LANGUAGE PRODUCTION IN PSYCOLINGUISTIC

LANGUAGE PRODUCTION

WHAT IS PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

Psycholinguistics investigates the mental mechanisms underlying language processing. (Cognitive)

How to perceive words and store them in the mind, how to understand a sentence, how to learn to read, how language and writing systems influence mental organizations.

PsPsychological reality of linguistic aspectsychological reality of linguistic aspects

Decode spoken language, speech

Characters

Words

Alphabetic

Logographic

Syllabary/syllables

Pictographic; Naxi nationality, Yunan

WHAT IS PSYCHOLINGUISTICSWHAT IS PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

Two Aspects:

Language Comprehension –how we understand the meaning of words and sentences (receptive process)

Language Production –how we speak and use language (productive process)

THE PROBLEM

lexicon

Bilingualism

Spoken word comprehension

Written word comprehension

ComprehensionProduction

Spoken word production

Written word production

Dialogue

/Discourse

EXAMPLE: LANGUAGE PRODUCTION

• Language production is a process

from idea generation to language

expression.

• It is a mental process that is heavily

influenced by language users’ culture.

LANGUAGE PRODUCTION

First, we must conceptualize what we wish to communicate;

Second, we formulate this thought into a linguistic plan;

Third, we execute the plan through the muscles in the speech system;

Finally, we monitor ore speech, assessing whether it is what we intended to say and whether we said it the way we intended to.


IIdea: cross-cultural communicationdea: cross-cultural communication

• People using the same language (i.e. English) but coming from different cultures.

• Example: Cultural differences in directness – how explicitly and clearly do we say what we mean.

• Case study: letters of recommendation for a bright but immature student, Peter Gore. (By John McCarthy)


British Professor(least direct)

“Mr. Gore impresses one as very intelligent. As to his maturity and readiness for graduate study, I can say very little, having had an opportunity to observe him only under relatively unfavorable conditions.”


American Professor(intermediate directness)

“In my judgment, Gore is very intelligent. During the time I have known him, I have seen him grow in maturity; I hope and expect that this will continue when he begins graduate study.”


Australian Professor

(most direct)

“Peter’s brilliant, there’s no doubt about that. But

he’s a bit of a baby, with a lot of growing up to do.”


Chinese Professor (from Mainland)(Ignore the fact)

“Peter Gore is a very smart student. He was doing extremely well in my class. He gets along well with everyone and is respected by others.”

EXAMPLE: VISUAL WORD RECOGNITION

When people encounter a printed word, how do they identify it?

Properties of the word

Visual or auditory (Modality) Orthographic –whether a word is constructed

in a legal way (e.g. “math” vs “mtah”) Phonological (syllable: /cat/; phoneme: /k/,

/e/, /t/, Meaning

EXAMPLE: WORD RECOGNITION

In identifying a written word,

Visuo-orthographic analysis occurs. (activate, activation)

Is the meaning of a word accessed automatically?

Is the phonological information of a word accessed automatically?


An Experiment: Task: Speak out the color name of the stimulus you will view. (red, blue, green)

Requirement: Complete the task as quickly and accurately as possible.Subjects, participants,

(The task was devised by Stroop, 1935 --the “Stroop task”.)


Possible results:

For color words (red, green, blue), when their ink color is inconsistent with the meaning of the words,

Naming time is longer (i.e.response latency); Responses are less accurate.


Why there is such an

interference effect?

The mental lexicon

red

*

/blu:/

red

blue

The mental lexicon

red

*

/blu:/

red

blue

red

blue

red

blue

red

blue

red

blue


The above finding suggests that the meaning of words is activated automatically –people cannot control the activation of meaning.

automaticity


What about the phonological information of

a written word in a silent reading task?

Is a word’s phonology activated in a task

that does not require reading aloud?


Another experiment:

Task: On each trial, you will first see a semantic category name (e.g., “flower”). Following the semantic category, you will see a target word which may be an exemplar of the category (e.g., “rose”). Judge if the target word you will see is an correct exemplar of the category.


Possible results:

High “false” correct responses to homophones of the

exemplars.

Suggest that the meaning of words is accessed via phonology.

