Language
a system of communication using sounds or symbols that can express feelings , thoughts, ideas, and experiences.
communication
a system by which info is exchanged between individuals.
Language is hierarchical
components can be combined to form larger units
rule based
specific ways that components can be arranged
dynamic
it is constantly changing.
creative
can generate novel content. demonstrates generativity
phonemes
shortest segments of speech that , if changed, changes the meaning of a word.
morphemes
smallest units of language that have meaning or grammatical function
alphabet
standardized set if letters or symbols representing each phoneme used in that language
syllabary system
uses symbols to represent syllables ( a unit of pronunciation contains at least one vowel sound)
logographic system
uses symbols to represent whole words
Braille
uses bumps that are processed with touch sensations.
sign language
used hand signals and gestures
cross modal
the interaction or combination of different sensory modalities, such as sight, sound, and touch
ex. producing vowel sounds involves opening our mouth more widely than when producing consonants, which may be reflected in the visual appearance of the letters that represent those sounds (ex. O vs. S)
language is creative and dynamic
representations are constantly changing, . The letters in our alphabet are a way to fuse together representations that come to be associated w visual appearance, sound , and meaning.
sound symbolism
suggesting that certain sounds can evoke specific concepts. accounts for the bias that many of us seem to have in terms of how well certain sounds seem to fit w particular shapes.
typically explained as associating ‘sharp’ sounding words w ‘sharp’ sounding objects.
linking color and pitch
Hagtvedt and Brasel (2016) found that high frequency sounds guide attention towards light colored objects (and vice versa: low frequency sounds -> dark colored objects). This seems to happen spontaneously and w out any awareness on the part of the person experiencing this effect
universal need to communicate with language
most humans w normal capacities develop a language and learn to follow its complex rules (even w sensory deficits, even if it must be created on their own).
language is universal across cultures and its development is often similar.
different languages can be considered ‘unique but the same’ (different words, sounds, and rules but all have nouns, verbs, negatives, questions, past/present tense)
psycholinguistics
discover psychological process by which humans acquire and process language. much of this work falls into comprehension , speech production, representation, and acquisition
phonemic restoration effect
phenomenon where the brain fills in missing sounds in speech (phonemes) based on context
word superiority effect
refers to the fact that letters are easier to recognize when they are contained in a word, as to when they appear alone or in a nonword
lexical decision tasks
involve reading a list of words and non-words and identifying whether or not each stimulus is a real word.
word frequency effect
respond more quickly to high frequency words than low
speech segmentation
process by which the brain determines where 1 meaningful unit (e.g., word or morpheme) ends and the next begins in continuous speech.
unfolds based on various factors: context, understanding of meaning, understanding of sound and syntactic rules , statistical learning.
