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11 - The phonological brain

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2013

Iris Berent
Affiliation:
Northeastern University, Boston
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Summary

Previous chapters have suggested that the human mind is equipped with core phonological knowledge – a system specialized for the computation of phonological structure. This chapter examines what brain mechanisms mediate phonological computation and evaluate their presumed genetic underpinnings. While the findings suggest that a neural phonological network certainly exists, they cannot determine whether this network is specialized for phonology. An answer to this question hinges on how specialization is defined, and, more generally, how cognitive explanations are linked to neuroanatomical models. Existing neuroanatomical models presently lack an explicit account of that link. I thus conclude that specialization, in general, and the hypothesis of core phonology, specifically, can be presently evaluated primarily at the functional, cognitive level. Neural data can be profitably correlated with functional findings, but they can rarely falsify functional hypotheses concerning specialization.

Individuating cognitive functions: functional specialization vs. hardware segregation

At the center of this book is the question of specialization: Are human minds equipped with a system specialized for phonological patterning? The previous chapters present several observations that are consistent with this possibility. We have seen that distinct phonological systems share design principles that distinguish them from nonlinguistic systems, that knowledge of grammatical universals is evident even when they concern structures unattested in one’s language, and that the capacity for phonological patterning emerges spontaneously, in the absence of a model. Not only are phonological constraints universal and possibly innate, but they are also demonstrably distinct from nonlinguistic pressures, most notably, the phonetic pressures governing the processing of aural stimuli and their production. Functional specialization, however, should be further mirrored at the neural level. If the mind has a specialized computational system dedicated to phonological patterning, then one would expect this special “software” to require a specialized brain “hardware” that mediates phonological computation. The brain networks that support phonological computation could potentially present another test for the specialization of the phonological mind.

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The Phonological Mind , pp. 251 - 279
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2013

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  • The phonological brain
  • Iris Berent, Northeastern University, Boston
  • Book: The Phonological Mind
  • Online publication: 05 February 2013
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139049610.016
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  • The phonological brain
  • Iris Berent, Northeastern University, Boston
  • Book: The Phonological Mind
  • Online publication: 05 February 2013
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139049610.016
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • The phonological brain
  • Iris Berent, Northeastern University, Boston
  • Book: The Phonological Mind
  • Online publication: 05 February 2013
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139049610.016
Available formats
×