Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-mlc7c Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-19T12:41:16.922Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

“Et in Amygdala Ego”?

UG, (S)LA, and Neurobiology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 November 2008

Lynn Eubank  and
Kevin R. Gregg
Lynn Eubank
Affiliation:
University of North Texas
Kevin R. Gregg
Affiliation:
St. Andrew's University, Japan
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

John Schumann and colleagues (Jacobs, 1988; Jacobs & Schumann, 1992; Pulvermüller & Schumann, 1994; Schumann, 1990a, 1990b) have argued for a neurobiological perspective on language acquisition, one that denies a role for a specifically linguistic mental module of the sort proposed by, for example, Chomsky (e.g., 1986). In this paper, we challenge this perspective by offering evidence that such a mental module must be involved in the acquisition of grammatical competence.

Type
Articles
Information
Studies in Second Language Acquisition , Volume 17 , Issue 1 , March 1995 , pp. 35 - 57
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Alkon, D. L. (1992). Memory's voice: Deciphering the brain-mind code. New York: Harper Collins.Google Scholar
Atkinson, M. (1992). Children's syntax: An introduction to principles and parameters theory. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Basso, A., Lecours, A. R., Moraschini, S., & Vanier, M. (1985). Anatomoclinical correlations of the aphasias as defined through computerized tomography: Exceptions. Brain and Language, 26, 201–229.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Beck, M. (1995). Tracking down the source of NS-NNS differences in syntactic competence. Unpublished manuscript, University of North Texas.Google Scholar
Bellugi, U., Poizner, H., & Klima, E. (1989). Language, modality and the brain. TINS, 12, 380–388.Google ScholarPubMed
Bellugi, U., Poizner, H., & Klima, E. (1990). Mapping brain function for language: Evidence from sign language. In Edelman, G. M., Gall, W. E., & Cowan, W. M. (Eds.), Signal and sense: Local and global order in perceptual maps (pp. 521–543). New York: Wiley-Liss.Google Scholar
Chomsky, N. (1959). Review of Verbal Behavior by B. F. Skinner. Language, 35, 26–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chomsky, N. (1980). Rules and representations. London: Blackwell.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chomsky, N. (1981). Lectures on Government and Binding. Dordrecht: Foris.Google Scholar
Chomsky, N. (1986). Knowledge of language. New York: Praeger.Google Scholar
Corina, D., Poizner, H., Bellugi, U., Feinberg, T., Dowd, D., & O'Grady-Batch, L. (1992). Dissociation between linguistic and nonlinguistic gestural systems: A case for compositionality. Brain and Language, 43, 414–447.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Crain, S. (1991). Language acquisition in the absence of experience. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 14, 597–650.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cummins, R. (1983). The nature of psychological explanation. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Curtiss, S. (1977). Genie: A psycholinguistic study of a modern-day “wild child.” New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Curtiss, S. (1980). The critical period and feral children. UCLA Working Papers in Cognitive Linguistics, 2, 22–31.Google Scholar
Curtiss, S. (1982). Developmental dissociation of language and cognition. In Obler, L. K. & Menn, L. (Eds.), Exceptional language and linguistics (pp. 285–312). New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Fodor, J. A. (1981a). Special sciences. In Fodor, J. A., Representations: Philosophical essays on the foundations of cognitive science (pp. 127–145). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Fodor, J. A. (1981b). Computation and reduction. In Fodor, J. A., Representations: Philosophical essays on the foundations of cognitive science (pp. 146–174). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Fritsch, K. von. (1962). Dialects in the language of the bees. Scientific American, 202, 78–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gilbert, C., & Wiesel, T. (1992). Receptive field dynamics in adult primary visual cortex. Nature, 356, 150–151.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gleitman, L., & Wanner, E. (1982). Language acquisition: The state of the state of the art. In Wanner, E. & Gleitman, L. (Eds.), Language acquisition: The state of the art (pp. 3–48). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gopnik, M. (1990a). Dysphasia in an extended family. Nature. 344, 715.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gopnik, M. (1990b). Feature blindness. Language Acquisition, 1, 139–164.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gordon, P. (1985). Level ordering in lexical development. Cognition, 21, 73–93.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gregg, K. R. (1993). Taking explanation seriously; or, let a couple of flowers bloom. Applied Linguistics, 14, 276–294.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gregg, K. R. (in press). The logical and developmental problems of second language acquisition. In Ritchie, W. C. & Bhatia, T. (Eds.), Handbook of language acquisition: Second language acquisition. San Diego: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Gwinner, E. (1986). Internal rhythms in bird migration. Scientific American, 254, 84–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hempel, C. (1966). Philosophy of natural science. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Hubel, D., & Wiesel, T. (1970). The period of susceptibility to the physiological effects of unilateral eye closure in kittens. Journal of Physiology, 195, 215–243.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jacobs, B. (1988). Neurobiological differentiation of primary and secondary language acquisition. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 10, 303–337.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jacobs, B., & Schumann, J. (1992). Language acquisition and the neurosciences: Towards a more integrative perspective. Applied Linguistics, 13, 282–301.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jakubowicz, C. (1984). On markedness and binding principles. Proceedings of NELS, 14, 154–182.Google Scholar
