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Summary Psychology of Language (800144-B-6) 9781605357058, ISBN:
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Summary of the lectures for the course Psychology of Lanugage as well as a summary of the book from Sedivy (2020).
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Ted talk questionsLera Boroditsky: how language shapes the way we think
1. Are concepts innate or learned (hardwiring)? Or both?
Babies can group basic-level categories by 3-4 months
Broad categories even earlier
Sensitive to both conceptual and perceptual features (7 months: animals vs vehicles;
birds vs planes soon after), and spatial relations
Conceptual development and language development seem to happen desperately
But! Children only start talking from about 12 months -> unclear whether language
and conceptual development influence each other earlier. Even though babies can
recognize shared features and categories objects early, unclear whether mental
representation is rudimentary or rich. Learning accelerated through language?
Language as a means of directing attention to certain aspects?
Lecture 1 – 31/08 – Introducti on
Why look at language?
- Everyone uses language
- Language is pretty complex
- Language use happens quickly, without too much effort or errors
- Other, we don’t realize what we do when we use language
- Language is interesting, funny, beautiful, evocative
Defining language
A system of form-meaning pairings that can be used to intentionally communicate meaning.
- System: there is structure to the madness
- Form-meaning pairings: of different sizes, at various levels of specificity
- Use: different modalities (spoken/written), production (sending the signal) and
perception (decoding the signal)
- Intentionally: producer wants to achieve something
- Communicate meaning: various communicative goals
Language as a system
Usually thought of as ‘rules’, but (psycho)linguistics are not prescriptivists. Meaning most
researcher do not consider it their job to establish or guard the rules of preferred language use
(such as the use of ‘proper’ grammar, style, spelling etc.) as teachers, however, we must make
an exception. Rather, we describe and try to understand and perhaps predict systematicities at
different levels: sounds, words, phrases, clauses, sentences, discourse. Understanding why
language is the way it is.
Form-meaning pairings
,The intuitive form-meaning unit is a word. If a person utters the sound apple, we know what
the meaning of that sound is in the world. But there are units of different sizes, also below the
word-level:
- Un- in unpleasant. Un is not a word but it definitely has meaning.
- The X-er and the Y-er: the sooner the better; the more you pay attention, the more
you’ll remember. It gives a signal that there is a connection, that one goes hand in
hand with the other.
Language use
Language is spoken and heard, signed and seen. and written and read. Sign languages are full
pledged languages (you can express anything, not only concrete things), it is not imitation of a
spoken language. But is a complex system that has very little to do with the spoken language.
Reading and writing is something we learn later in live, in some countries you never learn it.
The primary mode of language is in the spoken/signed modality, the written system is super
imposed on the foundations that we have from the spoken/signed languages.
Language is acquired, learned, and sometimes forgotten or lost. We are not born knowing any
language. The ethnicity you have has nothing to do with the language that you speak. But a
child can hear sounds in the womb, that can gives the child an advantage in the first year in
learning that language of which the sounds the child heard.
We know that we can use language. We don’t necessarily know how we do it: there is much
about which we are unaware, for example how do you move your tongue when we speak?
Intentional communication
We use language to exchange information, to express emotions, to get others to do something.
This makes language very relevant for student of communication sciences.
Communicating meaning
We can communicate almost anything, including deceiving and saying things that are not true
(prevarication) or talking about things that are not physically present or do not exist
(displacement).
Linguistics – the study of language
Language can be studied in a number of different ways, at different levels and with different
foci:
- Phonetics: study of raw sounds: when people communicate with spoken language they
use sound waves. There is information in sound waves.
- Phonology: study of how sounds are used within a language
- Morphology: study of words and word formation: how we build words
- Semantics: study of meaning
- Syntax: study of word order
- Pragmatics: study of language use
- Discourse studies: study of language in interaction
Psychology of language
,The study of language in mind and brain. Focus on acquiring and processing language. Often
from a cognitive point of view (memory, attention etc). Approaching language from a
functional perspective.
Q: If psychology of language is the field of study, what types of evidence would we need and
value when we research it:
- Actual language use (production and perception)
- Language processing data: eye tracking, brain activity
- Behavior as influenced by language
- Attitudinal measures
- Errors, problem in language use
Lots of experimental data (e.g. reaction times in lexical decision tasks). Tightly controlled for
many factors but not very realistic. It is not close to what people do in real life.
Catch-up with the basic contents: Crash Course Linguistics on YouTube!
Lecture 2 – Origins of Human Language
There’s no scientific agreement
Is language uniquely human?
Yes No
Yes Humans (and humans only) are Humans and (some?) animals are
Are humans hardwired for language?
genetically predisposed to acquire and genetically predisposed to acquire and use
use language language
No Humans (and humans only) have the Humans and (some?) animals have the
cognitive and physical abilities to cognitive and physical abilities to
acquire and use language. These communicatie
abilities are not unique to language
Yes + Yes = Nativism (in the field of psycho linguistics)
‘the view that not only humans genetically programmed to have a general capacity for
language, particular aspects of language ability are also genetically specified’.
, When answering the question ‘is language uniquely human’ it depends partially on what you
define as ‘language’. Lots of studies looking at animals, ranging from birds and bees, to
dolphins and primates.
Design features of language
Intended as an anti-nativist overview of characteristics all human languages share:
Related to the channel of communication: you make sounds and those sounds mean
something
- Vocal-auditory channel
- Broadcast transmission
- Rapid fading: once you utter a sound its gone
Related the interactive aspect of language:
- Interchangeability
- Total feedback
- Traditional transmission
- Learnability
Related to the content and structure of language
- Semanticity
- Arbi
What design feature is unique to human language? That depends partially in what you define
as ‘language’ ….
Studies of Primates
Kanzi makes different vocalizations in the context of different objects (juice vs. bananas vs.
grapes). This is evidence for the design feature: arbitrariness. A connection between the
meaning and the sound.
Nim Chimpsky never learned to talk but did learn to make signs. This is evidence of the
design feature: traditional transmission.
Top 10 three-sign sequences Nim Chimpsky. Evidence of the design feature duality of
patterning
Differences between apes and humans
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