METHODOLOGY IN PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

1. Reaction time (RT) approach

It measures people’s RT (response latency) to a language stimulus. It includes many on-line methods of studying people’s language behavior continuously in a laboratory setting

Infer the mental activity in terms of RTs.

dog/dawg/


2. Memory and Classroom Approach

It investigates language behavior in classroom, a more natural setting.

To study the developmental pattern of children’s reading ability:

cross-sectional (grades 1 to grade 5) longitudinal (a 5-year study)


3. Eye movements Approach

Use the eyetracker to measure the position and duration of people’s eye fixations upon the text

It is a most reliable psycholinguistic technique.


How the Eyes Work?

When people read, the eyes do NOT move

continuously. Instead, the eye will “stop” on

some word for a brief period (150 to 500

milliseconds). This is called fixation. Between

the fixations are periods where the eye moves

rapidly. These rapid eye movements are called

saccades.

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY IN PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

To understand a sentence, the eyes sometimes move back to some word, re-fixating it. These “backward” saccades are termed regression.

Words that are fixated are in the fovea; words surrounding the fixated words are in the parafovea.


A healthy body may seem reward enough for . . . . . . . 177 196 175 244 302 112 177

most people. However, for all those who . . . . . 266 188 199 216 212

question the payoff, some recent research… . . . . 179 266 245 188


H

ow the Eyes Work?

Fixation Saccades

duration length (characters)

E

nglish 231 msec. 7.8

Hebrew 265 msec. 5.5

Chinese 300 msec. 2.0


How the Eyes Work?

Information extracted from the parafovea aids in

reading:

Reading rate is about 200 words per minute when only the fixated word is visible on each fixation, but it is 300 words per minute when both the fixated word and the one immediately to the right are visible on each fixation.

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY IN

PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

4. Neurolinguistic Approach

It studies the brain mechanism for language functioning –

where is language functioning localized in the brain?

Lesion study –using brain-damage patients

Functional brain imaging study –using the intact human

brain


PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

Left hemisphere

Right hemisphere

cortex

Left hemisphere Right hemisphere

Language and speech perception of nonlinguistic soundAnalytic reasoning holistic reasoning Temporal ordering visual and spatial skills Reading and writing recognition of patterns Calculation recognition of musical melodies Associative thought

BRAIN LATERALIZATION FOR MAJOR MENTAL FUNCTIONS UNDER THE CONTROL OF EACH HEMISPHERE IS GIVEN AS

FOLLOWS


PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

Basi

c Neuroanatomy:

T

he outer layer of the brain –cerebral cortex

H

idden underneath the cortex are subcortical parts of the brain

T

he left and right hemispheres are connected by a band of nerve fibers –corpus

callosum


PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

Basic Neuroanatomy:

An important feature of the human nervous system is that each cerebral cortex is connected to the opposite side of the body. This is termed contralateral connections.

(Same-side connections are very weak.)


PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

S

plit-brain patients –those who have a damaged

corpus callosum but an undamaged brain.


PSYCHOLINGUISTICS


PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

R

esults:

The left hemisphere is a language hemisphere.

(dominant).


PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

Brain Imaging Techniques

Language processing requires energy. Brain imaging

techniques depend on the fact that working brain

tissue calls more blood its way and consumes more

glucose.


PSYCHOLINGUISTICS


PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

“ Brain Imaging ” -- visualize the activity of the intact human brain

• PET (positron emission tomography)

Subjects are injected with glucose that has been tagged with a radioactive substance; through this, brain images can be got indicating which regions of the brain have the greatest blood flow are are using the most energy.


PSYCHOLINGUISTICS• fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging):

When subjects perform a task (e.g., reading), neural

activity in specific areas of the brain increases. This results

in greater need for glucose and oxygen, both of which are

met by increasing blood flow. There is a small difference in

magnetic susceptibility (a property of molecules) between

oxygenated hemoglobin and de-oxygenated hemoglobin.

With increased blood flow to activated brain areas, there is

a change in the proportion of oxygenated to de-oxygenated

hemoglobin. This difference can be detected in the scanner.

LANGUAGE PRODUCTION IN PSYCOLINGUISTIC

Education

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