psycholinguistics - syntax (goslin lecture 1)

Question 1

What is the focus of psycholinguistics?

Answer 1

Deals with human language competence

It encompasses what we know about the language that allows us to speak and understand.

Question 2

Define implicit knowledge in linguistics.

Answer 2

Knowing what is right

Question 3

Define explicit knowledge in linguistics.

Answer 3

Formal rules

Question 4

What is phonology?

Answer 4

The study of how sounds are used in a language

Question 5

What is phonetics?

Answer 5

The study of speech sounds and production

Question 6

What is syntax?

Answer 6

The study of the structure of language - to relate surface form to semantics

independent of semantics

Question 7

What is semantics?

Answer 7

The study of meaning

Question 8

What is pragmatics?

Answer 8

The study of language use

Question 9

What is morphology?

Answer 9

The study of words and word formation

Question 10

What does linguistic performance refer to?

Answer 10

What we do; how knowledge is used
-how & why? we learn language, make errors, accomoodate accents

Question 11

Who challenged Skinner’s behavioral approach?

Answer 11

Noam Chomsky

Question 12

What is the cognitive revolution in linguistics?

Answer 12

A shift towards understanding the mind and cognitive processes in language acquisition

Question 13

What is language nativism?

Answer 13

The idea that humans are born with an innate capacity for language

Question 14

What is the critical period in language acquisition?

Answer 14

A time frame during which language acquisition occurs most easily

Question 15

What does ‘poverty of the stimulus’ refer to?

Answer 15

The idea that children cannot learn language solely from the input they receive

degenerate input: segmentation problem, errors, cant learn from exposure alone and not enough training data

Question 16

What is meant by ‘degenerate input’?

Answer 16

Input that is insufficient for children to learn language effectively

Question 17

What is meant by ambiguity in language?

Answer 17

A situation where a sentence can have multiple meanings

Question 18

What is Chomsky’s concept of universal grammar?

Answer 18

The theory that the ability to acquire language is innate to humans, but we are not born with a particular grammar

syntax is a cognitive reality, we can utter an infinite number of sentences - finite storage in the brain

Question 19

What does syntax allow us to do?

Answer 19

Utter and understand an infinite number of sentences

Question 20

What is the difference between surface structure and deep structure?

Answer 20

Surface structure refers to the outward form of a sentence, whereas deep structure refers to the underlying meaning

Question 21

What is a constituent of a sentence?

Answer 21

A group of words that functions as a unit

Question 22

What is the substitution test?

Answer 22

A method to determine constituents by replacing them with pro-forms

Question 23

What is the stand-alone test?

Answer 23

A method to determine constituents by checking if they can answer a question

Question 24

What is parsing in linguistics?

Answer 24

Breaking a sentence into its component parts and indicating the relationships between these components

Question 25

What do phrase structure diagrams represent?

Answer 25

Hierarchical relations between constituents

Question 26

What are phrase structure rules?

Answer 26

Rules that define what is syntactically legal

Question 27

What is generative grammar?

Answer 27

A system that provides rules for generating sentences

Question 28

What does syntactic recursion allow for?

Answer 28

One constituent to be embedded inside another constituent of the same type

Question 29

True or False: Syntax is uniquely human.

Answer 29

True

Question 30

Fill in the blank: The phrase structure rule S → NP + VP indicates that a _______ consists of a noun phrase followed by a verb phrase.

Answer 30

[sentence]

Question 31

What is the significance of Chomsky’s work in syntax?

Answer 31

It established the idea of infinite rule-governed creativity in language

Question 32

what is the modern definition of psychoinguistics?

Answer 32

examination of the psychological processes that underlie our langauge abilities

Question 33

what is the genetic basis for grammar?

Answer 33

* speef of acquistion * critical period * poverty of the stimulus * convergence of grammars * specificty to the species

Question 34

what is meant by speed of acquisition?

Answer 34

children learn language when exposed in a normal language environment - adults dont teach language

Question 35

how is grammar universal?

Answer 35

infants hear surrounding language detect patterns and matches them with stored structures switches on those that match children develop language

Question 36

what is the heirarchial structure for syntax?

Answer 36

sentences are hierachial organisations of constitutuents e.g. the wolf, ate, the little pigs,

Question 37

how is constituency determined?

Answer 37

through the substitution test and the stand alone test

Question 38

what are some generative grammer rules?

Answer 38

Question 39

what are the meanings of symbols?

Answer 39

Question 40

is there a limit to depth of syntactic recusion?

Answer 40

no limit -chomsky: infinite rule governed creativity, finite series of syntactic rules, limited number of words but unlimited number of possible sentences & meanings

Question 41

define psycholinguistics?

Answer 41

Psycholinguistics is the study of the psychological processes involved in language. -study understanding, producing and remembering language