PSYC 101 Ch. 9 Flashcards: Language and Thought

Language, Thinking (Concepts & Categories, Planning & Problem-Solving, Reasoning & Judgement, Decision-Making)

Language

system of communication that uses signals that are combined according to rules of grammar, and that convey meaning

Grammar

rules that specify how units of language can be combined to produce meaningful messages- includes morphology and syntax

Morphology / Morphological Rules

word rules, how morphemes can be combined into words

e.g. “how do you make a noun plural to make it say there’s many?”

Syntax / Syntactic Rules

sentence rules, how words can be combined to make sentences

e.g. combinations of words → adjectives going before nouns, etc.

Units of Language

Phonemes → Morphemes → Words → Phrases → Sentences

Phonemes

• smallest units of sound in language (smallest units of speech) that change meaning when altered e.g., /b/ vs /p/ in “bat” and “pat”

• important in speech perception and language processing

Phonological rules

Mental rules for how sounds are organized and combined in a language, including pronunciation patterns and sound changes

Morphemes

The smallest units of meaning in language, such as words or meaningful word parts

e.g., “un-,” “dog,” “-ed”

Content morphemes

things and events

e.g. “cat”, “dog”, “take”, etc.

Function morphemes

grammatical functions i.e. tying sentences together

e.g. “and”, “or”, “but”, “-s” to make plural, “re-” to convey idea of second attempt

Telegraphic speech

Early child speech using mostly content words and omitting smaller grammatical words

e.g., “want cookie”

Semantics

meaning

i.e. “what are we trying to say?”

“Frank discovered a louse combing his beard.” What type of structure does this violate, and why?

violates surface structure, can imply different scenario than intended → Frank discovered the louse while combing his beard, not a louse that was combing his beard

“Colourless green ideas sleep furiously.” What type of structure does this violate, and why?

violates deep structure- surface structure/syntax is fine, deep structure (meaning behind each word") doesn’t really make sense together

0-4 months

• tell difference b/t speech sounds (phonemes) that are not distinguished in their native language

• cooing esp in response to speech

Dishabituation paradigm

• pacifier study in infants 1-4 months

• type of discrimination in preverbal babies

• measured ability to distinguish different sounds based on how often they suck on pacifier

• overtime: focus in on 1 language → loses ability to differentiate sounds that aren’t distinguished in their language → can’t discriminate

4-6 months

babbles consonants

6-10 months

• understands some words and simple requests

• can now only tell difference b/t sounds that are distinguished in native language

10-12 months

begin to use simple words

12-18 months

vocabulary 30-50 words (simple nouns, adjectives, verbs)

18-24 months

• 2-word phrases ordered according to syntactic rules

• vocabulary 50-200 words

• understands rules

• **** comprehension exceeds production*****

24-36 months

• vocabulary ~1000 words

• production of phrases and incomplete sentences

  • telegraphic speech

Telegraphic speech

Early child speech using mostly content words and omitting smaller grammatical words

e.g., “want cookie”

36-60 months

• vocabulary >10,000 words

• production of full sentences

• mastery of grammatical morphemes (e.g. -ed) AND function morphemes (e,g, and, but)

• can form questions and negations

At every stage of language development, children _____ language better than they can _____ it.

understand, speak

Behaviourist explanation for language learning

• B. F. Skinner

• reinforcement learning => operant conditioning

• parents spend little time training/reinforcing grammar, spend more time correcting mindset/intention behind things they say

• children generate unique sentences

• errors are over-regularizations of rules they’ve learned but often can’t express

Nativist explanation for language learning

• Chomsky

• parents reinforce early babbling, richness of language canNOT be explained by reinforcement learning

• Nativist Theory

• brain equipped with universal grammar

Nativist Theory

language is an innate biological capacity in which you acquire language rapidly through simple exposure to speech

Universal grammar

collection of processes that facilitates language learning

Genetic dysphasia

frequent grammar errors disproportionate to IQ

• specific difficulties w/ grammar compared to other cognitive test domains

e.g. Carol is cry in the church

Critical periods

requires exposure to language before a certain point, ~b/t age 6 and puberty

• easier to learn language/instrument during childhood/certain window

language acquisition

explanation of the processes by which the innate, biological capacity for language combines with environmental experience.

Interactionist explanation for language learning

Although infants are born with an innate ability to acquire language, social interactions play a crucial role in language.

