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5 - Talking and Thinking: The Role of Speech in Social Understanding

from Part II - Language, Communication, Social Cognition, and Awareness

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 July 2009

By
Jeremy Carpendale ,
Charlie Lewis ,
Noah Susswein  and
Joanna Lunn
Edited by
Adam Winsler ,
Charles Fernyhough  and
Ignacio Montero
Adam Winsler
Affiliation:
George Mason University, Virginia
Charles Fernyhough
Affiliation:
University of Durham
Ignacio Montero
Affiliation:
Universidad Autónoma de Madrid
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Summary

How talking and thinking or language and thought relate to one another has been discussed through generations in philosophy, linguistics, and psychology. This is once again reemerging as an important issue in social development with new evidence that language acquisition tends to be correlated with social cognitive development. The specific part played by language and the function of social interaction more generally have emerged as factors of central importance in current research on social cognitive development, or children's so-called theory of mind (Astington & Baird, 2005; Carpendale & Lewis, 2004, 2006; Symons, 2004). Here we review approaches to the relations between language and thought, and discuss our position on the role of language in social cognitive development.

We should be clear, however, that the relations described between language and thought depend on one's view of these phenomena. Even to discuss such links appears to presuppose that the two are separable and monolithic entities that can interact. From our perspective, language and thought are overall umbrella terms that include different aspects of human activity. Asking questions, making requests, persuading, apologizing, and joking are diverse examples of what makes up language. Similarly, although thought may include imagining the smell of roses, remembering to buy a bouquet for one's spouse and then calculating the cost, or attempting to figure out why a particular rose bush is not doing well in one's garden, these diverse activities seem to have little in common.

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Chapter
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Private Speech, Executive Functioning, and the Development of Verbal Self-Regulation , pp. 83 - 94
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2009

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