VL7 Perception-language interface

collection of symbols + rules for combining these symbols that they can be used to generate infinite variety of messages

• symbolic —> sounds & words as symbols for things in world

• structured —> rules used to combine symbols, people that know rules can understand

• generative —> limited word number but unlimited sentence number; plus new words can be invented

• bilinguals are believed to have on integrated memory store —> knowledge from both languages

  —> rely on context to help activate appropriate information

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• English & spanish speakers look at different objects when asked to look at object in visual display

• „clock“ —> English speakers also look at cloud; reloj —> regalo

• context emerges from interplay of linguistic & visual information

• language

• thought

• context

• linguistic relativity

• structure of language affects its speakers thought and worldview

• encoding of meaning in language constrained by shared non-linguistic experience

  • culture

  • norms

  —> meaning tied to culture —> influenced by experiences of ppl living & using the language

  —> meaning diverges across languages —> words cannot be mapped directly onto another in different language

articles in german link objects to societal gender roles

aboriginal culture that use south west east north instead of left right etc. —> better orientation

• Universalist view

  • Biology is the same so development of color terminology has universal constraints

• Relativist view

  • cross-linguistic variability of color terms suggests more culture specific phenomenon

Russian blues:

-          lighter blues: goluboy

-          darker blues: siniy

-          Russian speakers faster to distinguish between two colors when they fall into different linguistic categories than when they were from same linguistic category

• experimental procedure

  • 1st subject: valid context

  • 2nd subject: invalid context

  —> subjects with valid context outperformed the ones without in comprehensibility ratings

  —> context makes language easier to understand

• using world knowledge to make sense of stimuli

• top-down processing —> models, ideas, expectations to interpret sensory information

• bottom-up processing —> taking sensory information and assembling and integrating it

—> successful integration of both depends on how much bottom up information is available

—> in real world: always at least some information available

• influence of quality of cue on search guidance

• increased efficiency when target cue guided with more information —> ambiguity less efficient

• most efficient when picture provided

• ranked by efficiency most to least

  • picture

  • boots precise

  • footwear abstract

  • brown boots precise + color

  • brown footwear abstract + color

• makes language easier to understand

• resolves ambiguity

• helps balance top down and bottom up info

• perceptual tasks easier to accomplish across modalities

  • linguistic cues help with visual tasks