Individual Differences in Language Ability and Language Behavior
- 1st Edition - May 10, 2014
- Editors: Charles J Fillmore, Daniel Kempler, William S-Y. Wang
- Language: English
- Paperback ISBN:9 7 8 - 1 - 4 8 3 2 - 3 8 7 6 - 0
- eBook ISBN:9 7 8 - 1 - 4 8 3 2 - 6 3 2 0 - 5
Individual Differences in Language Ability and Language Behavior is a collection of papers that discusses differences at the center of the study of language, specifically, on the… Read more

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Request a sales quoteIndividual Differences in Language Ability and Language Behavior is a collection of papers that discusses differences at the center of the study of language, specifically, on the various dimensions of linguistic ability and behavior along which individuals can differ from each other. Papers also review the development of techniques that measure these dimensions in relation to biological, psychological, and cultural parameters. Some papers review individual differences in language study in terms of different perspectives: that of a psychometrician's, of an individualistic's vantage point, and of a psycholinguistic's. Other papers discuss how each individual accesses, uses, and judges his language through fluency, biases, spatial principles, or a linguistic-phonetic mode. Several papers examine individual differences in language acquisition, such as "profile analysis," strategies in acquisition of sounds, second language learning, and duplication of adult language system. A group of papers addresses the biological aspects of language variation. These biological aspects include selective disorders of syntax (agrammatism), selective disorders of lexical retrieval (anomia), and cerebral lateralization effects in language processing. Certain papers explain individual differences in languages using sociolinguistic analysis. The collection is well suited for linguists, ethnologists, psychologists, and researchers whose works involve linguistics, learning, communications, and syntax.
List of Contributors
Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter Summaries
References
I The Treatment of Individual Differences
1 Psychometric Approaches to the Study of Language Abilities
The Place of Psychometrics in Psychology
Factor-Analytic Studies of Language Abilities
The Possible Relevance of Language Ability Studies for Linguistic, Psycholinguistic, and Sociolinguistic Research
Studies of Specific Language Abilities Involved in Foreign Language
Aptitude Tests
References
2 Sapir, Competence, Voices
3 The Treatment of Individual Differences in Psycholinguistic Research
II Language Use and Language Judgments
4 Verbal Fluency and the Language-Bound Effect
General Method
Results and Discussion
General Discussion
References
5 On Fluency
1. The Generativist Position
2. Language Variability
3. Two Senses of "Competence"
4. The Competence-Performance Distinction
5. Dimensions of Fluency
6. Sources of Fluency Differences
7. Research Possibilities
8. Summary
References
6 Language Use and Language Judgment
1. Population Differences in Metalinguistic Performance, in the Presence of Relatively Invariant Linguistic Performance
2. Are the Metalinguistic Functions Related to Language Use and Learning?
3. Summary and Conclusions
References
7 Where's English?
1. Background
2. The Experiment
3. The Results
4. Downshot and Upshot
Appendix
References
III Acquisition
8 Profile Analysis of Language Disability
Descriptive
Developmental
Interactional
Profiles and Language Disability
Profile 1: Hugh
Profile 2: Peter
Profile 3, 4, and 5: Difficulties with Complex Sentences
Profiles Extended
Appendix
References
9 Phonology as an Individual Access System: Some Data from Language Acquisition
1. Individual Differences in Phonology
2. Individual Differences in Child Phonologies
3. Toward a Model of Phonology
References
10 Individual Differences in Second Language Acquisition
Cognitive and Social Strategies in Second Language Learning
Sources of Individual Differences in Second Language Learning
Summary
References
11 Individual Variation in Some Phonetic Aspects of Language Acquisition
Introduction
Apologia
Aspects of Perception
Conclusion
References
IV Neurolinguistics
12 Individual Variations in the Perception of Dichotic Chords
13 Effect of Aphasia on the Retrieval of Lexicon and Syntax
Agrammatism
References
14 How Shall a Thingummy Be Called?
Method
Results
References
15 On the Evolution of Neurolinguistic Variability: Fossil Brains Speak
Materials and Methods
Results
Discussion
Summary and Conclusions
References
16 Strategies of Linguistic Processing in Human Split-Brain Patients
Lateralization and Language
Language Limitations of the Right Hemisphere
What Is Meant by Language?
The Cognitive Dispositions of the Right Hemisphere
A Missing Process in the Right Hemisphere
Summary
References
V Sociocultural Aspects
17 Individual and Social Differences in Language Use
Example 1: Regent St.
Example 2: Yogurt Dressing
Example 3: Party
Example 4: Who's the Artist?
Example 5: How's the Family?
Example 6: The Fingers of the Hand
Example 7: A Gig
Example 8: I Don't Wanna Read
Example 9: I Don't Know
Example 10: A Bridge
Conclusion
References
18 Locating the Frontier between Social and Psychological Factors in Linguistic Variation
A Deviant Individual: Nathan B.
Individual Variation in Repetition Tests
Individual Variation in the Acquisition of the Philadelphia Dialect
Categorical Discrimination
References
Subject Index
- No. of pages: 362
- Language: English
- Edition: 1
- Published: May 10, 2014
- Imprint: Academic Press
- Paperback ISBN: 9781483238760
- eBook ISBN: 9781483263205
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