Terms etc. Flashcards
What is language used for?
It is used for communication, a form of joint action, where people collaborate to achieve a common goal.
What was the “information theory”?
It emphasized the role of probability and redundancy in language.
What did “behaviourism” emphasize?
It emphasizes the relation between an input (or stimulus) and output (response).
What are “flow diagrams”?
Flow diagrams illustrate levels of processing and it attempted to show how one level of representation of language is transformed into another.
What do the “box” and “arrow” represent in “box-and-arrow” diagrams?
Boxes represent processing levels, and the arrows being the means of getting from one box to another.
What is “priming”?
The general idea that if two things are similar to each other and involved together in processing, they will either assist or interfere with each other, but if they are unrelated, they will have no effect.
What is “facilitation”?
Priming causes processing to be speeded up.
What is “inhibition”?
Priming causes processing to be slowed down.
What are “lesion studies”?
They examine the effects of brain damage on performance.
What is the Wernicke-Geschwind model?
Language processes flow from the back of the left hemisphere to the front, with high-level planning and semantic processes towards the back (Wernicke’s area), amd low-level sound retrieval and articulation towards the front (Broca’s area), with the two regions connected by a tract of fibres called the arcuate fasciculus.
What are EEGs and what do they do?
They are electroencephalograms and event-related potentials. They measure the electrical activvity of the brain by putting electrodes on the scalp.
What are ERPs and what do they do?
The are event-related potentials. They measure voltage changes on the scalp associated with the presentation of a stimulus. The peaks of an ERP are labelled according to their polarity and latency in milliseconds.
What are MEGs?
They are magnetoencephalographies and they measure the magnetic activity of the brain.
What is a CAT?
It is a computerized axial tomography. It produces medium-resolution images from intergrating large numbers of X-ray pictures taken from many different angles around the head.
