Psycholinguistics - A Book Review

A Psycholinguistics Book Review Psycholinguistics is a field of study concerned with psychological aspects of language studies. It goes to the heart of what we do with language and it provides insights into how we assemble our own speech and writing and how we understand that of others. As the field of Psycholinguistics is relatively new, not all Psycholinguistics books cover the same subject matter. For any learner who has never been exposed to any aspects of Psychology, it is recommended to start off with an introductory book. Having to browse a few books, I subsequently found quite a comprehensive book compared to other Introduction to Psycholinguistics books. The technicality in elaborating the subject matters might not be of comprehension to entry level learners. Nevertheless, I found it comprehensible on the whole. The book entitled Psycholinguistics : Psychology, Linguistics and the Study of Natural Language, authored by Joseph F. Kess, published by John Benjamins Publishing Company, Amsterdam/Philadelphia 1992. This ten-chaptered book covers from the history of Psycholinguistics right up to first language acquisition by children inclusive of the study of phonology, morphology, syntax, discourse, semantics, and biological correlates. Through my analysis, each topic in this book carries approximately the same weight. Each topic is being theoretically and practically discussed and investigated in some detail. Also detailed are those research topics that have captured the interests of psycholinguists over the past few decades like language and thought and language acquisition. The chapter Language and Thought, where some books would use the term Language and the Brain, starts off with the author’s introductory comments, and moves on to thorough discussion on Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis and ends with an interesting insight on Piaget and Vygotsky’s opinions

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on cognitive and linguistic development. The author here poses the issues of whether language is necessary for thought, whether the nature of language determines the nature of thought, or whether there is simply a partial dependence between the two. To answer those issues the author highlights the Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis, a notion made by Benjamin Lee Whorf (1956), which states that the force of linguistic habit (structure of the language) influences the way in which one understands his or her environment. In this particular chapter, the author outlines Piaget and Vygotsky’s brief but informative insights on the developmental sequences of stages in cognitive development. This helps to better understand the later chapter on first language acquisition. For anyone who would like to make an extended reading on the basic terms and concepts of first language acquisition, I would recommend to read the chapter 10 (First Language Acquisition) of this book. In the introductory part of this chapter, the author gives examples and makes comparisons across languages and then gradually elaborates the acquisition of phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics of an English-speaking child. The author maintains that even though children do differ in the beginning and rate of language development, but the order of stages and stages suggested by theorists seem to remain constant. In conclusion, even though this book is intended for senior learners, entry level learners could as well make use of this book through the basic terms and concepts explained in each topic prior to the investigations made. This book should be a useful reference as it investigates on a number of theoretical and research attempts on how language is comprehended, produced and acquired.

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