Posted: Nov 20, 2010 5:32 pm
This post remained unanswered, but I think it proposes an interesting topic: how are those “words for the nonexistent” learned? Are there empirical studies about this issue?
I guess that the first words learned by children are operants related to concrete responses and stimuli (i.e., Skinner´s “mands” and “tacts”: correct responses of the child to requests are reinforced, correct verbal requests of the child are reinforced, correct naming responses by the child are reinforced, correct orienting responses after hearing a name are reinforced). Then the relational operants allow to combine words and relational frames, creating relational nets (e.g.: “cat is a kind of animal”, “cat is different from dog”, “cat is gato in spanish”, etc.), and also allow to recombine words and relational frames in novel ways, generating those “words for the nonexistent” as one of the effects of this relational recombination: we can recombine “horse” and “with wings” to get the concept of “Pegasus”, and we can recombine “creator” and “of the Universe” to get the concept of “God”. I guess this capacity might be beneficial or harmful, depending on the context.
I guess that the first words learned by children are operants related to concrete responses and stimuli (i.e., Skinner´s “mands” and “tacts”: correct responses of the child to requests are reinforced, correct verbal requests of the child are reinforced, correct naming responses by the child are reinforced, correct orienting responses after hearing a name are reinforced). Then the relational operants allow to combine words and relational frames, creating relational nets (e.g.: “cat is a kind of animal”, “cat is different from dog”, “cat is gato in spanish”, etc.), and also allow to recombine words and relational frames in novel ways, generating those “words for the nonexistent” as one of the effects of this relational recombination: we can recombine “horse” and “with wings” to get the concept of “Pegasus”, and we can recombine “creator” and “of the Universe” to get the concept of “God”. I guess this capacity might be beneficial or harmful, depending on the context.