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Role of Linguistic Experience in the Perception of Speech

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Perception and Experience

Part of the book series: Perception and Perceptual Development ((PPD,volume 1))

Abstract

Although the linguistic and psycholinguistic theories of the 1960s emphasized the predispositional and maturational aspects of language acquisition, no one denies that experiential variables have profound effects on all aspects of the development of language functions. The knowledge of a language possessed by a normal adult is a product of many years of exposure to a specific language environment. Both receptive and expressive modes of language behavior are molded by the speaker-hearer’s interaction with the linguistic community. In literate societies, the perceptual aspects of receptive language function include both vision (reading) and audition (speech perception), but, obviously, the latter is the primary mode by which language is learned and used by all normal humans. (For a comparison and contrast of the visual and auditory modes, see Kavanagh and Mattingly, 1972.)

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Strange, W., Jenkins, J.J. (1978). Role of Linguistic Experience in the Perception of Speech. In: Walk, R.D., Pick, H.L. (eds) Perception and Experience. Perception and Perceptual Development, vol 1. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4684-2619-9_5

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