Categorical perception: Issues, methods, findings.
| Number | 443 |
|---|---|
| Year | 1984 |
| Drawer | 8 |
| Entry Date | 11/19/1999 |
| Authors | Repp, B. H. |
| Contact | |
| Publication | In N. J. Lass (Ed.), Speech and language: Advances in basic research and practice (Vol. 10). (pp. 243-335). New York: Academic Press. |
| url | http://www.haskins.yale.edu/Reprints/HL0443.pdf |
| Abstract | [Introduction] Ever since the beginning of language-and perhaps even earlier-human beings have classified things and events into categories. Categorization occurs when we focus on important properties that are common to different objects and ignore irrelevant detail. Although such an act of attention is commonly accompanied by verbal statements, categorization may also occur covertly. However, the fact that most categories do have names is definitely advantageous in communication. For example, the name of an object or event may still be recalled when memories of physical details have long faded. It is not suprising, therefore, that category names form the core of our vocabulary. Many of the categories we have are natural-they reflect obvious physical partitions among things in the world, and there is little question or choice as to what is included in a particular category and what is not. Other categories, however, are less transparent, and may reflect special knowledge or conventions. Some scientific categories fall in this class; for example, the zoologist’s category of “fish” excludes dolphins and whales but includes eels and sea horses, whereas a prescientific, shape-oriented category of “fish” might include the former but exclude the latter. In addition, there are cases, such as those involving aesthetic judgment or preference, where individuals are free to draw the boundaries between categories. Categories based on relative judgment (size, weight, speech, etc.) are totally situation-specific and essentially arbitrary. The categories of speech-which include the phonetic segments, or phonemes-play an important part in linguistic theory and are implicated in the development and continued use of alphabetic writing. However, illiterates have little awareness of them (Morias, Cary, Alegria, & Bertelson, 1979); non linguists know them only in a vague fashion, commonly mistaking letters for phonemes; and even among specialists, there are disputes about their precise nature and description. Did linguists nearly invent these categories for the purpose of abstract description, or did they discover an unimportant, though not very transparent, principle of discrete organization that underlies human speech production and perception? And if the latter, do the proposed descriptive categories map directly onto the funcational categories of active speech communication? These questions are aspects of the more general question about the psychological reality of the products of linguistic analysis -an issue that lies at the heart of modern psycholinguistics. Categorical perception research in the speech domain is concerned with the perceptual reality of phonetic segments-that is, with the role of phonetic categories in perceptual processing regardless of whether the perceiver has any awareness of them. Although categorical perception research is, in principle, a rather broad area of inquiry permitting a variety of methods, over the years it has become identified with a particular laboratory paradigm, That paradigm has generated a large amount of useful research that presents a challenge to theories of speech perception. However, in recent years, there have been some signs of exhaustion. This seems a good time to review some of the history, methods, and problems of categorical perception research and to try to seem where we stand. We will begin with a historical overview. The studies mentioned will be discussed in greater detail in later sections. |
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