Lecture: Psycholinguistics
Professor Dr. Neal R. Norrick
_____________________________________
Psycholinguistics
Universität des Saarlandes
Dept. 4.3: English Linguistics
SS 2009
4.2 Tip-of-the-Tongue Phenomena
Thinking on Tip-of-the-Tongue (TOT)
phenomena begins with James (1890)
James speaks of “a gap that is intensively
active” in consciousness when we try to recall a
forgotten name.
Meringer and Mayer (1895), Fromkin (1973) kept
personal catalogues of error types to gather natural
data.
Brown and McNeill (1966) collected intuitions
on remembering in diary studies, e.g.
unable to recall the name of the street on
which a relative lives,
one of us thought of Congress and
Corinth and Concord
and then looked up the address and
learned that it was Cornish.
Brown and McNeill also induce TOT states, by
reading definitions of uncommon words to
subjects, who then answer questions about their
search for the missing word, e.g.
subjects asked to identify the target word
sextant based on a dictionary definition
“A navigational instrument used in measuring
angular distances, especially the altitude of sun,
moon and stars at sea.”
Burke et al. (1991) write, “When a TOT occurs, a
lexical node in a semantic system becomes
activated, giving access to semantic information
about the target word, but at least some
phonological information remains inaccessible.”
Subjects in the TOT state often report that a word
related to the target comes repeatedly and
involuntarily to mind, yielding ‘blockers’,‘interlopers’
or ‘persistent alternates’, e.g.
sexton or sextet for sextant
Burke et al. (1991) developed an experimental task,
using prompts like those in a trivia game presented
on a computer, where subjects typed responses,
e.g.
What is the old name of Taiwan?
target: Formosa
foils: Taipei, Canton, Ceylon
The foils often acted as blockers for the target word
They then asked questions like:
“How familiar do you think the word is?”
“How certain are you that you can recall the word?“
“What is the first letter or group of letters in the word?”
Burke et al. (1991) identify a semantic system or
network of nodes connecting concepts
• the concept chastity is connected with “is a virtue,”
“take a vow of” etc
• the concept baker with “bake bread” “get up early”
“sell cakes” “knead dough” etc
Compare scripts of Schank and Abelson (1977),
cognitive models of Lakoff (1987):
Cognitive model for chastity would identify
prototypes for the virtue like saints, and distinguish
characteristics like “is a virtue” from linguistic
constructions in which the word chastity occurs such
as “take a vow of chastity.”
Cognitive model for baker would identify prototypes
for profession like the owner of the bakery at the foot
of the hill.
Burke et al. (1991) say one word may prime,
i.e. facilitate recognition of, another word,
the activation of nurse facilitates activation of
doctor because priming spreads and summates
via these many shared connections.
Cognitive processes recoded in diary studies
and lab experiments differ from TOT searches
in real conversation, e.g.
1 Helen: in Hammond, north Hammond. Junior Toy Company.
2
they used to make toys, little tricycles and scooters and everything.
3 David: and where was it?
4 Helen: I don't remember the street.
5
Hoffman?
6
No.
7
it was a little beyond right here, you know,
8
it wasn't right in north Hammond.
9
t was around that street that turns into Illinois,
10
there when you go to the cemetery.
11
here's a tavern on one side and a VFW on one side.
12
forget the street.
13 David: Gosselin?
14 Helen: Could be, I don't know.
15
I don't know,
16
but that's where Junior Toy was in the low corner there.
• Helen expresses her forgetfulness at line 4 with
“I don’t remember the street.”
• She takes a guess at the name in line 5, but
immediately rejects the guess in line 6.
• She begins an extended description of the area in
terms of landmarks in lines 7-11.
• She concludes, “I forget the street” at line 12,
but David offers a guess of his own, since he’s
familiar with the local neighborhood.
• Helen expects help with name or at least
assurance that David can identify the place.
Storytellers often name landmarks and major
streets, not phonetically similar words.
