Language acquisition Essay

Chapter 1 Invitations to Linguistics 1. 1Why get a line delivery? 1. Language is very essential to world beings. 2. In terminology thither ar m each things we should know. 3. For further understanding, we need to meditate pronounces scientifically. 1. 2What is run-in? Language is a means of verbal communication. It is a body of arbitrary vocal symbols aff bearingd for human communication. 1. 3Design features of delivery The features that define our human wordss can be called design features which can distinguish human language from whatsoever animal arrange workforcet of communication. 1. 3.1Arbitrariness Arbitrariness refers to the fact that the melodic lines of linguistic scientistic signs feign no natural relationship to their nitty-grittys. 1. 3. 2Duality Duality refers to the property of having both aims of grammatical constructions, such that units of the primary level be composed of members of the secondary level and individually of the twain levels has its own principles of organization. 1. 3. 3Creativity Creativity means that language is resourceful beca practice of its wave-particle duality and its recursiveness. Recursiveness refers to the rule which can be applied repeatedly without any defined limit.The recursive nature of language provides a theoretical home for the opening of creating endless metres. 1. 3. 4Displacement Displacement means that human languages enable their users to symbolize rejects, heretoforets and c erstpts which argon not present (in time and space) at the moment of conversation. 1. 4Origin of language 1. The pooch conjecture In primitive times multitude imitated the heavy(a)s of the animal calls in the wild environment they lived and shout out and address developed from that. 2. The pooh-pooh theory In the hard life of our primitive ancestors, they utter instinctive rifles of pains, anger and triumph which gradually developed into language.3. The yo-he-ho theory As primitive the great unwashed worked together, they earnd just much or less rhythmic grunts which gradually developed into chants and then into language. 1. 5Functions of language As is proposed by Jacobson, language has six aims 1. Referential to convey message and culture 2. poetical to indulge in language for its own sake 3. Emotive to demo attitudes, feelings and emotions 4. Conative to persuade and influence opposites with commands and entreaties 5. Phatic to strengthen communion with others 6. Metalingual to clear up intentions, forges and significations.Halliday (1994) proposes a theory of meta bleeds of language. It means that language has trey metafunctions 1. imaginary function to convey pertly data, to communicate a message that is cabalistic to the he arr 2. Interpersonal function embodying all use of language to express mail social and personal relationships 3. Textual function referring to the fact that language has mechanisms to chance on any stretch of spoken and pe n discourse into a reproducible and unified text and soak up a living passage several(predicate) from a random list of sentences. According to Hu Zhuanglin, language has at least(prenominal) seven functions 1.5. 1Informative The informative function means language is the instrument of conceit and people often use it to communicate rising information. 1. 5. 2Interpersonal function The social function means people can use language to establish and maintain their status in a society. 1. 5. 3Performative The performative function of language is in the first place to change the social status of persons, as in marriage ceremonies, the sentencing of criminals, the grace of children, the naming of a ship at a launching ceremony, and the blaspheming of enemies. 1. 5. 4Emotive functionThe emotive function is hotshot of the most powerful uses of language be lay down it is so crucial in changing the emotional status of an auditory sense for or against soulfulness or something. 1. 5 . 5Phatic communion The phatic communion means people endlessly use some small, seemingly gistless expressions such as Good morning, God bless you, Nice day, etc. , to maintain a comfortable relationship amidst people without any f unfeigned content. 1. 5. 6Recreational function The recreational function means people use language for the turn out joy of using it, such as a babys babbling or a chanters chanting. 1. 5.7Metalingual function The metalingual function means people can use language to talk roughly itself. E. g. I can use the news book to talk about a book, and I can in like manner use the expression the word book to talk about the sign b-o-o-k itself. 1. 6What is linguistics? Linguistics is the scientific oeuvre of language. It studies not just sensation language of any one community, except the language of all human beings. 1. 7Main branches of linguistics 1. 7. 1Phonetics Phonetics is the study of obstetrical delivery sounds, it includes ternary main areas a rticulatory phonics, acoustic phonetics, and auditory phonetics.1. 7. 2Phonology Phonology studies the rules governance the structure, distribution, and sequencing of saving sounds and the shape of syllables. 1. 7. 3Morphology Morphology studies the minimal units of essence morphemes and word-formation does. 1. 7. 4Syntax Syntax refers to the rules political science the way words are combined to form sentences in a language, or simply, the study of the formation of sentences. 1. 7. 5semantics Semantics examines how in be given is encoded in a language. 1. 7. 