EXAM 2: Language

Question 1

Language

Answer 1

A set of symbols used for communication and comprehension
- Verbal, Visual (and tactile)

Question 2

Psycholinguistics

Answer 2

Cognitive processes involved in using language

Question 3

Language: Duality of patterning

Answer 3

• Units can be rearranged and combined
• Leads to infinite productivity (can convey an infinite range of knowledge and beliefs)

Question 4

Basic Principles: Phonemes

Answer 4

Sounds
/f/ /u/ /n/ /aw/ /l/ /u/ /j/ /ee/

Question 5

Basic Principles: Graphemes

Answer 5

Letters
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz

Question 6

Basic Principles: Lexicon

Answer 6

Words (Mental lexicon: the words you know)
dictionary

Question 7

Phoneme

Answer 7

Clearly different speech sounds that change meaning of the word
- (/b/ed vs. /r/ed)

Question 8

Morphemes

Answer 8

Smallest meaningful unit of language
- usually contain 2 or more phonemes
- root words, prefixes, and suffixes (pre- , un- , -ly, -ness)

Question 9

Perceiving spoken words: How do we determine meaning of words?

Answer 9

Cohort Model

Question 10

Cohort Model

Answer 10

Bottom up procesing
- First phoneme activates lexial candidates (/b/: boat, boast, bow, bat, etc.)
- Second phoneme eliminates candidates (/b/ /o/:boat, bost, bow)
- Continues until one word remains (/b/ /o/ /t/: boat)

Question 11

Evidence for cohort model

Answer 11

Processing speed, # of lexical candidates
- More lexical candidates = slower processing speed (takes longer to eliminate all candidates)
- Fewer lexical candidates = faster processing speed (takes less time to decide on final word)
- Examples (xylophone - /z/ + /i/). (happy - /h/ + /a/)

Question 12

TRACE Model

Answer 12

Sentence/context can also help word identification
- top down processing -> what is the evidence for this? phonemic restoration effect

Question 13

Speech segmentation

Answer 13

• We often ‘hear’ pauses between words
• No clear boundaries, yet speech segmentation is effortless

Question 14

How do we segment words? Phonotactic Knowledge

Answer 14

Use rules about phoneme combinations to segment
- /h/ often starts, rarely ends
- /t/ never precedes /th/ in a word

Question 15

How do we segment words? Metrical Segmentation

Answer 15

Use syllable stress to segment
- In ENglish words OFTen have stress on the first SYLLable

Question 16

Percieveing spoken words: Use knowledge of words to segment (EXAMPLE)

Answer 16

• both phontactic and semantic knowledge help, so easy to segment (THEDOGCHASEDTHECAT)
• Semantic knowledge can help when phonemes cannot (IRANDOWNTHESTAIRS) (BET RELATE THIN HEIFER)

Question 17

Stages of speech production

Answer 17

(1) Conceptualizing what we want to say
(2) Planning (linguistic plan - organizing our thoughts in terms of language)
(3) Articulating linguistic plan
(4) Self-monitoring

Question 18

Slips of the tongue: Anticipation

Answer 18

Sounds/words are spoken ahead of their time
- “Cuff of coffee” <> “Cup of coffee”
- Indicates you were thinking about what to say next

Question 19

Slips of the tongue: Perseveration

Answer 19

Sounds/words are spoken later than they should have been
- “beef needle” <> “beef noodle”
- Indicates you were not planning enough / talking too fast

Question 20

Language development: When are phonemic boundaries developed?

Answer 20

10 months
- Tune into important sounds
- Tune out unimportant speaker differences

Question 21

Child-Directed Speech: Prosody

Answer 21

Rhythm, stress, and intonation of speech

Question 22

Child-directed speech

Answer 22

Higher pitch, exaggerated “ups” and “downs”, extended pauses, elongated vowels, and a slower cadence
- babies prefer child directed speech

Question 23

Functions of child directed speech

Answer 23

(1) Linguistic: Child-directed speech facilitates language acquistion
(2) Emotional: Let’s the child know their caretaker is focused on them

Question 24

Non-human langauge: Communication vs. Language

Answer 24

Communication: Information transfer through symbols (honeybees = dance movements to signify nectar location) (vervet monkeys = sounds to signify danger)
Language: Complex, developed, dynamic, evolving system