1. Morphology & the mental lexicon DAY 25 – Oct 25, 2013
Brain & Language
LING
NSCI
Harry Howard
Tulane University

2. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
Course organization
The syllabus, these slides and my recordings are available at
If you want to learn more about EEG and neurolinguistics, you are welcome to participate in my lab. This is also a good way to get started on an honor's thesis.
The grades are posted to Blackboard.

3. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
Review

4. Summary of lateralization of phonology
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
Summary of lateralization of phonology
LH, small window of temporal integration
RH, large window of temporal integration
high temporal frequency:
rapid cues, like stops
low temporal frequency:
slow cues, like vowels
high spectral frequency:
formants
low spectral frequency:
fundamental
categorical distinctions:
lexical, phrasal, clausal stress;
lexical tone in Thai/Chinese
graded/coordinate distinctions:
emotional intonation,
sentence type?

5. A theory of how the brain works
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
A theory of how the brain works
The five theories of the lateralization of phonology that we have reviewed gradually converge towards lateralization as a kind of calculation or computation.

6. A neuron as a computation, if not a calculation
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
A neuron as a computation, if not a calculation
dendrite a
dendrite b
dendrite c
dendrite d
axon

7. Morphology & the mental lexicon
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
Morphology & the mental lexicon
Ingram: III. Lexical semantics, §9.

8. Linguistic model, Fig. 2.1 p. 37 Discourse model Syntax Morphology
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
Linguistic model, Fig. 2.1 p. 37
Discourse model
Semantics
Sentence level
Word level
Syntax
Sentence prosody
Morphology
Word prosody
Segmental phonology
production
Articulatory phonetics Speech motor control
Segmental phonology
perception
Acoustic phonetics Feature extraction
INPUT

9. Dual-route model compositional route lexical route meaning
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
Dual-route model
meaning
verb + past tense
morphological analysis
/di.paɹ.t + ɪd/
compositional route
lexical route
phonological input
/di.paɹ.tɪd/
/wɪnt/

10. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
What is a word?
Phonologically
a spike in the level of uncertainty as to what the next sound will be d o g ?
Semantically
that is the topic of this chapter

11. Morphological decomposition
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
Morphological decomposition
Recall that words can be analyzed in terms of inflection & derivation
inflection: cats > cat+s, sleeping > sleep+ing
derivation: government > govern+ment
argument
detriment
department

12. Form-frequency relations in English past tense Table 1.9
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
Form-frequency relations in English past tense Table 1.9
Basic form
Past tense
Occurrence in speech
Morphological type go
went
high token frequency
suppletive
leave
left
mid token frequency
partially regular
depart
departed
low token frequency
(fully) regular
These relations generalize to other morphemes and other languages, eg. tack~tacks, knife~knives, ox~oxen.
Can one learning model account for all three,
or is a dual-route model necessary,
or perhaps even a triple-route model?

13. What does ‘to prime the pump’ mean?
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
What does ‘to prime the pump’ mean?
What is priming in psychology?
‘the facilitatory effect that presentation of an item can have on the response to a subsequent item’
usually measured in terms of reaction time

14. An example of priming Table 9.2
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
An example of priming Table 9.2
Conditions
prime ~ probe
Priming effect
[+morph, +phon]
friendly ~ friend
yes
[+morph, –phon]
elusive ~ elude
serenity ~ serene
[–morph, +phon]
tinsel ~ tin no

15. What causes the priming effect? Table 9.3
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
What causes the priming effect? Table 9.3
Conditions
prime ~ probe
Priming effect
[–sem, +morph]
casualty ~ casual no
[+sem, +morph]
punishment ~ punish
yes
[+sem, –morph, –phon]
idea ~ notion
[–sem, –morph, +phon]
bulletin ~ bullet
Answer: The semantic relationship.

16. What causes the priming effect? Table 9.4
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
What causes the priming effect? Table 9.4
Conditions
prime ~ probe
Priming effect
[–sem, +morph]
casualty ~ casual no
[+sem, +morph]
punishment ~ punish
yes
successful ~ successor
confession ~ confessor
restrain ~ strain
insincere ~ sincere
depress ~ express
unfasten ~ refasten

17. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
10/28/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
A little too early
The previous experiment suggests that prefixes and suffixes are processed differently.
I want to introduce a model of word semantics first, and then we will return to this issue.
Ingram has a good summary of a PET and a MEG experiment on morphological processing.
MEG is more informative, but to understand the results, we need to wait until we have discussed Broca’s area.

18. Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
10/25/13
Brain & Language - Harry Howard - Tulane University
NEXT TIME Q7
Start word semantics