Chapter 10: Language

Select the sentences that violate English syntax. If there are no violations, select the "No Violations" button.

He placed on the counter. He slept the apple on the counter.

Identify each sentence as an active-voice sentence or a passive-voice sentence.

I am loved by him = passive voice. Idris helped his mother = active voice. The cat is being annoyed by the dog = passive voice. The mailman delivered the packages = active voice.

Why does speech in a foreign language often sound very fast?

If we don't know the language, we dnt know how to segment the continuous speech stream.

Molly (an English speaker) and Aiko (a Japanese speaker) are setting up Molly's house for a birthday party. Their friend Brent walks in with balloons. When he sets them down, a couple of them hit against the nearby ceiling fan and pop. How are Molly and Aiko each likely to describe this balloon-popping event? Who is most likely to remember that Brent was involved?

Molly: Most likely to remember that Brent was involved "Brent popped the balloons!" Aiko: "The balloons popped!"

____ refers to the pattern of pauses and pitch changes that characterize speech production.

Paosody.

The process of figuring out each word's syntactic role in a sentence is called

Parsing.

Select the statements that are true about influences on parsing.

People usually seek the simplest phrase structure. Function words signal syntactic roles in sentences. Background knowledge guides how people parse sentences.

The overall organization of sentences and the ways in which various elements are linked to each other are defined by ___ rules. These rules can be illustrated using a ___, like the one illustrated here.

Phrase structure. Tree structure.

Match each term to the correct definition.

Rules that describe how language is "supposed to be" used = prescriptive rules. Rules that characterize the language as it is usually used by fluent speakers = descriptive rules.

"Colorless green ideas sleep furiously."—Noam Chomsky What does this quote by Noam Chomsky tell us about the rules of syntax in language?

Syntax is not sufficient to convey semantics.

Which of these conversations depends on having established common ground to fill in gaps in the dialogue?

Tammy: "I'm leaving you." Eric: "Who is he?"

In one study, participants read a paragraph about a city dealing with a high crime rate. Half the participants read that "crime is a wild beast preying on" the city; others read that "crime is a virus infecting" the city. Participants were then asked to decide whether the city needed more social reform or increased enforcement. The results of the study are illustrated in the graph. What can we conclude from this study and its results about language and thought?

The choice of metaphor influence participants opinions.

Knowledge of a word includes several different components. Match the appropriate label to each knowledge component.

the mental representation of the word's meaning = semantic representation. the rules that govern how to use the word = syntax. the sequence of phonemes that make up the word = sound. the mental representation of the word's sounds, pronunciations, etc. = phonological representation. the sequence of letters that spell the word = orthography.

Match each term to the correct definition.

the way in which a speaker restricts air flow from the lungs to make a speech sound = manner of production. the position at which a speaker restricts air flow from the lungs to make a speech sound = place of articulation. a vibration caused by the rapid opening and closing of vocal folds = voicing.

People parse sentences ___ they hear the sentence being spoken.

while.

A typical college graduate in the United States knows a minimum of ___ thousand and up to ___ thousand different words.

75 thousand. 100 thousand.

Early stages of a conversation serve to establish ____.

Common ground.

Identify the overregularization errors.

Correct": "I losed a tooth last night." "Look! Sheeps!"

Identify the garden-path sentences.

Correct: Fat people eat accumulates. The horse raced past the barn fell.

You're speaking with Kwame, an international student who is visiting the United States for the year. What do you probably need to change about your speech to make communication easier?

Correct: syntax prosody vocabulary

"Can you pass me the salt?" Failing to recognize that this is a request for salt and not an inquiry about arm strength or reach violates which rules of the language?

Pragmatic rules.

Which of these statements about garden-path sentences is TRUE?

Printed garden path sentences are usually more confusing than spoken versions.

Language is organized as a hierarchical structure of linguistic units. Identify the type of linguistic unit depicted in each row of the hierarchy.

Sentence. Phrase. Word. Morpheme. Phoneme.

Which of these factors contribute toward making speech perception a complicated task?

Correct: When producing speech, phonemes overlap. The sound of an individual phoneme differs based on what else is being said.

According to the Whorfian hypothesis, language has a(n) ___ influence on cognition, and this influence is ___.

Direct. Irreversible.

If asked to compare the two colors outlined in red, which group of speakers will likely make finer and more defined distinctions?

English speakers.

The capacity to create an endless series of new combinations from a small set of fundamental units in a language is referred to as ____?

Generativity.

Evidence indicates that language, attention, and thinking are related, but how?

Language influences attention influences thinking.

What can we conclude from documented cases of "wolf children" about human language learning and capacity?

Language learning may depend on nature and nurture components.

This image illustrates the moment-by-moment sound amplitudes of someone uttering a greeting. What can we learn from this speech stream about how we process spoken language?

Listeners must "slice" speech streams into segments.

Identify each statement about language capacity in animals as true or false.

Some animal species have sophisticated communication systems = true. Animal language is not naturally occurring, but it can be taught = false. Some animal species have sophisticated language systems = false. Language training is more successful with animals that are very similar to humans genetically = true.

The rooster and duck in this cartoon think that Chicken Little is warning, "The sky is falling!" again when, in fact, he is warning, "This guy is falling!" This reflects an error in

Speech segmentation.

Identify each of the items as a "free" morpheme, a "bound" morpheme, or indicate that it is not a morpheme at all. free morpheme bound morpheme not a morpheme

Umpire = Free morpheme. The = Free morpheme. Cats = Not a morpheme. Ed = Bound morpheme. Es = Bound morpheme.

Indicate whether each scenario is abiding by a prescriptive rule or a descriptive rule of English.

"But I don't want to." = descriptive rule. "With whom are you going?" = prescriptive rule. "It is I." = prescriptive rule. "No one really know why they are alive." = descriptive rule.

Identify the pragmatic maxim that is best being demonstrated or violated in each scenario.

"Do you know the time?" "Yes." "Well? Are you going to tell me what time it is?" = maxim of quantity. "Where'd the cake go?!""I don't really like cake. I prefer tarts or cookies." "Okay . . . but where'd the cake go?" = maxim of relation. "You look tired." "The baby won't stop crying." = maxim of relation. "Where are you from?" "My parents are from Norway." = maxim of quantity.

Abbie is listening to the local news. The anchor says, "The libraries in the tri-county area hosted a joint fundraiser this past Monday." The cameraman accidentally coughs in the background while the anchor is speaking, covering up the [m] phoneme in "Monday." What is most likely to be true of Abbie's perception of this speech?

Abbie will hear the complete word "Monday," including the missing "m."

Which of these points provide evidence that humans are born with mechanisms in place for language learning?

Children pick up on linguistic patterns without being taught. Deaf children who are not taught to sign formally will invent their own "home sign."

Aylin grew up bilingual, so she knows how to speak and write in English and Turkish. What is likely true about how her language and cognition have developed as compared with her monolingual friends?

Correct: As a child, she did not confuse English and Turkish syntax and vocabulary. Initially, she had a smaller vocabulary.