6Pragmatics Pragmatics is the study of center in context.1.8Macrolinguistics Macrolinguistics is the study of language in all aspects, diaphanous from microlinguistics, which dealt solely with the formal aspect of language system. 1. 8. 1Psycholinguistics Psycholinguistics investigates the interrelation of language and school principal, in do working and producing utterances and in language acquisition for example. 1 . 8. 2Sociolinguistics Sociolinguistics is a term which covers a variety of incompatible interests in language and society, including the language and the social characteristics of its users. 1. 8. 3anthropological linguistics.Anthropological linguistics studies the relationship amid language and culture in a community. 1. 8. 4Computational linguistics Computational linguistics is an interdisciplinary field which centers around the use of computers to process or amaze human language. 1. 9Important distinctions in linguistics 1. 9. 1Descriptive vs. normative To say that linguistics is a descriptive science is to say that the linguist tries to discover and record the rules to which the members of a language-community actually conform and does not search to impose upon them other rules, or norms, of correctness.Prescriptive linguistics aims to lay blast rules for the correct use of language and settle the disputes over usage once and for all. For example, Dont say X. is a prescr iptive command plurality dont say X. is a descriptive statement. The distinction lies in prescribing how things ought to be and describing how things are. In the 18th century, all the main European languages were analyze prescriptively. However, modern linguistics is by and large descriptive because the nature of linguistics as a science determines its preoccupation with description instead of prescription.1. 9. 2Synchronic vs. diachronic A synchronised study takes a fixed instant (usually at present) as its point of observation. de Saussures diachronic description is the study of a language through the course of its history. E. g. a study of the features of the position utilize in Shakespeares time would be synchronic, and a study of the changes side has undergone since then would be a diachronic study. In modern linguistics, synchronic study seems to enjoy priority over diachronic study.The reason is that unless the diverse state of a language are successfully studied it wo uld be difficult to describe the changes that have taken place in its historical development. 1. 9. 3Langue & release Saussure distinguished the linguistic competence of the verbaliser system and the actual phenomena or data of linguistics as langue and parole. Langue is relative stable and systematic, parole is dependant to personal and situational constraints langue is not spoken by an individual, parole is always a naturally occurring event.What a linguist should do, gibe to Saussure, is to draw rules from a mass of confused facts, i. e. to discover the regularities governing all instances of parole and make them the thing of linguistics. 1. 9. 4Competence and procedure According to Chomsky, a language users underlying friendship about the system of rules is called the linguistic competence, and the actual use of language in concrete situations is called performance. Competence enables a speaker to produce and understand and indefinite number of sentences and to recogniz e grammatical mistakes and ambiguities.A speakers competence is stable while his performance is often influenced by psychological and social factors. So a speakers performance does not always match his supposed competence. Chomsky believes that linguists ought to study competence, rather than performance. Chomskys competence-performance distinction is not exactly the same as, though similar to, Saussures langue-parole distinction. Langue is a social product and a set of conventions of a community, while competence is deemed as a property of mind of to each one individual.Saussure looks at language more from a sociological or sociolinguistic point of view than Chomsky since the latter deals with his issues psychologically or psycholinguistically. 1. 9. 5Etic vs. emic universe etic means researchers making far too many, as well as behaviorally and inconsequential, differentiations, just as often the case with phonetics vs. phonemics digest in linguistics proper. An emic set of lec ture acts and events must be one that is formalise as meaningful via final resource to the native members of a speech community rather than via appeal to the investigators ingenuity or intuition alone.Following the suffix formations of (phon)etics vs (phon)emics, these terms were introduced into the social sciences by Kenneth superhighway (1967) to denote the distinction between the material and functional study of language phonetics studies the acoustically measurable and articulatorily definable immediate sound utterances, whereas phonemics analyzes the peculiar(prenominal) selection each language makes from that universal catalogue from a functional aspect. Chapter 2 lyric Sounds 2. 1Speech production and perception Phonetics is the study of speech sounds.It includes tercet main areas 1. Articulatory phonetics the study of the production of speech sounds 2. Acoustic phonetics the study of the physical properties of the sounds produced in speech 3. Auditory phonetics the study of perception of speech sounds Most phoneticians are interested in articulatory phonetics. 2. 