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Prolonged plasticity: Necessary and sufficient for language-ready brains

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 October 2008

Patricia J. Brooks  and
Sonia Ragir
Patricia J. Brooks
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, College of Staten Island and the Graduate Center of City University of New York, Staten Island, NY 10314pbrooks@mail.csi.cuny.eduhttp://www.csi.cuny.edu/faculty/BROOKS_PATRICIA.html
Sonia Ragir
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, College of Staten Island, and The American Museum of Natural History, Staten Island, NY 10314. ragir@mail.csi.cuny.eduhttp://library.csi.cuny.edu/~ragir
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Abstract

Languages emerge in response to the negotiation of shared meaning in social groups, where transparency of grammar is necessitated by demands of communication with relative strangers needing to consult on a wide range of topics (Ragir 2002). This communal exchange is automated and stabilized through activity-dependent fine-tuning of information-specific neural connections during postnatal growth and social development.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 31 , Issue 5 , October 2008 , pp. 514 - 515
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008

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