LANGUAGE: BASIC PRINCIPLES Most impressive and important If the vocal cords vibrate at this point, the phoneme
ibrate at this point, the phoneme is termed
cognitive achievement as human beings is language—the intricate
symphony of representations and processes that allows us to
communicate our thoughts to others.
Psycholinguistics refers to the study of the processes involved in using
language; psycholinguists are interested in exactly how we execute our
language abilities, the study of linguistic performance.
Linguistics refers to the study of language in its pure form- rules that
define it and our knowledge of those rules. This (relatively) pure
knowledge of language and its rules is termed linguistic competence.
Words and Rules
Language is defined by a set of symbols (words) and rules for
their combination (grammar) that allow for communication and
comprehension.
One obvious characteristic of language is that everything to which we
refer is symbolized by a word. All the words a person knows comprise
their mental lexicon, or mental dictionary- a significant part of
semantic memory, the general knowledge store.
Design Features of Language
Language is distinguished by a number of design features, which include
semanticity (symbols have meaning), displacement (we can
communicate about the future and past), prevarication (we can lie),
reflectiveness (we can use language to talk about language), and
productivity (we can generate infinite combinations from finite
symbols).
Language in Nonhuman Animals
Animal communication does exhibit a few of the design features that
characterize human language, but due to its lack of productivity, animal
communication seems to fall well short of language. Although animals
are able to learn labels or symbols for a wide array of objects and
concepts, it is doubtful whether these labels are truly referential. Animals
also fail to show evidence of using grammar intentionally or deliberately.
The most impressive evidence of language-like abilities has been shown
with Kanzi and other bonobo chimps. Trained with a cross-fostering
technique that involved the spontaneous use of symbols in day-to-day
interactions with his trainers, Kanzi generated a wide array of novel sign
combinations that seemed to indicate a rudimentary use of grammar.
Some argue that the defining feature of human language that separates
human from animal language is recursion—or the ability of
language to embed sentences and phrases within other
sentences and phrases, theoretically without limit. Both language
reception and language production can be addressed at a number of
levels of analysis.
PHONOLOGY: THE SOUND OF LANGUAGE
Understanding spoken language could be considered an exercise in
auditory perception—perceive and understand difference between
sounds and pattern recognition—matching the information we received
from the information we have stored in brain.
Phonology is the linguistic study of speech sounds and manual units and
how they change depending on their contexts.
- Study of the sound patterns that occur within languages.
One components of phonology is the study and discovery of
“phonological rules” ; it is a way phonologist predict how a speech
sound will change depending on its position in various environment
Phonological rules are part of communication through language,
whether spoken or written, and knowing what they are and why
they exist can help us better understand our world.
Phones and Phonemes
The smallest unit that we need to identify must be defined by the
acoustic properties of a sound. This segment of speech is called a
phone.
Phones are speech sounds without regard of its place in phonology of
language
It is a realization sounds of phonemes; it is represented by brackets
Phoneme refers to categories of speech sounds that are clearly
different and that change the meaning of a spoken signal. It can be
categorized as consonant or vowels.
It is a unit of sounds that can distinguish one word from another.
If changing one phoneme to another it will change the meaning of the
word.
Phonemes don’t necessarily correspond with number of letters; some
phonemes are represented by 2 letters.
Producing Phonemes
Speech sounds are a product of the vocal tract and can be described in
terms of the movement of the structures within it.
Vowel phonemes involve a continuous flow of air through the vocal tract.
Consonant phonemes involve some type of obstruction of the airflow
Vowel phonemes are the product of differences in the position of the
tongue vertically (high, mid, or low) and horizontally (front, central, or
back).
 Consonant phonemes differ along three dimensions:
- First, they differ in their place of articulation, which refers to
the part(s) of the vocal tract used to make the sound.
- Also differ in their manner of articulation, which refers to
exactly how the airflow is obstructed.
- Finally, consonant phonemes differ in voicing. Voicing relates
to what the vocal cords do when the airflow disruption stops.
voiced. If the vocal cords vibrate after the disruption stops, it’s
termed voiceless.
Perceiving Phonemes
 Phonemes also differ in what are termed suprasegmental
factors—aspects of the speech signal such as rate, stress, and
intonation—over and above the actual phonemes.
 Coarticulation- Refers to the influences that speech sounds
have upon each other in different contexts
 Two articulators moving at the same time for the
production of different phonemes