2Speech organs Speech organs are those part of the human body involved in the production of speech. The speech organs can be considered as consisting of common chord parts the initiator of the air stream, the producer of voice and the resonating cavities.2. 3Segments, divergences, and phonetic written text 2. 3. 1Segments and divergences As there are more sounds in English than its earns, each letter must represent more than one sound. 2. 3. 2Phonetic transcription International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) the system of symbols for representing the pronunciation of words in any language according to the principles of the International Phonetic Association. The symbols consists of letters and diacritics. whatever letters are taken from the Roman alphabet, some are special symbols. 2. 4Consonants 2. 4. 1Consonants and vowelsA consonant is produced by constricting or obstructing the vo cal parcel at some places to divert, impede, or completely shut off the eat of air in the oral cavity. A vowel is produced without obstruction so no turbulence or a total stopping of the air can be perceived. 2. 4. 2Consonants The categories of consonant are established on the basis of several factors. The most important of these factors are 1. the actual relationship between the articulators and thus the way in which the air passes through certain parts of the vocal tract (manner of articulation)2.where in the vocal tract there is approximation, narrow downing, or the obstruction of the air (place of articulation). 2. 4. 3 styluss of articulation 1. Stop/plosive A speech sound which is produced by stopping the air stream from the lungs and then utterly releasing it. In English, ? , ? , ? , ? , ? , ? are stops and ? , ? , ? are nasal stops. 2. strident A speech sound which is produced by allowing the air stream from the lungs to work with friction.This is caused by bringing the deuce articulators, e. g. the upper teeth and the dispirit lip, clam up together but not closes enough to stop the later onmaths completely. In English, ?, ? , ? , ? , ? , ? , ? , ? , ? are fricatives. 3. (Median) approximant An articulation in which one articulator is close to other, but without the vocal tract being narrowed to such an extent that a turbulent airstream is produced. In English this class of sounds includes ? , ? , ? . 4. Lateral (approximant)A speech sound which is produced by partially blocking the airstream from the lungs, usually by the knife, but letting it escape at one or both sides of the blockage. ? is the unaccompanied lateral in English. Other consonantal articulations include trill, tap or flap, and affricate.2. 4. 4Places of articulation 1.Bilabial A speech sound which is make with the two lips. 2. Labiodental A speech sound which is made with the lower lip and the upper figure orchestrate teeth. 3. Dental A speech sound which is made by the barbarism terminus or mark and the upper front teeth.4. Alveolar A speech sound which is made with the tongue tip or blade and the alveolar ridge. 5. Postalveolar A speech sound which is made with the tongue tip and the back of the alveolar ridge. 6. Retroflex A speech sound which is made with the tongue tip or blade curled back so that the underside of the tongue tip or blade forms a stenosis with the back of the alveolar ridge or the hard palate.7. Palatal A speech sound which is made with the front of the tongue and the hard palate. 8. velar A speech sound which is made with the back of the tongue and the napped palate. 9. Uvular A speech sound which is made with the back of the tongue and the uvula, the short projection of the soft tissue and muscle at the stool end of the velum. 10. Pharyngeal A speech sound which is made with the motif of the tongue and the walls of the pharynx. 11. Glottal A speech sound which is made with the two pieces of vocal folds pushed towar ds each other. 2. 4.5The consonants of English Received Pronunciation (RP) The type of British Standard English pronunciation which has been regarded as the prestige variety and which depicts no regional variation. It has often been popularly referred to as BBC English or Oxford English because it is widely used in the private sector of the education system and spoken by most newsreaders of the BBC network. A chart of English consonants Manner of Place of articulation articulation Bilabial Labio- Dental dental 2. Its advantages. by dint of IC analytic thinking, the informal structure of a sentence may be demonstrated clearly, any ambiguities, if any, willing be revealed in that IC analysis emphasizes not but the linear structure of the sentence but also the hierarchical structure of the sentence. E. g. the sentence Leave the book on the shelf. is ambiguous. It has two meanings (1) Put the book on the shelf (2) Dont interest the book on the shelf. These two m eanings can be shown by the pastime maneuver diagrams. (Omitted. See the textbook p125128. ) 3. Its occupations However, IC analysis has three disadvantages.First, at the beginning, some advocator insisted on binary divisions. Any aspect, at any level, will be cut into two parts. But this is not thinkable. E. g. aged men and women is ambiguous in that it may mean old + men and women or old men + and women. Its impossible to combine with provided the preceding part or only the succeeding part. Second, constructions with discontinuous constituents will pose technical problems for tree diagrams in IC analysis. E. g. the phrasal verbs wish well make up, turn on, or give up will cause problems in that when the object is expressed by a pronoun, it will discontinue the phrasal verb as in make it up.The most serious problem is that there are structural ambiguities which cannot be revealed by IC analysis. E. g. the tree diagram and the labels can only do one analysis for the hit th e hay of God. 4. 