ABSTRACT
Si bien existen numerosas investigaciones sobre la percepción del lenguaje en recién nacidos, la percepción de la entonación en adultos y la Psicología Comparada del lenguaje, son muy escasos los estudios en cuanto a la percepción de los contornos de entonación declarativo e interrogativo con bebés, y los estudios sobre este mismo tema en modelos animales son al parecer inexistentes. En este artículo se plantean los fundamentos del estudio comparado de la percepción de dichos contornos de entonación en bebés y en animales. En primer término se discute acerca de la composición del lenguaje y el enfoque de estudio psicolingüístico comparado. A continuación se tratan los temas de la isocronía y de los contornos de entonación declarativo e interrogativo, argumentando que en ambos casos existe un alto grado de universalidad. Finalmente se analizan los alcances del tipo de estudio propuesto, indicando su viabilidad y pertinencia.
One of today's most influential theories of language development and acquisition assumes that the human faculty of language is made-up of three components: syntax, phonology, and semantics. Of these components, the syntactic one may be exclusive of humans, while some specific aspects of the semantic and phonological ones may be not. One implication of this division of the language faculty is that aspects of the semantic and phonological systems could also be found in non-human animals, with their function not necessarily being related to communication. Even though not all the scientific community accepts such explanation of the components of the language faculty, diverse academic groups that do so, have been doing research with humans, non-human primates, rodents, birds, and even with cats, for the last 25 years or so. Usually, the purpose of this type of studies has been to determine what human capacities related to speech have emerged from different precursor systems that were already present in ancestral species, and would have been inherited by men, which components of language are specifically human, which are specifically linguistic, and which ones could be domain-general mechanisms or have served originally for other purposes. Several of these studies imply the existence of a universal division of languages according to rhythmic considerations, known as isochrony. According to this concept, each natural language possesses stable units of constant duration that occur regularly, making it sound in a particular way. But isochrony is not the only universal language feature that can constitute a valid variable in this sort of study. Some characteristics of intonation may also be. Specifically the declarative and interrogative intonation contours, which have been considered a universal phenomenon present in comparable ways in all natural languages. In this regard, though in the different languages of the world the distinction between declaratives and interrogatives can be marked by means of morphsyntactic modifications and intonation, not be marked by intonation, or be only marked by intonation, it is believed that there is a universal tendency to use rising intonation contours to indicate questions (especially in the case of unemphatic yes / no questions) and falling intonation contours to indicate statements. This phenomenon would be related to certain non-linguistic universal codes shared by the human broad phylum, and derived from biologically determined relations. However, while there are numerous investigations in the newborns' and infants' general speech perception processes, in perception of intonation of declarative and interrogative sentences in adults, and in Comparative Psychology of language, studies with infants and newborns in terms of the discrimination of questions and statements are insufficient, and studies on this topic on animal models are, as far as we know, non-existent. In this paper we theoretically validate the comparative study of the perception of intonation contours for questions and statements in infants and in non human animals. We conclude that is feasible and relevant to increase the study of the infants' perception of declarative and interrogative intonation contours, with meaningful variations with respect to the experiments already done, such as the length of the utterances, the type of speech register, the words order, the use of grammatical auxiliaries, the ages of the participants, and the experimental methods. Moreover, it is also desirable to make that same kind of perceptual studies of intonation on animal models, such as rats, birds and monkeys. Pursuing these objectives would make it possible to deepen the knowledge about the language components that are unique for humans and those that are shared with other species. It also could shed some light on the form-function relationships in the phonological component of the language, and about the linguistic universals and precursors.
ABSTRACT
El estudio de la percepción temprana del habla surgió a comienzos de la década de los setenta, pero solo se desarrolló plenamente diez años después, debido a la aparición y adaptación de nuevos métodos empíricos y herramientas tecnológicas. En este artículo se presenta una revisión de los métodos experimentales que pueden ser utilizados para el estudio de la percepción del habla en niños menores de un año. También se refieren algunas de las conclusiones teóricas más relevantes que se han alcanzado gracias a su aplicación. Se pretende brindar un panorama delestado metodológico y teórico del estudio de la percepción del lenguaje hablado durante el primer año de vida...
