Language as a cognitive ability

"Language is the way we interact and communicate, so, naturally, the means of
communication and the conceptual background that’s behind it, which is more important, are
used to try to shape attitudes and opinions and induce conformity and subordination. Not
surprisingly, it was created in the more democratic societies." - Chomsky
Language is a central part of everyday life and communication a natural human
necessity. For those reasons there has been a high interest in their properties. However
describing the processes of language turns out to be quite hard.

A natural language can be analyzed at a number of different levels. In linguistics we

differ between phonology (sounds), morphology (words), syntax (sentence structure),
semantics (meaning), and pragmatics (use). Linguists try to find systematic descriptions
capturing the regularities inherent in the language itself. But a description of natural language
just as a abstract structured system, can not be enough. Psycholinguists rather ask how the
knowledge of language is represented in the brain, and how it is used. Today most important
research topics are:

1. Comprehension: How humans understand spoken as well as written language, how

language is processed and what interactions with memory are involved.

2. Speech production: Both the physical aspect of speech production, and the mental
process that stands behind the uttering of a sentence.

3. Acquisition: How people learn to speak and understand a language.

Cognitive science
Cognitive science is an interdisciplinary field with contributors from various fields,
including psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, philosophy of mind, computer science,
anthropology, and biology. Cognitive science tends to view the world outside the mind much
as other sciences do.

A. Cognitive science: the term

The term "cognitive" in "cognitive science" is "used for any kind of mental
operation or structure that can be studied in precise terms" (Lakoff and Johnson, 1999).

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This conceptualization is very broad, and should not be confused with how "cognitive" is
used in some traditions of analytic philosophy, where "cognitive" has to do only with
formal rules and truth conditional semantics. (Nonetheless, that interpretation would
bring one close to the historically dominant school of thought within cognitive science
on the nature of cognition - that it is essentially symbolic, propositional, and logical.)

Cognitive science may be concisely defined as the study of the nature of

intelligence. It draws on multiple empirical disciplines, including psychology,
philosophy, neuroscience, linguistics, anthropology, computer science, sociology and
biology. The term cognitive science was coined by Christopher Longuet-Higgins in his
1973 commentary on the Lighthill report, which concerned the then-current state of
Artificial Intelligence research. In the same decade, the journal Cognitive Science and
the Cognitive Science Society were founded. Cognitive science differs from cognitive
psychology in that algorithms that are intended to simulate human behavior are
implemented or implementable on a computer.

Cognitive science is an interdisciplinary field with contributors from various

fields, including psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, philosophy of mind, computer
science, anthropology, and biology. Cognitive science tends to view the world outside
the mind much as other sciences do.

The earliest entries for the word "cognitive" in the OED take it to mean roughly
pertaining "to the action or process of knowing". The first entry, from 1586, shows the
word was at one time used in the context of discussions of Platonic theories of
knowledge. Most in cognitive science, however, presumably do not believe their field is
the study of anything as certain as the knowledge sought by Plato.

Cognitive science is a large field, and covers a wide array of topics on cognition.
However, it should be recognized that cognitive science is not equally concerned with
every topic that might bear on the nature and operation of the mind or intelligence.

Below are some of the main topics that cognitive science is concerned with. This
is not an exhaustive list, but is meant to cover the wide range of intelligent behaviors.
See List of cognitive science topics for a list of various aspects of the field.

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1. Artificial intelligence: Artificial intelligence (AI) involves the study of cognitive
phenomena in machines.

2. Attention: Attention is the selection of important information. Attention is

sometimes seen as a spotlight, meaning one can only shine the light on a particular
set of information.

3. Language processing: A well known example of a Phrase structure tree. This is

one way of representing human language that shows how different components
are organized hierarchically.

4. Learning and development: Learning and development are the processes by which
we acquire knowledge and information over time. Infants are born with little or no
knowledge (depending on how knowledge is defined), yet they rapidly acquire the
ability to use language, walk, and recognize people and objects.

5. Memory: Memory allows us to store information for later retrieval. Memory is

often thought of consisting of both a long-term and short-term store. Long-term
memory allows us to store information over prolonged periods (days, weeks,
years). We do not yet know the practical limit of long-term memory capacity.
Short-term memory allows us to store information over short time scales (seconds
or minutes).

6. Perception and action: Perception is the ability to take in information via the
senses, and process it in some way. Vision and hearing are two dominant senses
that allow us to perceive the environment. Some questions in the study of visual
perception, for example, include: (1) How are we able to recognize objects?, (2)
Why do we perceive a continuous visual environment, even though we only see
small bits of it at any one time? One tool for studying visual perception is by
looking at how people process optical illusions. The image on the right of a
Necker cube is an example of a bitable percept, that is, the cube can be interpreted
as being oriented in two different directions.

