PSY2004 SEMESTER 1 - WEEK 5 Flashcards
define human language
symbolic, rule-governed system that is both abstract and productive, characteristics that enable its speakers to produce and comprehend a wide range of utterances
name 5 key parts of development of the pragmatic system
- turn-taking
- imitation
- initiating interactions
- maintaining conversations
- repairing faulty conversations
outline role of turn-taking in development of pragmatic system
mother-infant interactions (proto-conversation)
dyadic interaction, only invovles child and adult but develop into triadic interactions (infant, adult, object)
include proto-imperative, proto-declarative
what is proto-imperative (mother-infant interactions)
infant point to object and alternate gaze between object and adult until receive object
what is proto-declarative in mother-infant interactions
infant uses pointing, looking to direct attention toward object
what is role of imitation in development of pragmatic system
early presence is due to mirror neuron
what is role of initiating interactions in development of pragmatic system
first attempt usually non-verbal, attempt to point to object to learn to respond to others peoples point, better direct others attention
at what age do infants start to coordination gestures, looks, vocalisations
12-18month
what is role of maintaining conversation in development of pragmatic system
waiting until speaker finished, adding relevant info to dialogue
what is role of repairing faulty conversations in development of pragmatic system
understand when and how to repair miscommunication
what are Hockett’s design features of language
properties of language that can be shared between humans and animals
name some examples of hocket’s langauge design features
- semanticity
- arbitrariness
- displacement
- productivity
- duality of patterning
- discreteness
- vocal auditory channel
- broadcast transmission
- rapid fading
- interchangeability
- total feedback
- specialisation
- traditional transition
what is arbitrariness (Hockett’s design features of language)
no necessary connection between sounds used and message being sent (eg can come up for new name/words)
what is displacement (Hockett’s design features of language)
ability to communicate about things that are currently not present (talking about future/past)
what is productivity (Hockett’s design features of language)
ability to create new utterances from previously existing utterances and sounds (saying a completely new sentence but others know what it means due to knowing what different component mean)
what is duality of patterning (Hockett’s design features of language)
meaningless phonic segments (phonemes) are combined to make meaningful words, which in turn are combined again to make sentences
name some language forms
phonological (sound ‘b’)
prosodic (rising intonation of question - going to shops can be answer/question, depend on intonation)
lexical (sound of word ‘dog’)
morphological (plural inflection, s in ‘dogs’)
syntactic (how word, part of word related to one another to produce sentence, following rule)
name some language functions
semantic
pragmatic
what is semantic language function
saying something about world eg; saying something about dogs
what is pragmatic language function
managing communicative exchange in relation to your audience and context (eg; refer to pen with pronoun, then hide, audience know what you are talking about)
name some auditory perceptual abilities present from birth
- prefer to listen to speech than music
- process speech predominantly with left side of brain
- able to distinguish some foreign languages from their own native language based on prosody (tell apart English/Italian on rhythm patterns)
what is prosody
rhythm or melody of a language
Italian rhythm sounds different to English but Dutch rhythm is similar for English
define categorical perception
process that allows us to distinguish sounds between categories (different phonemes) yet at same time makes it difficult to distinguish sounds within category (particular phoneme, eg; /ba/)
from one month, what categorical perception do infants show
shows categorical perception of speech sounds /p/ and /b/
what is VOT
from when set vocal chord vibrations, to speech sound actually coming out
how can VOT of infant be studied
high amplitude sucking procedure
playing babababa
initially sucks more, then habituate, then if changed
babapa
hear pa and distinguish diference, sucks more
what are phones
different sound in language and how we can tell they are different languages despite not knowing any words
what are phonemes
different phones changing meaning of words
(not all languages have same phonemes)
smallest segmental units of sound employed in language to form meaningful contrasts between words