2. 3Endocentric and exocentric constructions An endocentric construction is one whose distribution is functionally equivalent, or onrushing equivalence, to one of its constituents, which serves as the center, or head, of the whole. It is also called headed construction. Typical endocentric constructions are noun phrases, verb phrases and adjective phrases.They may be further divided into two subtypes subordinate and get up constructions. Those, in which there is only one head, with the head being dominant and the other constructions dependent, are subordinate constructions. In the coordinate construction, there are more than one head, e. g. sons and girls, in which the two content constituents, boys and girls, are of equal syntactic status, and no one is dependent on the other. The exocentric construction is defined negatively as a construction whose distribution is not functionally equivalent to any of its constituents.There is no noticeable center or head in it . Typical exocentric constructions are prepositional phrases, subordinate clauses, English basic sentences, and the verb plus object constructions. 4. 3The productive approach 4. 3. 1Deep and climb structures In transformational generative grammar (a. k. a. T-G grammar), the plentiful structure may be defined as the kidnap representation of the syntactic properties of a construction, i. e. the underlying level of structural relations between its different constituents, such as the relation between the underlying subject and its verb, or a verb and its object.The get ups structure is the final stage in the syntactic descent of a construction, which closely corresponds to the structural organization of a construction people actually produce and receive. The example for the surface structure is The newspaper was not delivered today. The oceanic abyss structure of the above sentence would be something like (negative) someone (past tense) deliver the newspaper today ( resistless). The items in brackets are not lexical items but grammatical concepts which shape the final form of the sentence. Rules which describe deep structure are in the first part of the grammar (base component).Rules which transform these structures into surface structures (transformational rules) are in the second part of the grammar (transformational component). 4. 3. 2The standard theory and after What is the come theory? I think this is difficult. It is too move up for me. icywarmtea After the lawsuit of an element in a sentence there will be a trace left in the original position. This is the notion trace in T-G grammar. Its suggested that if we have the notion trace, all the necessary information for semantic interpretation may come from the surface structure. E. g. The passive Dams are built by beavers.differs from the active Beavers built dams. in implying that all dams are built by beavers. If we add a trace element delineated by the letter t after built in the passive as Dam s are built t by beavers, then the deep structure information that the word dams was originally the object of built is also captured by the surface structure. Trace theory proves to be not only theoretically significant but also data-basedly valid. 4. 3. 3Government, attach, etc. 1. element command /C-command ? c-commands ? if ? does not dominate ? and every ? that dominates ? also dominates ? , as shown in the diagram below ? ? ? 2. bond theory Part of the government / binding theory. It examines connections between noun phrases in sentences and explores the way they relate and refer to each other. (1)An anaphor is echo in its governing category. (2)A pronominal is free in its governing category. (3)An r-expression is free. 3. Binding The notion binding is borrowed from logic, which refers to the relation between a quantifier and a variable, that is a variable is bound by a quantifier.In the generative approach, binding refers to the relation between different refe rring word and the subject of a sentencecontaining it. 4. Anaphor A process where a word or phrase refers back to another word or phrase which was used preliminary in a text or conversation. In a narrow sense, it used to include only reflexives like myself and reciprocals like each other. 5. pronominal phrase A pronominal refers to pronouns other than reflexives and reciprocals. 6. R-expression A r-expression, as the abbreviation of a referential-expression, covers all the other r-expressions except anaphors and pronominals, e. g. John, Bill, the man. 7. The D-structure and the S-structure.In Government / Binding theory, the D-structure is an abstract level of sentence representation where semantic roles such as an component (the doer of an action) and patient (the entity affected by an action) are assigned to the sentence. means is sometimes also referred to as the logical subject and patient as the rheme of the sentence. E. g. (in modify form) Verashootintruders Agent or logic al subjectpatient or rheme The next level of sentence representation is the S-structure where syntactic / grammatical cases such as token(a) / grammatical subject and accusative / grammatical object are assigned. E. g.