To what extent does language influence thought?

Watson's view: Thinking is just subvocal speech

 

The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis:

Linguistic Relativity: Lexical and syntactic differences between languages are mirrored by nonlinguistic cognitive differences

 

Linguistic Determinism: People in different cultures think differently because of differences in their language

 

Eskimos have N words for snow while we only have one word for snow. This causes them to think differently about snow.

 

How is language related to thought across cultures?

Color Terms and color processing

Across cultures there is regularity in which colors (wavelengths of light) get named

Berlin and Kay (1969): 11 Specific colors

Physiologically based principles behind color naming

1) Black, White

2) Red

3) Yellow, Blue, Green

4) Brown

5) Purple, Pink, Orange Grey

Heider study of the Dani tribe

Despite having only two colors, they

  1. recognized focal colors better than non-focal colors
  2. could distinguish among colors not used in their language

Evidence against strong linguistic determinism

But: performance can depend on codability

Codability: how easy it is to describe a concept in a language

More easily coded colors are better remembered

Key and Kempton (1984) study of color chips

Tarahumara speakers don't have separate terms for blue and green

Tarahumara speakers judged stimuli based on physical characteristics of the color chips

English speakers judged based on greenness or blueness

Evidence for a weak-linguistic determinism due to coding

 

Effects of language on higher cognition

Language differences in number names depends on whether languages have place values (ten, twenty)

Asian children understand number concepts earlier because of the presence of place values in numbers

 

 

Within-language studies of linguistic determinism

Bartlett's tests of visual memory

Is it a picture frame or a carpenter's square?

Eyewitness memory

Examples: how fast was the car going when it smashed into the other one.

vs. hit the other one.

Was there broken glass in the picture?

Yield sign vs. stop sign

Key point: Memory is a reconstruction as well as a reproduction

 

 

Framing Decisions: The way an issue is posed can affect people's judgements and decisions

Ground Beef: 75% lean vs.

25% fat

Birth control: 95% success rate vs.

5% failure rate

Operation: 90% survival rate vs.

10% die during operation

Framing in the real world

Gas stations: 5% discount for cash vs.

5% surchage for credit cards

Prices: $50 shirt marked off 40% to $30

Same shirt selling for retail price of $30

What is the meaning of a word?

Bachelor

Spinster

 

Verbal overshadowing. Describing features of an item can cause decrements in performance

 

Key question: Is this linguistic determinism or just confusing visual and verbal memory?

 

 

Conclusion: Thoughts are not determined by our language, but they may be constrained by our language