The early speech perception began to be studied at the beginning of the 1970s, but only developed fully ten years later due to the appearance and adaptation of new empirical methods and technological tools. The article reviews the experimental methods that can be used to study early speech perception in children under the age of one, and discusses some of the most relevant theoretical conclusions reached thanks to their application. The objective is to provide an overview of the methodological and theoreticalsituation of the study of speech perception during the first year of life...
O estudo da percepção precoce da fala surgiu no começo da década de 1970, mas só se desenvolveu plenamente dez anos depois, devido ao aparecimento e adaptação de novos métodos empíricos e ferramentas tecnológicas. Neste artigo, apresenta-se uma revisão dos métodos experimentais que podem ser utilizados para o estudo da percepção da fala em crianças menores de um ano. Também se referem algumas das conclusões teóricas mais relevantes que se alcançaram graças à sua aplicação. Pretende-se oferecer um panorama do estado metodológico e teórico do estudo da percepção da linguagem falada durante o primeiro ano de vida...
Subject(s)
Humans , Child Language , Language , Language Development , Methods , Psychology, Child , Psychology, Experimental , Child Development , Critical Period, Psychological , PsychologyABSTRACT
La adquisición del lenguaje implica una serie de habilidades complejas que evolucionan y se correlacionan haciendo que quien aprende por primera vez a hablar -o a expresarse mediante el lenguaje de señas- alcance los mejores resultados con el mínimo esfuerzo, siempre y cuando lo haga en el lapso de tiempo adecuado. En este sentido, se ha propuesto que la percepción temprana del habla tiene un papel primordial en la adquisición del lenguaje. En este artículo se presentan los resultados de las investigaciones más relevantes sobre la discriminación de clases y tipos de palabras, la discriminación prosódica e interidiomática, la discriminación fonológica y fonotáctica y el reconocimiento de regularidades de distribución entre los elementos de la señal del habla, con el fin de brindar un panorama del conocimiento científico actual sobre las capacidades de los menores de un año para percibir el lenguaje hablado.
Language acquisition involves a number of complex skills that evolve in correlation with each other, thus making it possible for learners of their first spoken language -or sign language- to achieve the best results with minimal effort, as long as they do so within the appropriate period of time. In this regard, it is proposed that early speech perception has a primary role in language acquisition. In order to provide an overview of the current scientific knowledge as to the capabilities of children under the age of one to perceive spoken language, this paper presents the results of the most relevant research on discrimination of classes and types of words, interidiomatic and prosodic discrimination, phonological and phonotactic discrimination, as well as recognition of distributional regularities amongst the elements of the speech signal.
ABSTRACT
Entre las teorías sobre el funcionamiento del lenguaje, se cuenta el Modelo de Situación de Kintsch y van Dijk, referido al proceso y a la estructura resultante de la comprensión del discurso textual; también, la teoría de las Categorías Semánticas Innatas, defendida por Chomsky y por los teóricos de la Nueva Síntesis, referida a estructuras conceptuales que guían la adquisición, comprensión y uso de las formas lingüísticas. De existir, tales categorías innatas de significados habrían de influenciar la forma en que es representado el conocimiento en la mente, y por lo tanto, la estructura resultante de la comprensión del discurso. Una aproximación teórica a este fenómeno es la propuesta en este escrito.
Among the theories of language performance, the Situation Model by Kintsch and Van Dijk refers to the process and the resultant structure of textual discourse comprehension. The Innate Semantic Categories by Chomsky and the New Synthesis theorists refer to conceptual structures that guide the acquisition, comprehension and use of linguistics forms. If those innate meaning categories exist, they should influence the way of representing the knowledge in the mind, and therefore, they should influence the resultant structure of discourse comprehension. A theoretical approximation to this phenomenon is the proposal of this article.