J Cult Cogn Sci (2022) 6:93–96
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EDITORIAL
Scripts’ influence on reading processes and cognition:
a preamble
Prakash Padakannaya . George K. Georgiou . Heather Winskel
Published online: 3 August 2022
Ó The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022, corrected publication 2022
The term ‘language’ generally subsumes both spoken experience. Reading, in this way, is built on the
and written forms though they are very different. neuronal network evolved primarily for speech
Spoken language is more biological and sponta- (Dehaene et al., 2010). It is not surprising that
neously acquired while literacy (reading and writing) reading/writing is built on spoken language as by the
is a more culturally evolved skill. Learning to read time children are introduced to literacy skills they
requires explicit, conscious instruction and practice. have already mastered the spoken language to a large
Spoken language is a unique feature of the human extent. Modern research suggests that newborn infants
species while reading and writing is the hallmark of develop initial language-related skills shortly after
human civilization. The origin of language dates back birth (Wu et al., 2022). Eye movement studies also
to about 1.5 million years ago while writing and suggest that eye movements during text reading align
reading date back to about 6000 years ago—a very with the rate of speech production (Gagl et al., 2022).
recent phenomenon in human history. Therefore, These recent studies support the view that reading/
human brains are not hardwired for literacy. There writing, a culturally learned and transmitted secondary
are no dedicated neuronal structures or networks linguistic skill, has grown out of spoken language
specifically evolved for reading and writing. Reading roots.
skills are achievable due to the malleability or In reading/writing research, one comes across the
neuroplasticity of the human brain, which has an terms orthography and script that might be confusing.
inbuilt capacity of rewiring the existing (pre-wired) The term script refers to visual symbols that we see in
neuronal connections as a function of practice and print (written form) encoding a particular language. A
particular system of symbols may be used by more
than one language (e.g., the Roman script is used for
P. Padakannaya (&) writing many European languages such as English,
Christ University, Bengaluru, India Italian, Spanish, etc., Kannada script is used to write
e-mail: [email protected]
Tulu, Konkani, and Kodava besides Kannada) and the
G. K. Georgiou same language may be written using different scripts
University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada depending upon geo-political situations (e.g., Konkani
e-mail: [email protected] in India is written in three scripts—in Devanagari,
Kannada, and Malayalam). Orthography is a broader
H. Winskel
James Cook University, Singapore, Singapore term involving the specific mapping rules and condi-
e-mail: [email protected] tions between a language and its script.
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Though reading (writing included) is an explicitly our focus here is how to tease apart the influence of
learned skill, it becomes so automatized and sponta- spoken language and written language on cognition as
neous that we forget that it is learned. Think of the they are often confounded and undifferentiated in the
Stroop test. We cannot resist reading the color names literature. For example, in most of the psycholinguistic
though the task is to name the ink/font color used to studies on monolinguals or bi/trilinguals, the partic-
write the color names. Once children learn to read and ipants are monoliterate or bi/triliterate. Though liter-
write, language becomes visually concrete, which acy is a culturally acquired skill, the differential effect
facilitates metalinguistic awareness. The visual of literacy is hardly considered in such studies.
images or orthographic images of phonograms/ mor- Moreover, many psycholinguistic studies have written
phograms that readers internalize transform the way words/sentences as stimuli. The interpretation of
they think and process speech and language. This leads results in such studies seldom differentiates between
to three major questions. First, whether a literate mind orality and literacy modes. It is also not clear whether
is different from an illiterate one. A related question is the prefix bi stands for bi, tri, and multi as they are
whether the cognitive consequences of literacy are the rarely differentiated.
same across cultures. The second question is whether Human brains are similar but orthographies or
the language and/or orthography in which one scripts vary across cultures. Languages differ and so
becomes literate exerts any specific effects on cogni- are the way they are written. There are different
tion.The third question, a related one, is what are the principles and ways that speech is encoded in different
implications of biliteracy/triliteracy/multiliteracy for writing systems. Writing systems may vary in terms of
reading and cognition. opacity/transparency (whether or not the mapping
There have been some studies probing the first (e.g., between written symbols and sound is consistent) or
Huettig & Mishra, 2014; Morais et al., 1986; Wolf, grain size (the linguistic level that the character/
2015) and the second (e.g., Georgiou et al., 2008; symbols represent) and script features (the way it is
Landerl et al., 2021; Nag & Perfetti, 2014; Prakash written on two dimensions- visual configuration,
et al., 1993; Rao et al., 2017; Winskel & Kim, 2021) directionality), etc. When coding principles are dif-
question. These studies show enough evidence favor- ferent across orthographies, it is natural that decoding
ing the view that there are certain differences between strategies too will vary.
literate and illiterate minds/brains in their functional We do not support the strong linguistic determinism
organization. Studies on the orthographic effect on version of the linguistic relativity hypothesis but
reading and cognition also clearly suggest that the accept the linguistic influence version of the theory.
cognitive processes underlying reading and non- Multiple illustrations described in the two non-empir-
linguistic tasks are influenced by orthography-specific ical papers in this journal issue and our own observa-
features. Still, one cannot deny that research, in tions (Padakannaya, 2000; Winskel & Kim, 2021)
general, is skewed and biased in favor of alphabetic advocate script-specific influences on reading and
orthographies (Daniels & Share, 2018; Share, 2008). cognition. Thus, there is a universality in reading
Many of the research questions, designs, theories, and processes across cultures, and at the same time, there
models that drive research are essentially Eurocentric are script-specific effects. Hence, we see both script-
and may hardly be relevant to other major ortho- independent and script-dependent impacts on reading
graphic contexts (Padakannaya & Mohanty, 2004; and cognition across cultures.
Vaid & Padakannaya, 2004; Winskel & Padakannaya, There has been more concern among researchers, of
2014). Research related to the third question too is late, about the alphabetic-centered bias resulting in a
impacted by the dominance of western alphabetic non-perfect (if not distorted) science of reading. Many
perspectives that need to be addressed (Vaid, 2022). constructs, phenomena, theories, and models that
The nature of the relationship between language emerged from research findings on alphabetic scripts
and cognition is a more basic issue that goes beyond may not be applicable and relevant to readers of non-
the above questions. In general, there is agreement alphabetic scripts. For example, the crucial signifi-
among researchers that language and cognition are cance of phoneme awareness in alphabetic literacy
inseparable. The influence between them is mutual and may be merely due to the explicitness of phonemic
bidirectional. However, more pertinent to the topic of components in alphabetic writing (Morais et al., 1986;
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J Cult Cogn Sci (2022) 6:93–96 95
Padakannaya, 2000). The very concept of a letter, the science of reading (and its implications for the
upper/lower cases, spelling, and grapheme may not be human mind and civilization).
present in many major scripts. The conventions
Declarations
followed regarding the directionality of writing,
spacing or no-spacing between word boundaries, Conflict of interest and funding The authors express no
linearity/non-linearity of ligatures, degree of explicit- conflict of interest. This work is not supported by any funding.
ness of symbols, single/multiple forms of symbols,
etc. may vary across scripts. Cultural practices asso-
ciated with literacy initiation, and training may also References
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