PSY 403 EXAM 1 Flashcards
linguistics (vs psycholinguistics)
study of grammars, systems of languages, lang structure; takes a descriptive approach
psycholinguistics (vs linguistics)
study of the psych factors involved in language perception, production, and acquisition; experimental approach
nativists (theories of language development)
S. Pinker, Noam; support the Genetic Bio-program Hypothesis, that genetic evolution produced language organ” in humans, we r specialized for complex specialized language production
anti-nativists / constructionists (theories of language development)
Tomasello; lang developed universally in humans as a result of our shared cognitive, social, linguistic hardware; not genetically pre-determined
Hockett’s Design Fts (5)
i. semanticity - permanency in our understanding of the meaning of words
ii. arbitrariness - no direct links between objects and the words that signify them (randomness)
iii. discreteness - clear boundaries between linguistic units of a language
iv. displacement: ability to distinguish different states of time and place
v. productivity: discreteness allows for limitless combos of words
sound symbolism
violation of HDF of arbitrariness where certain sounds are associated with certain words/concepts ex. takete/maluma, gl = light
continuity (comparative MHL perspectives)
modern human language as a result of quant changes to primitative lang (ANTI-NATIVISTS)
discontinuity (comparative perspectives)
modern human language as a result of qualitative changes to primitive lang (NATIVISTS)
what apes CAN do
i. accumulate a (100+word) lexicon
ii. spontaneously comment (not strictly transactional)
iii. displacement, productivity, prevarication, grammar
iv. exceptional working memory
v. some comprehension
what apes CANT do
i. lang acquisition is variable, only exceptional apes can learn it (not tru for humans)
ii. innovate, babble (apes copy)
iii. as utterances grow longer, complexity doesn’t increase (repetition does)
communicative intent
human trait of using words to convey intentions/planned actions; apes don’t use or understand this, but babies (and dogs!) do (ex. pointing)
- domesticated dogs/foxes exhibit better comm intent than wild ones, may be a result of living in packs or in closer proximity to humans –> cooperation/tameness as a selected for trait
joint attention
the awareness between 2+ that they are paying attn to the same thing; perhaps only present in humans; contributes to social behaviors that enhance comm (helping, fairness, altruism) even in children
physical language adaptations in humans
vocal tract is more vertical/columnar than apes –> conducive to oral speech production but increases risk of choking (can’t breathe and talk @ same time); potential evolutionary trade off
specific language impairment (dissociation between lang skills and general cognitive ability)
patients have normal IQ but grammatical, morphological, working verbal memory problems; diagnosed @ age 4-5; may have genetic component (mutation of FOXP2 gene)
williams’ syndrome (dissociation between lang skills and general cognitive ability)
patients have abnormal brain structure and function, mental impairment but lang abilities are generally left intact
broadmann areas
division of brain into sections based on different cell types and structure; 52
broca’s aphasia (importance)
paul broca associated a patient’s repetitive speech problem with his L FRONTAL LOBE damage –> discovery helped to develop the concept of brain modularity
broca’s aphasia (symptoms)
L FRONTAL LOBE
i. agrammatism (disturbed word order, misuse of function words, poor comprehension)
ii. labored speech, difficulty word finding
iii. awareness of deficit
PRESENT ACROSS MODALITIES (SPEECH + WRITING)
wernicke’s aphasia (symptoms)
L TEMP LOBE
i. fluent speech and intonation but speech is incoherent
ii. neologisms, nonsense words
iii. unawareness of deficit
iv. issues with comprehension
* early patients likely had Alzheimer’s*
why data from brain damaged patients is not perfect / why broca’s + wernicke’s aphasia should be considered “syndromes”
i. patients have various individual differences
ii. very small # of patients
iii. brain has the ability to reorganize in response to certain kinds of damage
iv. aphasia’s are not strictly linked to the 2 areas (ex. Broca’s patients had deep subcortical damage, not just damage to B’s area)
fMRI (vs just MRI)
i. “FUNCTIONAL” magnetic resonance imaging; depicts brain structure AND what areas are most active at a given time based on O2 blood flow, popular in language research
ii. data is always in contrast; reflects level of relative difference in brain activity between 2+ tasks or conditions so the baseline condition/measurement is V important
embodied semantics
the meanings of expressions are understood via a mental simulation of the indicated action; stimulation of associated areas of the PMC
streams of language processing (2)
i. dorsal: “how”, pronunciation, phonology, articulation (front lobe)
ii. ventral: “what” meaning, syntax, semantics (temp lobe)
- supported by dissociations
prosody
i. the tone / tonality / rhythm of a language, picked up by fetuses in the first trimester AND in UTERO
ii. differs between speakers
prosodic bootstrapping
ii. babies use prosody to identify important words/sounds (at around 2 mos); utilize stress patterns (ex. trochaic v iambic), known words as landmarks, and the phonotactic constraints of their particular language (around 7.5-9mos)
measuring infant language capabilities: methods
i. preferential looking: babies look longer at FAMILIAR stimuli
ii. high amplitude sucking (HAS): babies suck harder in response to NOVEL stimuli
iii. cardiac deceleration: in utero, babies’ heart race slows in response to FAMILIAR stimuli (ex. nursery rhymes and music)
phoneme discrimination in infants
detection begins around 1 mo/old, ability begins to decay around 6-8 mos; can learn to distinguish speech sounds learned while sleep!
statistical language learning
i. it’s possible babies utilize the fact that there’s higher P of syllable transitions within words than between words to id what is a word and what isn’t
ii. exper.: 3 syllable words (ex. bidaku) babies exposed to it for 2 mins and then listen to a scrambled version –> they looked/attended longer to the scrambles than to the actual words indicating that they noticed the difference
iii. also occurs in the id’ing of visual patterns –> suggests that word learning mechanisms are general purpose rather than lang specific (anti-nativist/constructionist)
event related brain potentials (ERPs)
type of EEGs that measure brain electrical activity in response to different stimuli, non-invasive; great TEMPORAL resolution, poor spatial (thick heads); reflect post synaptic potentials (PSPs)
important ERP values
i. N400: hill, brain response to semantic deviations (errors) 400 milliseconds after presentation [ex. ice is hot]
ii. P600: valley, brain responds to syntactic deviations 600 ms after presentation [ex. he like fruit]
learning biases
it’s easier to group items/create categories that share 1 feature(s) –> natural clases; babies/people learn individual sounds but also make categories of similar sounds and how they combine
sonority
how easily can air vibrate in the vocal tract when producing a sound?
- vowels are the most sonorant, all other sounds exist in a hierarchy
- the most sonorant sound occurs in the middle of the syllable (in the nucleus)
- segments closest to the nucleus tend to be more sonorant than those further from the nucleus; i.e. words are arranged along the hierarchy which may aid in learning
