Talking the Talk provides a comprehensive introduction to the psychology of language, written for the reader with no background in the field or any prior knowledge of psychology.
Written in an accessible and friendly style, the book answers the questions people actually have about language; how do we speak, listen, read, and learn language? The book advocates an experimental approach, explaining how psychologists can use experiments to build models of language processing. Considering the full breadth of psycholinguistics, the book covers core topics including how children acquire language, how language is related to the brain, and what can go wrong with it. Fully updated throughout, this edition also includes a new chapter on bilingualism and new coverage of AI and the rise of ChatGPT.
Talking the Talk is written in an engaging style that does not hesitate to explain complex concepts. It is essential reading for all undergraduate students and those new to the topic, as well as the interested lay reader.
Table of Contents:
Preface to the third edition 16
1 Language 20
What is this book about? 21
What is the plan of this book? 21
What is language? 25
Are there other types of language other than human? 28
How do human languages differ from each other? 29
How many languages are there? 32
Where did language come from? 35
How has language changed? 39
How has English changed? 41
How do we describe language? 44
How do we do psycholinguistics? 45
Is psycholinguistics a science? 47
What counts as an explanation in psycholinguistics? 49
What is a statistical model? 53
What are the issues in modern psycholinguistics? 55
2 Animals 60
How do animals communicate? 61
What do monkeys communicate about? 63
What can we learn from the birds? 64
How powerful are animal communication systems? 65
Do dolphins and whales use language? 67
Can we teach language to animals? 68
Can parrots talk? 70
What about chimps? 71
What did Washoe know? 74
Why is Kanzi the chimp so important? 77
Why are animals poor at human language? 80
Why is the question of animal language important? 82
3 Children 84
When do children learn language? 84
Can a human foetus learn language? 86
Why do babies babble? 88
How do young children segment speech? 90
What are the first words? 92
How do children learn words? 95
What mistakes do children make? 97
How do adults talk to children? 99
What are the early sentences? 101
What drives syntactic development? 103
When does language acquisition stop? 106
Are we driven to produce language? 107
What’s the difference between a pidgin and a creole? 108
How do children learn language? 110
Do we need to have innate knowledge of language? 114
What are the problems with nativist accounts of language development? 116
Are there language-specific impairments? 119
Are there genes for language? 121
Is there a critical period for language acquisition? 122
What can we learn from isolated children? 125
Is language development dependent on cognitive development? 130
Is language development dependent on social development? 134
4 Two 138
What is bilingualism? 138
How does a child become bilingual? 140
Do you have to be young to learn a second language well? 141
How many lexicons does a bilingual person have? 143
What are cognates? 144
Do two languages interfere with one another? 145
What does neuroscience tell us about bilingualism? 147
Is learning two (or more) languages good for you? 148
What’s the best way to learn a second language? 150
5 Thought 153
What is thought? 153
What is inner speech? 155
Is language a special, separate module? 157
What is the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis? 158
What can we learn from numerical cognition? 163
What can we learn from how people name colours? 166
Does language influence memory and reasoning? 170
Are we forced to think in categories? 174
Are there practical consequences of the way we use language? 175
6 Meaning 179
What’s the meaning of meaning? 179
What does philosophy tell us about meaning? 180
What’s a dog? 182
Are meanings captured by networks? 184
What’s a semantic feature? 187
How do we search our semantic memory? 191
What does deep dyslexia tell us about word meaning? 193
What do connectionist models tell us about meaning and deep dyslexia? 195
How can we explain what goes wrong in dementia? 201
How is semantic memory organised? 203
How does the brain store semantic categories? 204
What’s grounding? 206
What are statistical models of meaning? 208
7 Words 211
How do study word processing? 212
How do we recognise spoken words? 214
What is the Cohort model of word recognition? 218
What is the TRACE model of word recognition? 219
How should we evaluate models of spoken word recognition? 221
How do we read? 223
How did reading evolve? 224
What’s the dual-route model of reading? 226
What does brain damage tell us about reading? 228
What are the problems with the dual-route model? 230
What’s the triangle model of reading? 233
Do we have to sound a word to understand it? 236
Does speed reading work? 238
How do we understand ambiguous words? 240
What is the alphabetic principle? 244
What is phonological awareness? 246
What is the best way of learning to read? 248
What is developmental dyslexia? 250
What causes developmental dyslexia? 252
How should we treat developmental dyslexia? 256
8 Understanding 259
What is parsing? 260
What is syntactic ambiguity? 261
What are garden path sentences? 263
How do we deal with temporary ambiguity? 265
How do we decide where to attach phrases? 266
What does the study of electrical activity in the brain (ERPs) tell us about parsing? 269
How do multiple constraints operate? 271
How then do we parse, really? 274
Why is making a model of the world important? 276
What do we remember of what we understand? 277
How do we make use of context? 279
How do we go beyond the words? 281
What can we do with language? 285
How do we link new information with old? 288
How do we construct our mental model? 292
How does brain damage affect recognising spoken words? 293
Where does humour in language come from? 294
How do chatbots work? 296
9 Speaking 300
Can we learn from our mistakes? 301
What are Freudian slips? 305
What is the Fromkin-Garrett model of speech production? 306
How do we retrieve words when speaking? 310
Why are words sometimes on the “tip of our tongue”? 317
How do we plan syntax? 320
What is syntactic priming? 322
How do we get different parts of a sentence to agree with each other? 325
How do we control conversations? 329
How does brain damage affect language? 331
10 End 338
Are there sex differences in language? 338
How does neurodiversity affect language? 341
How does ageing affect language? 342
Is there a “Grand Model” of language processing in the brain? 344
What were those issues again? 347
What use is psycholinguistics? 350
What’s the future? 351
11 Next 352
Chapter 1: language 352
Chapter 2: animals 354
Chapter 3: children 355
Chapter 4: two 358
Chapter 5: thought 359
Chapter 6: meaning 362
Chapter 7: words 365
Chapter 8: understanding 368
Chapter 9: speaking 370
Chapter 10: end 372
Questions 374
1 Language 374
2 Animals 374
3 Children 375
4 Two 375
5 Thought 375
6 Meaning 375
7 Words 376
8 Understanding 376
9 Speaking 376
10 End 377
