PSYC 105 Lecture Notes - Lecture 20: Vocal Folds, Speech Perception, Speech Segmentation
Document Summary
What is language: system of communication using arbitrary sounds or symbols to express feelings, thoughts, ideas, and experiences, uniquely human. When defined as having complex grammar and productivity. Many species have the ability to communicate, but does not necessarily mean that the form of communication is a language, since talking with your dog has no clear grammar. All have nouns, verbs, negatives, questions, past/present tense. Studying language in cognitive psychology: psycholinguistics: discover psychological process by which humans acquire and process language. Organization of language is hierarchical: speech sounds; smallest unit of language: phonemes. (cid:862)d(cid:863) or (cid:862)g(cid:863) sou(cid:374)d i(cid:374) (cid:862)dog(cid:863: smallest units of meaning: morphemes. (cid:271)(cid:455) putti(cid:374)g (cid:862)s(cid:863) at the e(cid:374)d of (cid:862)dog(cid:863) (cid:373)akes it plural. (cid:271)(cid:455) addi(cid:374)g (cid:862)i(cid:374)g(cid:863) to (cid:272)hase (cid:272)ha(cid:374)ges the (cid:373)ea(cid:374)i(cid:374)g. Addi(cid:374)g (cid:862)ship(cid:863) to (cid:862)frie(cid:374)d(cid:863) (cid:272)ha(cid:374)ges the (cid:373)ea(cid:374)i(cid:374)g to frie(cid:374)dship: words and semantics, structure of phrases and sentences: syntax. Change order of words in a sentence to make its syntax different, but mean the same thing.
