Psycholinguistics Notes PDF

Psycho final exam Exam: Multiple choice, some open questions, some match questions Language perception Chapters 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13(no studying syntactic parsing stratregies or trees.) Humans possess a skill called Hemispheric specialization: Left hemisph...

Psycho final exam Exam: Multiple choice, some open questions, some match questions Language perception Chapters 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13(no studying syntactic parsing stratregies or trees.) Humans possess a skill called Hemispheric specialization: Left hemisphere is dominant in speech processing. Shown in brain-imaging experiments and Dichotic listening experiments. (competing words presenting in each ear, usually more accurate identification for right ear, so left hemisphere. Perceptual information is processed in the contralateral hemisphere. Generalization, Right is also involved N400 is higher when prompted with unpredictable speech patterns Dealing with variability: exemplars stored in the mental lexicon, if it looks like it, we assume it’s the one. Segmentation: We chunk up different parts of words and recognize them as their parts (evidence for this is that there are often no boundaries between words, yet we’re still able to perceive them. Categorical perception: Basically if there’s no contrast between a thing in your language, you won’t be able to perceive said contrast in a different language. like with /g/ and /ch/ or /l/ and /r/. Experience in and exposure to a native language shapes the perceptual system. Prediction: Readers and listeners actively anticipate upcoming words. Cue integration: strong reliance on context in a spoken word environment. We rely on things like the McGurk effect and the Phoneme restoration effect(It was found that the /#il/ was on the …). We also rely on our selective attention (cocktail party effect) Framework for Linguistic perception: Pre-lexical analysis Contacts: Establishing links between input and stored forms of words Activation: getting contacted words excited about the fact that they have been contacted Psycho final exam 1  Access: Getting hold of the information about a word that is stored in the mental lexicon Recognition: Knowing which word it is that we have heard. McGurk effect = Laurel/Yanny thing Word superiority effect: When reading, you see words you know over words you don’t know, you read WORD instead of WOLD. Regression = when looking back at a word to re-understand the sentence/ get more context. Representations/ mental lexicon Core character Cohort model Focuses on spoken word recognition Key idea: Word recognition is incremental, starting from the first phoneme and narrowing down to the target word Process: Hear first sound → activate all sounds that begin with it (cohort of candidates) → Selection narrows down as more phonemes are heard → Word is identified once it comes past the “uniqueness point” Limitations: Does not account for context or top-down influence. Can’t account for recognition of words with noise or mispronunciations. Trace model (for spoken language) Was made as a reaction to the Cohort model Connectionist model of auditory word recognition There are ‘layers of recognition’: Input layer/Feature layer: Processing basic acoustic cues (voicing, place, etc.) Phoneme Layer: Activation of word candidates that match part of the features of the speech input →unfolds over time Psycho final exam 2  Word layer: activates lexical items based on phoneme input Activation treshold Key Ideas: Interactive activation = bottom-up (sensory input) and top-down (lexical context) processes interact. Competition between activated candidates, best match ‘wins’ Can handle noise and partial input better than the Cohort model Limitations: Computationally intensive and probably not real-time word recognition. Interactive activation model (McClelland & Rumelhart) (This is for visual input) Connectionist model of visual word recognition Key Idea: Recognition involves bidirectional flow of activation between levels of processing. Structure: Bottom-up activation (features → letters → words) Feature Level: detects visual features (letter shapes/ strokes) Letter Level: Activates individual letters based on detected features Word Level: Activates lexical candidates based on the combination of letters Key Mechanisms: Top-down and Bottom-up processes: Context and prior knowledge (top- down) can influence letter and word recognition Competition and Inhibition: Activated candidates compete, strongest one ‘wins’ + Can account for word superiority effect - problems with non-alphabetical languages - prone to semantic effects - static Psycho final exam 3  BIA+ (Bilingual Interactive Activation Plus) model Dijkstra & Van Heuven Focuses on Bilingual visual word recognition Key Idea: Both languages of a bilingual are activated simultaneously during word recognition, influenced by context and cognitive control. Builds on Interactive Activation Model but adds: Language node: Represent and regulate activation of each language Task-decision system: Reflects the influence of task demands Integrated lexicon: Words from both languages are stored together with cross- linguistic competition Key Mechanisms: Non-selective access: both languages are always activated. Contextual modulation: Task and language context help to guide recognition to the right language. Language non-selective access (activating words in Dutch also activates