Pattern Learning in Language (2014)

Undergraduate: Rachel Broad

Faculty Advisor: Katya Pertsova
Department: Linguistics

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The process of language learning involves acquiring an array of intricate patterns, both conscious and subconscious and in areas such as phonology and morphology. Pattern learning (or categorization) has long been studied in cognitive psychology and many experiments have investigated its effects in visual learning. However, the relatively complex process of pattern learning in language is not well understood. Fundamental questions of whether the same cognitive processes are used for non-linguistic and linguistic learning and how various factors may affect learning have yet to be answered. This study takes a preliminary look at these questions through a web-based experiment. Pilot tests investigated the relative salience of the chosen stimuli and the relative difficulty of morphological learning given various pattern structures.