Neurolinguistics, psycholinguistics, and cognitive linguistics

The three cognitive aspects of language studies – neurolinguistics, psycholinguistics, and cognitive linguistics – being interrelated, remain however individual fields.

Neurolinguistics centers on the problem ‘language and the brain’. Neurolinguistics investigates the basis in the human nervous system for language development and use. It specifically aims to construct a model of the brain’s control over the processes of speaking, listening, reading, writing, and signing. The ultimate objective is the BRAIN which is accessed through language (language  BRAIN). The data are collected from observing normal speech and speech deviating from the norm (language pathology). Contemporary studies of the brain’s activity use methods which employ new brain imaging technologies, among them positron emission tomography /PET/, magnetic resonance imaging /MRI/, functional magnetic resonance imaging /fMRI/, and magneto-encephalography), which can highlight patterns of brain activation as people engage in various language tasks (Fig. 3.2).

Fig. 3.2. Brain imaging

Psycholinguistics and cognitive linguistics focus on the problem ‘language and the mind’. Psycholinguistics is an experimental science. It studies the correlation between linguistic behavior and the mental processes and skills that underlie this behavior. It attempts to find the linguistic evidence for supporting the psychological theories as to how the mind works when people produce and comprehend speech. Thus, the ultimate objective of psycholinguistics is the MIND (language  MIND). In this respect, psycholinguistics is close to psychology. Besides, they both apply similar research methods grounded on observations and experiments, and similar data obtained from observing the actual speech behavior of adults and children.

Cognitive linguistics is a theoretical science. It aims to find the psychological (cognitive) evidence for explaining the phenomena of language and speech, so its ultimate objective is the LANGUAGE and its construal influenced by the mind’s workings (mind  LANGUAGE). Therefore, cognitive linguistics, as well as psycholinguistics, is concerned with exposure of the mental structures and cognitive operations that underlie language and speech. The methods used in cognitive linguistics (conceptual analysis in its various forms) are an extension of linguistic methods, especially those developed in structural semantics. The analyzed data are mostly represented by the systems of different languages, and by texts as the ‘products’ of speech. Theoretical assumptions formulated by cognitive linguistics are grounded on its own findings, the insights of other linguistic fields, and the data obtained by various disciplines contributing to cognitive science.

3. Neurolinguistics

The coining of the term "neurolinguistics" has been attributed to Harry Whitaker, who founded the Journal of Neurolinguistics in 1985. As an interdisciplinary field, neurolinguistics draws methodology and theory from fields such as neuroscience, neurobiology, neuropsychology, cognitive psychology, linguistics,  communication disorders,  computer science an others. Much work in neurolinguistics is focused on investigating how the brain can implement the processes that theoretical linguistics and psycholinguistics consider to be necessary in producing and comprehending language.