Chapter 9 amp;11 psycholinguistics and language acquisition 英语专业语言学PPT教学文稿.pptVIP

Chapter 9 Psycholinguistics Discussion: What is psycholinguistics about? Psycholinguistics links psychology and linguistics. Also called psychology of language, is the study of the language –processing mechanisms. Concerned with the relationship between language and the human mind The purpose is to find out the structures and processes which underlie a human’s ability to produce and understand language. Above all, psycholinguistics is about language acquisition: How children acquire their mother tongue. Directions of psycholinguistic study:1. Study how language is used to explain psycholinguistic theories and processes; 2. Study the effects of psychological constraints on the use of language. Genetic view on language acquisition: Steven Pinker’s The Language Instinct, the elements of linguistic knowledge to be innate. Consistent with Chomsky’s Universal Grammar, there is a common underlying structure to every language, the knowledge of which we are born with. (Cf: 268-269) n 2. behaviorist J. B. Watson: thought is language. Thought is sub-vocal speech, like a very quiet whisper to oneself. P.233 i 3. Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis or Whorfian Hypothesis and their supporting evidence A. Linguistic determinism: linguistic structure determines cognitive structure; B. Linguistic relativity: the resulting cognitive systems are different in speakers of different languages. Comment on Whorfian Hypothesis 235 1. There is no hard-and fast identification of word categories with thought categories. 2. Bilinguals can express their ideas freely in two or more languages; 3. Language users can use borrowed languages to express certain ideas. 4. Thought determines language --Children’s cognitive development comes earlier and cognitive categories determine the linguistic categories that they will acquire. --focal color experiment: there is some constraint that limit the way in which our experience is coded in the language. Conclusion on Language and thought: (235, 237) Hec