User:Johnboudreau

John Boudreau
John Boudreau is a third year BSc student at Dalhousie University, majoring in psychology.

January 17, 2011
From the very early pages of our text, and first lectures, the notion that language is arbitrary seemed to make perfect sense to me, however, I was then left wondering. Where exactly do words originate? If there is no relation between objects and the names we give them, how do we form and attribute names to these objects? I know English, to an extent, has Latin roots, and borrows from neighboring languages, but in creating the language, was assignment of names to objects aimless and arbitrary? Was it completely random? There must be some reason as to why a shoe is known as a shoe and so forth.

The productivity of language allows it to be free and open to creating an infinite amount of sentences and phrases. The possibilities for creation and interpretation are unfathomable. I believe it is this productivity that allows us to be creative in our expressions and thoughts. I often take note of those special human beings who seem to have a way with words, whether it is an artist (musician or poet) or an academic, some of us seem to use words with ease in communication, and do so in a way that sets us apart from others. In a way, the productivity of language facilitates our creativity. What is it about us that makes some people more capable in their linguistic abilities? I presume there to be some neurological evidence, some part of the brain functioning that differs as language ability increases. I hinted above to a relationship between language and thought, which was presented as Whorf’s hypothesis in our readings. From my interpretation thus far, I understand language to be a form of knowledge, and I believe it is knowledge that shapes our daily cognitions and thoughts. I believe there must be some truth to Whorf’s ideas.

January 24, 2011
I was surprised to learn that the lateralization of language is not as left-hemisphere dominated as I thought. In the past I seem to recall hearing of left hemisphere dominance and very little of the right hemisphere. Thanks to Dr. Newman, this belief of mine has been discounted, along with the belief that most left-handers had right hemisphere dominance (turns out only 27% of left-handed people are RH dominant). I would be interested in hearing more about how handedness affects intelligence, whether being right-handed or left-handed is associated with greater intelligence, or if one or the other corresponds to strengths in different types of intelligence. Of interest to me also are the sex differences in language processing, with women seeming to be more capable in their language abilities, partially (or fully?) due to less lateralization and more inter-hemispheric connections via the corpus collosum.

I once again have been confronted by the colossal relationship between the amygdala and emotional processing. I learned recently of paired deficits in the perception and generation of negative stimuli (eg. Fear) in processing facial expressions. Those who show a reduced amygdala response in perceiving fear also have a deficit in generating a response to this fear. I never considered this before, but read in the text that an impaired amygdala goes beyond association in processing emotional stimuli such as faces, but also is related to having difficulty processing threatening speech. Is there a reduced response (less amygdala activity) in processing speech associated with negative emotional stimuli? Does reduced amygdaloid volume correspond to a deficit in processing speech?

January 31, 2011
I was most interested in the lecture on speech perception to see just how good humans are at understanding speech. We seem to do so with great ease. By the short-comings of speech recognition programs, I realized how advanced and how complex the process of speech recognition is in our brains. I was quite surprised at how incapable the speech recognition programs were, and in thinking technology had come so far that this would be easy…. I must re-evaluate my brain vs. technology stance. I also found the answer to a question I had always wondered but not made an effort to find. I wondered where amongst the 20Hz to 20KHz spectrum of audible sound (for humans) our voices are. With a great interest in music, I am aware of where different instruments are on this continuum, but not the human voice. My puzzle, now complete, has the important frequency for understanding speech between 1000Hz and 2500Hz (F1 and F2 bands).

Although consonants and vowels seem like black and white, I know understand the importance of vowels in shaping speech. Consonants as I now understand, are completely dependent on vowels, and based on the context of vowels, consonants can change in sound (ex. Frequency). A final question, and one we touched on in class, is the possibility that with such dependency on vowels, maybe a syllable, rather than a phoneme are the units we use in understanding speech? I know this is Dr. Newman’s question, but could such a question be answered? Is this a current focus of research in the field?

