A unique overview of the human language faculty at all levels of organization. Language is not only one of the most complex cognitive functions that we command, it is also the aspect of the mind that makes us uniquely human. Research suggests that the human brain exhibits a language readiness not found in the brains of other species. This volume brings together contributions from a range of fields to examine humans' language capacity from multiple perspectives, analyzing it at genetic, neurobiological, psychological, and linguistic levels. In recent decades, advances in computational modeling, neuroimaging, and genetic sequencing have made possible new approaches to the study of language, and the contributors draw on these developments. The book examines cognitive architectures, investigating the functional organization of the major language skills; learning and development trajectories, summarizing the current understanding of the steps and neurocognitive mechanisms in language processing; evolutionary and other preconditions for communication by means of natural language; computational tools for modeling language; cognitive neuroscientific methods that allow observations of the human brain in action, including fMRI, EEG/MEG, and others; the neural infrastructure of language capacity; the genome's role in building and maintaining the language-ready brain; and insights from studying such language-relevant behaviors in nonhuman animals as birdsong and primate vocalization. Section editors Christian F. Beckmann, Carel ten Cate, Simon E. Fisher, Peter Hagoort, Evan Kidd, Stephen C. Levinson, James M. McQueen, Antje S. Meyer, David Poeppel, Caroline F. Rowland, Constance Scharff, Ivan Toni, Willem Zuidema

“What this book proposes to do,” writes Derek Bickerton, “is to stand the conventional wisdom of the behavioral sciences on its head: instead of the human species growing clever enough to invent language, it will view that species as blundering into language and, as a direct result of that, becoming clever.” According to Bickerton, the behavioral sciences have failed to give an adequate account of human nature at least partly because of the conjunction and mutual reinforcement of two widespread beliefs: that language is simply a means of communication and that human intelligence is the result of the rapid growth and unusual size of human brains. Bickerton argues that each of the properties distinguishing human intelligence and consciousness from that of other animals can be shown to derive straightforwardly from properties of language. In essence, language arose as a representational system, not a means of communication or a skill, and not a product of culture but an evolutionary adaptation. The author stresses the necessity of viewing intelligence in evolutionary terms, seeing it not as problem solving but as a way of maintaining homeostasis—the preservation of those conditions most favorable to an organism, the optimal achievable conditions for survival and well-being. Nonhumans practice what he calls “on-line thinking” to maintain homeostasis, but only humans can employ off-line thinking: “only humans can assemble fragments of information to form a pattern that they can later act upon without having to wait on that great but unpunctual teacher, experience.” The term protolanguage is used to describe the stringing together of symbols that prehuman hominids employed. “It did not allow them to turn today’s imagination into tomorrow’s fact. But it is just this power to transform imagination into fact that distinguishes human behavior from that of our ancestral species, and indeed from that of all other species. It is exactly what enables us to change our behavior, or invent vast ranges of new behavior, practically overnight, with no concomitant genetic changes.” Language and Human Behavior should be of interest to anyone in the behavioral and evolutionary sciences and to all those concerned with the role of language in human behavior.

Showing the far-reaching psycho- and sociolinguistic utility of this theory, Tobin demonstrates its applicability to the teaching of phonetics, text analysis, and the theory of language acquisition.

Written by leading experts in language and cognition, this groundbreaking behavior analysis textbook brings the study of verbal behavior into the 21st century with cutting-edge research. Students and clinicians in the burgeoning field of applied behavior analysis will find the theoretical foundation they need to effectively help the increasingly diverse clients seeking their services. The origins of behavior analysis can be traced to the pioneering work of B.F. Skinner. Skinner’s fundamental insights into how human behavior is shaped, maintained, and can be changed were powerful and far-reaching. Some of Skinner’s most innovative contributions were in the study of language. Behavior analytic work in the area of language and cognition did not stop with Skinner, however. Indeed, Skinner’s work in this area has inspired considerable expansion, particularly with an eye toward more sophisticated verbal and cognitive repertoires. This important volume provides an overview of the concepts and core behavioral processes involved in language and cognition. You’ll find a deeper exploration of complex linguistic and cognitive skills, including generative responding, learning by observation, and perspective taking. Also included are clinically supported interventions based in mindfulness, psychological flexibility, and emotion regulation to help clients improve complex language, social, and academic skills. The future of behavior analysis is here. With its focus on the importance of language and cognition, this textbook is a must-read for anyone studying or practicing in the science of behavior.

In these newly edited, annotated, and contextualized foundational linguistic works, many previously unpublished, the late William Diver of Columbia University radically analyzes language as a structure shaped by communicative function and by characteristics of its human users.