22. Language Processing

Question 1

Psycholinguistics is the study of r____, m____ and p____ that underlie our ability to a____ and u____ language

Answer 1

representations, mechanisms, processes, acquire, use

Question 2

What is meant by linguistic competence?
Knowing about the s____ of our l____

Answer 2

We know (maybe implicitly) about the structures of our language

Question 3

What is meant by linguistic performance?
We use knowledge about language s____ in p____ language, but sometimes make m____ or a____ things to what we s____

Answer 3

We use knowledge about language structure in processing language, but sometimes make mistakes or add things to what we say (“um”, “er” eg)

Question 4

What are two aspects of language processing?

Answer 4

1. Comprehension
   - listening
   -reading
2. production
   - speaking
   writing

Question 5

On explanation for how comprehension and production are related is that they use a c____ s____ of k____. They each have d____ p____ for using that k____

Answer 5

common store of knowledge
dedicated processes, knowledge

Question 6

What are the three stages of processing?
1. W____
2. S____
3. M____

Answer 6

1. Words
2. (Sentence) Structure
3. Meaning
   (Production is the other way round)

Question 7

In spoken language the listener is largely constrained by what?

Answer 7

How the speaker is speaking

Question 8

Breaking a sound stream into words according to what makes sense is called the s____ p____

Answer 8

Segmentation problem

Question 9

Our knowledge of words is stored in our m____ l____

Answer 9

Mental lexicon (or dictionary)

Question 10

Identifying words relies on a set of i____ d____, one for each w____

Answer 10

interconnected detectors, word

Question 11

We have to use our knowledge of what s____ are allowed in our l____ to help us to work out the s____ the s____ we are hearing/reading

Answer 11

structures, language, structure, sentences

Question 12

Unlike words, of which there are a f____ number, there are i____ many structures for sentences in English (or any other language). However, the possible structures can be represented using a small number of rules of c____

Answer 12

finite, indefinitely, combination

Question 13

The process of working out structure in comprehension using stored rules is known as s____ p____ or p____

Answer 13

syntactic processing, parsing

Question 14

A major processing issue is that different structures are p____, and which is c____ may only be clear later in the s____

Answer 14

possible, correct, sentence

Question 15

Intuitively we feel we understand a sentence as we hear it. What are the two main ideas about how this happens?
1. The g____-p____ theory
2. C____-b____ theories

Answer 15

1. The garden-path theory (at each point we make a choice, if its the wrong choice we have to revise later)
2. Constraint-based theories (we develop all possibilities in parallel, and discard them if they become incompatible with later parts of the sentence)

Question 16

Altmann et al. (1992) found that when there was no context and the sentence structure was complex (relative clause) readers … in the d____ region, suggesting they had made the w____ a____(complement clause) and need to rethink

When there is an a____ r____c____ (two women you need to distinguish between, e.g. by a relative clause!!) readers … at the disambiguating region suggesting they have made the right analysis all along

This suggests the …. theory is wrong

Answer 16

slowed down
disambiguating
wrong analysis

appropriate referential context
don’t slow down

garden path

Question 17

What is one thing involved in dialogue other than the ordinary processes of comprehension and production?
A____ - participants in a dialogue a____ their l____ o____ at a v____ of levels

Answer 17

Alignment
Participants in a dialogue align their linguistic output at a variety of levels, e.g.
- how they pronounce the sounds of their language
- how fast they talk,
- the expressions they use to refer to the things they are talking about