Language and speaking Flashcards
language =
an exchange of information, set of spoken/written/signed words combined to communicate meaning, requires understanding of syntax
what makes learning a language difficult?
depends whether it is your 1st or 2nd language
what is required to make language special to humans?
syntax
all animals use speaking (vocal-auditory channel) to communicate. what complex aspects do only humans use?
duality of patterning (grammar), specialised adapted speech organ, comprehension (interchangeability)
describe the Sapir-Whorf theory
humans complex language makes us think in a more complex way that sets us apart from other animals. so the way we think is because of the language we use (however less popular theory now)
describe research that looks at how colour perception is affected by language
looked at how we categorise different shades of ‘blue’, in russian they have different words for different shades. this affects an individuals ability to perceive those colours so do we see the same thing?
what affects ability to remember items on a list?
word order in a language
if you speak a language that is front loaded this means you are ____ at remembering things from the front of the list. if your language has most meaning at the end of sentences then you’re more able to remember things at the ____ of the list
better, end
what is language based on?
mental representations
describe the mental representation process for COMPREHENSION of language
in the brain when listening to speech, you activate your existing mental representations that match the sound you hear > link it to meaning > output = comprehension
describe the mental representation process for PRODUCTION of language
when trying to speak to someone, you activate the concept (thing you want to say) > have to link the concepts to the sounds and syntax that represent the concept words > get meaning across > output = production
accessing words and representations of words ‘inside the box’ to either comprehend or produce speech =
mental lexicon
speaking and writing are examples of?
production
reading and understanding are examples of?
comprehension
what are the building blocks of language?
semantics, syntax, morphology, form (phonology > sound), speech
semantics =
meaning/concept
to express a concept word, semantics has to link with ____ and ______
form, syntax
what model best describes semantic memory structure and how?
associative network model, semantic relatedness > activation of one concept sparks activation of related concepts in memory
how is the mental lexicon linked to semantic memory?
in mental lexicon (store of words) activate things related by sound, written down and meaning
syntax =
grammar (different word orders in different languages)
smallest meaningful unit of sound =
morphemes
collection of sounds that combined have meaning =
free morpheme
suffix =
morpheme at end of word
prefix =
morpheme at beginning of word
inflix =
emphasis
within form, what is the sound system of language?
phenology
constituent sounds that are put together to build up into words =
phonemes
roughly how many phonemes are there in english?
40
what symbol is used to represent a sound?
/
can be more than 1 letter if it represents a single sound
orthography =
writing system
visual representation of a phoneme, can be made up of a number of letters or 1 letter =
graphemes
why we choose a certain language =
pragmatics
what does pragmatics depend on?
context, meaning, emphasis, vocabulary, who’s being addressed
what are Grice Maxims rules of conversation? (quantity, quality, relation, manner)
don’t include more info than necessary, truthful communication, relevant to topic, avoid ambiguity
what do cases of aphasia allow us to see?
where different language processes may be located in the brain
what area is specific to producing speech?
Broca’s area
what area is specific to comprehending speech?
Wernicke’s area
what is the evidence that producing and comprehending speech are DISTINCT PROCESSES?
it is possible to be able to comprehend but not speak and vice versa
how many words do we speak p/s?
2-3
how many words do we speak p/min?
150-200
why does speech contain ‘ums’, ‘ers’, pauses and hesitations?
in the mental lexicon we have huge amount of info that is activated when speaking and listening so makes sense that speech can be disfluent. our brain filters out this disfluency when hearing speech.
how are the building blocks formed when writing language?
activate concept > link to phenological sound representations > link to semantic meaning > activate syntactic elements > activate the orthographic text
what is the process in the mental lexicon that occurs unconsciously when a word is activated?
spreading activation
what types of relevant concepts can be activated from the word ‘tiger’?
other cats (semantic), other words that sound similar (phonological), orthographic
how does spreading activation work?
causes a ripple effect from one word or concept activated in the mental lexicon through the SEMANTIC, PHONOLOGICAL, ORTHOGRAPHIC RELATEDNESS
how does spreading activation cause an underlying process of competition? give an example
huge level of info is activated so is competing for attention and selection.
e.g. activate word ‘tiger’ in mental lexicon but may say the word ‘lion’ as it is activated strongly
in response to activation of a concept:
related words are activated in the mental lexicon and activated words compete for selection
what are the measures for competitive processes with selection of concepts?
hesitations in speech, blend errors, tip of the tongue states
what are the different methods used to test speech production?
timing of speech onset/hesitations/pauses, speech errors, tip of the tongue state
what might a delay in initiating speech show?
language processing problems
In the study conducted by Schacter et al (1991) testing hesitations in 2 lecturers subjects, why were more ‘ahs’ and ‘ums’ found in speech for humanities lecture compared to natural science lecture?
humanities talks about related concepts, synonyms, words that share meaning whereas science might have less words that mean the same thing in their mental lexicons. humanities = more words activated > more competition for attention > less fluid speech. science = less activation > less competition > more fluid speech
idea that you know what you want to say but retrieve the wrong word to say it =
speech errors
why does a larger number of words in the lexicon result in more hesitations?
concepts compete for articulation
measurable by level of fluid speech produced
what do Vigliocco & Hartsuiker (2002) estimate how many time a speech error occurs?
every 500 sentences
what would the WORD slip of the tongue be for ‘the prong of a fork’?
the fork of a prong
what would the MORPHEME slip of the tongue be for ‘sliced thinly’?
slicely thinned
what would be the PHONEME slip of the tongue for ‘york library’?
lork yibrary
what would be the CONCEPT slip of the tongue for ‘spoon and fork’?
spork
do exchanges usually come from the same or different category?
same
what does the fact that we switch across whole words with word errors suggest?
there is a word level of processing
what speech errors are produced from sematics?
conceptualisation, semantic blend errors (‘spork’)
what speech errors are produced from syntax and morphemes?
formulation, syntactic and morpheme exchange (switching the morphological elements of words)
what speech errors are produced from articulation?
word and phoneme exchange e.g. forks of a prong, lork yibrary (exchange complete words or parts of words)
what are some of the rules with speech errors?
exchanges or blend errors result in ‘legal’ non words (make sense to say e.g. spork not fpoon), phoneme combinations are restricted by rules
idea of knowing what you want to say but you can’t retrieve the word to say it =
tip of the tongue state
what can result in hesitation or tip of the tongue state?
interference from conflicting info > activation and competition between related terms BLOCKS retrieval of the target word
what were Smith & Tindell’s results in their tip of the tongue experiment?
looked at competition in mental lexicon. found activation of related information (anchovy) interferes with access of target information (anatomy). found activation of unrelated information (failure) doesn’t interfere with access of target information (baggage)
SHOWS THAT RELATED ITEMS COMPETE FOR ACTIVATION
