I've noticed that the Lteter Oerdr question engenderes a
lot of discussion and I am curious WHY. There is a large body of evidence in
reading literature suggesting that reading entails a great deal of
anticipation, both semantic and morphological. I wonder if there is more
in the Lteter Oerdr phenomenon than what the whole language people argued for?
I was trying to understand why this phenomenon happens in languages such
as English and German, but not in "rooth" languages, such as Hebrew and
Arabic. It appears to me that it could have soemthing to do with the principles
of visual perception described by Gestalt psychology. Gestalt psychologists
(Wertheimer, KOffka, KOhler, Lewin) believed in the supremacy of
the integrated whole, or GESTALT. They argued that people tend to perceive
an imperfect thing as if it corresponds to a perfect form or pattern,
Praegnanz.
In reading, the critical elements that constitute the gestalt of a word
seem to be consonants (as suggested before). However, in
writen Hebrew there are only consonants and permutation of consonants
changes the "rooth" of the word and thereby its meaning. In other words,
in English permuation is some kind of error which we correct to fit the
gestalt, in Hebrew, changes the gestalt.
BEsides consonants, it seems that the beginning and the end of the word
also seem to be critical, since they define its boundary.
The whole langauge world, after all!
Sonja
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