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Experimental Psychology > Chapter 7 - Language and Thought > Flashcards

Chapter 7 - Language and Thought Flashcards

8 questions

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1
Q

What is language?

A

A system for communicating with others using signals that convey meaning and are combined according to the rules of a grammar

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2
Q

What is grammar?

A

A set of rules that specify how the units of language can be combined to produce meaningful messages

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3
Q

Human language

A
  • extremely complex: the range of ideas and concepts we can express is far wider than in any other species
  • can refer to abstract intangible concepts that do not really exist in the physical world
  • is used to name, categorize and describe things to ourselves when we think, which influences the way in which thought and knowledge are organized in the brain
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4
Q

Linguistics

A

The study of language and its rules

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5
Q

Psycholinguistics

A

The study of human use of language. It attempts to describe how we acquire, use, generate, and comprehend language

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6
Q

Phonemes

A

The smallest unit of sound that differentiates between words

Are sounds, not letters. The number of phonemes in languages varies between 12-85 (English and Dutch have ~40)

Form higher order structures such as syllables, words, sentences, etc.

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7
Q

Phonological rules

A

Indicate how phonemes can be combined to produce speech sounds

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8
Q

Morphemes

A

The smallest units of meaningful language

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9
Q

Morphological rules

A

Indicate how morphemes can be combined to form words

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10
Q

Where are words stored?

A

Mental lexicons

~40,000 entries

Multi-linguals most likely have language-specific lexicons for each language

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11
Q

If a word is activated in the input lexicon…

A

it activates semantics (meaning of a word), syntax, orthography (writing), grammatical gender (depending on language), etc.

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12
Q

Syntax (syntactical rules)

A

Specify how the units of language can be combined to form phrases and sentences

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13
Q

What prosodic cues can give information in spoken language?

A
  • intonation
  • volume
  • speaking rate
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14
Q

Prosody

A

Aids in syntactic grouping and is important for expressing emotions in spoken language

Each language has different prosodic rules

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15
Q

How are consonants and vowels percieved?

A

Categorically

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16
Q

Catagorical perception in babies

A

Have catagorical perception when less than 8 weeks old, and can distinguish almost every phonetic detail

Also applies to non-native phonemic contrasts. However, quickly fades as experience with the native language increases (perceptual narrowing)

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17
Q

Methods in infant research

A
  • high-amplitude sucking (birth-4 months)
  • head turn procedure (6-10 months)
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18
Q

How do children learn language?

A

Behaviorist explanation: conditioning

Nativist explanation: humans have an innate, biological capacity to learn language
- Chomsky: “the human brain is equipped with a Language Aquisition Device (LAD)

Interactionist explanation: Biological and cognitive mechanisms are necessary but not sufficient. Language development must occur in the context of meaningful social interactions

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19
Q

Genetic dysphasia

A

The inability to learn grammatical structure despite otherwise normal intelligence

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20
Q

Broca’s aphasia

A

Deficit mainly in production of language:
- non-fluent speech
- word finding problems
- comprehension problems for more complex grammatical structures
- writing impaired, but reading relatively intact

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21
Q

Wernicke’s aphasia

A

Deficit mainly in perception:
- unable to correctly understand spoken words
- produced speech is fluent and (mostly) grammatical correct, but meaningless
- difficulty with reading and writing

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22
Q

The Gardners (1978)

A

Raised Washoe the chimpanzee using sign language. Washoe was able to learn 160 signs which could be sued in combinations

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23
Q

Savage-Rumbaugh

A

Trained the bonobo Kanzi using a board with symbols. Kanzi was able to words and phrases, and at age 9 was able to correctly carry out 72% of 660 spoken requests

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24
Q

Vocal learning

A

The ability to modify acoustic and syntactic sounds, acquire new sounds via imitation, and produce vocalizations (with a genuine vocal organ, not lips, teeth, tongue etc.) is observed in bats, cetaceans (whales, dolphins), pinnipeds (seals and sea lions), elephants, and three distantly related bird groups including songbirds, parrots, and hummingbirds

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25
Q

Javal

A

Showed that our eyes do not move across text in a smooth continuous movement

26
Q

Huey

A

Described reading as a succession of saccades and fixations. The eyes cannot focus while moving, and for accurate/detailed perception of letters, the information has to be in the fovea during a fixation

27
Q

How long do fixations and saccades last?