• both biological and social process

Language Areas in the Brain; located in ____ hemisphere

left hemisphere

• Broca’s Area

• Wernicke’s Area

• arcuate fasciculus

Broca’s area

• left frontal cortex

• language production

• motor programs for articulation

• syntax rules

Wernicke’s area

• left temporal cortex

• language comprehension

arcuate fasciculus

pathway that connects Broca’s area & Wernicke’s area

Aphasia

difficulty producing or comprehending language

Alexia

difficulty putting ideas into words after injury to occipital lobe

Broca’s aphasia

• understand language relatively well

• increasing comprehension difficulty as grammatical structures get more complex

• **impaired speech production

• speak mostly in short content morphemes

Wernicke’s aphasia

• grammatical speech normal BUT lacks meaning

• comprehension difficulties

• Pure word deafness:

  • own speech excellent

  • cannot recognize and comprehend speech

  • can recognize non-speech sounds (e.g. barking dogs, door bells)

Dorsal stream

• “where” pathway

• V1 → Dorso-posterior (Parietal lobe)

• spatial awareness and guiding actions

Ventral stream

• “what” pathway

• V1 → Ventral-lateral (Temporal lobe)

• object recognition and perception

Bilingual and monolingual children show ____ rates of langauge development.

similar

Some bilingual children show greater _____, such as the ability to ______ and flexibly _____.

executive control capacities; prioritize information; focus attention

_____ tend to have a later onset of Alzheimer’s disease.

Bilinguals

linguistic relativity hypothesis

The idea that the language people speak influences how they think and perceive the world.

Concept

mental representation that groups or categorizes shared features of related stimuli

Prototype theory

we make category judgements to assess new items by resemblance/comparison with the category’s prototype i.e. most typical member of that category

Family resemblance theory

similar to prototype theory, but less systematic; we don’t learn the technical rules, we just learn general characteristics (1 or 2 key things, which could form the basis of the prototype) of a group of things

e.g. “this thing looks just like people in that family”, so just jump right to that conclusion

**prototype theory requires brain to have built that stimulus in order to make that comparison- not comparing to an alike group, but rather a single prototype already built

Exemplar theory

we make category judgements to assess new items by comparison with stored memories of specific instances

Adam suffered a stroke when he only a day old. When tested aged 16, he could identify pictures of inanimate (non-living) objects well (e.g. chair, spoon, hammer) but was poor at recognizing pictures of living things (e.g. faces, plants, animals). From your other knowledge about vision, we might call this an example of:

Category-specific agnosia

explanation:

• A. Prosopagnosia - problem recognizing faces; can identify voice but not face

  • ‘Proso’ Greek for ‘faces’, ‘pagnosia’ is object recognition

• D. Category-specific agnosia is a problem in object recognition

Frontal lobe

forward from the central sulcus

central sulcus

deep groove on cerebral cortex, separates frontal lobe from the parietal lobe

Primary motor cortex & premotor areas

aka M1- plans and sequences complex movements, then issues direct commands to muscles

PFC

further organization here

• Dorsal & lateral = ‘cold’ executive functions

• Ventral & medial = ‘hot’ emotional functions (aka ‘orbitofrontal’)

Cold executive functions

logical, analytical, and task-oriented, handling planning, working memory

Hot executive functions

emotional regulation, motivation, and decision-making during high-stakes or emotionally charged situations

Anterior cingulate gyrus

surrounds corpus callosum, involved in pain network

green

lateral pfc

purple

premotor areas

red

primary motor area (M1)

star

central sulcus

yellow

ventromedial pfc

pink

anterior cingulate gyrus

Executive functions

processes that involve the control and monitoring of behaviour

2 distinctions of executive functions

automatic vs controlled: how much conscious effort you put in, how much thinking is required

bottom-up vs top-down: how much you draw from the world around you that drives how much effort you put in

automatic

habitual, ingrained, do them w/o thinking, can multitask with them

bottom-up

driven by sensory input- something appears in visual field, automatically move head & eyes to look at it

controlled

effortful, have to concentrate on them, one thing at a time

top-down

guided by knowledge or strategy

Example: You’re driving to campus, know route well, don’t really have to think, then all of a sudden you hear an ambulance/siren, and you become more present. What mechanism explains this transition?

automatic bottom-up process → controlled top-down process

3 types of executive processes

1. Planning

2. Flexibility

3. Inhibition

Tower of Hanoi (executive functions)

• forward PLANNING

• move only 1 ring at a time, place each ring directly onto a peg, take only the top ring on a peg, you cannot place a larger ring on top of a smaller ring

• have to think thru mind’s eye whole solution

• emphasizes ‘thinking into the future’

In relation to the executive process involved in the Tower of Hanoi test, patients with ______ damage confined to the ______ sector experience a _______ deficit and are (impaired / not impaired) at this task.

dorsal prefrontal; lower/orbital; planning; impaired

PET Imaging of Planning

• identify number of moves to solve

• particip. plans ahead in ‘mind’s eye’

• ****PET displays cerebral blood flow increasing with problem difficulty aka moves required

Wisconsin Card Sort Test

• test of cognitive FLEXIBILITY, called ‘gold standard ‘ task of frontal lobe integrity

• feedback processing, inhibition of previous rule

• perseveration: sticking with unsuccessful strategy

1. given card & 4 decks in front

2. have to think of ways the given card can be sorted- colour, number, shape, etc.