(in simplified form)Vera (agent)shootintruders (patient / rheme)Grammatical subjectgrammatical object The phonetic form (PF) component and the logical form (LF) component are then needed to turn the S-structure into a surface sentence. The PF component presents the S-structure as sound, and the LF component gives the syntactic meaning of the sentence. 4. 4The functional approach 4. 4. 1Functional sentence perspective 1. Functional sentence perspective (FSP) The functional sentence perspective (FSP) is a type of linguistic analysis associated with the Prague School which describes how information is distributed in sentences.FSP deals particularly with the effect of the distribution of cognize information and new information in discourse. The known information (known a s theme), refers to information that is not new to the reader or listener. The rheme refers to information that is new. FSP differs from the traditional grammatical analysis of sentences because the distribution between subject-predicate is not always the same as theme-rheme contrast. E. g. (1)Johnsat in the front seat Subjectpredicate Themerheme (2)In the front seat satJohn.PredicatesubjectThemerheme John is the grammatical subject in both sentences, but theme in (1) and rheme in (2). 2. communicative dynamism (CD) By CD Firbas means the extent to which the sentence element contributes to the development of the communication. 4. 4. 2Systemic-functional grammar 1. The material process (a process of doing) the representation of outer experience. 2. The noetic process (a process of sensing) the representation of inner experience. 3. The relational process (a process of being) the relation between one experience and another. 4.The behavioral process (a process of behavioring) physiol ogical and psychological behavior. 5. The verbal process (a process of saying) any kinds of emblematic exchange of meaning. 6. The existential process (a process of happening) a representation of something in existence or happening/ These six processes form a slew as follows (omitted. See textbook, p. 155) Chapter 5 marrow 5. 1Meanings of meaning 1. Meaning Meaning refers to what a language expresses about the world we live in or any possible or imaginary world. 2. connotation The additional meaning that a word or phrase has beyond its central meaning.3. annex That part of the meanings of a word or phrase that relates it to phenomena in the strong world or in a fictional or possible word. 4. Different types of meaning (Recognized by Leech, 1974) (1) modelual meaning Logical, cognitive, or denotative content. (2)Associative meaning a. Connotative meaning What is communicated by virtue of what language refers to. b. Social meaning What is communicated of the social circumstances of language use. c. Affective meaning What is communicated of the feelings and attitudes of the speaker / writer. d.Reflected meaning What is communicated through affiliation with another sense of the same expression. e. Collocative meaning What is communicated through association with words which tend to occur in the environment of another word. (3)Thematic meaning What is communicated by the way in which the message is organized in terms of order and emphasis. 5. The difference between meaning, concept, connotation, and denotation Meaning refers to the association of language symbols with the real world. There are many types of meaning according to different approaches. Concept is the impression of objects in peoples mind.Connotation is the implied meaning, similar to implication. Denotation, like sense, is not directly related with objects, but makes the abstract assumption of the real world. 5. 2The referential theory 1. The referential theory The theory of meaning which relat es the meaning of a word to the thing it refers to, or stands for, is known as the referential theory. 2. The semantic triangle theory Ogden and Richards presented the classic Semantic Triangle as manifested in the following diagram, in which the symbol refers to the linguist elements (word, sentence, etc.), the referent refers to the object in the world of experience, and the thought or reference refers to concept or notion. Thus the symbol of a word signifies things by virtue of the concept, associated with the form of the word in the mind of the speaker of the language. The concept thus considered is the meaning of the word. The connection (represented with a dotted line) between symbol and referent is made possible only through concept. Concept / notion Thought / reference pic - Symbolobject Wordstands for universe Signifierreferent.Codesignified 5. 3Sense relations 5. 3. 1Synonymy Synonymy is the technical name for the sameness relation. 5. 3. 2Antonymy Antonymy is the name f or oppositeness relation. There are three subtypes gradable, complementary and converse antonymy. 1. Gradable antonymy Gradable antonymy is the commonest type of antonymy. They are mainly adjectives, e. g. good / bad, long / short, big / small, etc. 2. Complementary antonymy The members of a touch in complementary antonymy are complementary to each other. That is, they divide up the whole of a semantic filed completely.Not only the trust of one means the denial of the other, the denial of one also means the assertion of the other, e. g. alive / dead, hit / miss, male / female, boy / girl, etc. 3. talk about antonymy Converse antonyms are also called relational opposites. This is a special type of antonymy in that the members of a pair do not constitute a positive-negative opposition. They show the reversal of a relationship between two entities, e. g. buy / sell, resurrect / child, above / below, etc. 5. 