A

Fixations last between 100 and 500 ms, depending on difficulty of the text

Saccades span about 7-9 characters. When texts get more difficult, saccades get shorter and more corrective regressions are made

28
Q

What is required by the brain when reading out loud?

A

Requires us to map symbols onto representations in the brain

29
Q

Dual-Route Model

A

The ‘route’ we take, depends on the words we’re reading

30
Q

Horse-Race Model

A

Both routes are parallel but do not cooperate. First to finish wins

31
Q

Interactive Activation Model

A

(Partially) activated words provide ‘top-down’ feedback to the reader

32
Q

Which model helps to understand different types of acquired dyslexia?

A

Dual-Route Model

33
Q

Surface Dyslexia

A

characterized by difficulty with whole-word recognition and spelling. Someone with surface dyslexia can usually master phonics but cannot read words that are spelled differently than they sound

34
Q

Phonological Dyslexia

A

Impaired phonological route that manifests itself as an inability to correctly read non-words like ‘refki’

35
Q

Deep Dyslexia

A

Readers cannot retrieve the meaning of a word, but seem to have access to the semantic representation

36
Q

Developmental Dyslexia

A

The child fails to learn to read adequately despite normal education, intelligence, and an ability to learn

37
Q

Linguistic Determinism Hypothesis

A

Language determines our experiences and is a defining framework

38
Q

Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis

A

Language may influence the way we think and perceive

Supported by the Himba study and Boroditsky’s study

39
Q

Classical view of concepts

A

Concepts are sets of rules that specify necessary and sufficient conditions for category membership
- Necessary: must be true in order to belong to the category
- Sufficient: if true, the object must belong to the category

40
Q

Family Resemblence Thoery

A

Members of a category have certain characteristic features, but not every member needs to possess all of these features, and some features are never shared

41
Q

Prototype Theory

A

Categorization is organized around the properties of the most typical member of the category.
- Membership is ‘graded’; some objects fit the prototype better than others

42
Q

Exemplar Theory

A

An object is compared with stored memories of all category members (exemplars) we have encountered

43
Q

Rational Choice Theory

A

We make decisions by determining the value of an outcome and multiply that with the likelihood of occurring

44
Q

Judging frequencies and proportions

A

People are good at judging frequencies but not good at judging proportions due to people often not thinking of the base-rate

45
Q

Availability bias

A

Information that is more readily available, has a large impact on our decision. It is judged as having occurred more frequently and as being more representative

46
Q

Confirmation tendency (bias)

A

More value is attributed to information that supports a presumption than information that disproves it

47
Q

Conjuction fallacy

A

Believing that 2 events are more likely to occur together than seperately

48
Q

Representativeness heuristic

A

Making a probability judgement by comparing something or someone to a prototype

49
Q

Gambler’s fallacy

A

The incorrect belief that something happening more frequently than normal will happen less frequently in the future

50
Q

Framing effects

A

the way in which a situation is phrased shapes the decision

51
Q

Sunk-cost fallacy

A

People make decisions based on previous investments

52
Q

Distractors influence choice

A

.

53
Q

What is a heuristic

A

An efficient ‘rule of thumb’ (a ‘shortcut’) that is practical to use, but may not necessarily lead to the optimal answer

54
Q

What did Kahneman find?

A

We have 2 systems of thinking:
- System 1
- System 2

55
Q

What is an algorithm?

A

A procedure that is unique to every situation and always leads to the correct solution

56
Q

When do we rely on heuristics instead of algorithms?

A

When:
- the problem space is too large
- the time to make a decision is limited
- the decision is unimportant
- we have access to very little information
- an appropriate heuristic comes to mind (by ‘accident’)

57
Q

Analogical problem solving

A

Finding a problem (source) that is similar to the problem you need to solve (target) and applying the solution of the source onto the target

58
Q

Means-end analysis

A

Generating sub-goals to reach desired goal

59
Q

Functional fixedness

A

Our tendency to perceive an object’s function as fixed

60
Q

Syllogistic reasoning

A

a form of deductive argument where the conclusion follows from the truth of two (or more) premises

Experimental Psychology (12 decks)

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