The _____________ believe that language is a vehicle for establishing interpersonal relations and for performing social transactions between individuals.

• A. Functionalist
• B. Transformationalist
• C. Interactionist
• D. Behaviorist learning theory

Answer: (C)

Language is a tool for building relationships and carrying out social interactions. The interactionist view treats language development as inseparable from social life: children learn through meaningful communication with others, receiving feedback, modeling, and joint attention within real conversations. Through these social exchanges, they pick up vocabulary, grammar, and the practical ways language is used to negotiate, cooperate, and manage social roles. This perspective also highlights the teacher’s role in creating rich communicative contexts—pair work, dialogs, collaborative tasks—that let learners practice language as it functions in everyday social transactions. In short, language grows out of social use and is shaped by interaction with others. By contrast, functionalist ideas focus more on language’s purposes rather than the social process of learning, behavioral theories stress habit formation through conditioning, and transformational approaches center on syntax and structural rules rather than social practice.