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Science 17 December 1999:
Vol. 286. no. 5448, pp. 2283 - 2284
DOI: 10.1126/science.286.5448.2283
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Perspectives

Also see the archival list of Science's Compass: Enhanced Perspectives

COGNITION:
Enhanced: An Innate Basis for Language?

Dorothy V. M. Bishop

It is well established that abilities such as language are mediated by specific brain regions in adulthood, but it is still a matter of debate whether such specialization is present from birth or whether it emerges during the course of early childhood development. In an elegant Perspective, Dorothy Bishop discusses whether new findings in infants with Williams syndrome (WS)--a disorder in which it has been claimed that language abilities are largely retained even though other cognitive impairments abound--may help to resolve this debate (Paterson et al.).

The author is in the Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3UD, UK. E-mail: dorothy.bishop{at}psy.ox.ac.uk

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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)