Cognition and Communication Research Centre, Department of Psychology, Northumbria University, Northumberland Building, Northumberland Road, Newcastle upon Tyne NE18ST, UK.
Cognition. 2010 Sep;116(3):444-9. doi: 10.1016/j.cognition.2010.06.004. Epub 2010 Jul 7.
Human languages may be shaped not only by the (individual psychological) processes of language acquisition, but also by population-level processes arising from repeated language learning and use. One prevalent feature of natural languages is that they avoid unpredictable variation. The current work explores whether linguistic predictability might result from a process of iterated learning in simple diffusion chains of adults. An iterated artificial language learning methodology was used, in which participants were organised into diffusion chains: the first individual in each chain was exposed to an artificial language which exhibited unpredictability in plural marking, and subsequent learners were exposed to the language produced by the previous learner in their chain. Diffusion chains, but not isolate learners, were found to cumulatively increase predictability of plural marking by lexicalising the choice of plural marker. This suggests that such gradual, cumulative population-level processes offer a possible explanation for regularity in language.
人类语言不仅可能受到语言习得的个体心理过程的影响，还可能受到源于反复语言学习和使用的群体水平过程的影响。自然语言的一个普遍特征是它们避免不可预测的变化。目前的研究探讨了语言的可预测性是否可能是成人简单扩散链中迭代学习的结果。使用了迭代人工语言学习方法，其中将参与者组织成扩散链：每个链中的第一个个体接触到一种在复数标记方面表现出不可预测性的人工语言，随后的学习者接触到其链中前一个学习者产生的语言。结果发现，只有扩散链而不是孤立的学习者通过将复数标记的选择词汇化，逐渐提高了复数标记的可预测性。这表明，这种渐进的、累积的群体水平过程为语言的规律性提供了一种可能的解释。