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B. Human language

In 1948, in Orange Park, Florida, Keith and Cathy Hayes tried to teach English
words to a chimpanzee named Vikki. She was raised as if she were a human child. The
chimpanzee was taught to "speak" easy English words like "cup". The experiment failed
since with the supra lingual anatomy and the vocal fold structure that chimpanzees have it
is impossible for them to produce human speech sounds. The failure of the Vikki
experiment made scientists wonder how far non-human primates are able to communicate
linguistically.

C. Sign language

From 1965 to 1972 the first important evidence showing rudiments of linguistic
behavior was "Washoe", a young female chimpanzee. The experimenters Allen and
Beatrice Gardner conducted an experiment where Washoe learned 130 signs of the
American Sign Language within three years. Showing pictures of a duck to Washoe and
asking WHAT THAT? She combined the symbols of WATER and BIRD to create
WATER BIRD as she had not learned the word DUCK (the words in capital letters refer
to the signs the apes use to communicate with the experimenter).

D. Using Language

Conversations are dynamic interactions between two or more people (Garrod

&Pickering, 2004 as cited in Goldstein 2005). The important thing to mention is that
conversation is more than the act of speaking. Each person brings in his or her knowledge
and conversations are much easier to process if participants bring in shared knowledge. In
this way, participants are responsible of how they bring in new knowledge. H.P. Grice
proposed in 1975 a basic principle of conversation and four “conversational maxims.” His
cooperative principle states that “the speaker and listener agree that the person speaking
should strive to make statements that further the agreed goals of conversation.” The four
maxims state the way of how to achieve this principle.

1. Quantity: The speaker should try to be informative, no over-/under information.

2. Quality: Do not say things which you believe to be false or lack evidence of.
3. Manner: Avoiding being obscure or ambiguous.
4. Relevance: Stay on topic of the exchange.
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Communicative System

Communication is commonly defined as "the imparting or interchange of thoughts,

opinions, or information by speech, writing, or signs. Communication can be perceived as a
two-way process in which there is an exchange and progression of thoughts, feelings or ideas
towards a mutually accepted [clarification needed] goal or direction.

Communication is a process whereby information is encoded and imparted by a

sender to a receiver via a channel/medium. The receiver then decodes the message and gives
the sender a feedback. Communication requires that all parties have an area of
communicative commonality. There are auditory means, such as speaking, singing and
sometimes tone of voice, and nonverbal, physical means, such as body language, sign
language, paralanguage, touch, eye contact, by using writing.

Types of Communication

There are three major parts in human face to face communication which are body
language, voice tonality, and words.

A) Dialogue or verbal communication

A dialogue is a reciprocal conversation between two or more entities. The

etymological origins of the word (in Greek διά(diá,through) + λόγος(logos,
word,speech) concepts like flowing-through meaning) do not necessarily convey the
way in which people have come to use the word, with some confusion between the
prefix διά-(diá-,through) and the prefix δι- (di-, two) leading to the assumption that a
dialogue is necessarily between only two parties.

B) Nonverbal communication

Nonverbal communication is the process of communicating through sending and

receiving wordless messages. Such messages can be communicated through gesture,
body language or posture; facial expression and eye contact, object communication
such as clothing, hairstyles or even architecture, or symbols and info graphics, as well
as through an aggregate of the above, such as behavioral communication. Nonverbal
communication plays a key role in every person's day to day life, from employment to
romantic engagements.
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 C) Visual communication

Visual communication as the name suggests is communication through visual aid.

It is the conveyance of ideas and information in forms that can be read or looked
upon. Primarily associated with two dimensional images, it includes: signs,
typography, drawing, graphic design, illustration, color and electronic resources. It
solely relies on vision. It is form of communication with visual effect. It explores the
idea that a visual message with text has a greater power to inform, educate or
persuade a person. It is communication by presenting information through Visual
form.

Other types of communication

Other more specific types of communication are for example:

a) Facilitated communication

b) Graphic communication

c) Nonviolent Communication

d) Science communication

e) Strategic Communication

f) Superluminal communication

g) Technical communication

Communication can be seen as processes of information transmission governed by three

levels of semiotic rules:

1) Syntactic (formal properties of signs and symbols),

2) Pragmatic (concerned with the relations between signs/expressions and their users)
and

3) Semantic (study of relationships between signs and symbols and what they represent).

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 REFERENCES

"communication - Definition from the Mirriam-Webster online dictionary". Mirriam-

Webster. Retrieved on 2009-03-08.

"communication". written at Washington. office of superintendent of Public instruction.

Retrieved on March 14, 2008.

"Language". The New Encyclopædia Britannica: MACROPÆDIA. 22. Encyclopædia

Britannica,Inc.. 2005. pp. 548 2b.