Table Of ContentCONTRIBUTORS
FERGUS I. M. CRAIK
JAMES DEESE
ROY FREEDLE
PAUL A. KOLERS
ERIC H. LENNEBERG
MICHAEL LEWIS
MORRIS MOSCOVITCH
MARTIN T. ORNE
GREGORY RAZRAN
Communication
and Affect
LANGUAGE AND THOUGHT
Edited by
PATRICIA PLINER LESTER KRAMES
THOMAS ALLOWAY
Erindale College
University of Toronto
Mississauga, Ontario, Canada
ACADEMIC PRESS New York and London 1973
A Subsidiary of Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Publishers
COPYRIGHT © 1973, BY ACADEMIC PRESS, INC.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
NO PART OF THIS PUBLICATION MAY BE REPRODUCED OR
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ACADEMIC PRESS, INC.
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United Kingdom Edition published by
ACADEMIC PRESS, INC. (LONDON) LTD.
24/28 Oval Road, London NW1
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Symposium on Communication and Affect, 2d, Erindale
College, 1972.
Communication and effect: language and thought.
Bibliography: p.
1. Languages-Psychology-Congresses. 2. Thought
and thinking-Congresses. I. Pliner, Patricia, ed.
II. Krames, Lester, ed. III. Alloway, Thomas, ed.
IV. Title.
BF455.S95 1972 153 72-9335
ISBN 0-12-558250-1
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
The editors have recently learned of the
untimely death of Professor Gregory Razran,
one of the contributors to this volume. In
recognition of his extensive contributions to
psychology, we would like to dedicate this
volume to his memory.
viii
LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
Numbers in parentheses indicate the pages on which the authors' contributions begin.
FERGUS I. M. CRAIK (45), Erindale College, University of Toronto,
Ontario, Canada
JAMES DEESE (9), Department of Psychology, The University of Vir-
ginia, Charlottesville, Virginia
ROY FREEDLE (127), Educational Testing Service, Princeton, New
Jersey
PAUL A. KOLERS (21), Department of Psychology, University of To-
ronto, Ontario, Canada
ERIC H. LENNEBERG (1), Department of Psychology, Cornell Uni-
versity, Ithaca, New York and Department of Neurology, The New
York Hospital, Cornell Medical School, White Plains, New York
MICHAEL LEWIS (127), Educational Testing Service, Princeton, New
Jersey
MORRIS MOSCOVITCH (89), Erindale College, University of Toronto,
Ontario, Canada
MARTIN T. ORNE (157), Unit for Experimental Psychiatry, Institute of
the Pennsylvania Hospital and Department of Psychiatry, University
of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
GREGORY RAZRAN* (67), Queens College of the City University of
New York, New York, New York
* Deceased.
ix
PREFACE
During the past three decades, behavioral psychologists have been de-
voting an increasing amount of attention to problems of language and
thought. This interest has gone beyond the strict behavioristic approaches
to rote memory and language acquisition viewed as conditioning, and has
often involved the incorporation of cognitive theories into what neverthe-
less remains, at the observational level, an essentially behavioral enterprise.
This volume contains a series of papers dealing with this neobehavioristic
approach to language and thought. The individual papers represent a broad
spectrum of substantive topics that are linked by their common neo-
behavioristic methodology and by their subject matter dealing with human
verbal and symbolic behavior.
Eric Lenneberg employs linguistic theory in an attempt to delineate the
behavioral criteria for knowledge of a language. James Deese discusses the
linguistic concept of marked and unmarked attributes and relates it to
cognitive structure and affect. Paul Köhlers compares the pictoral and
verbal modes of representing information. Fergus Craik proposes a "levels
of processing" model of human memory. Gregory Razran discusses the
evolution of human cognition and compares Soviet and Western approaches
to this problem. Morris Moscovitch discusses some current empirical and
theoretical approaches to the question of localization of language functions
in the human brain. Michael Lewis and Roy Freedle describe the complex
communication network between the human infant and mother. Finally,
Martin Orne discusses the nature of implicit communications in experi-
mental situations.