Kalil, R. (1989). Synapse formation in the developing brain. Scientific American, 261, 76–85.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kiparsky, P. (1983). From cyclic phonology to lexical phonology. In van der Hulst, H. & Smith, N. (Eds.), The structure of phonological representations (pp. 131–175). Dordrecht: Foris.Google Scholar
Krashen, S. D. (1982). Principles and practice in second language acquisition. Oxford: Pergamon Press.Google Scholar
Kucera, H., & Francis, W. N. (1967). Computational analysis of present day American English. Providence, RI: Brown University Press.Google Scholar
Landau, B., & Gleitman, L. R. (1985). Language and experience: Evidence from the blind child. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Lardiere, D. (1993). L2 acquisition of English synthetic compounding is not constrained by level-ordering (and neither, probably, is LI). Unpublished manuscript, Boston University.Google Scholar
Lipton, P. (1991). Inference to the best explanation. London: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacWhinney, B. (1991). The CHILDES project. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Madison, D., Malenka, R., & Nicoll, R. (1991). Mechanisms underlying long-term potentiation of synaptic transmission. Annual Review of Neuroscience, 14, 379–397.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Marcus, G. F. (1993). Negative evidence in language acquisition. Cognition, 46, 53–85.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Neville, H. (1988). Cerebral organization for spatial attention: Effects of early sensory and language experience. In Stiles-Davis, J., Kritchevsky, M. & Bellugi, U. (Eds.), Spatial cognition: Brain bases and development (pp. 327–341). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Neville, H. (1991). Neurobiology of cognitive and language processing: Effects of early experience. In Gibson, K. R. & Peterson, A. C. (Eds.), Brain maturation and cognitive development: Comparative and cross-cultural perspectives (pp. 355–380). Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Neville, H., Nicol, J., Barss, A., Forster, K., & Garrett, M. (1991). Syntactically based sentence processing classes: Evidence from event-related brain potentials. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 3, 151–165.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Penfield, W., & Jasper, H. (1954). Epilepsy and the functional anatomy of the human brain. Boston: Little, Brown.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pettet, M., & Gilbert, C. (1992). Dynamic changes in receptive-field size in cat primary visual cortex. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, 889, 8366–8370.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pinker, S. (1990, 10). Rules and associations in human language. Paper presented at the Fourth Conference on the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory, Irvine, CA.Google Scholar
Prasada, S., Pinker, S., & Snyder, W. (1990, 12). Some evidence that irregular forms are retrieved from memory but regular forms are rule-generated. Paper presented at the 31st meeting of the Psychometric Society, New Orleans.Google Scholar
Pulvermüller, F. (1993). On connecting syntax and the brain. In Aertsen, A. (Ed.), Brain theory: Spatiotemporal aspects of brain function (pp. 131–145). New York: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Pulvermüller, F. (1994). Syntax and brain mechanisms: Perspectives of a multidisciplinary science of language. Kognitionswissenschaft, 4, 17–31.Google Scholar
Pulvermüller, F., & Schumann, J. H. (1994). Neurobiological mechanisms of language acquisition. Language Learning, 44, 681–734.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pylyshyn, Z. W. (1984). Computation and cognition. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Schumann, J. H. (1978). The acculturation model for second language acquisition. In Gingras, R. (Ed.), Second language acquisition and foreign language teaching (pp. 27–50). Arlington, VA: Center for Applied Linguistics.Google Scholar
Schumann, J. H. (1990a). Extending the scope of the acculturation/pidginization model to include cognition. TESOL Quarterly, 24, 667–684.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schumann, J. H. (1990b). The role of the amygdala as a mediator of affect and cognition in second language acquisition. In Alatis, J. E. (Ed.), Proceedings of the Georgetown University Round Table on Language and Linguistics (pp. 169–176). Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.Google Scholar
Schumann, J. H. (1993). Some problems with falsification: An illustration from SLA research. Applied Linguistics, 14, 295–306.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shepherd, G. (1988). Neurobiology (2d ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Solan, L. (1987). Parameter setting and the development of pronouns and reflexives. In Roeper, T. & Williams, E. (Eds.), Parameter setting (pp. 189–210). Dordrecht: Reidel.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tallal, P., Ross, R., & Curtiss, S. (1989). Familial aggregation in specific language impairment. Journal of Speech and Hearing Disorders, 54, 167–173.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tomblin, J. B. (1989). Familial concentration of developmental language impairment. Journal of Speech and Hearing Disorders, 54, 287–295.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Turkewitz, G. (1988). A prenatal source for the development of hemispheric specialization. In Molfese, D. & Segalowitz, S. J. (Eds.), Brain lateralization in children: Developmental implications (pp. 73–81). New York: Guilford Press.Google Scholar
Waddington, C. (1961). Genetic assimilation. In Caspari, E. & Thoday, J. (Eds.), Advances in genetics (Vol. 10, pp. 257–293). New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Weinberger, N. M., McGaugh, J. L., & Lynch, G. (Eds.). (1985). Memory systems of the brain. New York: Guilford Press.Google Scholar
Wexler, K., & Chien, Y.-C. (1985). The development of lexical anaphors and pronouns. Papers and Reports on Child Language Development, 24, 138–149.Google Scholar
Wexler, K., & Manzini, R. (1987). Parameters and learnability in binding theory. In Roeper, T. & Williams, E. (Eds.), Parameter setting (pp. 41–76). Dordrecht: Reidel.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yamada, J. E. (1990). Laura: A case for the modularity of language. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar