PSYCHOLINGUISTICS

Much like breathing, walking and seeing, speaking and understanding our native language are natural activities we engage in, many times a day, with little or no conscious awareness or effort. Scientists have, however, uncovered the complexity and creativity underlying even the simplest act of human language use. The course aims to provide students with knowledge and skills to study language as a mental function within a broader cognitive science perspective. We will focus specifically on the psycholinguistics of language production in different populations and across languages. We will cover the current experimental methods to study language representation and processing, current theories and computational models in language production, psycholinguistic approaches to dialogue, the relationship between comprehension and production, language production and memory systems, language processing in bilinguals and second language speakers, language changes across the life-span and as the result of changes in language experience; language representation and processing speakers with aphasia.

Student will show Knowledge and Understanding of the following aspects of language in a psycholinguistic perspective:

(1) The bio-psycho-social underpinnings of the language system; What we mean by levels of explanation with respect to language as a cognitive system
(2) Representation and processing in monolingual adult speakers
(3) Language and implicit vs. implicit memory systems
(4) Psycholinguistic perspectives on dialogue
(4) Computational models of language processing
(5) Language processing in bilingual speakers
(6) Language processing in second language speakers and the role of proficiency
(7) Language processing in older adults
(8) Language processing in speakers with aphasia
(9) Experimental designs in psycholinguistics: from theory to practice
(10) Research ethics for human subject research

Applying knowledge and understanding
Students will show that they can apply their theoretical knowledge of psycholinguistics to understand and critique primary research reports in refereed journal articles, propose follow ups to existing research lines; collaborate with their peers and the instructor to construct a psycholinguistic experiment from scratch, including the design, materials, methods, programming of the experiment in a experimental presentation software package, collecting the data, coding and analysing the data and presenting the results.

A basic curiosity for understanding how language works inside our heads. A general background in linguistics including syntax, phonetics and phonology, an introduction to statistics.

(1) The bio-psycho-social underpinnings of the language system; What we mean by levels of explanation with respect to language as a cognitive system
(2) Representation and processing in monolingual adult speakers
(3) Language and implicit vs. implicit memory systems
(4) Psycholinguistic perspectives on dialogue
(4) Computational models of language processing
(5) Language processing in bilingual speakers
(6) Language processing in second language speakers and the role of proficiency
(7) Language processing in older adults
(8) Language processing in speakers with aphasia
(9) Experimental designs in psycholinguistics: from theory to practice
(10) Research ethics for human subject research

Branigan, H. P., & Pickering, M. J. (2017). An experimental approach to linguistic representation. BBS, 40.
Ferreira, V. S., & Bock, K. (2006). The functions of structural priming. Language and Cog. Proc., 21(7-8), 1011-1029.
Pickering, M. J., & Ferreira, V. S. (2008). Structural priming: a critical review. Psyc Bulletin, 134, 427–459.
Bock, J. K. (1986). Syntactic persistence in language production. Cog Psych., 18(3), 355–387.
Bock, K., & Loebell, H. (1990). Framing sentences. Cognition, 35, 1–39.
Potter, M. C., & Lombardi, L. (1998). Syntactic priming in immediate recall of sentences. JML, 38, 265–282.
Ziegler, J., & Snedeker, J. (2018). How broad are thematic roles? Evidence from structural priming. Cognition 179, 221–240.
Ziegler, J., Bencini, G., Goldberg, A., & Snedeker, J. (2019). How abstract is syntax? Evidence from structural priming. Cognition, 193.
Pickering, M. J., & Branigan, H. P. (1998). The Representation of Verbs: Evidence from Syntactic Priming in Language Production. JML, 39, 633–651.
Bock, K., & Griffin, Z. M. (2000). The persistence of structural priming: Transient activation or implicit learning? JEP: General, 129, 177–192.
Hartsuiker, et al. (2008). Syntactic priming persists while the lexical boost decays: Evidence from written and spoken dialogue. JML, 58, 214–238.
Scheepers, C., Raffray, C. N., & Myachykov, A. (2017). The lexical boost effect is not diagnostic of lexically-specific syntactic representations. JML, 95, 102–115.
Tooley, K. M. (2020). Contrasting mechanistic accounts of the lexical boost. Mem. & Cogn.
Chang, et al. (2006). Becoming syntactic. Psych Review, 113, 234–272.
Chang, et al. (2000). Structural priming as implicit learning: A comparison of models of sentence production. J. of Psycholing Research, 29, 217–229.
Chang, F., Janciauskas, M., & Fitz, H. (2012). Language adaptation and learning: Getting explicit about implicit learning. Language and Linguistics Compass, 6, 259–278.
Jaeger, T. F., & Snider, N. E. (2013). Alignment as a consequence of expectation adaptation: Syntactic priming is affected by the prime’s prediction error given both prior and recent experience. Cognition, 127, 57–83.
Pickering, M. J., & Garrod, S. (2004). Toward a mechanistic psychology of dialogue. BBS, 27(2), 169–190.
Pickering, M. J. (2006). The dance of dialogue. Psychologist, 19, 734–737.
Ferreira, V. S. (2019). A Mechanistic Framework for Explaining Audience Design in Language Production. Annual Review of Psychology.
Branigan, H. P., Pickering, M. J., & Cleland, A. A. (2000). Syntactic coordination in dialogue. Cognition, 75, B13–B25.
Branigan, H. P., &McLean, J. F. (2016).What children learn from adults’ utterances: An ephemeral lexical boost and persistent syntactic priming in adult–child dialogue. JML, 91, 141–157.
Tooley, K. M., & Bock, K. (2014). On the parity of structural persistence in language production and comprehension. Cognition, 132, 101–136.
Shin, J. A., & Christianson, K. (2012). Structural Priming and Second Language Learning. Language Learning, 62, 931–964.
Van Gompel, R. P. G., & Arai, M. (2018). Structural priming in bilinguals. Bilingualism, 21.
Hartsuiker, et al. (2016). Cross-linguistic structural priming in multilinguals: Further evidence for shared syntax. JML, 90.
Hwang, H., Shin, J. A., & Hartsuiker, R. J. (2018). Late bilinguals share syntax unsparingly between L1 and L2: Evidence From Crosslinguistically similar and different constructions. Language Learning, 68.
Flett, S., Branigan, H. P., & Pickering, M. J. (2013). Are non-native structural preferences affected by native language preferences? Bilingualism, 16.
Favier, S., et al. (2019). Proficiency modulates between- but not within language priming.
Additional papers and course calendar are available on moodle

A written exam in the form of multiple choice, short answers, short essays on the theoretical part of the course.
A psycholinguistic project in groups of four peers, and a final oral presentation to the entire class.
A three page project proposal including: research question, specific aims, design, method (including independent and dependent variables) and example materials, experiment template.

Written exam: 30 points
Group project: 25 points for each group member
Individual research proposal: 40 points
Participation: 5 points
Total:100 points

Frontal lessons for the theory parts, weekly lab tutorials and assignments, practical experience in the lab.

English

Accessibility, Disability and Inclusion: Information regarding accommodation and support services for students with disabilities and students with specific learning impairments

Ca Foscari abides by Italian Law (Law 17/1999; Law 170/2010) regarding support services and accommodation available to students with disabilities. This includes students with
mobility, visual, hearing and other disabilities (Law 17/1999), and specific learning impairments (Law 170/2010). If you have a disability or impairment that requires accommodations (i.e., alternate testing, readers, note takers or interpreters) please contact the Disability and Accessibility Offices in Student Services: disabilita@unive.it.

written and oral

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "Human capital, health, education" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development