PROPERTIES OF LANGUAGE

Discreteness

Language is composed of discrete units like words and morphemes that are combined to create meaning.

Displacement

Language allows communication about things not present in the immediate context, spatially or temporally.

Arbitrariness

The relationship between words/morphemes and their meanings is not based on logic but on agreed-upon symbols.

Infinity

While the number of words is finite, the potential combinations to form sentences are limitless.

Recursion

Language property allowing nesting structures within larger ones, like embedding phrases within other phrases.

Phonology

Governs the sequencing of phonemes, the basic sound units distinguishing words.

Morphology

Governs the sequencing of morphemes, the smallest units carrying meaning.

Syntax

Involves arranging words into sentences in a language, ensuring grammatical correctness.

Semantics

Deals with the meanings of words and sentences, exploring vocabulary and word relationships.

Pragmatics

Focuses on the contextual use of language to achieve communicative goals in social interactions.

Nim Chimpsky

A chimpanzee involved in a project by psychologist Herbert Terrace in the 1970s to teach sign language using operant conditioning.

Operant Conditioning

A method used by Terrace to teach Nim sign language by reinforcing desired behaviors with rewards.

Peer

An individual with the same age or maturity level, not family members, with whom children form relationships.

Peer Groups

Social structures that teach children cooperative activities, social skills, and emotion regulation among in-group and out-group peers.

Attachment

A deep emotional bond connecting one person to another, often forming between infants and primary caregivers.

Internal Working Model

Mental representation developed based on early experiences with caregivers, influencing future relationships and behaviors.

Imprinting

A form of learning where young animals form a strong attachment to a particular individual or object early in life.

Secure Attachment

A type of attachment where a child feels distress when separated from the caregiver but is comforted upon reunion.

Insecure Avoidant

A type of attachment where a child shows no distress upon separation from the caregiver and may actively avoid them.

Disinhibited Social Engagement Disorder

A condition where a child shows inappropriate approach to unfamiliar adults and lacks wariness of strangers.

Behaviorism

Rejects mentalist explanations for behaviors, focusing on observable behavior and the relationship between environmental stimuli and responses.

Black box analogy

Focuses on inputs (stimuli) and outputs (responses) of a system, emphasizing behaviorists' interest in environmental stimuli and behavioral responses without speculating on internal processes.

Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny

Haeckel's idea that individual development stages mirror evolutionary history, although modern biology finds it oversimplified due to the lack of precise developmental stages in humans.

Representation

Mental constructs organisms use to encode, store, and manipulate information about their environment, themselves, and past experiences.

Comparative cognition

Study of how organisms process information, with Gallistel's computer analogy likening cognitive processes to computer operations.

Ethology

Scientific study of behavioral mechanisms in natural environments, focusing on innate behaviors and releasers triggering specific responses.

Tinbergen's 4 levels of analysis

Framework exploring animal behavior questions related to development, mechanism, evolution, and function.

Theory of mind

Ability to attribute mental states to oneself and others, crucial for understanding social interactions and predicting behavior.

False belief

Understanding that others may hold beliefs different from one's own, often measured through tasks like the Sally-Anne test.

Appearance-Reality task

Experimental paradigm assessing children's understanding of appearance versus reality and distinguishing between first-person and third-person false beliefs.

Change of Location Task

A task assessing children's understanding of third-person false belief, where they predict where a character will search for an object based on the character's false belief about its location.

Language Ability and False Belief Understanding

The significant correlation between children's language proficiency and their understanding of false beliefs, indicating that language skills play a crucial role in comprehending others' beliefs and perspectives.

Reading the Mind in the Eyes (RMET)

The ability to recognize emotions solely from the eyes, used to assess emotion recognition abilities, particularly in research related to autism.

Executive Functions

Essential cognitive processes supporting complex goal-directed behavior, including inhibition, working memory, and cognitive flexibility, which are linked to children's performance on false belief tasks.

Family and Social Environment

Factors influencing children's performance in theory of mind tasks, such as larger families, older siblings, and discussing mental states with friends and siblings.

Prosocial Behavior

Behaviors like helping, comforting, sharing, and cooperation, which are positively correlated with Theory of Mind (ToM) abilities, especially affective perspective taking (APT) tasks, indicating a connection between understanding others' emotions and engaging in prosocial behaviors.