Issues in Decision Making Kahneman and Tversky – Representativeness heuristic How well does information match our representation of concept Stereotype, generalize – Availability heuristic Jump to conclusions based on most available information How easy does information come to mind

Obstacles to good decision making Confirmation bias Overconfidence Belief perseverence Intuition Framing effects Extensive deliberation

Language Development

Language is the jewel in the crown of cognition

Can you imagine an alien species that transferred thoughts from one to another through blowing air at one another…

What makes language unique? Semanticity - use of symbols in a meaningful way Generativity - ability to combine words in a novel, meaningful ways Displacement - refer to objects and events that are not present

What are the components of language? basic sounds each language has some unique phonemes Phonemes smallest unit of language that has meaning Also include prefixes and suffixes Morphemes rules that we use to order words into sentences Syntax set of rules that we use to derive meaning from morphemes, words and even sentences Semantics

Semantics: – Deep structure - underlying meaning of a statement – Surface structure - how the words are actually arranged Pragmatics : the relationship between language and social context

Language is so complex… 26 letters 40 phonemes 100,000 morphemes 616,500 word forms in the Oxford Infinite number of sentences that are original

Language is AMAZING Select the words Assemble the sentences Physically articulate the sounds Monitor

When do we learn language? Receptive language Understand even if can’t speak Sign-language. Productive language Babbling One-word phrases Holophrastic speech Overextension Underestimation Two-word stage – telegraphic speech Overregularization displacement

Summary of Language Development Month (approximate) Stage Babbles many speech sounds. Babbling reveals households language. One-word stage. Two-word, telegraphic speech. Language develops rapidly into Complete sentences.

Theories of Language Development Skinner Operant conditioning Modeling reinforcement Noam Chomsky Language Acquisition Device Inborn Pre-wired Universal grammer Interactionist – biology +experience Genetically able to learn language Social-learning: Learn through modeling, reinforcement “motherese” Cognitive theories: part of general cognitive development - Piaget

Critical period of language development 1800 “Wild boy of Averyron” 1970 Genie “locked in a bottle” Second language learning

What is the relationship between language and thinking? Whorf – linguistic determinism (1956) – “Language itself shapes a man’s basic ideas” – words affect our perceptions – thinking also occurs in images – mental rehearsal

Brain and Language Processing language involves: – Speaking, perceiving, thinking, remembering Aphasia – impaired use of language – Damage to: Broca’s area – left frontal lobe – Disrupts speaking Wernicke’s area – left temporal lobe – Disrupts understanding

Language Genes design the mechanisms for a language, and experience fills them as it modifies the brain

Is animal communication considered language?

Wolfgang Kohler’s experiment on insight by a chimpanzee by solving complex problems

Animal language researchers Allen Gardner and Beatrix Gardner 1969 – Washoe Herbert Terrace (1979) – Nim Chomsky Sue Savage-Rumbaugh (1986) – Kanzi

Conclusion Animals can communicate but humans alone have a complex language system

Practical Implications of Problem Solving

Practical Applications of Decision Making

Practical Applications of Language Development