Chapter 9 Language and Thought Flashcards
A system for communicating with others using signals that are combined according to rules of grammar
Language
Grammar
Set of rules that specify how the units of language can be combined to produce meaningful messages
Phoneme
Smallest unit of sound that is recognizable as speech rather than random noise
Syntactical Rules
Indicate how words can be combined to form phrases and sentences. EX: Simple rule in english is that every sentence must contain one or more nouns
Meaning of a sentence
Deep Structure
How a sentence is worded
Surface Structure
A sentence is the _____ unit of language
Largest
First words occur at ___ months old
10-12
Fast Mapping
The process of rapidly learning a new word by contrasting it with a familiar word. This is an important tool that children use during language acquisition.
An example would be presenting a young child with two toy animals - one a familiar creature (a dog) and one unfamiliar (a platypus). When the child is asked to retrieve the platypus a contrast is provided for the child (dog versus unknown creature) which allows them to infer the other creature must be a platypus.
Telegraphic Speech
Apart of two-word speech developement, has words arranged in order that makes sense and almost contains all nouns. EX:A child to wants to get milk might just say “get milk”
The three different theories of language development
1) Behaviourist
2) Nativist
3) Interactionist
Behaviourist Theory
B.F Skinner & John B Watson
State that language is learned through imitation and conditioning
Nativist Theory
Argues that language is innate snd language development is best explained as a biological capacity
Interactionist Explanation
Although infants are born with innate capability to lean language, social interaction plays a crucial role in language
Language Acquisition Device (LAD)
A collection of processes that help language learning
A syndrome where the ability to learn grammatical structure is compromised despite having normal intelligence
Genetic Dysphasia
Left frontal cortex, involved in speech production and language developement
Broca’s Area
Left temperal cortex, involved in language comprehension, speech sounds
Wernicke’s Area
Aphasia
Difficulty in producing or comprehending language
Benjamin Whorf (1897-1941)
“Language shapes the nature of thought” Creator of linguistic relativity hypothesis
Proposal that language shapes the nature of thought
Linguistic Relativity hypothesis
Prototype
The best or most typical member of a category
We make judgements by comparing a new instance with stored memories
Exemplar theory
