Abstract
The ‘grunt’, a laryngeal vocalization functioning communicatively in many primate repertoires, including humans’, has been implicated in both evolution and development of language. Within one month of communicative grunt onset human infants studied by McCune and colleagues transitioned to referential language. Human infants’ transition to referential language is impacted by a dynamic system of variables: mental representation, vocal motor skill, gesture, and communicative grunts, occurring in the context of affective attachment and developing inter-subjectivity with caregiver(s). Across mammalian species grunts are an initial reflex response to autonomic demand (e.g. effort). From the Darwinian notion of a behavior initially beneficial for an animal being co-opted for communicative use, the shift from autonomic to communicative grunt may act as an engine for development and evolution. Chimpanzee and vervet infants are similar to humans in the shift of grunts from effort to communication, but differ in levels of mental representation and intersubjectivity, indicating chimpanzees’ closer relationship with common ancestors to humans. Protolanguage(s) no doubt relied upon such developments in the young as a critical path to the adult repertoire. Where related species share characteristics, these are implicated for common ancestors.
Published Version
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