Linguistics, the study of language, is a distinctive field of study in and of itself. It is, however, a discipline that does cross cut the boundaries of other disciplines, allowing for study of various different aspects of language in and of itself or through those other fields of study. For example, linguistic anthropology is an area of anthropological research that examines the interconnections between language and culture. Specific study questions pertaining to the sounds that exist within languages spoken today and/or in the past, the meaning of words within languages, the origins of language, and more are all questions asked by both linguistic anthropologists and linguists, but one of the fundamental questions posed by many anthropologists, which is what are the origins of language, is one that can be frame from a psycholinguistic approach. This blog post will discuss what psycholinguistics is and how it is being used to address this question.
Psycholinguistics is the study of the psychological processes involved in language. It is a broad subdiscipline that does cross cut anthropology, neuroscience, psychology, philosophy, and, of course, linguistics. Early psycholinguistic scholars, starting with the credited pioneer of this field of study, Wilhelm Wundt, believed that language was acquired through conditioning. Young children learned how to speak by repeating what their parents said and associating the words with specific emotional responses. There remains quite a bit of evidence to support this idea (as anyone who has been around children know that they are much like sponges and repeat what is said around them).
This approach, however, neglects the biological aspects required for language acquisition and use. This is evident when examining non-human primates and language use. Non-human primates communicate, but they have not produced their own languages. They can learn sign language and demonstrate several linguistic abilities that were thought to be unique to humans, but they still lack some of the biological requirements for full language use (e.g., the FoxP2 gene). It is through the study of nonhuman primates and humans of various ages and from various cultural groups that it is clear that environmental (cultural) and natural (biological) circumstances played a role in the creation and formation of languages among humans.
Today, psycholinguists focus on a variety of study topics, ranging from the social/cultural to the biological. They can study how written versus spoken language is understood cognitively, understanding how language is interpreted different by those with either learning or other serious cognitive disabilities, as well as attempt to better understand first and second language acquisition patterns within and between age groups. Each of these can be approached from a solely social/cultural or biological perspective, although the most complete answers may come from studying these topics holistically and bridging both perspectives. This is why psycholinguistics remains an interdisciplinary field of study-no one approach can truly answer the questions psycholinguists seek to answer.
Works Cited
No Author. (2014). Psycholinguistics. obo in Psychology.
Ratner, N.B. (2004). Encyclopedia of Neuroscience || Psycholinguistics. , (), 1199–1204
Von Raffler-Engel W. (1992) The Contribution of Psycholinguistics to the Study of Language Origins. In: Wind J., Chiarelli B., Bichakjian B., Nocentini A., Jonker A. (eds) Language Origin: A Multidisciplinary Approach. NATO ASI Series (Series D: Behavioural and Social Sciences), vol 61. Springer, Dordrecht.
