language Flashcards
what is a natural language
naturally occurring, find it spontaneously. arbitrary signs ( why do we call a chair a chair)
early study by Robert seyfarth findings when animals are called to do something ..
they responded to recorded monkey sounds by running away suggesting this communication had meaning
example of chimpanzee vicky being taught speech
could say 4 words, mama, papa, cup, and up.
why do primates struggle to vocalise human speech
they do not have the correct vocal anatomy to produce speech sounds as humans do.
the shape of the tongue is different and has difficult mechanics with fine motor control that they struggle to achieve.
washoe chimp
sign language in man made region, learned 200 words.
koko gorrilla
intelligent could sign but was this spontaneous
kanzi
ould make a tool to open a box to get a banana, some level of communication necessary fot his behaviour to be learned. Know hundred of words. could be told to find something and would.
could put soap on ball, and listen ti actions and understand sentences and word orders.
what is different in humans that allows us to have better communicatiob system
- brain size
- compared to body mass
- brain growth, w era born with 28% whilst mammals 90%
evolutionary factors that have improved human communication system
- babies are constantly encouraged to communicate learning more social behaviours
- babies are better at interpreting
dogs and pointing
dogs are able to do this as well. between 2 and 3 babies go through development that takes them past that of a dog. dogs understand pointing because they have been domesticated and breeded together.
innate modular perspective of language
- language is an instinct
- everything the brain does has its own module and rules
what is the innate language organ?
present at birth that guides the language we are subject to learn due to our environment. a separate brain system.
what is an example of a module?
vision, language, motor skills and memory
poverty of the stimulus argument
children are not exposed to rich enough data within their linguistic environments to acquire every feature of their language therefore there must be an aspect of innateness
they have to learn sentence structure etc this cant be learned via SR so innate capacity to know
experienced based interactive view of language
children must map together both linguistic and non-linguistic information.
they receive feedback from their environment and this is how they learn language.
