The point is that we automatically interpret physically ambiguous items by drawing on higher level context. This is even more the case in speech which due to speed of presentation often "misses" phonetic targets. (THE CAT is a well known example in writing)
Chomsky's attack on Skinner was based on the fact that behaviourism involved the concept of reinforcement of specific stimuli. A child in essence produces most of its language by mere immersion in in a whole plethora of linguistic variations mostly in "non-reinforcing" situations. A simple example is that pitch varies between speakers of the "same" word. The question that cannot be answered by behaviourists is how a child for example discounts pitch as being significant in English (and not say in Chinese). Furthermore behaviourists had no explanation for the child's ability to generalize grammatical rules, like the -ed suffix for past tense as in "I jump/I jumped" and the "wrong" "I run/ I runned". Chomsky's argument was that such generative competence was "wired in" and had nothing to do with reinforcement techniques.
Now it may be the case that "behaviour therapy" can be applied with limited success in cases of communication disorders such as those of autism, but whether such therapy has any "theoretical status" is an open question. It could merely be a matter of "attention giving". A parallel could be drawn with the theoretical basis for "psychoanalysis" given that there as as many "cures" by parish priests as there are by "analysts".
Last edited by eccles; 08/17/09 12:06 PM.