Note references to cemetery (l. 10),
tavern and VFW (l.. 11)
Description “in the low corner” implies that the
teller can visualize the scene.
So why not search corpora for natural
instances of TOT?
4.3 Discourse, frames, prototypes
Cognitive linguists look at discourse contexts where
words occur, e.g. if, for an item like roof,
The house needs a new roof
Then "house has a roof" is part of discourse frame
Consider also frame effects:
We saw an old house.
The roof was in need of repair.
Consider typical collocations and metaphors:
she has no roof over her head
- for 'no house'
we're finally under one roof
- for 'in the same house‘
Moreover, Rosch and her co-workers have shown:
• some properties are more salient than others
• some members of a category are more typical
it may be impossible to define certain words without
exemplification,
e.g. colors, fruits, games etc
instead of: "a fruit is the edible part of a plant etc"
we find: "a fruit is like an apple, a peach or a banana"
 word meanings and categories are generally not
defined by features or propositions, but by
prototypes
Testing for prototypes
A. Ask subjects to identify the most typical bird:
B. Ask subjects for typical statements about birds,e.g.
A bird was singing outside my window
A bird flew down and caught a worm etc
C. Then substitute different bird names into the
statements and ask how well they fit:
A robin/eagle/chicken was singing outside
my window
A robin/eagle/chicken flew down and caught
a worm
D. Test for speed of verification of identity
statements
A robin/eagle/chicken/penguin/bat
is a bird
Prototype Effects:
prototype:
marginal:
non-member:
A trout is a typical fish
A tadpole is a kind of a fish
Their daughter is a regular fish
Note: real members don't fit here:
*This trout is a regular fish
Prototypical verb meanings extend:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
The kid runs around the house
The pavement runs around the house
The rainwater runs down the spout
The Mississippi runs from Minnesota to
the Gulf
Peter climbed a ladder
The plane climbed to 30,000 feet
The ivy climbed the fence
The temperature climbed to 30° C
Judy climbed down into the well
5. First Language Acquisition
Natural acquisition with no special learningnecessary
critical period resulting from a combination of factors:
• development of connections between nerve cells
• myelination of nerve cells
•
•
•
•
lateralization of brain functions
dominance of left hemisphere
corresponding development of motor skills
general cognitive stages of development
(Piaget)
5.1 Developmental sketch
Age
Language
(months)
9
10
General
babbling
crawling
first words
precurrent, maintained
(ba)nana(na) for
'banana, food, mama'
standing,
claps hand,
holds spoon
Age
Language
(months)
General
11
5-10 recurrent words
fulfills requests like:
bring me the blue ball
show me the big red dog
first steps,
recognizes
pictures in
books
12
5 distinct vowels
5 distinct consonants
starts walking
Age
Language
(months)
General
13
recognizable words
daddy nein ball
allgone
running,
climbing furniture
14
imitations: horse, train simple puzzles
reduplications:
turns book pages
choochoo
byebye taktak ‘clock’
Age
Language
(months)
General
16
recognizes own name points to himself:
20+ words
Where's Nicky?
18
vocabulary explosion climbs stairs
2-word units:
without rail
ducky allgone
Nicky haben
Age
Language
(months)
20
General
3-word units:
hangs on monkey
Nicky cookie haben bars, points to
also:
eyes, nose, mouth
haben Nicky cookie
Age
Language
(months)
22
verb + particle: lock up/
deck zu
4-word units:
Mami Auto fahren kauft
Inni gute Nacht sagen
General
dramatic
play,
stuffed
animals, dolls
Age (months): 24
Language
verb endings: Inni spuckt bisschen
statement:
Nicky auch essen
question:
Nicky auch essen, ja?
