LING 200 Study Guide - Quiz Guide: Animal Language, Animal Communication, Behaviorism
Ling 200 Homework #1 (Total points = 40)
Due: Friday September 22rd at 10am on myCourses
NOTE 1: always read the instructions and the questions very carefully, before you attempt
answering.
Note 2: It is perfectly fine to work with your classmates on this assignment. Each student
must submit their own work. Please write the names of the classmates that you worked
with at the top of your assginment
Part 1. Practice with IPA
(10 points, 2 for each question)
(1) Give the English equivalent of IPA [plaɪ]:
a. play
b. ply
c. plea
d. ploy
(2) Give the English equivalent of IPA [bæθ]:
a. bait
b. bathe
c. bath
d. bat
(3) Give the English equivalent of IPA [bət]:
a. bad
b. but
c. bat
d. bet
(4) Give the English equivalent of IPA [sɪn]:
a. sin
b. sign
c. sane
d. scene
(5) Give the English equivalent of IPA [jeɪ]:
a. gee
b. jay
c. yew
d. yay
Part 2: Animal language
(15 points, 5/5/5)
During the first half of the 20th century, linguists who theorized about the human
ability to speak did so from the behaviourist perspective that prevailed at that
time. They therefore held that language learning, like any other kind of learning,
could be explained by a succession of trials, errors, and rewards for success. In
other words, children learned their mother tongue by simple imitation, listening to
and repeating what adults said.
1. Discuss briefly why language cannot be learned through simple imitation.
-Language cannot be learned through imitation because there is no overt award
every time a child does something well and no consistent verbal praise to reinforce
the language. And imitation would not be able to explain how children produce and
understand sentences they’ve never heard before.
2. Provide 3 characteristics of human language that animal communication
systems lack. Provide an example for each different feature to support this
claim.
1. Displacement: Which is the ability to communicate about things that are not
in our absolute vicinity. An example in which animals lack this is a monkey
cannot talk about the banana that fell on the other monkey’s friend last
week.
2. (full)Productivity: Which Is the ability to produce and comprehend an
infinite number of sentences and finite means. For example, parrots can
know the phrase “I like candy” and “I like yummy crackers” but they would
not be able to produce the phrase “I like candy and yummy crackers”.
3. Interchangeability: Which is the ability to create messages regardless of their
truth or relation to the speaker. An example of this in relation to animals is
they would not be able to say that there is a predator to the animals around
them if there was not one.
3. In a couple of sentences, give a reason why you agree or disagree that the
human language capacity is different from the communication systems used
by animals.
I agree that the human language capacity is different from animals because even
though animals have the ability to respond to verbal stimuli, mimic vocalizations,
and can have some level of arbitrariness and productivity, they lack the abilities to
communicate about things not in their vicinity or abstract, full productivity, and the
ability to have interchangeability (lying). The human language capacity is much
larger and much more complex than that of animals.
Part 4. Morphophonemics of English
(15 points, 2/3/5/3/2)
