Page 73 - The Modul of Psycholinguistics Studies_2

2. Four Theories Regarding the Dependence of Thought And
Culture On Language

Theory 1: Speech is essential for thought (We must learn
how to speak aloud, otherwise we cannot develop thinking).

Proponents:
a. Thought is a kind of behaviour, speech, which originates
from speech production (verbal or non-verbal)

b. Thought develops as a kind of speech
By speaking aloud, you start to speak subvocally or make
internal articulations.(Thought is defined as subvocal

speech or behaviour)
Why is speech production not necessary in order to think?

(Inadequacies of the theory):
a. Children having no speech production can comprehend
and think.

E.g Hearing persons who are born mute. If a person can
comprehend the meaning of speech, that person must

have the ability to think.
b. Speech comprehension, which implies thought, develops
from speech production in normal children- Speech

comprehension precedes speech production. In other
words, speech comprehension is the basis for speech

production.
E.g Children who could only produce single-word
utterances could understand syntactic structures

composed of more than one word. This shows that the
children‟s level of speech comprehension is well in

advanced of their level of speech production, which is an
only one-word production.
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