Project description
Shedding light on humans’ extraordinary language ability
Language acquisition, a hallmark of humanity, perplexes researchers due to its unique nature. Despite similarities in perceptual and cognitive mechanisms across species, only humans fully develop language skills. The precise mechanisms enabling this linguistic leap in infancy remain elusive. To solve this mystery, the ERC-funded GALA project investigates the biological foundations of early language acquisition, comparing nonhuman species with human newborns, infants, and adults. Specifically, it will investigate two linguistic constraints – Maximal Onset Principle and Sonority Hierarchy – across species and developmental stages using behavioural and neuroimaging methods. Overall, GALA aims to shed light on why humans alone possess this extraordinary ability.
Objective
Language is perhaps the most prominent feature that distinguishes humans from the rest of the animal kingdom. Nevertheless, many perceptual and learning mechanisms serving language acquisition are not tailored specifically to language nor to humans. Decades of research have shown that several animal species are equipped with perceptual, cognitive and neural architectures that allow to learn language but only humans end up doing so. The key features and mechanisms that make language learnable by very young humans are still unclear. The GALA project focuses on how humans begin to learn language, exploring the biological nature of the mechanisms at the ‘entry-gate’ of language through a comparative-developmental approach involving nonhuman species, human newborns, infants and adults.
Syllables are essential processing units of speech at the onset of language acquisition, through which newborns and infants preferentially encode and organize the speech signal. My proposal is that the mechanisms that allow to parse syllables from speech emerge from evolutionary-ancient sensory processes that likely evolved to compute different inputs in different species. I will explore two alleged universal linguistic constraints responsible for parsing syllables, and shaping the syllabic structure: Maximal Onset Principle (Research Line 1) and Sonority Hierarchy (Research Line 2). I will test such constraints across species, and at distinct stages of human development as well as in distinct sensory modalities, with behavioral and neuroimaging techniques. The GALA project will shed light on the ontogenetic and phylogenetic origins of the mechanisms through which humans access language, and will provide invaluable new knowledge that will bring us closer to understand why are humans the only species so far able to learn language.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
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Topic(s)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
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Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2023-STG
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
08950 ESPLUGUES DE LLOBREGAT
Spain
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