command:
Nicky auch essen
word-formation: cutter ‘knife’
auskleben ’tear apart’
umwärts
General
kicks soccer ball
plays hide-n-seek
draws details:
ears, tails, wheels
Age (months): 26
Language
participles:
Mami ist weggegingt
das ist runtergefallt
comparison:
Pferdchen ein kleineres
Mond grösser als Daddy
General
draws objectively
recognizable figures,
recognizes colors
Monologues/ Mami kommt darein, tic-tac
stories:
Danke, Post schickt Daddy
Age
Language
(months)
27
future orientation:
Let's build a castle
I'll put it in
28
General
sings melodies
recursive structures:
counts to 5
Ich weiss nicht, wen
recognizes letters:
der Deckel verloren hat N, C, O
questions with
when, how
Age
Language
(months)
30
conditionals:
ich suche, ob ich den Hasen finde
Timmy ist traurig, wenn das
Osterhäschen hier schläft
plans:
I want to read a book about a story
Age
Language
(months)
32
first real narrative:
It was a wooden lamby
and it was on the floor
in a barn
and they took it home
and they washed it
and it wasn't ugly
General
builds Legos
draws people
and house
with chimney
and windows
Age
Language
(months)
34
General
reports on TV program:
learns to
Plötzlich kamen zwei
peddle trike
Krokodile und haben das
Kälbchen ge'essen
reports on activities:
I'm pretending this is
a castle
(continued: 34 months)
explains actions:
I break it that I can make it new
predicts:
It's gonna be real beautiful,
you're gonna love it
Age (months): 36
Phonetics
• voiced th: initial okay in the this etc
• medial v in other
• voiceless th: initial s in sing
• final f in both
• vocalizes final l and r
• mispronunciations: amimals, cimamon, pasketti
Morphology
• double plurals:
mens, feets, mices
• double preterites:
sawed, standed
• regularized preterites:
goed, sitted
• reverse word-formations: popcorner, mowgrasser
Syntax
• negation: I see it not, That doll sits not right
• questions: What it did? What the lady said?
• counting: 1 2 3 4 5 6 20 14 fiveteen 16
Mean Length of Utterance (MLU)
as standard measure of first language
development as opposed to age
5.2 Natural order of acquisition:
5.2.1 "Why mama and papa?“
Jakobson's order for phoneme acquisition
• in babbling, children produce all kinds of
sounds and sound combinations; many
children produce imitations after babbling
• but around age 2, children narrow their sound
repertory and begin to produce sounds of
their language in fixed order
order reflects an attempt to create the clearest
possible set of distinctions at any given point, within
the given physiological limits
• this order of acquisition also reveals parallel
between different languages
• most salient distinction is between Vowels (V) and
Consonants (C)
Vowels are characteristically open and resonant:
• the prototypical V is a
Consonants are characteristically closed and
obstruent:
• stops are prototypical Cs
• the prototypical stop is p
the prototypical syllable is CV: maximizing the C-V
distinction, a child's first syllable should be pa
 given children's tendency to reduplication,
a child's first real word should be papa
the first division within the class of Cs is that between
oral and nasal; the nasal counterpart of bilabial p is m
 maximizing the p-m distinction and reduplicating,
the child's second word should be mama
(actually initial nasals often appear first, because
of the association with sucking; and mama is
often first word recorded, because of the
centrality of mother for the child)
major divisions within the class of Vs are those
between front and back, high and low, spread and
open; the vowel most distinct from a along all these
parameters is i
 again maximizing the a-i distinction
(and reduplicating), the child's next words
should be pipi and mimi
extending the pattern of Vs, always seeking to
maximize distinctness, the child should move to a
triplet:
a
u
i
after the Cs p and m , the child usually acquires t ,
then the third voiceless stop k and so on:
p
m
t
k
 child moves on to ever larger patterns with
increasing numbers of distinctive features
only when child controls the individual consonants
can they occur together in 2-consonant clusters:
• then word-initial clusters like pl- and st- precede
final clusters like -lp and –st
• later come initial 3-consonant clusters like
spr- and str• and then word-final 3-consonant clusters like
-rst and -sks
 of course, kids don't learn sounds in isolation,
but only in words and syntactic structures