Language and Communication

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Lecture 6

• Language and Communication

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Language and Communication

• Introduction
• What is communication?
• Nonverbal Communication
• Functions and types
• Verbal Communication
• Language and cognition
• Attitudes and language variation
• Social Psychology of Bilingualism

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What is Language?

• Language is a sign and symbol system. It
  involves a set of rules regarding the linking of
  symbols to referents and their meanings and the
  linking of symbols to each other.

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What is Language?

• Language includes several subsystems
• Phonological system
• sounds
• Morphological system
• meaning units (e.g. words)
• Syntactic system
• grammar
• Semantic system
• meaning
• Pragmatic system
• use

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What is Communication?

• Communication is a process during which source
  individuals initiate messages using
  conventionalized symbols, nonverbal signs, and
  contextual cues to express meanings by
  transmitting information in such a way that
  similar or parallel understandings are
  constructed by the receiving pry or parties
  toward whom the messages are directed. (Defleur
  et al., 1992, p. 11)

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Perspectives on Communication

• Encoder-Decoder Model
• Intentionalist Model
• Perspective-Taking Model

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Encoder-Decoder Model
Message
NOISE
Source
Channel
Target
Message
Communication is a process in which an idea or
feeling is encoded into symbols by a source and
transmitted to a receiver (target) and decoded
into the original idea or feeling.
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Intentionalist Model

• Communication involves the exchange of
  communicative intentions, and messages are a
  means to this end.
• Speech Act Theory (Searle, 1979)
• The Cooperative Principle (Grice, 1975)

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Intentionalist Model, cont.

• The Cooperative Principle (Grice, 1975)
• Make your contribution, such as is required, at
  the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted
  purpose or direction in which you are engaged.
• Maxims
• Quantity
• Quality
• Relation
• Manner

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Perspective-Taking Model

• Communication is a process of both creating and
  reflecting a shared context between speaker
  (source) and listener (target). It involves the
  use of symbols whose meaning depends upon the
  shared context created by the participants.

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What is Nonverbal Communication?

• Nonverbal communication is defined as the way in
  which people communicate, intentionally or
  unintentionally, without words.

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Nonverbal Communication

• Functions of Nonverbal Communication (Ekman
  Friesen, 1969)
• Repeat what is said verbally
• Complement or clarify verbal meaning
• Contradict verbal meaning
• Regulate verbal interaction
• Substitute for verbal meaning

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Similarities and Differences in Verbal and
Nonverbal Codes (Burgoon, Buller, Woodall, 1996)

• Discreteness
• Syntax rules
• Polysemy
• Arbitrariness
• Displacement
• Reflexivity
• Transformation
• Productivity

• Analogic coding
• Iconicity
• Universality vs. culture/context bound meaning
• Simultaneity
• Sensory directness
• Spontaneity

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Nonverbal Communication

• Types of Nonverbal Communication
• Facial Expression
• Kinesics - body movement and gesture
• Proxemics - use of interpersonal space
• Oculesics - eye gaze
• Haptics - touch
• Chronemics - time
• Paralinguistics - vocal cues and silence

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Nonverbal Communication

• Kinesics is the study of body movement and
  gestures
• Illustrators -- nonverbal gestures directly
  linked to language
• Emblems nonverbal substitutes for spoken
  language

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Nonverbal Communication

• Proxemics
• Hall (1959, 1966) Zones of Spatial Distance
• Intimate (18 inches)
• Personal (18 inches to 4 feet)
• Social (4 to 12 feet)
• Public (12 to 15 feet)

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Nonverbal Communication

• Chronemics
• Monochronic perspective time is a scarce
  resource, which must be rationed and controlled.
• Polychronic perspective time is flexible, used
  for the maintenance of harmonious relationships.

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Verbal Communication

• Language and Cognition
• Linguistic determinism
• The language we speak causes us to think in a
  particular manner.
• Linguistic relativism
• The language we speak predisposes us to think in
  a particular manner.

