The Language of Animal Language Research: Reply to Schusterman and Gisiner

Abstract

Language, as a cognitive process, is a legitimate, fruitful area of study in animal cognition. Its study in animals should not be encumbered by proscriptions against the use of linguistic terms “reserved” for humans. linguistic terms can serve as metaphors in domains other than human language, shaping one’s thinking about the phenomena of interest. Theories derived from linguistic models, as contrasted with S-R models, are likely-to be sensitive to nonlinear sequences of behavior. Interpretations by Schusterman and Gisiner of the receptive competency of a dolphin exposed to an artificial gestural language are based on a limited subset of the available data and are largely derived from S-R analyses. Specifically considered in this paper are performance on relational sentences, syntactic processing, and the referential quality of a word. Misinterpretations of the dolphin data in these three areas, as presented by Schusterman and Gisiner, or shortcomings in interpretations by these authors, are discussed.