Genie and Victor
Who is Genie?
A 13 year old girl, Genie, was found in her home. She was believed to have been locked up in her room, suffering from solitary isolation, for her entire life. She was hardly taught any tasks of developed human beings, including how to talk. Scientists were fascinated by her case and wanted to study how she had developed in such an extreme environment. (View video to the right for more information on Genie's case) Who is Victor? Victor was a French feral child who was found in 1800 after apparently spending the majority of his childhood alone in the woods. Physician, Jean Itard, "adopted" the boy for 5 years to discover what Victor could and couldn't learn. Both Genie and Victor are examples of extreme asynchronus nurture. Their intense isolation allowed scientists to study the idea of a critical period. The critical period is defined as " a stage or point in development during which a person or animal is best suited to learn a particular skill or behavior pattern." Psychologists, Linguists, and others studying development were all curious to see if Genie and Victor were past their "critical periods". Could they still learn simple tasks such as reading and comprehension? |
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