ones in a non-native language) Frequency of words determines how quickly they become activated Shared semantics lead to faster recognition Bia model was still static, didn’t account for spoken or signed language, and had problems with proficiency levels of users, now a new model: Multilink Model Focus: Bilingual word recognition (visual and auditory) Key Idea: Unified model of bilingual processing that incorporates features of lexical activation, competition, and language control. Structure: Integrates the strengths of TRACE and BIA+ models Accounts for cross-linguistic interaction at multiple levels (orthographic, phonological, semantic) Key mechanisms: Psycho final exam 4  Integrated lexicon: all words are stored together, which leads to parallel selection Phonological and semantic Links: Links between similar words in both languages influence selection/recognition Task and Control Factors: Language mode and attention can modulate activation Limitations: Complexity makes the model harder to test empirically Needs further integration with non-visual modalities Model Focus Strengths Limitations Ignores top- Spoken word Incremental and 1. Cohort down/contextual recognition efficient recognition. effects. Handles noise and Spoken word Computationally 2. TRACE integrates top-down recognition intensive. info. 3. Interactive Visual word Explains context Limited to visual Activation recognition effects in reading. modality. Primarily visual; less Bilingual visual Non-selective access 4. BIA+ focus on spoken word recognition in bilinguals. input. High complexity; Bilingual word Comprehensive 5. Multilink challenging to test recognition (both) bilingual processing. fully. Under which account of sentence processing do we assume a separation of semantic and syntactic operations? Modular account of sentence processing Under which account of sentence processing do we assume that comprehenders engage in superficial processing, to arrive at an interpretation, rapidly? Good enough account Under which account of sentence processing would we expect a garden- path effect in the sentence "the evidence examined by the lawyer turned out Psycho final exam 5  the unreliable“? Modular account: we tend to assume a simple construction, subject, verb, etc. but then we are prompted with a passive construction. i Modularity in language processing modularity of syntactic and semantic operations: Syntax First → Semantic processing Second. (= garden path model) Information encapsulation (assumes processes within one model are sealed off from other models); assumes linearity; models automatically start when receiving input from other models Early views on Broca’s Wernicke’s aphasia in favor of modularity. Broca: syntactic processing; left inferior frontal area Wernicke: semantic processing; left temporal area Disruption between the part linking broca’s and wernicke’s leads to problems with both Interactive view: crosstalk syntax/semantics before the police/ the truck stopped the driver was getting nervous Modularity of production & comprehension Anomia = word finding difficulty Word deafness = can’t understand spoken words The P-Chain: Relating sentence production and its disorders to comprehension and acquisition Processing (comprehension) involves Prediction → Prediction is Production (like sentence planning) → Anticipatory movement is important for production Production trains comprehension Psycho final exam 6  Prediction leads to prediction errors (never 100% correct) → leads to implicit learning Prediction errors lead to a form of priming: When hearing a structure that is infrequent, it is changing the system’s expectation and putting it at the top of the memory, so the system expects it to appear more frequently than it does, leading to a form of priming. This also leads you to then produce relatively more of this error (So hearing passives and incorrectly predicting them will lead you to use more passive constructions yourself) Conclusion: Priming is implicit learning Language and other cognitive systems Modularity or interactivity Language, perception, memory, pragmatics, executive control Focus on relation between language and visual system visual information can facilitate or hinder language comprehension. People seem to activate an image of what words are supposed to look like → look at spindle which looks like ‘beaker’. So do we predict visual features of upcoming words? Moon → round shape? YES → people looked a lot at ‘moon’, and second at tomato, so shape competitor is valid How does the mind represent the concepts that words refer to? → Cognition is an A-Modal (Fodor) vs Perceptual symbol system (Barsalou) Language is arbitrary A-Modal: representations are static, not influenced by changes in the referent (egg is represented in the same way, regardless of context Psycho final exam 7  Perceptual symbols: Representations contain exemplar-specific perceptual information (raw egg/fried egg) Like shape, colour, orientation Perceptual symbols theory and ‘mental models’ In a Perceptual symbol system account of linguistic representation, there is a tight link between language and perception. Embodied cognition: can’t separate bodily experiences/information from the senses from our representations. When we comprehend language, we evoke mental representations. mental models are situation- and context-specific, and contain a great deal of perceptual detail (a mental image) People respond faster when the question matches the picture