The papers in this volume were originally presented at the second of a
series of annual symposia on Communication and Affect held at Erindale
College, University of Toronto, in March 1972. This series of symposia
has been generously supported by the College and represents a portion of
the College's emphasis upon interdisciplinary programs.
xi
xii Preface
We would like to take this opportunity to thank some of the many
people whose efforts have contributed to the success of this series of sym-
posia. Among them are I. M. Spigel, who proposed the idea of holding a
series of symposia; J. T. Wilson and E. A. Robinson, Principal and Dean,
respectively, of Erindale College, who arranged financial support; and
Donald Thompson, who advised us in the selection of symposium par-
ticipants. In addition, we would like to acknowledge the dedicated assis-
tance of the College's nonacademic staff under the direction of Arthur
Boorman, Arnold Miller, Géorgie Anderson, and Stanley Wardle. Mrs.
Doris Heckman, our secretary, also provided invaluable help with the
necessary details of organizing and staging the symposium.
Finally, although their remarks do not appear in this volume, the dis-
cussants of the major papers made an important contribution to the sym-
posium. Thus, we would like to thank M. G. Effran, B. Forrin, J. B. Gil-
more, R. S. Lockhart, M. W. Milgram, N. P. Moray, and N. J. Slameka.
WHAT IS MEANT BY KNOWING A LANGUAGE?
Eric H. Lenneberg
Cornell University
and
The New York Hospital
There are many practical situations in which one may be in doubt as to
whether a subject actually knows English or whether he is just doing some-
thing that superficially resembles speaking, without any real knowledge of
English. The classical example of the latter is the parrot. Recently, two
young female chimpanzees are said to have acquired skills that are, in the
eyes of their trainers, like knowing English, though many observers con-
tinue to be skeptical (Ploog & Melnechuk, 1971). Even among humans, it
is not always clear whether an individual in fact knows a natural language.
Clinicians are often faced with patients whose language behavior is so
deviant that serious doubts may be raised about their language capacities.
Such borderline cases are valuable for our understanding of the nature of
language. It is clear why this should be so; just as it is difficult for us to ap-
preciate the vital nature of the atmosphere until we are deprived of it, it is
difficult for us to see just what we do when we understand and speak a lan-
guage until we are faced with malfunctioning of the mechanisms involved.
Language is so intimately interwoven with our cognitive life, that we nor-
mally find it hard to imagine what "language-free cognition" would be like.
(Yet such conditions exist among the congenitally deaf before formal in-
struction in language or sign communication has begun; Furth, 1966.) Let
us start with some operational tests for language knowledge.
Suppose we train a subject (throughout this first section, subject stands
for normal child, neurological patient, or experimental animal alike) to
hand us an object placed before him upon being given a certain signal.
1
2 Eric H. Lenneberg
When the light goes on, he finds in front of him a box, an apple, or a
bottle, for example; he learns that he is expected to pick the object up and
give it to the experimenter. After he has learned this game, we start building
up a vocabulary. Each object will have its own signal, say the spoken
English word that corresponds to it, some graphic representation, or some
tactual pattern — the sense modality is immaterial. As soon as the subject
performs correctly on some 10 words, we begin to train him (by whatever
means we can think of) to execute commands of the following type: When
the light goes on, the subject will always find two objects in front of him,
selected from among those whose "names" he seems to know. However,
now he is no longer to hand the experimenter automatically whatever is in
front of him, but must wait for special instructions. For instance, one in-
struction might be expressed by the word (graphic symbol, etc.) "and";
another by the word "or"; yet another by the phrase "the larger," etc. The
first instruction is followed correctly only if the subject hands both objects;
the second only if he hands one of the two objects; the third only if he
picks up the larger; and so on. It is clear that each instruction is, in fact, a
command to relate the two objects before him to one another. "Relate
object O to object 0 'and-wise' ('or-wise,' 'comparatively bigger-wise,'
x 2
etc.) before handing them to the experimenter!" is what the instructor is
essentially saying to the subject.
