Name: 語言和認知理論 (Theories of Language and Cognition)
Uploaded: 2021-01-14T06:29:35.000Z
Duration: 5 min 7 s

then you know that some words don't translate exactly.

你就會知道有些字不能直接翻譯

For example, there's a language in New Guinea that

meaning "bright," and mili, meaning "dark."

是「亮」的意思，而mili則是「暗」

我們有很多詞彙可以形容顏色--

blue, green, teal, mauve, all that stuff.

But does the fact that we have different words for color

mean that we actually think about color differently?

就代表我們對顏色的看法不同嗎？

And your answer to that question places you

你對這個問題的答案關係到你在

on one position of the great language-thought debate.

And on one end, we have something called universalism.

This theory says that thought comes before language.

So your thoughts dictate the language that develops.

所以你的想法支配發展出的語言

So going back to our New Guinean example,

a universalist would say that that group of people

and if they had concepts or ideas about other colors,

而如果他們對其他色彩有概念或想法

that thought determines language completely.

And now here, at this point, we have the idea

而在這裡，這個時間點，我們了解到

Just a little bit gentler of a statement.

And this is the idea that Piaget ascribed to.

Piaget came up with a theory of cognitive development

皮亞傑建構出一套幼兒的認知發展理論

in children, and it was because of this and his observations

因為這套理論和他對孩童的觀察

of children that he believed that once children

then they developed the language to describe those thoughts.

他們便發展出用以形容這些這些想法的語言

So, for example, when children learn that objects continue

所以，舉例來說，當小孩明白儘管看不見物品

to exist even though they can't see them,

像是「消失」、「不見」、「找到」

So their language development is influenced

by their cognitive development and their newly-discovered

他們的認知發展和他們新開發的

ability to understand that objects exist,

And now, a little further down, towards the more middle ground,

現在，往下走一點，往較中立的立場

And Vygotsky thought that language and thought are

independent, but they converge through development.

是獨立的，但經由發展，它們交會

So he didn't really say if language influenced thought

他並沒有真的說語言是否影響認知

He just said they're both there, they're both independent,

他只說它們都存在著，它們都是獨立的

but eventually, you learn to use them at the same time.

develop language through social interaction

with adults who already know the language.

與已經了解該語言的成人進行社會互動

learn to connect their thoughts and the language

學會連結他們的想法和他們終於學會

OK, so now we're crossing over the middle ground

好了，現在我們要走過中間地帶

So these are called the weak and the strong hypotheses.

And this isn't a value judgment on how good they are

for us to think in certain ways depending

So, for example, I'm going to read you a sentence,

and I want you to draw it out or at least vividly imagine it.

我要你把它畫出來，或至少生動的想像那個畫面

OK, so however you drew that out or imagined it,

if you drew it this way, with the girl on the left pushing

the boy toward the right, than your native language probably

把男孩推向右邊，那麼你的母語可能是

If you drew the girl pushing the boy this way,

with the girl on the right pushing toward the left,

one that reads from right to left, like Hebrew.

從右到左書寫的，像是希伯來文

Now, it's not that you can't or didn't even draw it

It's just that, depending on how your language is structured,

for you to think about that action in a certain direction.

that language determines thought completely.

This is also called the Whorfian hypothesis,

because the guy that came up with it, his name was Whorf.

因為提出這個主張的人叫沃爾夫

And he observed that there is a Native American tribe called

他觀察到有一個美國原住民部落叫作

the Hopi that don't have any grammatical tense