D: Esquire
M Esquire and we're from Lower Than Atlantis and we're not very funny so, sorry
Interviewer: um(0.5) second time playing Slam Dunk, is it right? What's changed since last time do you feel?
M: Um(.5) about twelve months(0.5) uh the stage 'cus we played (0.5)
D: Last year we played the smallest stage at about the same time we played the main stage this year(0.5) so (0.5) in a year we've gone up four five stages so that's cool
Interviewer: uhm um that's a it's a good year then so has ah um la last year been a good year for you?
Mike: Yeah(0.5) it definitely has um here we(0.5) I'm so sorry we're a bit flustered because we just played but uh(0.5) I don't really know what to say to that (0.5) yeah it's been good(0.5) isn't in a nutshell (0.5) we signed to a prestigious label (0.5) um we (0.5) since then we've played our first ever head line tour and it sold out everyday in presale which was great and good fun um umm lalalala (1)
D: yeaaaaah
M: yes
Interviewer: How is it, how was it on stage for this show?
M: Absolutely great it was really well received um we had good fun while we were there very hot (0.5) um on stage wasn't great and that's a f****** understatement (0.5) can I say f******? Yeah f*****' hell (0.5) um yeah it was great thanks to everyone who watched us if you're watching this
Interviewer: Um you were saying about um signing to Island um what made ya make the jump make you sign to a major?
D: Money/
M: /Well nothing else/ (0.5) nothing else came along so we thought f*** it yeah alright then was it really(0.5) I dont know(0.5) um everything we've done so far as a band...

P: Well I am arrogant, I am a big head and it's like I said to you last week, it needs slappin' out of us and I think this way I can improve incredibly(0.5)I was responsive of Lorraine and effectively we lost the task(0.5)I was project manager last task(0.5)and no one was bitchin' about me at the end of the day and we won(0.5)
SAS: If I remember rightly that last task was fools win wasn't it↑ Didn't the other team just bomb out badly and/
W: /Yes
SAS: Yeah/
P: /It was a tough/
SAS: /You didn't make any money
P: No but it was a tough - task sir Alan/
SAS: /No but you didn't make any money
P: But we won
SAS: You won by default you lost money and you won by default
P: Yeah well I can't seem to do any right(0.5)
SAS: Listen don't get impatient with me(0.5)Philip you know/
P: /I'm not sir Alan it's just you know it's just I can't seem to say anything right, you criticize Lorraine I get in the nick(0.5)I win as project manager and get in the nick(0.5) I can't do anything right!
SAS: That's all you've done today Philip is criticize Lorraine if you come out with anything else constructive um I might listen to you that's all you've done from the minute you walked through that door today
P: because she's trouble Sir Alan she's trouble(0.5) week after week after week you'll get this again and again and again/
L: /trouble↑/
P: /right before, I think I've been one of the outstanding candidates over the past few weeks I've/
SAS: /woah, well listen look look (0.5) look you know the the body rocker thing↑
P: yeah/
SAS: /I think this bleedin' things gone to your head or what okay you've done well there/
P: /yes/
SAS: /yeah and  the design of it okay but that's it you know one(0.5) swallow don't make it summer (0.5) you understand, 'cus since then you hadn't done that great/ from my understanding
P: /well I sold three of them last week Sir Alan
M: Tell us about pants man (3.0)
SAS: Kate
K: yep
SAS: What I can not understand and what I can not get my head around/
K: /yes/
SAS: /is how you can go from hero to zero↓ You didn't sell one thing this week
K: Believe me, there's no one more frustrated about the day/ than I am
SAS: /Are you sure it wasn't a case of you wanted her to fall on her sword↑
P: It's /Lorraines fault
K: /I am abs- I'm absolutely positive, I expected to be here today on the back up having no orders because that just isn't acceptable, but I believe I've performed consistently throughout all of the tasks and that's been the reason I've not been in the final three in the board room↓

The Dominance theory (1975)

Robin Lakoff

The Dominance theory says that in a mixed gender conversation, men are more likely to interrupt than women. Lakoff tries to get away from the deficit theory (which says female language is weak in comparison to the male language), and instead consider men’s language as dominant, but still, not better than the female language. However; Lakoff says that women lack authority, seriousness, faith in themselves and principle.

Some of the ways women’s language may be perceived as being the; are techniques such as tag questions, these are questions that follow a declarative sentence, for example: ‘This is nice, isn’t it?’ or ‘I should, shouldn’t I?’, fillers, such as words like ‘um’ or any break in the text filled with a verbal noise which usually has no meaning-for example ‘I think you should, um, urrrr…’, intensifiers, this is words like ‘very’, ‘completely’, ‘better’ etc… Anything that puts emphasis on the meaning or phrase, in context; ‘isn’t she very pretty’ and ‘I completely understand’, hypercorrect grammar: using grammar incorrectly to perhaps look better, formally or intellectually and hedging, which is things that weaken a sentence, and therefore make it lack in authority or declaration and show query, for example ‘I suppose I can’ or ‘I sort of can’

Here is an advert with a tagged question: http://www.printwand.com/blog/media/2013/08/example-advertising-question-with-answer.jpg

If this was used in woman’s language, according to Lakoff it could be considered a sign of weakened language compared to men’s. But in this advert it clearly is thought provoking and effective. The question at the end; ‘don’t they?’ perhaps makes parents (who I think are the target audience of this advert) think and reminisce about either children they have who have grown up, or young children and thinking about their future. This doesn’t show weakness, but that they are looking for you to think about the topic they are introducing, and getting the audience involved.

http://www.eclipse-creative.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/premier-foods-adverts2.jpg

Bibliography:

http://oliviatrippaslanguage.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/three-ds-deficit-dominance-and.html

http://www.universalteacher.org.uk/lang/gender.htm#dominance