Modular vs non-modular processing in language

Why does the brain use different coding systems?

Different sensory modalities require different systems (visual, auditory, somatosensory etc.)

What does cognitive neuropsychology show about brain organisation?

The brain contains many highly specialised systems

Give examples of selective impairments supporting specialised systems?

Deficits in recognising faces, words, objects, colour, motion, spoken language, or specific semantic categories

What is word meaning deafness?

Poor understanding of spoken words despite intact hearing and written comprehension

What is category-specific anomia?

Difficulty naming items from a particular semantic category (e.g. fruits and vegetables)

What major question exists about specialised systems?

How information flows and interacts between them

What are the two broad views about interaction between systems?

Highly interactive processing vs limited/ modular processing

Which researchers argued for interactive speech perception?

McClelland, Miram & Holt (2006)

Which researchers defended limited interaction/ modularity

McQueen, Norris & Cutler

What is the classic limited-interaction theory called?

Fodorian modularity

According to Fodor, what are “vertical systems”?

Modular systems interfacing within the outside world

What systems are considered modular by Fodor?

Perceptual, language, and motor systems

What are perceptual systems broken into?

Subsystems such as colour, motion, 3D perception etc.

According to Fodor, how do modular systems behave?

Like automatic reflexes

Why are modular systems useful according to Fodor?

They are fast, automatic, and accurate

What famous quote reflects Fodor’s idea of modular perception?

“Prejudiced and wishful seeking makes for dead animals”

What are Fodor’s “horizontal systems”?

High-level non-modular systems involved in reasoning, memory, and problem-solving

What is the key question in Fodorian modularity?

How much knowledge/ belief influences perception

What is information encapsulation?

Modules operate with restricted access to information from other systems

Why are visual illusions important for modularity theories?

Illusions persist even when we know the truth

What does the Müller-Lyer illusion demonstrate?

Perception interprets contect rather than physical reality

Why are table-top illusions important?

Knowledge does not eliminate the illusion

According to Fodor, why do illusions persist?

Perceptual systems are partly immune to higher knowledge

What is “massive modularity”

The idea that the mind contains many evolved domain-specific modules

Which field strongly supports massive modularity?

Evolutionary psychology

Examples of proposed evolved modules?

Cheating detector and theory-of-mind modules

What limitation exists for evolutionary modularity theories?

Reading and writing are not evolutionary adaptions

What do neuroscientists often mean by modularity?

Domain-specific brain regions/ functions

Example of neuroscience “module”?

Visual word form area (VWFA)

What is Fodorian modularity mainly concerned with?

Online interaction between systems during processing

What is a top-down effect?

Higher-level information influencing lower-level perception

What are the three proposed views of speech perception interaction?

No feedback, lexical feedback only, or semantic feedback

What does the strict modular view claim about speech perception?

No lexical or semantic feedback affects phoneme perception

What processing sequence is proposed in strict modular models?

Phoneme → syllable → word → semantics

Which model argued feedback is unnecessary?

Norris, McQueen & Cutler (2000)

What does lexical-feedback theory propose?

Words can influence phoneme perception, but semantics cannot

Is lexical feedback compatible with Fodor?

Yes, if phonology and lexicon are within the same module

Which phenomenon strongly supports lexical feedback?

Phonemic restoration

What does sematic-feedback theory claim?

Meaning / context influence phoneme perception

Why is semantic feedback incompatible with Fodorian modularity?

It allows higher-level knowledge to penetrate perception

What is phonemic restoration?

The illusion where listeners “hear” missing phonemes replaced by noise

Why is phonemic restoration important theoretically?

It may demonstrate top-down processing

Does phonemic restoration necessarily prove semantic feedback?

No

What is selective adaption?

Repeated exposure to a phoneme changes later phoneme perception

Example: What happens after repeated exposure to /d/?

People require stronger /d/ evidence to hear /d/

Why does selective adaption occur?

The phoneme detector becomes fatigued/ habituated

In selective adaption experiments, what do participants classify?

Sounds along a phoneme continumm (e.g. /b/-/d/)

What is a phoneme continuum?

Gradual acoustic steps between two phonemes

Which phonetic feature differs between /b/ and /d/?

Place of articulation

What is the place of articulation for /d/?

Alveolar

What is the place of articulation for /b/?

Bilabial

What key question did Samuel (1997) ask?

Can restored phonemes produce adaption effects?

Why is this important?

It tests whether top-down restoration affects phoneme representations

What happened in the standard adaption condition?

Real /d/ sounds produced normal adaption

What happened when /d/ was replaced by noise?

Adaption still occurred due to phoneme resotration

What happened when /d/ was replaced by silence?

No adaption effect occurred

What does Samuel’s study suggest?

Lexical activation can influence phoneme perception

What is pause detection?

Measuring how quickly listeners detect a silence in speech

What affects pause detection speed?

Amount of lexical-phonological activation

What is an early unique word?

A word identifiable early because few alternative share its beginning

What is a late unique word?

A word identifiable only near the end because many competitors exisit

Why are pauses harder to detect in late unique words?

More lexical competitors are activated

Why does context help late unique words more?

Because many lexical competitors exist

Why is context less important for early unique words?

Lexical information already strongly contains possibilities

What do context effects suggest?

Semantic/ sentential context constrains lexical activation

What do ERP studies suggest about contect effects?

Context influences speech perception very early in processing