Linguistics provides a much needed theoretical framework for investigating the language learning of children and techniques for dissecting what has to be learned and what has been learned at different stages of development. Those who take the view that language is a cultural invention may hold some answers regarding this framework. There is evidence to suggest that language is more a cultural invention than a biological capacity. Skinner comes into this category with his learning principles. According to Skinner the parent first selectively reinforces those parts of the child's babbling sounds which are most like adult speech, therefore increasing the number of times these sounds are made by infants.
Parents reinforce sounds until they become more and more like adult speech.
Another view within this field is that children learn through imitation i.e. The child picks up words, phrases and sentences directly by imitation and then through reinforcement and generalization the child learns when it is appropriate to use and combine these responces. Skinner also puts forward an arguement regarding rewards and punishmebt. This is what he terms ' Operant Conditioning '. A child acts in order to get rewards, for example if a child wants a yogourt, then they will say yogourt and receive a yogourt as a reward. Children do not like to be punished, so they increase their language ability by saying things correctly and being rewarded.