GCSE Psychology Unit 2: Language, Thought & Communication

What do YOU think these words mean?

Which comes first, language or thought?

Two conflicting theories…

Piaget’s Theory: Language Depends on Thought THINKING COMES FIRST!

Piaget’s Theory: Language Depends on Thought Piaget though that children develop and think about schemas, and then develop the language to talk about it, e.g. they will think about a dog and develop a schema about dogs and only then will they be able to use language to communicate about dogs. Children can be taught language before having a schema, but in this case they are just using language like a ‘parrot’ and not understanding its meaning (i.e. not using language properly). E.g. a Year 6 child can be taught the word ‘respiration’ but they will not be able to use that language properly until Year 9 when they study the topic and apply meaning to the word

Piaget’s Theory: Language Depends on Thought Cognitive development leads to the growth of language We can only use language that matches our cognitive development In the sensorimotor stage babies are discovering what their bodies can do – they can make sounds and copy sounds (approx. 1 year old) In the pre-operational stage children are egocentric and focussed on themselves. They use language to voice their internal thoughts rather than to communicate with other people (aged 2+) In the concrete operational stage language has developed a lot but can only be used to talk about actual, concrete things In the formal operational stage language can be used to talk about abstract, theoretical ideas. Not all people get to the formal operational stage Piaget’s Theory: Language Depends on Thought

The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis: Thinking Depends on Language LANGUAGE COMES FIRST!

Language influences the way people perceive and think about the world Differenced between languages can determine the types of thoughts people are able to have There are certain thoughts an individual has in one language that cannot be understood by those who live in a different society that uses a different language The way people think is strongly affected by their native language The language we speak may lead to memory bias where our ability to recall information is increased or decreased They used Native American language with different words for time and an Inuit language for large numbers of words for snow to investigate claims There are two versions of the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis: The strong version says that language determines thought The weak version says that language influences thought (this version was preferred by Sapir and Whorf)