Gender Differences in Syntactic Development Amongst Youths

Scientists have conducted multiple studies that have reported that females have advantage in language skills. Females language skills are more developed and complex than males. In a study that included over 13,000 children in ten different language communities found that in every community, girls had more advanced language skills. Specifically, in early communicative gestures, vocabulary and combining words. It was wondered whether this gap remains as the children grow and receive more education. Although it has been observed that syntax develops more rapidly in the younger years and slows as the kids age. The author of the book hypothesizes that this gap between the genders will remain into adolescences due to females already having higher skills therefore giving them more opportunities for synaptic growth. The author did a study that included six adolescents ranging from 14 to 15; three girls and three boys. They all went to the same high school, had similar socioeconomic status' and similar education backgrounds. As well as having a group with a variety of ethnicities. The interviewer would read two stories to the participants and ask them to retell the story using their own words and include every detail they can remember. This is used to help collect language samples. It is a very easy way to produce an expository discourse in older adolescents and adults. Then the scientist assessed the syntactic development using clausal density. This is a "direct reflection of the subordination a speaker uses, and the more subordinate clauses a speaker uses, the more complex his/her language is considered to be"(3). The results showed that the male with the highest clausal density was still lower than the girl with the lowest clausal density. A reseracher named Joseph argues that the female brain is more organized making it easier for both hemispheres to engage and learn language skills. He says that females have a bigger corpus callosum (connects the hemispheres), enabling more efficient hemisphere interactions. The male brain relies more on the left hemisphere for language skills. This is because throughout evolutionary history, a females traditional role involved a lot of communication and being the caretaker of the home which corresponds with females advanced language ability. Same for males, who are generally better at fields of mathematics and spatial abilities which also correspond with their evolutionary jobs. The spatial ability was related to their success as a hunter/provider. This is a very interesting theory and scientist plan to study this more in depth.

Source
http://www.inquiriesjournal.com/articles/875/gender-differences-in-syntactic-development-among-english-speaking-adolescents

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