 A phenomenon allowing us to perceive invariance in phonemes
in spite of their different acoustic properties is termed
categorical perception.
 It allows us to distinguish between sounds, no matter how
varied or similar they may be.
 Categorical perception would seem to ease the problems
associated with coarticulation.
The Importance of Context.
 Speech perception also involves top-down processing—
the use of context and/or previous knowledge to
disambiguate a messy signal.
 Phonemic restoration effect is a powerful auditory
illusion in which listeners hear a part of a word that has in
fact been replaced by another sound.
 Phonemic restoration effect shows that our knowledge of
words and sentences affects perception allows us to
comprehend speech even when the information is
ambiguous or missing.
MORPHOLOGY: FROM SOUNDS TO WORDS
 A morpheme is the smallest unit of language that carries
meaning; it may refer to a single word (e.g. tree) or to a prefix
or suffix that changes the precise meaning of the word (eg,
the s in trees).
-A morpheme is a fundamental linguistic term that represents the
smallest meaningful item in a language. It can be a complete word, such
as 'tree,' when the entire word carries a certain meaning. A morpheme
can also be a prefix or suffix, such as the 's' in 'trees,' which, when
added to the base word 'tree,' changes its meaning to signify plurality.
Understanding morphemes is critical in linguistics because they are the
building blocks of words and allow us to cut apart language to its most
fundamental components, allowing us to analyze vocabulary, word
creation, and the complexities of linguistic structure.
Declarative Memory and Procedural Memory
 Meaning to say that declarative knowledge is about
knowing facts, such as knowing that "naught" is the irregular
past tense of "teach." while procedural knowledge is about
knowing how to execute actions or tasks in a specific manner,
for instance, it involves the knowledge of "how to add '-ed' to
'cook' to convey that the action occurred in the past and this
distinction is valuable in understanding different facets of our
cognitive abilities and language processing.
Perceiving the Spoken Word
 Cohort model
It proposes that when we hear a word, we access a mental
"cohort" or group of words that share similar starting sounds
or phonemes with the heard word. by continually refining our
predictions based on auditory input.
 One problem with the cohort model is that it places special
importance on discerning the initial phoneme of a given word.
Discerning Word Boundaries
The fact that individual sounds in a word run together poses a significant
problem for the Speech perception system. The same problem arises
when we need to segment these sounds into words.
Bottom up factors
A wide variety of factors present in the speech signal, itself, have been
identified in facilitating the determination of word boundaries.
 Begin with stimulus, travels through the senses, and words
upward toward the brain where it’s analyzed.
 Specific word move to the general.
Phonotactic knowledge
 Refers to the implicit understanding of the permissible sound
patterns and combinations in a particular language. It involves
knowing which sounds or phonemes can appear in different
positions within words, syllables, or clusters. Phonotactic play a
crucial role in language production and comprehension,
helping to determine what words and sequences of sounds are
allowed and what are not in a given language.
Metrical segmentation
  Which refers to the notion that the segmentation of words is
dependent on the phonology of the particular language.
Statistical Probabilities to Determine Boundaries
What may be the most powerful cue available for determining word
boundaries is arguably the most subtle. Spoken language is a series of
patterns to which we’re exposed constantly. And if there’s one thing the
human brain is good at, it’s detecting patterns. It turns out that there are
plenty of statistical regularities embedded within speech than can be
exploited by our Perceptual systems in order to discern where words
begin and end.
Top-down
 While there is no doubt that these bottom-up factors play a
role in determining word boundaries, another approach flips
the equation around, emphasizing that our knowledge of
words in a given language helps us locate word boundaries. In
order to understand this idea we’ll consider a visual analog.
Mondegreens
 Even with knowledge of the statistical properties of words, and
knowledge of the words within our own language, the
perception of word boundaries remains a challenging
perceptual task; misheard word boundaries have been dubbed
mondegreens.
The Stroop Effect
 Our tendency to experience difficulty naming a physical color
when it is used to spell the name of a different color.
Mental Lexicon
 The process by which a concept is activated within the mental
lexicon (our mental dictionary) is termed lexical access.
 High-frequency and nonambiguous words are more easily
accessed than low frequency and ambiguous words. When an
ambiguous word is encountered, both meanings are
temporarily activated; context leads to disambiguation.
 Bilinguals seem to have a common semantic memory store
underlying their two lexicon
SYNTAX AND SEMANTICS: FROM WORDS TO SENTENCES
Syntax- the set of rules that specify legal combinations of words within
a given language
-sets forth a specific order for grammatical elements like subjects, verbs,
direct and indirect objects, etc
