Thinking & Language
Module 36
Language
The spoken, written, or gestured
words/symbols a group uses to
communicate meaningfully
Parts of Language
•
Symbol – sounds, written words or gestures.
» Connection between symbol and its meaning is arbitrary or
random making language flexible.
» Meaning of symbols must be shared by others in order to
communicate.
•
Semantics – What words mean
•
•
Syntax – How we combine words.
Phonology – How language is produced (a system of
sounds)
Generative – able to generate an unlimited number of
different phrases and sentences.
Displacement – ability to communicate about items, ideas
and activities that are not physically present.
•
•
Building Blocks of
Language
Phoneme
• The smallest distinctive unit of sound of a
spoken language
• English has about 40 phonemes.
• A young baby produces all the phonemes of
all the languages of the world.
Phonemes – How we
produce the sounds of
speech
What is the first sound in the following words?
a.
Easy
b. Judge
c.
Psychic
d. Pneumonia
e.
Civic
f.
Apple
g.
Chutzpah
What is the final sound in the following words?
a.
Judge
b. Cheese
c.
Long
d. Niece
e.
Checked
f.
Watch
Note: The following letter combinations in English make just one
sound: ch sh th ng ph
How many phonemes (sounds) are in these words?
Chin (3) Habits (5) thing (3) thought (3) psychology (8)
Three (3) hopes (4) weigh (2) please (4) sun (3)
Wish (3) enough (4) nation (5) quickly (6) laughed (4)
Morpheme
• The smallest unit, in a language, that carries
meaning
• May be a word or part of a word:
– (prefix, root word, suffix)
• English has about 100,000 morphemes.
• How many Morpheme’s are in the following words?
People
Redevelopment
Swimming
Orange
Literally
Erasable
Reddish
Radish
Language
Grandmother
1
3
2
1
2
2
2
1
1
2
People
Redevelopment
Swimming
Orange
Literally
Erasable
Reddish
Radish
Language
Grandmother
Structure of Language
Grammar
• System of rules that help us get meaning from
sounds (semantics) and put words in order to form
meaningful sentences (syntax).
LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT
How do you pronounce: ghoti?
Pronounce gh
…as in enough
Pronounce o
…as in women
Pronounce ti
…as in emotion
Language:
Language Acquisition
Explaining Language Development
If children learn
language by
conditioning and
imitation, why do they
say things they have
never heard before?
B.F. Skinner
1904-1990
vs
Children learn to repeat
what they hear because
it brings them a reward.
Noam Chomsky
1928-
Skinner vs. Chomsky
(1957)
Skinner’s position (behavorist/nurture)
– imitation
– reinforcement – parents reward the use of language
Chomsky’s position (nativist/nature)
– language acquisition device – A person’s brain is hard wired to
learn vocabulary and the rules of grammar (universal grammar)
– critical period for learning language
• At birth, infants can distinguish among the speech sounds of all the world’s
languages.
• By 10 months, they distinguish only the speech sounds that are present in
the language to which they have been exposed.
When Do We Learn Language?
• Receptive Language –
Ability to understand
what is being said to
you. First to develop.
– By 4 months infants
recognize speech sounds and
stare longer at a face whose
lips match the sound they
hear
• Productive Language –
Ability to produce
words. Develops in
stages.
Language Predisposition
• Play “Language Predisposition” (3:44)
– Segment #24 from The Mind: Psychology Teaching Modules
– When can babies start to perceive the sounds of
language? (Patricia Kuhl’s idea of baby statistics)
– How is this studied?
– Who does this support? Skinner or Chomsky?
Encouraging language development:
Motherese
• Infant-directed speech found in all cultures used
when talking to babies.
• Motherese is characterized by distinct pronunciation,
a simplified vocabulary, short sentences, a high
pitch, and exaggerated intonation and expression.
Language Acquisition Stages
• In virtually every culture, infants follow the same
sequence of language development, and at
roughly similar ages.
• Three-step process:
•
•
•
Cooing & Babbling
One-Word Stage
Two-Word Stage
(Telegraphic
Speech)
Cooing and Babbling stage
• At about 3 months of age, the infant begins to “coo.”
• At about 5 months of age, the infant begins to babble.
• Infants all over the world use the same sounds
(phonemes) when they babble.
