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Semester 2

Human Speech: Beyond Written Language (PSYL10180)

Subject

Psychology

College

CAHSS

Credits

20

Normal Year Taken

3

Delivery Session Year

2023/2024

Pre-requisites

Visiting students must be studying Psychology as their degree major, and have completed at least 3 Psychology courses at grade B or above. We will only consider University/College level courses. **Please see Additional Restrictions below**

Course Summary

This course examines how speech is produced and comprehended from a cognitive psychology and social communication perspective, focusing on aspects of speech not typically written down (e.g. intonation, loudness, disfluencies).

Course Description

This course will explore the production and comprehension of human speech from the perspectives of cognitive psychology and social communication. A particular focus of the course is those aspects of speech which are not conveyed in writing, such as the ways in which we speak (intonation, loudness etc.) the noises we make which are not conventionally written down (*um*, *uh*, and other disfluencies), and the gestures and movements we make while speaking. **The course has three parts. *In the first, we will explore how words and sentences are produced, what humans do beyond language to support that production (managing rhythm, holding the floor), and what happens when the production system runs into difficulties. We will also investigate how aspects of speech which are not typically written down can be used to influence the meaning of what is said (for example, when attempting to deceive the listener). *In the second part, we will focus on the comprehension of human speech, looking at how words and sentences are deciphered and focusing particularly on the non-written aspects: Are listeners able to use signs of difficulty to help them understand speakers intentions? Are they sensitive to cues about floor-holding and turn-taking? Are they able to discern cues that the speaker doesn't literally mean what they are saying? *In the final part of the course, we will explore how written language is changing to become more speech-like, for example by including written disfluencies, and by adding emoji to convey emotions. **The course will be delivered as a series of 10 1-hour lectures and 10 1-hour seminars. The seminars will typically cover one or more relevant papers, and will include content on research design: How can we design experiments to evaluate the ways in which human speech is produced and understood?

Assessment Information

Written Exam 0%, Coursework 100%, Practical Exam 0%

Additional Restrictions

Unless you are nominated on a Psychology exchange agreement, visiting students are only permitted to enrol in one 3rd year Psychology course each, per semester, before the start of the relevant semester’s welcome period – and spaces on each course are limited so cannot be guaranteed for any student. Enrolment in a second course from this group will depend on whether there are still spaces available in the January Welcome Period, and cannot be guaranteed. It is NOT appropriate for students to contact staff within this subject area to ask for an exception to be made; all enquiries to enrol in these courses must be made through the CAHSS Visiting Student Office. This is due to the extremely limited number of spaces available in this very popular subject area.

view the timetable and further details for this course