What our next step in training ought to be is clear enough; since we only
chose objects whose "name" the subject had learned previously, we should
now leave all of the objects he knows permanently in front of him, but
instruct him verbally which two objects are to be related in the specified
way in the handing game. Natural languages abound with relational instruc-
tions of this sort. Virtually every utterance in English has (or implies) just
about as many relational instructions as "names" of things. Therefore, if we
want to test for language knowledge or the capacity for language knowledge,
it is only reasonable to investigate the set of relations as carefully as the
vocabulary. If our subject can name 10 objects, we should find out whether
he can as easily learn to follow, say, 10 relational instructions. Prepositions
lend themselves very nicely to this. In general, we would now be saying to
the subject, "Relate word w to word w in manner phi." Or, in symbols,
1 2
(Wi, H> 2)0, (1)
where φ is a potentially open set of relations, and M>I and w are elements
2
from a potentially open set of object words.
So far, the task used in order to enable our subject to give evidence of his
knowledge was completely fixed. It was a standing order to hand objects
to the experimenter. Because of this standardization, the task did not have
to enter into the language of instruction. It was no different in this respect
What Is Meant by Knowing a Language? 3
from a lever-pressing "instruction" to a rat in a Skinner box, which is also
transmitted to the rat without the use of English. The meaning of formula
(1) was pegged to this standard instruction. But natural languages have no
such fixed reference; one may change imperatives as freely as one changes
shirts. It is a variable in its own right. Instead of the imperative "hand to
experimenter," I might choose to train my subject to "look at," "point to,"
"avoid by escaping," "place," etc., and relate these imperatives to phrases
of type ( 1 ). Formula ( 1 ) is thus revealed as incomplete; we simply did not
bother to write down the imperative (or, more generally, the context of the
formula) because, in the artificial situation that we created, it was constant.
Now that we are about to add this sort of more variable instruction to our
subject, we had better create a symbol that indicates the context for
formula ( 1 ). Since we began with an imperative, "give," let us say that the
context of the formula shall be symbolized by gamma; thus
w] (2)
[(H>I, W 2)0 3 y9
where gamma stands for any instruction on how to relate ( 1 ) to something
else.1 The Greek letter, as in formula (1), stands for a general set of rela-
tions; the imperative is one such. It relates the words to the listener and/or
to the speaker in specific and complicated ways. Among the possible rela-
tional instructions are those that relate a statement to either people and
their actions or to other statements. An example of the latter might be "The
bottle or the apple is in the bigger box."
Notice that we are not particularly concerned here with just how the
information is to be encoded, what physical form the signals to the subject
must have, or how they are to be arranged sequentially. It is quite imma-
terial for this discussion whether the vehicle of communication is standard-
ized English. The essential aspect of language that I wish to bring out is this:
I have implied that there is a class of words that are the names of objects
(table, chair, box); this was our class w. Furthermore, the constituents of
this class are constantly being related to one another during discourse,
and each such relation has its own name. Thus, the names of relations
(Greek letters) seemed to constitute a second class of words —one that
apparently was to be treated as distinct from the class w; let us call this
1 In natural languages, the relations (Greek letters) are given either by "little
words," by affixes, by word order, or by a combination of any one of these with the
semantic relations expressed in the sequence of words as a whole. For instance, "fish
like food" is fairly automatically construed as analogous to "monkeys like trees," but
"fish" could also be construed as the imperative of "to fish," — an alternative that
no one would choose, because it would result in a meaningless sentence. Or, it might
be construed as any one of the following triple compounds: fish-like food, fish like-
food (which has no meaning in English), or a phrase analogous to "food like fish."