• At around 10 months of age, babies begin to only hear
& babble in the sounds specific to their language.
• Babbling seems to be a biologically
programmed stage of language
development. Twin Babies Talk!
Babbling and Language
Development
• IF TIME: Play “Talkin’ Babies” (10:00) - Episode 3:
(Start at 33:32)
– Segment #18 from Scientific American Frontiers DVD
•
•
•
•
Why do babies babble?
Is babbling tied to language or the ability to speak?
Is Language Progression the same in deaf children?
Do you see evidence for Skinner’s or Chomsky’s views on
language development?
• Is signing or speaking easier to learn?
One-Word Stage
• Long before babies become accomplished talkers, they
understand much of what is said to them.
– Comprehension vocabulary/Receptive Language (the words they
understand) is much larger than their production vocabulary (the
words they can say).
• Around their first birthday, infants produce their first real
words — usually referring to concrete objects or people that
are important to them
• Holographic Speech - Child uses one word and vocal
intonation to convey a complete thought or idea
“Ball!”
(Look! There is
a ball!)
Two-Word Stage
• Around age 2, infants begin putting words together to construct
simple “sentences.”
• Telegraphic Speech - Two word sentences showing an appreciation
of the rules of grammar
– Seeing a red car, the child says, “red car” rather than “car red”
• Children move beyond the two-word stage at around 2.5 years of age.
• Language production and comprehension increase dramatically
thereafter
– children may have a production vocabulary of over 10,000 words by school age.
“Want Ball!”
(Can I please
have that ball?)
Noam Chomsky Interview
• Chomsky’s idea of Universal Grammar (3 min)
• Chomsky gives an example of Universal
Grammar (1 min)
– Video #21 from Worth’s Digital Media Archive for Psychology.
Pragmatics
•
•
•
•
How Language is used in everyday settings.
This helps us understand ambiguous language
Example:
“Could you pass the salt?”
Is not a question of whether you are capable
of lifting the salt shaker.
Overgeneralization
• Child will generalize grammar rules so they apply the
rules too broadly if they haven’t learned the word for it.
• Example: If a child hasn’t learned the word, “dug” they
will apply the grammar rules to the word they do know,
“dig”.
– “I digged in the sandbox” rather than “I dug in the sandbox”
Grammar Development
• A system of rules governing how
one can combine sounds and words
and arrange them into sentences to
communicate with others
• “Gleason’s Wug Test” (1 min)
– Video #22 from Worth’s Digital Media Archive for Psychology.
– shows how kids apply grammar to new concepts
• Play “Born to Talk” (6:45)
– Segment #21 from Scientific American Frontiers DVD
• Wug test is used to show universal grammar being applied
by kids.
• Watch how grammar rules get overgeneralized. What
does this show us about language development?
• Who does this research support? Skinner or Chomsky?
Sign Language & Grammar
If time allows: Watch “Human Language: Signed &
Spoken” (6:04). - from The Mind DVD Segment 25
– Does sign language use grammar?
– Which areas of the brain are used for sign language?
– Do users of sign language use different areas of the
brain?
Is there a Critical Period for
Language?
• Language develops within a critical period
– Infants seem to do statistics on what they hear and learn
what to listen for and later reproduce themselves
– Patricia Kuhl (see TED Talk regarding this – 10 min)
– If not exposed to language by age 7, child will
gradually lose their ability to master any language
• They can master basic words but never become totally fluent
nor comprehend all the parts of grammar like a fluent speaker
• See example of Genie – The Wild Child (43 min)
Genes design the mechanisms for a language, and
experience activates them as it modifies the brain
New language learning gets harder with age
Language and the Brain
• Play “Old Brain, New Tricks” (11:00)
Segment #8 from Scientific American
Frontiers DVD
• What areas of the brain are being used as
you process language?
• Do adults and children under 4-5 process
language in the same ways?
• Is there a critical time to learn a second
language if you want to speak it like the
natives?
Language and the Brain
• Aphasia—partial or
complete inability to
articulate ideas or
understand language
because of brain injury or
damage
• Broca’s area—plays role
in speech production
• Wernicke’s area—plays
role in understanding and
meaningful speech
Aphasias
• Broca’s Aphasia – Damage to Broca’s Area causes a
person to struggle formulating words while still being able
to comprehend speech.