Semantics- the rules governing the effective transmission of meaning.
-the study of meaning in language. It can be applied to entire texts or to
single words
Transformational Grammar
 Transformational grammar- approach to how we engage in
language
 Universal grammar- the innate biological component of the
language faculty.
Phrase Structure, Surface Structure and Deep Structure
 Constituents- breaking a sentence down into its components
phrases.
-refers to a group of words that function as a single unit within
a sentence. These constituents are often phrases or smaller
grammatical units that are grouped together based on their
syntactic structure. Constituents are essential in understanding
the hierarchical structure of sentences.
 Deep structure- semantics representation of sentences.
-refers to concepts, feelings, ideas, thoughts. An abstract
representation of the core meaning and syntactic relationships
in a sentence, serving as the foundation for surface structures
in different languages and allowing for transformations to
generate various expressions while preserving the same
meaning.
Example: Deep Structure: The cat chased the dog.
 Surface structure- the particular ordering used to convey
that meaning.
-the particular ordering used to convey that meaning. Surface
structure is the outward form of a sentence. This means that it
is the version of a sentence that is seen or heard. Surface
structures follow grammar and syntax rules to make them
usable and understandable in everyday contexts.
Example: The dog was chased by the cat. (Passive)
PRAGMATICS: THE SOCIAL ASPECTS OF LANGUAGE
Pragmatics refers to the practical knowledge we need to use
language effectively during conversation.
Conversational Structure
Conversations have a fairly stable structure.
Conversations typically have a standard structure that includes a
greeting, turntaking, and little overlap.
 First, conversations usually start with one of a number of
standard greetings (Schegloff, 1972) like the unoriginal
“Hey, how’s it going?”
 Another standard feature of conversations is turn-taking
—the speakers alternate in what might be described as
ABABAB fashion, conversational overlap is exceedingly
rare.
- The predictable rhythm of conversation, and the unwritten
rules that seem to guide this rhythm, are an important source
of coherence. Violation of these rhythms would lead to
confusion, frustration, and misunderstanding
Grice (1975) spelled out a number of characteristics that seem to
define this contract. These “maxims,” as they’re termed, all
support one overriding principle: cooperation.
The four maxims are:
 Quantity: Say as much as you need to, but not more.
 Quality: Don’t say things that you believe to be false;
don’t say things for which you lack evidence.
 Relation: Be relevant to the topic at hand.
 Manner: Be clear; avoid obscurity and ambiguity. For an
appreciation of how important these maxims are to our
daily interactions, think of people you know who regularly
violate them, and how others react to these people.
Gender and Conversation
Some research indicates gender differences in conversation, although the
precise nature and origin of the differences is a matter of debate.
Contrary to popular belief, women and men seem to use about the same
number of words in everyday speech.
PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER: LANGUAGE PERCEPTION AND
PRODUCTION
Speech Production
 Is the process by which thoughts are translated into Speech
Stages of Speech Production
 Conceptualizing
 Planning
 Articulating
Categories of Speech Errors with Example:
Type of Error Example
Shift He was dunk in public (drunk in public).
Exchange Do you want water in your lemon?
(lemon in your water)?
Anticipation Twitch on the television (switch on the
television).
Perseveration I haven’t deleted the files yet (deleted the
files yet).
Addition The girl’s story is unbelievable
(believable).
Deletion Before I take the tape back I need to wind
it (rewind it).
Substitution Let’s play some TV (watch
some TV).
Blend Oh, my gooshness (gosh/goodness).
Self- Monitoring
 Self-monitoring is the ability to monitor your self-presentation
body language. It involves controlling your emotions and
changing your body language, tone and language.
How do I know if I am already doing this?
There are several critical signs exhibited by those who self-monitor.
 Saying something to get someone approval or to fit in.
 Acting to entertain others.
 Subconsciously imitating the behavior of others.
 Asking others to see what to do.
 Asking others for advice on what to wear, ask, think, or do.
Speech Perception

 Is the process by which the sounds of language are heard,

interpreted, and understood.

Modular View

 Holds that language is made up of a unique set of abilities and

capacities. That cannot be reduced.

Nonmodular View

 Contends that language is the joint product of the cognitive

process.

Motor Theory of Speech Perception

 According to the motor theory of speech perception, the same

mechanisms and representations underlie speech production
and speech perception and this mechanism is a separate and
“special” mechanism.

Auditory Theory of Speech Perception

 According to the auditory theory, speech perception is the

product of “regular” auditory perceptual processes.

Current evidence indicates that speech perception is most likely not an

entirely separate module, and can be accounted for within an auditory
perception framework.