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Language Attitudes Definition of Attitudes

• An attitude is a mental and neural state of
  readiness, organized through experience, exerting
  a directive or dynamic influence upon the
  individuals response to all objects and
  situations with which it is related. (G.W.
  Allport, 1935)

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Attitudes and Language Variation

• Persons have attitudes toward language which are
  especially salient and influential in initial
  interactions. Various linguistic features
  trigger in message recipients beliefs and
  evaluations regarding message senders and these
  beliefs and evaluations are most likely to affect
  recipients behaviours toward senders in contexts
  of low mutual familiarity (Bradac, 1990, p. 388)

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Standard and Non-Standard Speech Styles

• A standard speech style is the prestige form of a
  language, associated with the higher status group
  in a society.
• A nonstandard form is any variant from the
  standard form (e.g., another language, dialect,
  accent), usually associated with the lower status
  group.

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Hypotheses about Standard and Non-Standard Speech
Styles

• Inherent value hypothesis
• The standard dialect became the prestige form of
  the language because it evolved as the
  aesthetically ideal form of that language.
• Imposed norm hypothesis
• Standard and non-standard dialects are equally
  aesthetically pleasing, but the non-standard form
  is viewed negatively because of social norms
  which are biased against it.

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Research Approaches

• Content analyses
• Survey research
• Experimental research

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Matched Guise Technique(Lambert, Hodgson,
Gardner, Fillenbaum 1960)

• Independent Variable
• 4 bilingual speakers read passage once in English
  and once in French 8 passages
• Dependent Variable
• Height, good looks, leadership, sense of humour,
  intelligence, religiousness, self-confidence,
  dependability, entertaining, kindness, ambitious,
  sociable, character, likeablity

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Evaluative Dimensions

• Ryan et al. (1977)
• Status
• Educated-uneducated, wealthy-poor,
  intelligent-unintelligent
• Solidarity
• Trustworthy-untrustworthy, friendly-unfriendly,
  kind-cruel
• Zahn Hopper (1985)
• Superiority
• Literate-illiterate, educated-uneducated, upper
  class-lower class
• Attractiveness
• Nice-awful, kind-unkind, good natured-hostile
• Dynamism
• Active-passive, talkative-shy, enthusiastic-weak

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Evaluative DimensionsStatus and Solidarity
Respondents from Lower Status Group
Respondents from Higher Status Group
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Language Attitudes and Discrimination

• Compliance
• Workplace
• Education
• Law
• Medicine

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Language Attitudes and Discrimination in the
Workplace (de la Zerda Hopper, 1979)
Probability of Employment
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Other Speech Characteristics

• Lexical Diversity
• Vocabulary range, assessed through a type-token
  ratio ( of new words to total words)
• Evaluative reactions status, competence,
  control, persuasiveness
• Speech Rate
• The number of words or syllables that speakers
  utter per unit of time (per minute is the
  standard unit)
• Evaluative reactions competence, persuasiveness

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Other Speech Characteristics, continued

• Language Intensity
• The quality of language which indicates the
  degree to which a speakers attitude toward a
  concept deviates from neutrality (Bowers, 1963,
  p. 345)
• Evaluative reactions complex, interacts with
  other variables.

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Communication Accommodation Strategies

• Convergence
• Moderation of a speech style, whether in terms of
  lexical diversity, rate, accent, language, and/or
  some other linguistic feature, to become more
  similar to the interactant
• Divergence
• Accentuation of a difference between
  interlocutors on one or a number of linguistic
  features.
• Maintenance
• Refusal to alter communication style

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Communication Accommodation Theory

• Social Exchange Theory
• Similarity-Attraction Hypothesis
• Causal Attributions
• Psychological Group Distinctiveness

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Social Psychology of Bilingualism

• Ethnolinguistic identity theory
• Ethnolinguistic vitality
• Second language learning
• Attitudes and motivation
• Ethnic identity and language
• Additive and subtractive bilingualism