Speech errors

Old Data in Search of New Theories

Dados Bibliográficos

ID3988397
AutoresBrian Butterworth (0000-0001-8201-3347, autor correspondente)
Ano1981
Volume19
Fascículo7-8
Data de publicação1981-01-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoLinguistics (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0024-3949 • E-ISSN: 1613-396X
EditoraWalter de Gruyter GmbH (PUBLISHER • DE)
DOI10.1515/ling.1981.19.7-8.627
OpenAlexW2005016250
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas13
Referências citadas2

Recent theories of speech production have sought to explain speech errors in terms of the permutation or decay of intended elements. More venerable accounts Freud, Meringer and Mayer on the other hand, acknowledged the influence of unintended elements on the occurrence and nature of errors, and offered data whose most plausible explanation seemed to be in terms of the effects of unintended material. In this paper, I re-examine the claims made by these authors, along with modern attempts to explain away their problematic data. Recent theories are also committed to a strict sequence of processing stages, but a closer examination of both modern and older corpora reveals an improbable proportion of errors caused, apparently, by the malfunction of two or more theoretically independent stages. There seems to be no way of naturally extending strictly sequential models to accommodate these data, and the sketch of an alternative is proposed in which strict sequence is replaced by parallel processes with checking. 1. The sources of error In the seminal work on speech errors, Versprechen und Verlesen, Rudolf Meringer and Karl Mayer proposed three distinct sources of error: (i) interference from intended elements of the utterance (what I shall call PLAN INTERNAL ERRORS); (ii) interference from an alternative formulation of the intended thought (ALTERNATIVE PLAN ERRORS); (iii) interference from an unintended thought (COMPETING PLAN ERRORS). Of course, both alternative and competing plan errors can be thought of as involving competition, but at different levels or stages of production. Informally, alternative plan errors involve competition between ways of expressing or formulating an intended message; whereas, competing plan errors involve competition between separate messages, intended or unintended. Baars (1980) has recently proposed 'competing plans' as the 'trigger' for erroneous output, but for him both type (ii) and type (iii) errors fall under this rubric. Most other modern authors assign nearly all errors to category (i); Freud, on the other hand, wanted to assign all errors to category (iii), in fact, to a special subcategory of (iii) which will be discussed below. I shall argue that modern theories are based almost entirely on errors assigned to the plan internal category, are designed therefore just to account for this type, and cannot be extended in a natural and consistent way to deal with alternative plan errors (except for two subcategories of these) and thus have to ignore these venerable but inconvenient data. Two authors have proposed fairly detailed models that attempt to trace the entire route from thought to articulate speech using speech error data, Fromkin (1971: 1973) and Garrett (1975; 1976; 1980a; 1980b). Both models are well-known and widely cited, and both provide adequate treatments for large and varied corpora of error data. There have been admirable attempts to treat particular aspects of errors; for example, Shattuck-Hufnagel (1980; Shattuck-Hufnagel and Klatt, 1979) has provided a very detailed treatment of segmental movement errors; Fay and Cutler (1977) offer a n interesting account of a certain kind of word substitution error. However, Fromkin and Garrett have tried to provide a comprehensive framework for treating classes of errors from lexical, intonational and syntactic errors to phonetic feature movements and articulatory errors. Since, as will be seen, error categories (i)-(iii) cut across linguistic levels, my essay will concentrate on these two models. Plan internalerrors. It is assumed by all writers that the generation of an utterance involves the translation o r transduction of an intended thought into articulate speech via a hierarchy of levels of linguistic description roughly, syntactic structures, intonational patterns, words (or morphemes), sequences of items representing sounds, sequences of motor commands, etc. Authors disagree about the number of levels, the precise nature of descriptions at each level and the ordering of levels. Generally, it is held that at a given linguistic level there will be a (not necessarily complete) representation of the intended elements. So at a level where words (or morphemes) are represented, errors can lead to the anticipation, perseveration or transposition of these elements. a. Die Milo von Venus Target: 'Die Venus von Milo' (Meringer and Mayer, 1895). Old data in new theories 629 b. There you go again powdering mich (me) with deiner (your) puff. Target: 'There you go again powdering dich (yourself) with meiner (my) puff' (Freud, 1924). c. in the phonology of theory Target: 'in the theory of phonology' (Fromkin, 1971). d. although murder is a form of suicide Target: 'although suicide is a form of murder' (Garrett, 1975). At a presumably later level, where the sounds of words are represented, interfering elements need not be whole words but individual sound segments: (2) a . Eine Sorte von Tacher Target: 'Eine Torte von Sacher' (Meringer and Mayer, 1895). b. . . . durch die Ase natmen Target: 'durch die Nase atmen' (Freud, 1924). c. the nipper is zarrow Target: 'the zipper is narrow' (Fromkin, 1971). d . the little burst of beaden Target: 'the little beast of burden' (Garrett, 1975). Of course, not all errors yield the complete transposition of elements: there are, probably, at least as many errors of anticipation and perseveration of elements. We also find examples of the substitution of an unintended element for an intended element. Thus at the word level, whole word substitutions are widely observed. (3) a. Ich gebe die Preparate in den Briefkasten (letter box). Target: ' . . . i n den Brutkasten' (incubator) (Meringer and Mayer, 1895: 74). b. . . . they are certainly unusual people, they all possess Geizl (greed) I meant to say Geist (cleverness) (Freud, 1924). c. I really like to hate to get up in the morning (Frornkin, 197 d . At low speeds it's too light. Target: ' . . .heavy' (Garrett, 1975). Notice that in (3a) and (3b) the substituted word is similar in sound but different in meaning from the intended word; whereas in (3c) and (3d) the substituted word is similar in meaning but different in sound. All corpora report both kinds. Either kind of word substitution of course constitutes a prima facie problem for a plan internal explanation. A variety of solutions are possible and have been proposed. All require the postulation of

Linguistics · Natural language processing · Theoretical linguistics · Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science · Linguistic research and analysis · Philosophy · Phonetics and Phonology Research · Psychology · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation