Our Unconscious Mind Catches Grammatical Errors

The brain comprehends the syntax of language at an unconscious level.

Published on May 15, 2013 by Christopher Bergland in The Athlete's Way

The paomnehal pweor of the hmuan mnid.

Typing on a keyboard is a perfect example of how ourunconscious mind processes language and functions on autopilot. Are you someone who hunts and pecks or do you type without looking at the keys? I had to take mandatory typing when I was in high school and was trained to type the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog (which holds all 26 letters of the alphabet) as quickly as possible without looking at the keys. By typing without looking at the keys you learn implicitly where all the letters on a keyboard are located. To this day, I have no conscious awareness of where each letter is on the keyboard, but my fingers find them automatically. This is a universal phenomenon. If I asked you where the "J" and "F" are on your keyboard, would you know? However, I bet you can find them quickly without thinking much about it when you are typing or texting a sentence on autopilot. In 2010, researchers at Vanderbilt University published a study titled Fingers Detect Typos Even When Conscious Brain Doesnt, which confirmed this phenomenon. The skill of typing is managed by an autopilot system. When you type, you are able to catch errors even before they are picked up by your conscious brain. "We all know we do some things on autopilot, from walking to doing familiar tasks like making coffee and, in this study, typing. What we don't know as scientists is how people are able to control their autopilots," Gordon Logan, Centennial Professor of Psychology and lead author of the study, said. "The remarkable thing we found is that these processes are disassociated. The hands know when the hands make an error, even when the mind does not." Unconscious Mind Picks Up Grammatical Errors Neuroscientists at the University of Oregon recently discovered that people detect grammatical errors with no conscious awareness of doing so. Their study titled Grammar Errors? The Brain Detects Them Even When You Are Unaware was published in the May 8, 2013 issue of the Journal of Neuroscience. In the study, subjects were flashed a series of experimental sentencessome were syntactically (grammatically) incorrect and others that were grammatically correct such as: "We drank Lisa's brandy by the fire in the lobby" vs. "We drank Lisa's by brandy the fire in the lobby."

While observing the sentences a 50 millisecond audio tone was played which distracted the participants enough to allow researchers to measure the conscious vs. unconscious awareness of grammatical errors. Researchers used electroencephalography and focused on a signal known as the Event-Related Potential (ERP) to measure brain activity. Lead author Laura Batterink describes the method saying, "Participants had to respond to the tone as quickly as they could, indicating if its pitch was low, medium or high." Adding, "The grammatical violations were fully visible to participants, but because they had to complete this extra task, they were often not consciously aware of the violations. They would read the sentence and have to indicate if it was correct or incorrect. If the tone was played immediately before the grammatical violation, they were more likely to say the sentence was correct even it wasn't." Helen J. Neville, co-author of the study said, The key to conscious awareness is based on whether or not a person can declare an error, and the tones disrupted participants' ability to declare the errors. But, even when the participants did not notice these errors, their brains responded to them. These undetected errors also delayed participants' reaction times to the tones." The brain processes syntactic information implicitly, in the absence of awareness. The authors observed that, "While other aspects of language, such as semantics and phonology, can also be processed implicitly, the present data represent the first direct evidence that implicit mechanisms also play a role in the processing of syntax, the core computational component of language." Two-Year-Olds Can Understand Complex Grammar This new research from the University of Oregon confirms findings of previous studies. In 2010, researchers at the University of Liverpools Child Language Study Centre found that children as young as two-years-old could decipher sentences containing made-up verbs, such as 'the rabbit is glorping the duck.' When asked to match the sentence with a cartoon picture, even a two-year-old could identify the correct image with the correct sentence. The Liverpool study suggested that infants know more about language structure than they are able to articulate, and at a much earlier age than previously thought. Children may use the structure of sentences to understand new words, which may help explain the speed at which infants acquire speech. Dr. Caroline Rowland from the Institute of Psychology, Health and Society said: "When acquiring a language, children must learn not only the meaning of words but also how to combine words to convey meaning. Most two year olds rarely combine more than two words together. They may say 'more juice' or 'no hat', but don't know how to form full sentences yet." Studies suggest that young children build their understanding of grammar gradually by observing and listening to people. Understanding syntax may be more of an implicit than explicit brain function. Even at 21 months when infants cant yet articulate words properly they are already sensitive to the different meanings created by particular grammatical constructions. It appears that the brains ability to pick up grammatical errors at an implicit level begins at a very young age. Rowland says, "Our work suggests that the words that children say aren't necessarily the extent of what they actually know about language and grammar. Adding, The beginnings of grammar acquisition start much earlier than previously thought, but more importantly it demonstrates that children can use grammar to help them work out the meaning of new words, particularly those that don't correspond to concrete objects such as 'know' and 'love'. Children can use the grammar of a sentence to narrow down possible meanings, making it much easier for them to learn."

Conclusion: Implicit Learning Also Applies to Second Languages Scientists continue to fine tune differences between how our brain processes implicit and explicit information. This week researchers in the UK also discovered that the cerebellum has evolved to play a key role in human intelligence and cognition. It may be time to consider new teaching strategies for language acquisition and how adults are taught a second language. Helen J. Neville from the University of Oregon concludes, Children often pick up grammar rules implicitly through routine daily interactions withparents or peers, simply hearing and processing new words and their usage before any formal instruction." She likens this type of learning to "Jabberwocky," the nonsensical poem from "Through the Looking Glass" by Lewis Carrol. In the story, Alice discovers a book that appears to be written in an unrecognizable language but later realizes that it was written inversely and is readable in a mirror. In terms of mastering a second language, Neville recommends to "Teach grammatical rules implicitly, without any semantics at all, like with jabberwocky. Get them to listen to jabberwocky, like a child does."

Intelligence And Politics Have a Complex Relationship

The way political views relate to intelligence may depend on social context.
Published on May 21, 2013 by Scott A. McGreal, MSc. in UniqueLike Everybody Else

This post is a response to Do Racism, Conservatism, and Low I.Q. Go Hand in Hand? by Goal Auzeen Saedi, Ph.D. Intelligence is easily one of the most controversial and divisive issues in scientific psychology. Add the issue of political ideology and the result is likely to stir up heated debate. Dr Goal Saedi recently touched on the subject of how intelligence is related to political ideology recently and appears to have provoked quite a strong response. The subject is a complex one and not yet fully understood. Studies on the topic have produced some conflicting findings, but one theme that seems to emerge is that the cultural context influences the way that intelligence and political orientation are related to each other. Related Articles
Conservatism Linked to Lack of Education Are Conservatives Really Less Intelligent--or Just More Mentalistic? Conservatives are DumberAnd SmarterThan Liberals Are Conservatives More "Anti-Science" Than Are Liberals? If you accept evolution, you must oppose over-regulation of the economy

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Psychologists have often been unkind to conservatives

A number of theories have been proposed about the nature of the relationship between political views and intelligence. Some scholars (for example Stankov, 2009) have argued that conservative political ideologies tend to be associated with lower intelligence on average. Conservatives generally value tradition, respect for authority, and social order, and tend to be leery ofinnovation and change. These scholars have argued that such values tend to be associated with cognitive rigidity and may therefore appeal to people who have difficulty with intellectual challenges that require them to process novel information. In support of this, Stankov (2009) cited evidence that people with more conservative views tend to score lower on IQ tests and to have lower levels of education. Not surprisingly, conservatives tend to react with anger to such assertions. Accusations of liberal bias among academics are often made and there does appear to be a degree of truth to these, especially among social psychologists in particular (e.g. Prentice, 2012). An alternative theory, originally proposed by Hans Eysenck, is that higher intelligence is associated with avoidance of extreme political views in general. Hence, more intelligent people are thought to be moderate/centrist in their political views. The argument is that more extreme views, whether rightwing or left-wing, tend to be associated with dogmatism and rigidity, which are more appealing to less intelligent people. A recent proponent of this view is Rinderman who argued that more intelligent people tend to have civic values that lead them to support political systems they believe will foster education and the growth of knowledge (Rindermann, Flores-Mendoza, & Woodley, 2012). Hence, according to this view, intelligent people tend to believe that moderate/centrist parties are more likely to promote their particular social interests compared to more clearly left or right parties. In support of this, Rinderman et al. cite findings from Great Britain and Brazil showing that people who expressed support for centrist parties (including centre-right and centre-left) had higher average IQs compared to those who supported more clearly left or right parties. An interesting finding from the study in Brazil was that people who had a political orientation at all tended to have a higher IQ than those who said they had no political orientation. This suggests that people who are more intelligent tend to be more interested in and informed about politics generally. It is worth noting that the average IQs cited for the various political orientations in Rinderman et al.s study were all well within the normal range (an IQ ranging between 90 110 is considered average). For example, those who supported centreright parties had an IQ around 105 whereas those who supported clearly left or right parties had IQs around 94.

Although Rinderman et al. found that more intelligent people tended to support more moderate views, an American study found the opposite effect. Kemmelmeier (2008) surveyed college students who scored above average in academic achievement tests (e.g. SAT and ACT) and found two trends. There was a linear trend for more intelligent students to be less conservative overall, in line with Stankovs findings. Additionally, there was a non-linear trend[1] for the most intelligent students to support more extreme (i.e. left or right-wing) political views as opposed to more moderate ones, contrary to the findings of Rinderman et al. Political views in this study were measured by first asking people how liberal vs. conservative they were, and additionally asking about their views on more specific issues referred to as traditional gender roles and anti-regulation attitudes. Participants views on the former issues (e.g. gaymarriage and abortion) were more strongly associated with their overall conservatism than their views on government regulation (e.g. gun control, higher taxes for the wealthy, speech codes on campus). Interestingly, higher intelligence was associated with less conservative views on traditional gender roles on the one hand, but more conservative views opposing government regulation. This suggests that more intelligent people in this study tended to support both greater personal freedom and less government regulation in general (libertarians take note). This finding is similar to a previous finding that higher education was associated with greater support for liberal social policies but not with support for greater economic regulation (Gerber, Huber, Doherty, Dowling, & Ha, 2010). The respective findings of Rinderman et al. and of Kemmelmeier would seem to contradict each other. The conflicting findings might possibly reflect differences between the samples. Participants in Rindermans study were predominantly of average intelligence, whereas those in Kemmelmeiers study were students from elite colleges with high levels of intellectual ability. Perhaps, there is a complicated relationship with intelligence such that people of average ability tend to prefer moderate views, whereas those with greater intellectual gifts might perceive more extreme ideologies, whether left or right-wing, as more sophisticated and hence more appealing. Further research is needed to assess whether this is the case. Another possibility is that the cultural context has an important impact on what political ideologies are most acceptable to intelligent people. The results of Rinderman et al.s study might have been influenced by the fact that Brazilian people have had a long history of living through more extreme political regimes than in the USA. Hence, intelligent, sophisticated voters in Brazil might be more wary of extreme political parties than in the United States. Additionally, the ideologies that intelligent people support might be influenced by social norms. Woodleys cultural mediation hypothesis proposes that that the highly intelligent are better at detecting and espousing the values that are normative at a particular time (Woodley, 2010). Hence, intellectuals might fluctuate in their support for left or right-wing views according to changing social norms. In support of this, Woodley notes a study of white South Africans in the 1980s that found that higher cognitive ability was correlated with support for traditional conservative religious and political views, which were socially normative in that time and place. Woodley argues that since the 1960s, post-materialist values have become normative among intellectuals in much of the Western world. Hence apparent associations between left-liberal views and intelligence may reflect currently prevailing Western values. The findings discussed illustrate a number of key points. Firstly, highly intelligent individuals may actually support right-wing views, not just left-wing ones, contrary to claims that support for right-wing positions reflects a lack of intellectual sophistication. It seems fair to say then that not only liberals, but conservatives (and those with other positions, such as libertarians) can have intellectually sophisticated reasons for their political views. The second point is that categorising people simply as generally liberal or conservative may mask differences in peoples views on social versus economic issues. The results of Kemmelmeiers study suggest that when people are asked if they are liberal or conservative, they may give more weight to their views on social issues (such as abortion and gay

rights) than to their views on economic issues (such as taxation). Therefore, in order to better understand how political attitudes are related to intelligence, a two-dimensional model that separates social and economic attitudes (see The Worlds Smallest Political Quiz for one example) may be preferable to the traditional yet overly simplistic left/right distinction. Finally, the relationship between intelligence and political attitudes is most likely not fixed in some simple way, but probably changes across time and context.