February 6, 2011
February 6

Of the differing views on the organization and functioning of the mental lexicon, I found that I most agree with Conrad’s idea of ‘distance effects’ being based on the strength of the associations between words. It seems simple and straight-forward that highly associated words are to be stored together in memory. I have my questions about the hierarchical model. Is it required that all knowledge at the base level be encoded before moving on the following more specific levels? It seems like a lot of information to process, if you have to move in bottom-up fashion from the ‘animal’ level all the way up to the ‘canary’ level in order to encode the concept of canary into semantic memory. It seemed somewhat inefficient to me, unless these lower hierarchical processes become automatic. Luckily the ‘spreading activation model’ improved on this and made the process seem less rigid. I wondered if there is any variance in the initial activation of nodes? I understand how once a node/concept is activated, it spreads its activation to other associated concepts, but would be more interested in understanding the initial activation of a node. For understand a given ‘concept’, is one single node activated and then allowed to spread, or are multiple nodes activated simultaneously and then allowed to spread?

February 28, 2011
With an interest and fascination with music that has only continues grow, I felt it only appropriate for this entry to focus on Friday’s material on music and language. From the reading I was surprised to find a lack of definite answers to syntactic processing in music, as it appears the focus of has been predominantly on language. At first the notion that the processing of language and music could be similar seemed unlikely to me. The syntactic processing of language is of course very rule governed by our grammar and implicit knowledge of language. I think of music to be very different from this; I see chord progressions as much more free components of music, where syntax is not so rigid and unusual progressions are indeed permissible. However, the DLT theory for language and TPS theory for music (cognitive theories), showed me possible common properties in language and music in representation, more so than processing. It made perfect sense that the proximity effect applies also to the notes of a chord, where in a C-scale, c, e, and g, are more easily accessible than the other notes due to their close relations. I began to realize the common features in language and music representation just by applying the proximity effect to music rather than to words. The article however did not indicate much understanding beyond representation. Is processing similar in both music and language? This surprisingly is still a huge question. I am interested to see if those with comprehension deficits in language also share similar deficits in comprehension of music. Would someone with Broca’s aphasia have an impairment beyond words? Would they struggle to understand syntax, and further the semantics of music? I would believe processing to be shared amongst language and music in some respects as they are of course both auditory processing. The degree to which, I cannot begin to speculate, but I would be most interested in seeing results of music processing studies in individuals with Broca’s aphasia. If Broca’s aphasia applies also to music comprehension, would one’s production of music (their own musical abilities) be hindered? Or would they remain intact like the language production of one with this aphasia.

March 7, 2011
This weeks lecture on language and music left me questioning theories of a shared mechanism for language and music processing. While I am convinced that there are shared neural mechanisms and brain regions that are used in both language and music processing, I must question whether there is such sharing in mechanisms for acquisition and learning of the two disciplines. With a proposed language acquisition device, all humans are able to successfully learn their given language (unless developmental problems occur of course). We seem to have a universal ability to understand language. I believe that the acquisition of music, however, may not be so universal. I would be interested in knowing more about the neural processes involved in the acquisition of musical knowledge and abilities. Is there a comparable device to the LAD? If there is such a device specialized for music, I would suggest it must not have such universal traits, as no where near the amount of humans can flourish and succeed in their musical abilities like we do with our language. Perhaps we all acquire a complete LAD, as language has made such a substantial contribution to our evolution. Music on the other hand has not played such a role in our progress as a species. Maybe some are given more of a music acquisition device than others? Is it possible that a lineage of musically adept relatives provides someone with more of this music acquisition device than those born of parents who don’t play music? Maybe there is a specific MAD! Or maybe there is no such thing at all..

March 14, 2011
I was most interested this past week in our lecture on writing, and the evolution of the symbols of writing and communication. The origins of our writing are evidently in early pictures scrawled in stone, but what intrigued me was that these pictographs might have been more of a form of art rather than an intentional means of communication. It is art that first allowed us humans to symbolize and communicate our thoughts, which leads me to suggest that writing is then the product of millenniums of art evolution. Wow! I understand that pictographs are the origins of writing in all different cultures around the world, but I was unclear on how or why some cultures’ writing comes to be more phonetic based than others? Does further abstraction from pictographs mean a more-evolved and advanced writing system?

How do you become a good writer? Aside from the obvious practices of planning, editing, etc, I would be interested in seeing neurological research on what makes a ‘gifted’ writer. We touched on reading making a fair contribution to enhanced writing ability, but I presume reading does not cause good writing. Some could read all they want and still struggle with putting pen to paper for an essay. What are the limitations that affect one’s writing ability? I know working memory is a contributing factor, and from this I hypothesize that brain systems and regions involved in working memory could determine one’s writing ability. It seems unlikely that this alone is the factor; what about regions and processes for creativity? Are these also tied to working memory?

