Psychology 100:11Psychology 100:11

Chapter 11: Part IIIChapter 11: Part III

Development Development

Outline

Language acquisition Language and Communication

Linguistic universals Linguistics Linguistic relativity

Study Question:

• Compare and contrast animal communication with human language. Use Hockett’s defining features to underscore the distinction.

• Language acquisition in children– Perception of speech sounds by infants

>Newborn: Startle response to loud noise Orients head towards sound Calmed by human voice Prefers mother voice over stranger Can discriminate between many speech sounds.

>1-2 months: Smiles when spoken to

>3-7months: Responds differently to different intonations

Language

• Language acquisition in children– Perception of speech sounds by infants

>8-12 mo Responds to name Responds to ‘no’ Recognizes phrases (Peekaboo, patty cakes, etc.) Recognizes some words (bye-bye, bottle, Elmo,

etc.)

Language

Language • Language acquisition in children

– Prespeech period and first words>Newborn: Crying>1-2 months: Cooing>6 months: Babbling>10 - 12 mo: Nonreduplicative babbling>12 mo: First words - dada, baw-baw

Protowords- Kii, brrrr, caw

• Language acquisition in children– The two-word stage

>18-24 mos: Da-da bye-bye, laa laa ball, kiit door

– Acquisition of adult rules of grammar>Inflections: -ing, -s, -ed>Function words: to, of, in, on, etc.>Overextension: e.g., snow -> kii>Underextension: e.g., Kitty -> only “Puddin

Head”>Overregularization: Daddy goed to work.

Language

Language

• Language vs. communication– Continuity theory (Aitchison, 1983)

>Human language is a sophisticated calling system not fundamentally different from animal cries and calls

Bee hive communication Mating and other ritualized displays Ververt monkeys

• “chutter” -> cobra• “rraup” -> eagle• “chirp” -> lion

Language• Language vs. communication

– Problems with continuity theory>Apparent specifity

Ververt Monkeys• “chirps” for eagles as well as lions• Intensity of threat or symbollic representation

Intentionality• Often difficult to infer the intentions of animal

communication• E.g., Whale songs

Language

Language• Some definitions

– Language>A shared symbolic system for communication.

– Linguistics>Concerned with the characteristics, functions and

structure of language.

– Psycholinguistics>Concerned with language as it is learned and

used by people.

Language

Language• Hockett’s linguistic universals

– Essential design features> Semanticity

Linguistic utterances convey meaning by use of the symbols used to form the utterance

> Arbitrariness The connection between the symbol and the concept is arbitrary

We have few ‘true’ onomatopoeia.

English: bow wow bang ribbet

Arabic: haw haw bom ------

Mandarin: wang wang peng gua gua

Korean: meong meong ----- gaegol

Spanish: guau guau pum croac

Language

Language• Hockett’s linguistic universals

– Essential design features>Discreteness

Small separable set of basic sounds (phonemes) combine to form language

Language

Consonants Vowels

p pull s sip i heedb bull z zip I hidm man r rip e baitw willf fill æ badv vet u boot thigh U put

y yipt tie k kale o boatd die g galen near h hail a hotl lear sing

shoulds head

pleasurez

c chopgyroj

thyo but

V

bought

c

sofa

e

manyi

LanguageLanguage

Language• Hockett’s linguistic universals

– Essential design features>Duality of Patterning

Process of building an infinite set of meaningful words from a small set of phonemic building blocks

Language

Francois Truffaut’sWild Child (1970)

Language

• Hockett’s linguistic universals– Essential design features

>Displacement “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away” We talk about things are not in the here and now Displacement and bee hive communication

>Productivity If we were bees, we would make up a new word “Palimony”, “Podcasts”, “Twoonies”

>Traditional transmission Most elements of language are passed from

generation to generation “feral” children

Language• Linguistics

– Grammar: The complete set of rules that produce acceptable sentences and not produce unacceptable sentences

> Three levels Phonolgy

• Sounds of language Semantic or lexical

• Meaning Syntax

• Word order and grammaticity Semantics vs. syntax

The gorpy wug was miggled by the mimsy gibber.

Language

Noam Chomsky

Language

• Linguistics– A critical distinction

>Competence: Internalized knowledge of language that fully fluent speakers have

>Performance: the actual language behaviour that a speaker generates

Noam Chomsky

Language

• Linguistics– Our speaking performance is not always a

good indicator of language competency>Disfluencies: irregularities/ errors in speech

Lapses in memory (er….ummm…..er) Distractions

>Linguistic intuitions Which sounds better?

• I need a long, hot bath• I need a hot, long bath

LanguageLanguage

B. F. Skinner

• Linguistics

– The behaviourist approach to grammar>Skinner’s Verbal Behaviour.>Grammar as chaining discriminative responses.

– Chomsky’s Rebuttal: Perceived Grammaticality>Grammatical sentences should contain words

that have been paired often before: E.g.1,

Colourless green ideas sleep furiously E.g.2,

Will he went to the newspaper is of deeply end.

Language

Benjamin Whorf• Linguistics– Whorf’s hypothesis

>Linguistic Relativity hypothesis: Your language shapes your thoughts

Language controls thought and perception

>The Hopi as a timeless people>Heider (1971, 1972)

Focal colours Dani Language (New Guinea)

• Two words for colours: Mola (bright) & Mili (dark, cool)• Recognition memory influenced by focality

Language

Benjamin Whorf• Linguistics– “Eskimo words for snow” (100, 200, or 400?!?)

>Martin (1986) Franz Boas (1911; derived forms) 4 ‘Eskimo’ words for snow

• Aput - snow on the ground; Qana - falling snow; piqsirpoq - drifting snow; qimuqsuq - snowdrift.

English words for water• Liquid, lake, river, pond, sea, ocean, dew, brook, etc.

> these could have been formed from the ‘root’ water

> ‘Eskimos’ all snow related words from 4 ‘roots’

Language

Benjamin Whorf• Linguistics– “Eskimo words for snow” (100, 200, or 400?!?)

>Whorf (1940s) “We have the same word for falling snow, snow on the ground,

snow packed hard like ice, slushy snow, wind-driven flying snow- whatever the situation may be. To an Eskimo, this all-inclusive word would be almost unthinkable; he would say that falling snow, slushy snow, and so on, are sensuously and operationally different, different things to contend with; he uses different wards for them and for other kinds of snow.” (Whorf 1940)

7 words for snow (what about sleet, slush, hail, blizzard, etc.?)

Language

Benjamin Whorf• Linguistics

– “Eskimo words for snow” (100, 200, or 400?!?)> Brown (1958): Three words for snow

Only looked at the figures in Whorf’s paper!

> Eastman's (1975) Aspects of Language and Culture Cites Brown: "Eskimo languages have many words for snow”

(Mentions six lines later that the number was 3)

> Lanford Wilson's 1978 play “The Fifth of July” 50 words for snow

> New York Times editorial (1984) :100+ words for snow> The Science Times (1988)

"The Eskimos have about four dozen words to describe snow and ice”

> Cleveland weather forecast: 200 words for snow

Language