– Example: Broca first discovered this area when he had a patient
with damage to this area who could only say “tan”
• Wernicke’s Aphasia – Damage to Wernicke’s Area would
cause a person only to be able to speak in meaningless
words.
– Example: Asked to describe a picture of two boys stealing
cookies from behind a woman’s back, a patient responded:
– “Mother is away her working her work to get her better, but when
she’s looking the two boys looking the other part. She’s working
another time.”
• Mnemonic to remember: You can't read Wernicke's words
and Broca's makes you babble
Language Areas of the Brain
How We Read Out Loud
Language and Thinking
• Do our ideas come first and then we name them or
are our thoughts conceived in words to begin with?
• Does our language determine what we can think?
– Bilingual people report different senses of self and
personalities depending on which language they are
using
– Linguistic determinism is the notion that difference
among languages cause difference in the thoughts of
their speakers
Linguistic Determinism - (Whorfian) Hypothesis
• Hypothesis that one’s language determines one’s
thoughts & perceptions about their world.
• Proposed by Benjamin Whorf (1897-1941)
• This thought to be wrong. Instead, our perceptions
& thoughts influence the language we use to
describe those words.
– Rosch’s Dani color perception experiment:
• Although the Dani lack words for all the English colors (their
language contained only two color terms dividing all colors into
either the "light, bright" category or the "dark, cool" category),
• Rosch showed that they could still categorize objects by colors
for which they had no words
Language’s Influence on Thought
• Cognitive psychologists today say language can
influence perception & thought.
– Some concepts may be easier to learn or express in one
language than another. (counting 10-20 in English &
Chinese)
• Language & Social Perception – nuances of words
can influence our social perception of others
reinforcing or minimizing negative stereotypes.
(i.e. jock vs. athlete).
• Language & Gender Bias – using masculine
pronouns tends to produce images of males and
exclude females.
How would you refer to a(n) _______ if you wanted to
convey a positive or negative connotation?
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Smart Person
Farmer
Women’s Rights Advocate
Person Who Tends To Save Money
Politician
Self-Confident Person
Lawyer
Not All Thinking is in Words
• Mental Images – Watching a person do a
task you’ve learned will activate the same
areas of the brain as if you were doing the
task yourself.
• The same is true when you imagine yourself
doing the task. – Mental Rehearsal
Fun with Language
Examples of Ambiguous
Language
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
There is a fork in the road ahead.
California is a great state despite its faults.
The car was stopped by the tree.
This is my old friend.
The shooting of the teacher was terrible.
Never threaten someone with a chainsaw.
Norman Rockwell painted me on the front
porch.
Norman Rockwell painted me on the front porch.
Norman Rockwell painted me on the front porch.
Norman Rockwell painted me on the front porch.
Paradoxes in the English Language
• Why does night fall but never break and day break
but never fall?
• Why can homework be done in school?
• Why are people who ride motorcycles called
“bikers” and people who ride bikes called
“cyclists?”
• Why can your nose run and your feet smell?
• Why are boxing rings square?
• Why do we park in a driveway and drive on a
parkway?
• Why does quicksand work slowly?
• Why is phonetic not spelled phonetically?
Washington Post Alternative
Meanings Contest
Coffee (n.):
- a person who is coughed upon.
Flabbergasted (adj.):
- appalled over how much weight you have
gained.
Willy-nilly (adj.):
- impotent.
Testicle (n.):
- a humorous question on an exam.
Washington Post Alternative
Meanings Contest
Negligent (adj.):
- describes a condition in which you
absentmindedly answer the door in your
nightgown.
Oyster (n.):
- a person who sprinkles his conversation
with Yiddish expressions.
Abdicate (v.)
- to give up all hope of ever having a flat
stomach.
Washington Post Alternative
Meanings Contest
Flatulance (n.):
- the emergency vehicle that picks you up
after you are run over by a steamroller.
Circumvent (n.):
- the opening in the front of boxer shorts.
Doublespeak
- language deliberately constructed to disguise its actual meaning
Revenue enhancement
- tax increase
Inoperative statement
- lie
Social expression products
- greeting cards
Media courier
- newspaper carrier
Negative patient care outcome
- death
Doublespeak
Period of accelerated negative growth
- recession
Underground condominium
- cemetery
Oral hygiene appliance
- toothbrush