in both: Shape match/mismatch conditions (eagle in sky/on branch) Orientation match/mismatch conditions (nail on table/in wall) → sentences evoke situation models, mental image of the entire situation. → visual representations evoked by words are context-specific (so a sentence where a ball is being kicked evokes a different image then where a ball is floating in water) Linguistics cueing of perception Words and sentences help with visual recognition, language ‘jumpstarts’ vision. The ‘label advantage’ for perception You create 100s of abstract representations for things because of different versions of a thing, so we associate words with visual precepts. This is how exemplars are formed. Labelling facilitates abstractions and category formation representations are categorical Biological motion perception Paper Psycho final exam 8  Language can help with recognition, but can also trick us into thinking we see things that aren’t there! Language and Thought debate: Sapir Whorff hypothesis, linguistic relativity vs universalism LR: language influences thought UNI: Bullshit Motion events Satellite-framed languages have more attention to manner (high manner saliency) Verb-framed languages have more attention to path (low manner saliency Online and Offline processing Online processing: Measuring things while they are goin on (EEG etc.) Offline processing: Measuring things after they happened (’can you remember which word was shown’) Psycholinguistics methods Observations: Analysis of pauses, speech errors Experiments and what they reveal: naming/description task How words are retrieved from the mental lexicon. Effects of semantic interference (e.g., naming is slower if distractors are semantically related). picture-word interference Semantic interference: Slower naming when the distractor is semantically related (e.g., dog for cat). Psycho final exam 9  Phonological facilitation: Faster naming when the distractor shares phonological features (e.g., bat for cat). priming Organization of the mental lexicon (e.g., related words are closely connected). How activation spreads between related concepts or word forms. eye tracking Online processing during reading (e.g., syntactic parsing, resolving ambiguity). Real-time spoken word recognition (e.g., when listeners fixate on objects corresponding to words). cloze task Sentence-level processing and word predictability effects. Role of context in language comprehension. Tip of the tongue experiments How words are stored and accessed in the mental lexicon. Differences between phonological and semantic memory traces. Tongue twister experiments The interaction between phonological planning and articulation. Evidence for the serial or parallel nature of speech production processes. Sentence-picture verification task How language and visual information are integrated. Comprehension of word order and thematic roles (e.g., subject vs. object). Lexical decision task How words are stored and accessed in the mental lexicon. Effects of frequency, length, and neighborhood density on word recognition. linguistic cueing paradigm Psycho final exam 10  Top-down influences on language comprehension. Role of expectancy in word or sentence processing. visual world paradigm How listeners use contextual information (e.g., visual cues) to resolve ambiguity. Incremental processing and lexical competition during spoken word recognition. Task Primary Insight Naming/Description Task Lexical access and retrieval during speech production. Semantic/phonological effects on word retrieval and Picture-Word Interference production. Priming Spread of activation and structure of the mental lexicon. Eye Tracking Real-time language processing and ambiguity resolution. Cloze Task Predictive processing and role of context. Tip of the Tongue Lexical storage and retrieval mechanisms. Experiments Tongue Twister Experiments Phonological planning and articulation errors. Sentence-Picture Integration of linguistic and visual information, syntactic Verification parsing. Lexical Decision Task Word recognition and factors influencing lexical access. Influence of linguistic context and expectations on Linguistic Cueing Paradigm comprehension. Real-time auditory-visual integration and lexical Visual World Paradigm competition. Modularity between different types of language processing Interactive account Reversible vs irreversible sentences the chicken pushed the horse ↔ the horse pushed the chicken The boy pushed the piano Psycho final exam 11  which tasks shed light on online sentence processing? eye tracking during reading self-paced reading in which sentences do we find a reduced relative clause? the florist sent the flowers was pleased the horse raced past the barn fell In the visual world eye tracking experiment by Tanenhaus (put the apple on the towel..), it was found that... On which sentence element do you expect to find longer reading times in an eye tracking experiment? Which of the procedures below describe 'RSVP(rapid serial visual presentation)'? Participants read sentences by words being presented to them automatically at a fixed pace why do 'linguistic cueing effects' fit with an interactive view of the language system? Linguistic cueing effects—where features like prosody, syntax, or context influence linguistic processing—fit well with an interactive view of the language system because they reflect dynamic interactions between different levels of linguistic and cognitive processing Psycho final exam 12