3. after P chooses which deck to sort in, neuropsychologist says if it’s “right” or “wrong”

4. P has to figure out what the rule is

5. rule will stick for repeated trials, then w/o warning rule will change ~ P has to use new method to see what new rule is

the Stroop Test

• way to measure INHIBITION in healthy people

• “name the colour of the stimulus”

• automatic to read what word says ∵ the unusual colour-naming response asked isn’t used often in life

Analogical problem-solving

process in which new inputs (problems) are interpreted in terms of old knowledge

Characteristics of psychological problems

1. given state and goal state

2. number of rules that constrain solution

3. viable number of moves that create a problem space

problem space

map, can be visual map, conatins given state, goal state, amd all viable states in between

Tower of Hanoi (problem-solving)

• measures forward planning

• purpose of the study: thinking about rules in real-life scenario - lot of uncertainty in terms of particular outcomes

• e.g. forgot keys inside house, now locked out- do you smash the windows open to get into the house, among other possible outcomes?

What’s a way you can solve a psychological problem, particularly one that utilizes forward planning?

means-end analysis (definition)

means-end analysis (term)

• analogical problem-solving that offers pathways to effective solutions, ALTHOUGH we often frame things in terms of what we already know and already understand

1. Note difference between current state and goal state

2. Form a sub-goal that reduces that difference

3. Select mental operator that permits attainment of sub-goal

• working through subgoals 1 at a time, no master plan in mind’s eye to entire solution to the problem

Psychological factors that affect problem-solving

1. Constraint relaxation

2. Addition of new information e.g. a hint

3. Goal-subgoal conflict

4. Functional fixedness

5. Analogy

Matchstick problem

“Imagine these problems are made of matchsticks. I want you to move just one matchstick, in order to make each statement true.”

• P’s solve Type B problems slower than Type A

Why are Type B problems harder than Type A in the Matchstick problem?

• Type B requires constraint relaxation

• for Type A problems, we naturally understand that numbers are things that can be broken up

  • ***assumed/perceived a rule that was never actually stated to you

constraint relaxation

cognitive process of overcoming impasses (assumed/perceived rules) in problem-solving by abandoning unnecessary, self-imposed, or assumed limitations

e.g. Matchstick problem, 9-dot problem

Addition of new information

get a ‘hint’ that draws your attention to certain materials within problem => making it easier

Goal-subgoal conflict

one of subgoals in conflict with ultimate goal, feels like you’re going away from goal state in order to get back there,

have to start off going in the opposite direction to where you want to end up.

e.g. Tower of Hanoi

Maier’s (1931) Two-String Problem

• Participants must find a way to swing and tie two strings together that are out of reach of each other, room contains several objects- matches, hammer, nails

• Solution: tie hammer to one of the strings, swing hammer → weight allows you to catch it and tie strings

• tricky ∵ people don’t realize you can use hammer for that purpose

  • functionally fixed on the hammer as something you hit stuff with

Duncker’s (1945) Candle Problem

• Participants given candle, thumbtacks, matches, → asked to attach a candle to a wall so that it doesn’t drip wax onto the table

• Solution: use box of matches or thumbtacks creatively

• functionally fixed on the matchbox’s normal function

Functional fixedness

tendency to perceive functions of objects as fixed (a failure to ‘re-structure’ the problem).

e.g. Maier (1931) ~ Two-String Problem, Duncker (1945) ~ Candle Problem

The 2-string problem is difficult because subjects are ‘functionally fixed’ on the conventional uses of a hammer. But when subjects solve the problem, that sudden restructuring of the problem is also interesting to psychologists, and was originally recognized by the Gestaltists. This moment is usually called:

Insight

Radiation Problem

“Imagine you are a surgeon with a patient who has a stomach tumour. If the tumour is not destroyed, the patient will die. However, his condition is such that an operation is impossible: that would also kill him. All you have available are machines producing rays that can destroy tumours; however, rays at sufficient intensity to do this will also destroy surrounding healthy tissue, and that will kill the patient too. How can you save him?”

Fortress Problem

“A general was trying to capture a fortress in the middle of a country. Many roads led out from the fortress. Each road was mined so that only small groups of people could travel the road safely. However, the general needed all his forces to capture the fortress. The general decided to split his army and send small groups down each of the roads so that they converged at the fortress.”

Fortress & Radiation Problems

• problem solving by analogy – these scenarios

  are ‘isomorphic’

  • structurally & fundamentally- equivalent

  • superficially & systematically- different

• supposed to use fortress problem & solution as analogy to solve radiation problem

• Solution: surgeon can use several ray machines that converge on the tumour with sufficient intensity to destroy the tumour without destroying the healthy tissue

Analogy

applying a known solution to a similar problem

• isomorphism

e.g. Fortress & Radiation Problem

Issues with Analogy

• humans are poor at spontaneous use of analogy- many subjects also need its relevance to be highlighted

• analogy requires mapping structure from known problem to new problem – but hard to know which past problem is relevant!

  • highest percentage of people who got Radiation Problem correct who were given Fortress Problem, its solution, AND a hint that it might be relevant to solving the Radiation Problem, compared to people who solved it without the hint, or simply unprompted

‘Aha!’ Experience

Insight moment

• solution appears suddenly, powerful moment when way to arrive at solution clicks

• key to these experiences ~ how sudden they are e.g. using “hot”/”cool” to measure how close to solving a problem, participant feels cold, then all of a sudden they get it