The Structure of Language

Robert Fettgather is an associate faculty member at Mission College in Santa Clara, California, where he has taught courses in developmental psychology, general psychology, abnormal psychology, psychiatric interviewing, and developmental disabilities. Robert Fettgather has published numerous articles in the fields of education and psychology. 

To understand the structure of language, there is some basic terminology.  Here you go: Semantics is the rules for determining the meaning of words and sentences. Next sounds. Phonemes represent the most basic units of sounds used in language, while morphemes combine those bits of sound into the smallest units that have meaning.  Next, more rules. Grammar includes all the rules for combining morphemes into words, and syntax is the rules for combining words into sentences. Lastly niceties. Pragmatics deals with the practical aspects of communicating with others or the social etiquette of language.

Many scientists argue that what truly sets us apart from other species is our language. Behaviorist B.F. Skinner wrote a classic work on language acquisition, Verbal Behavior, and most people, like Skinner, believe we learn language through imitation and reinforcement. But it's actually far more complex. How do you explain that a child says foots instead of feet or "I swimmed"? Here, children are applying (incorrectly) language and grammar rules they have never been taught for singular/plural and past tense. But how? 

According to famed psycholinguist Noam Chomsky, humans possess an innate ability to comprehend and produce language through a mechanism he called the Language Acquisition Device (LAD). The LAD has an "innate facility" for acquiring language, including grammar.

The Sapir- Whorf hypothesis states that the structure of a language very much influences (some say determines) the modalities of thought and behavior of the culture in which it is spoken.  For example, Alaska Natives have many terms that refer to “snow,” which may cause them to perceive and think about snow differently than English speakers-- especially those from low snow environments.

An opposing theory to Sapir-Whorf, known as cognitive universalism, submits the proposition that ways of thinking (cognition) are shared among all groups of people and that those thought patterns influence the development of language.

Animals other than humans demonstrate a diverse ability to communicate, but it is unclear whether or not they have the capability for language, as demonstrated by the ability to use abstract symbols to communicate. Kanzi, a bonobo chimpanzee, has demonstrated an ability to understand about 150 spoken English words

Appreciating Other Points of View

Robert Fettgather has served as Special Consultant in psychometrics to the Departments of Education and Developmental Disabilities for the State of California. Robert Fettgather holds a specialist credential in learning handicapped and community college credentials in both learning and developmental disabilities.

In addition to cultural and individual differences, perceptions can be influenced by perceptual sets or expectancies. One example of perceptual expectancy is top-down processing. This happens when an individual utilizes pre-existing knowledge to place certain features into an organized whole. If there is no expectancy to help organize information, a person might use bottom-up processing to build a complete perception by making sense of the smaller features piece by piece. With a friend, try this experiment from Martin Bolt: print on a piece of paper the words below. Then read aloud these three words as your friend looks at the words and reads along with you:

FOLK CROAK SOAK

Next, immediately ask, what do you call the white of an egg? That expectation tricks the friend into a wrong answer, yolk!

Bottom-up processing starts with information and energy from the environment. Top-down processing refers to using past experience, knowledge, and expectations for how we perceive things (as in the example above). Remember that perception is a representation of our environment,  not a replication-- therefore, everyone’s perceptions may be different, and they may not be necessarily accurate. Once realized, this understanding allows for a deeper appreciation of different points of view!