March 21, 2011
This week was of course not the first time I have heard mention of the uncanny hearing abilities of a newborn baby, but I certainly learned that this distinctive ability goes beyond just having a greater perceptual range. I’m amazed by this innate ability to discriminate speech contrasts that occur in all languages and their sensitivity to prosody (French-Russian study). I believe these abilities provide clear support for an innate acquisition device as proposed by Chomsky. What is puzzling is how this broadened ability to perceive so many sounds is degenerative, with the ability to differentiate becoming weaker as they learn their own language. I fully understand the reasons why, but wonder if this process can be reversed? As an adult, if you were to learn a new language(s) (the more the better for this matter), are you able to regain that innate ability to discriminate between the sounds that you would have once had as an infant? Would it become easier to learn languages if you could broaden your perception? Or does this ability become lost and irretrievable?

March 28, 2011
I was left wondering this week when Dr. Newman talked about the prevalence of multiple languages here on our continent. He mentioned North America being one of the least multilingual regions in the world, but I then thought of how diverse of a country Canada is. I though we would be above and beyond other regions as far as how many languages are here. I presume the intended message was that there are fewer people here who speak multiple languages (2 or more) than other world regions, but that aside, we must still live in one of the most linguistically diverse regions? Correct me if I am wrong in saying this! Further, why is it that in NA we are less likely to learn multiple languages, where as it is so very common in places like Eastern Europe. Are we North Americans lazy, or is there just no motive or need to be bilingual here?

I understand that the critical and sensitive period for language acquisition is reduced by a biologically-caused change in neuroplasticity, however I would be interested in a further explanation of what causes the variance in learning a new language following the sensitive period. Why are some successful and fluent in learning later on in life, and others not so much? Does your initial language provide a scaffolding that enables you to learn certain languages but hinders you from learning others? I would hypothesize that similar languages are easier to learn (maybe an obvious point), but would learning one language (say English) take up space and impede the acquisition of a new language (such as Arabic)?

April 4, 2011
I must admit, as first mention of a debate, I was not at all looking forward to it! The thought lingered all semester about what I would be presenting, who I’d be presenting with, and who I would be competing against. It was not so much a fear of presentation, more so a distaste towards competition concerning the topic of psycholinguistics. That being said, I presented on Wednesday, arguing against the implementation of the Fast ForWard program for dyslexic students and I am very pleased with the outcome of our debate. I think this idea of having a debate for the end of term is great. My topic made me realize the relevance of the material we covered throughout the semester. The fact that there would be a presentation and debate was great motivation to do extensive research and really investigate the topic of dyslexia. Once I got working with my teammates, it almost became exciting when we found a weakness to argue against in the other group. I was shocked to find in my research that such a large company with such a popular learning program had so many faults in their own research. I found that their program had very little empirical support, and all supporting studies were borderline quasi-experimental! The company, however, seems to have had great success in implementing the Fast ForWord program. Their success with what I consider to be unsupported claims, makes me question not only their program, but perhaps many other academic learning companies creating learning programs for children and adults alike. This reminded me of how important it is to have empirical evidence and individual reviews done to confirm the effects of such programs, something I thought would be a given this day in age. Apparently this isn't so!

The Last Post
Initially, the prospect of no examination for this course was very appealing (and still is). WIth that in mind, I incorrectly dismissed of the notion that this course would be a lot of work, and figured no exam= easier course! Of course I was wrong, and there proved to be a consistent work load for this course, but I must now say I enjoyed the change in format. Although there was no testing, I somehow maintained motivation and attended class every day, in part due to the weekly blog posts. I think the weekly posts are a great way to keep us students engaged and to have us thinking critically about what we are learning. Considering the amount of time I invested into these posts however, I wish they had been worth more of my mark. If you were to consider the time commitment to a blog post (approximately an hour a week minimum it took me), and compare it to that of the learning exercise, I believe that some weight could be stolen from the learning exercise and given to the blog. These posts are a great way to maintain the interest of students and with greater weight they could provide even more incentive to dive into the course material.

All in all, I enjoyed the change in format and probably gained from the more steady work load, and of course the debate. The course provided a wide variety of avenues to learn and study the topic of psycholinguistics, and assignments made the subject material seem very relevant to my studies of psychology.

Thanks for a good semester!

Cheers, John