A developmental theory of speech act production.

Most recent studies of language acquisition have emphasized the child's learning of the abstract syntactic and semantic structures of “linguistic competence.” This study analyzes linguistic acquisition in terms of the semantic-pragmatic unit of the speech act. Findings support the idea that even before children acquire syntax, they develop a “communicative competence,” apart from linguistic competence, and that there are distinct styles of language acquisition best described in terms of the child's “primitive speech acts.”