Language Psychology Flashcards
What is language?
it is a universal defining feature of humans - no culture is language free
there is a biological aspect as language development is similar across all cultures
there are also shared characteristics across languages e.g. all languages have nouns/verbs/questions etc.
language is a form of communication but not all communication uses language
Hockett’s (1960) ‘design features’ of human spoken languge
dated attempt at categorisation but broadly language is:
- symbolic
- discrete
- combinational
- productive
symbolic vs iconic language
symbolic = elements bares no intrinsic resemblance to its reference - human language is mostly symbolic so we learn through social interaction of imitation and instruction. symbolic language allows us to discuss abstract concepts.
iconic = bares resemblance to its reference e.g. onomatopoeia, bouba/kiki test, some signs in BSL
discrete language
there are a finite number of individual elements
there are also a finite number of phonemes to make words and a finite number of grammatical rules
morphemes - e.g. bedroom = bed + room
combinational language
we combine the discrete elements to make words which make sentences which create meaning
allows us to provide context when the discrete elements are ambiguous
productive language
allows us to create existing elements in new ways to create new words - this is how language evolves
recursion = repetition of a rule or structure in a hierarchal way - this allows to easily apply general rules to new words
language in primates
Washoe = chimp brought up as child with ASL learnt 150-200 signs and was observed teaching her son signs
Nim Chimpsky = learnt 125 signs but longer utterances became repetitive so there is less evidence of understanding language
ethical and methodological issues - could have just learnt that some gestures resulted in rewards
primates do not show evidence that they understand the intent to share a mental state as children
Structure of language (is heirarchical)
- phonetics = speech sounds
- phonology = phenomes
- morphology = words
- syntax = phrases and sentences
- semantics = literal meaning of phrases
- pragmatics = meanings in context of discourse
how do we produce language?
- conceptualisation - choosing an idea to convey
- formulation - formulate the message into linguistic material
- articulation - articulate the linguistic signal
language errors
language isn’t perfect and humans are error prone
most language errors are semantic which tells us semantic planning occurs before other language planning
sentence planning
production latencies - picture naming takes around 600ms (Indefrey and Levelt, 2004)
turn taking in conversation takes around 200ms (Stivers et al., 2009) but sometimes turn overlap so humans aren’t perfect at predicting the end of others sentences
language prediction/instrumental planning
Prediction
Bögels, Magyari, and Levinson (2015) showed that answers were faster when an element that allows us to predict an answer comes at the start of a question e.g., Also called 007, which spy …. = allows us to predict answer
Incremental planning
Brown-Schmidt & Konopka, 2014 - had people select the ‘small star’ and found people who hadn’t previously seen the picture were slower also, English speakers were slower than Spanish as, in Spanish, the adjective comes after the noun
linguistic competence
linguistic knowledge, rules and structure
- what you know when you know a language
linguistic performance
how we produce and comprehend language
- describes processes
- involves cognitive processes
syntactic ambiguity
language does not have to be grammatically perfect to be understood, similarly we can’t always understand grammatically correct sentences e.g., ‘i shot an elephant in my pyjamas’ is ambiguous
our top-down knowledge of language allows us to make inferences form context
Parsing
the underlying structure that we have decided is correct when sentences are ambiguous
accounts of parsing:
syntax first = builds syntactic structure first then processes meaning
interactionist = people use whatever information is available at the time - sometimes multiple sources used
structural principles (Frazier, 1987) - syntax first parsing
principle of late closure = assume that each new word is part of the current phrase you’re building (structural principle)
principle of minimal attachment = build the simplest syntactic structure you can
garden path sentences = reanalysis - first reading does not make sense but provides info that makes the second reading make sense e.g. Rayner et al (1983) spy saw the cop with the binoculars… vs spy saw the cop with the gun… - requires rereading
interactionist accounts of parsing
constraint based
multiple sources of information (constraint) = frequency, semantics/plausibility, prosody, context
verb contraints = ‘the ghost read the book had been burned’ = garden path sentence as we attribute the noun to the first verb (Van Gompel, Pickering adn Traxler, 200)
unrestricted race model of parsing
combination of syntax first and interactionist = all structures are used to select among syntactic structures
the analysis that is constructed the fastest is the interpretation we take and if this incorrect then we reanalyse
self-paced reading (method of testing comprehension)
Just and Carpenter (1982)
Measured time spent reading a chunk (indicates processing time) of text before making each next word appear
simple and cheap BUT unnatural reading
Eye-tracking during reading (method of testing comprehension)
records how people read, how long the fixate on an area, how many times they re-read etc.
more natural reading behaviour, BUT more complicated set up
Visual world (method of testing comprehension)
where you look in a scene after hearing a sentence
more interactive, spoken language, high temporal resolution BUT more complicated set up, can induce strategies
event-related potentials (method of testing comprehension)
electrical brain activity recorded
high temporal resolution, multi-dimensional data, can inform about processes BUT difficult to combine with natural reading
what is context?
context provides us with a frame of understanding relative to the conversation we are having - it requires both top-up and bottom-down comprehension at times to gain full understanding
we create models of the conversation to increase understanding speed.
Situation models influence our interpretation of an unfolding sentence and our subsequent memory of it e.g., ‘i went to the doctors, she…’ subverts expectations
