Working on one thing at a time

[Brian MacWhinney]

Dear Info-CHILDES,
  So far, it appears that the evidence for a dissociation between walking
and talking is not panning out.  However, before concluding this discussion
on that note, let me throw in one other pointer and one reflection.  First
the pointer.  Moshe Anisfeld at Yeshiva began working on this about 15 years
ago.  He believed that, using more microgenetic methods, one could discern
some tendency for the child to focus on a single skill at a time.  Although
I read several initial papers from Anisfeld on this, I never saw anything
very definitive in published form.  Moreover, I find nothing in the CHILDES
online bibliography from Anisfeld on this issue.  So perhaps he never found
anything.  At the least, it seems to me, he was taking a close look at this.
If, after taking such a close look, one finds nothing, then perhaps one can
indeed conclude that there is nothing there.
  The other side of this matter is the fact that it seems to me that there
is a group of people that ought to be at least a bit worried about the
absence of this effect.  This group is composed of people who believe in the
modularity of mind along with limits on cognitive processing.  If the mind
is modular and if the resources for cognitive processing are at least
somewhat limited, shouldn't the attainment of rapid advances in one area
come at the expense of advances in another?  For example, if I am taking a
load of three courses at college, shouldn't I do better at these three
courses (ceteris paribus), than if I overload with six courses?  Wouldn't
this be the same for the infant?
  The clear alternative here is that progress in one of these domains
actually supports progress in another.  In this sense, the mind would have
at most some weak level of permeable modularity.  If the child can walk
about more, they can grasp more things and learn their names.  If they can
learn the names for things, they can activate their images and have greater
desire to grab them and walk and crawl about with them.

--Brian MacWhinney