Ch. 9 - Language and Thought Flashcards
What are the 5 key higher cognitive functions?
- acquiring and using language
- forming concepts and categories
- making decisions
- solving problems
- reasoning
What is language?
a system for communicating with others using signals that are combined according to rules of grammar and that convey meaning
What is grammar?
a set of rules that specify how the units of language can be combined to produce meaningful messages
3 differences distinguish human language:
- the complexity
- humans use words the refer to intangible things like unicorns
- we use language to name, categorize, and describe things to ourselves when we think, which influences how knowledge is organized in our brains
When did language emerge? as a written system? how many languages? how many language families?
- 1-2 mill yrs ago
- 6000 yrs ago
- 4000 languages
- 50 language families
What are phonemes? How do they differ?
the smallest units of sound that are recognizable as speech rather than as random noise. building blocks of spoken language, they differ through the way their produced by speaker (ex. b and p)
What are morphemes?
phonemes are combined to make phonemes, the smallest meaningful units of language
All languages have grammar rules that fall into 2 categories:
- rules of morphology - indicate how morphemes can be combined to form words
- rules of syntax - how words can be combined to form phrases and sentences
What are content morphemes and function morphemes?
content morphemes refer to things and events (dog, take) function morphemes serve grammatical functions (and, or), or indicating time (when) (re- to retake)
What type of morpheme comprises most of human language and makes language complicated enough for us to express abstract ideas?
function morphemes
What is syntax?
content and function morphemes can be combined to form an infinite number of sentences governed by syntax rule which indicate how words can be combined to form phrases and sentences
How fast do children learn language? What mistakes do they make? Do they understand or speak it better?
around 6-7 words a day, little errors and most are overregularizing grammatical rules. passive mastery (understanding) of language is better than their active mastery (speaking)
How does the ability to understand language change within the first 6 months of life?
at birth, they can distinguish all contrasting sounds in human language but after 6 months can only (like parents) distinguish among the contrasting sounds in the language they hear being spoken around them
What occurs at ages 4-6 months?
they begin to babble, which involves combinations of vowels and consonants that sound like real syllables but are meaningless
Do deaf babies babble?
yes but they stop if they cant hear themselves
What happens at 10-12 months? by 28 months?
they begin to utter or sign their first words, by 28 months they can say about 50
How many words do kids know before school? by 5th grade? university?
10,000
40,000
200,000
What is fast mapping? What does it allow?
the process whereby children map a word onto an underlying concept after only a single exposure.
allows them to learn at this rapid pace which contrasts effort required to learn other concepts and skills like writing
what happens at 24 months?
children begin to form 2-word sentences referred to as telegraphic speech because they are devoid of function morphemes and consist mostly of content words (more milk) (throw ball). tend to be grammatical though
What happens by age 3? 4-5?
children begin to generate complete simple sentences that include function words (give me the ball)
4-5, the complexity increases and many aspects of language acquisition are complete
Language development usually unfolds as a sequence of steps where they achieve one before moving on to the next, 2 reasons for this:
- general cognitive development unrelated to experience with a specific language (ex, short term memory is limited)
- experience with a specific language, reflecting a child’s emerging knowledge of the language
Doe observed shifts in early language development reflect specific characteristics of language learning or general limitations of cognitive development?
specific characteristics of language learning
According to B.F. Skinner how do we learn to talk? What’s wrong with this?
the same as any other skill, reinforcement, shaping, extinction, and other basic principles of operant conditioning
It does not account for many fundamental characteristics of language development
How changed the study of language and cognition in 1950s by criticizing the behavioural approach? What did he believe?
Noam Chomsky, believed language learning capacities are built into the brain, which is specialized to acquire language rapidly through simple exposure to speech
What is the nativist theory?
holds that language development is best explained as an innate, biological capacity (Chomsky)
How does the nativist view and genetic dysphasia connect?
normal children learn the grammatical rules of human language with ease in part because they are wired to, the biological predisposition to acquire language explains why newborn infants can distinguish contrasts among phonemes, even ones they’ve never heard
What are limitations of behaviourist approach?
if we only learned through imitation like behaviourists theorized, infants would distinguish only the phenomes they heard
What are criticisms of nativist approach?
they do not explain how language develops just why, a complete theory of language acquisition requires an explanation of the processes by which innate, biological capacity for language combines with environmental experience
What is the interactionist approach to language?
holds that although infants are born with an innate ability to acquire language, social interactions play a crucial role in language
How does language processes change in areas of the brain across infancy?
in early infancy, language processing is distributed across many areas of the brain but becomes more and more concentrated in 2 areas: Brocas areas and Wernickes area
How are Brocas and Wernickes area connected?
arcuate fasciculus
What results from damage to language centres in brain (brocas and wernickes area)?
aphasia, difficulty in producing or understanding language
Where is Brocas area located? Whats it involved in?
left frontal cortex
involved in sequential patterns in vocal and sign languages
What happens to someone with damage to Brocas area?
Broca’s aphasia, understand language well but have difficulty as grammatical structures get more complex, struggle with speech production, they speak in short phrases that consist of mostly content morphemes. function morphemes are usually missing and grammatical structure impaired
Where is Wernicke’s area located? What is it involved in?
left temporal lobe
it is involved in language comprehension
What happens when Wernicke’s area is damaged?
Wernicke’s aphasia differs from Broca’s in 2 ways:
1. they can produce grammatical speech but it tends to be meaningless
2. they have difficulty understanding language
although the ability to identify non language sounds is unimpaired
