Born To Chat: Humans May Have Innate Language Instinct, George Mason University Study

free biotech news Get the latest biotech news where you want it. Sign up for the free GenePool newsletter today!

People instinctively organise a new language according to a logical hierarchy, not simply by learning which words go together, as computer translation programs do. The finding may add further support to the notion that humans possess a "universal grammar", or innate capacity for language. The existence of a universal grammar has been in hot dispute among linguists ever since Noam Chomsky first proposed the idea half a century ago. If the theory is correct, this innate structure should leave some trace in the way people learn languages.

Hey, check out all the research scientist jobs. Post your resume today!

Back to news