Language structure reflects biases in pattern learning across domains and modalities

Jennifer Culbertson, Arianna Compostella, Simon Kirby

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

A central goal for psychological science is the explanation of variation in human behaviour. In the domain of language, patterns of cross-linguistic variation have been extensively documented, but there has been vigorous debate over how to explain them. A particularly contentious question is whether constraints on linguistic variation are driven by properties of the human mind that are specific to language or domain-general. In this paper, we present four pattern-learning experiments (N = 306 English- and Italian-speaking adults) across domains (linguistic and nonlinguistic) and modalities (visual, auditory, and tactile) to show that the patterns that are more easily learned are precisely the ones that are found most frequently across languages. This supports a domain-general, cognitive explanation for cross-linguistic variation. However, we suggest that the general/specific dichotomy is ultimately misleading because language structure arises when domain- and modality-general biases meet domain-specific representations.
Original languageEnglish
JournalQuarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology
Early online date13 Sept 2024
DOIs
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - 13 Sept 2024

Keywords / Materials (for Non-textual outputs)

  • language
  • pattern learning
  • cognitive biases
  • syntax

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