3. 3Hyponymy Hyponymy involves us in the notion of meaning inclusion. It i s a matter of class membership.That is to say, when x is a kind of y, the lower term x is the subsidiary, and the upper term y is the superordinate. Two or more hyponyms of the same one superordinate are called co-hyponyms, e. g. under flower, there are peony, jasmine, tulip, violet, rose, etc. , flower is the superordinate of peony, jasmine, etc. , peony is the hyponym of flower, and peony, jasmine, tulip, violet, rose, etc. are co-hyponyms. 5. 4Componential analysis Componential analysis defines the meaning of a lexical element in terms of semantic components. That is, the meaning of a word is not an unanalyzable whole.It may be seen as a complex of different semantic features. There are semantic units smaller than the meaning of a word. E. g. Boy +human-adult+male Girl +human-adult-male Son child (x, y) & male (x) girlfriend child (x, y) & -male (x) Take cause (x, (have (x, y))) Give cause (x, (-have (x, y))) 5. 5Sentence meaning 5. 5. 1An combine theory 1. Compositionality A principle for sentence analysis, in which the meaning of a sentence depends on the meanings of the constituent words and the way they are combine. 2. woof restrictions Restrictions on the choice of individual lexical units in construction with other units.E. g. the word breathe will typically select an animate subject (boy, man, woman, etc. ) not an abstract or an inanimate (table, book, etc. ). The boy was still breathing. The desk was breathing. 5. 5. 2Logical semantics 1. Prepositional logic / prepositional tartar / sentential calculus Prepositional logic is the study of the truth conditions for propositions how the truth of a manifold proposition is determined by the truth value of its constituent propositions and the connections between them. 2. Predicate logic / predicate calculus Predicate logic studies the internal structure of simple propositions.Chapter 6 Language Processing in point 6. 1Introduction 1. Language is a mirror of the mind in a deep and significant sense. 2. Language is a product of human intelligence, created a new in each individual by operation that lie far beyond the reach of will or consciousness. 3. Psycholinguistics proper can mayhap be glossed as the storage, comprehension, production and acquisition of language in any medium (spoken or written). 4. Psycholinguistics is concerned primarily with investigating the psychological universe of linguistic structures.5.The differences between psycholinguistics and psychology of language. Psycholinguistics can be defined as the storage, comprehension, production and acquisition of language in any medium (spoken or written). It is concerned primarily with investigating the psychological reality of linguistic structures. On the other hand, the psychology of language deals with more general topics such as the extent to which language shapes thought, and from the psychology of communication, includes non-verbal communication such as gestures and facial expressions.6.Cognitive psycholing uistics Cognitive psycholinguistics is concerned above all with making inferences about the content of the human mind. 7. Experimental psycholinguistics Experimental psycholinguistics is mainly concerned with empirical matters, such as speed of response to a particular word. 6. 1. 1Evidence 1. Linguists tend to favor descriptions of spontaneous speech as their main source of evidence, whereas psychologists mostly prefer experimental studies. 2. The subjects of psycholinguistic investigation are normal adults and children on the one hand, and aphasics-people with speech disorderson the other.The primary assumption with regard to aphasic patient that a breakdown in some part of language could lead to an understanding of which components might be independent of others. 6. 1. 2Current issues 1. Modular theory Modular theory assumes that the mind is structured into separate modules or components, each governed by its own principles and operating independently of others. 2. Cohort theory The age bracket theory hypothesizes that auditory word recognition begins with the formation of a radical of words at the perception of the initial sound and proceeds sound by sound with the cohort of words decreasing as more sounds are perceived.This theory can be expanded to deal with written materials as well. Several experiments have supported this view of word recognition. hotshot obvious prediction of this model is that if the beginning sound or letter is missing, recognition will be much more difficult, perhaps even impossible. For example Gray tie great eye a namean aim an ice mana nice man I screamice cream See Mable-seem able well fill out-welfare lookoutlook out decadeDeck Eight laypersonlaymen persistent turnpersist and turn 3.Psychological reality The reality of grammar, etc. as a purported account of structures represented in the mind of a speaker. Often opposed, in discussion of the merits of alternative grammars, to criteria of simplicity, elegance, and internal consistency. 4. The three major strands of psycholinguistic research (1)Comprehension How do people use their knowledge of language, and how do they understand what they hear or read? (2)Production How do they produce messages that others can understand in turn? (3)Acquisition How language is represented in the mind and how langua.