How does the brain learn to make sense of language, other people, and an uncertain world?
In this episode of Beyond Words, host Garrett Oyama, MS, CCC-SLP, is joined by neuroscientist Professor Karl Friston, FRS, FMedSci, FRSB, to examine the free energy principle, predictive processing, and active inference, and what these ideas may reveal about speech, language, and communication.
Karl introduces the brain as an inference system, constantly using past experience to predict what it will encounter, make sense of sensory information, and guide action. From this perspective, language is more than receiving and producing information. Communication can be a way of actively engaging with the social world, reducing uncertainty, and building shared understanding with others.
Garrett and Karl consider what this framework might mean for language development and clinical practice. Could infant babbling and vocal play serve as a way of actively learning about the vocal and social environment? What happens when our expectations about language or other people do not match what we encounter? And is explicitly teaching a communicative response the same as learning how to communicate flexibly across people, contexts, and situations?
This episode offers SLPs a different lens for thinking about language development, not simply as acquiring words, rules, or behaviors, but as learning to predict, adapt, communicate, and act within an uncertain social world.
In this episode of Beyond Words, host Garrett Oyama, MS, CCC-SLP, is joined by neuroscientist Professor Karl Friston, FRS, FMedSci, FRSB, to examine the free energy principle, predictive processing, and active inference, and what these ideas may reveal about speech, language, and communication.
Karl introduces the brain as an inference system, constantly using past experience to predict what it will encounter, make sense of sensory information, and guide action. From this perspective, language is more than receiving and producing information. Communication can be a way of actively engaging with the social world, reducing uncertainty, and building shared understanding with others.
Garrett and Karl consider what this framework might mean for language development and clinical practice. Could infant babbling and vocal play serve as a way of actively learning about the vocal and social environment? What happens when our expectations about language or other people do not match what we encounter? And is explicitly teaching a communicative response the same as learning how to communicate flexibly across people, contexts, and situations?
This episode offers SLPs a different lens for thinking about language development, not simply as acquiring words, rules, or behaviors, but as learning to predict, adapt, communicate, and act within an uncertain social world.
