Mistakes That Explain Everything: Scientists Discuss the Future of Psycholinguistics

© HSE University

Today, global linguistics is undergoing a ‘multilingual revolution.’ The era of English-language dominance in the cognitive sciences is drawing to a close as researchers increasingly turn their attention to the diversity of world languages. Moreover, multilingualism is shifting from an exotic phenomenon to the norm—a change that is transforming our understanding of human cognitive abilities. The future of experimental linguistics was the focus of a recent discussion at HSE University.

HSE University hosted a conference titled ‘Experimental Research on Understudied Languages,’ organised by the Centre for Language and Brain and the Faculty of Humanities in collaboration with the RAS Institute of Linguistics. Over three days, scholars from various countries discussed new approaches to language study and the prospects of forming a research consortium in this field.

Opening the conference, Olga Dragoy, Director of the HSE Centre for Language and Brain, noted that the event was the result of years of collaboration among researchers united by their interest in understudied languages and experimental methods. ‘Our centre conducts experimental research on language and the brain, and we are well aware of how insufficiently described even Russian remains, let alone languages that lack rich resources. For this reason, it is especially important for us to share our experience and coordinate our efforts,’ she emphasised.

The conference brought together representatives of the RAS Institute of Linguistics; Adyghe State University; the Sechenov Institute of Evolutionary Physiology and Biochemistry (RAS); the Ibragimov Institute of Language, Literature and Art (Tatarstan); Lomonosov Moscow State University; the Centre for the Study, Preservation and Development of Native Languages of the Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia); the Institute of Language named after H. Acharyan (Armenia); the Institute of Linguistics named after Akhmet Baitursunuly (Kazakhstan); Shokan Ualikhanov Kokshetau University (Kazakhstan); Fergana State University (Uzbekistan); and the City University of New York (USA).

The programme included presentations on experimental linguistic methods, discussions of regional practices, and a series of round tables. On the first day, scholars focused on systematising Russian research; on the second, they discussed cooperation between the HSE Centre and regional laboratories across Russia; and on the third, they worked on international collaboration. The event concluded with a discussion on establishing a consortium of universities and laboratories dedicated to researching understudied languages.

‘We want to bring together the efforts of universities and research centres to jointly develop a unified programme for studying rare languages—not only from a linguistic perspective but also from the standpoint of neuroscience and cognitive research,’ said Director Olga Dragoy.

From ‘Garden-Path Sentences’ to Digital Tests

The first presentation, on the history of experimental linguistics—a field at the intersection of psychology, neuroscience, and linguistics—was delivered by Professor Irina Sekerina from the City University of New York.

She traced the beginnings of modern psycholinguistics to 1959, when Professor Noam Chomsky of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology criticised the behaviourist approach to language and proposed the concept of universal grammar. ‘It was a real revolution,’ the professor noted. ‘For the first time, language was viewed not as a behavioural skill but as a reflection of the human mind’s internal structure.’

The earliest experiments allowed scientists to observe how the human brain processes speech, constructs syntactic structures, and reacts to ambiguous sentences.

Irina Sekerina

© HSE University

One of the key discoveries of the second half of the 20th century was the study of ‘garden-path sentences,’ also known as misleading sentences. These are sentences that initially lead the listener or reader to assign an incorrect syntactic structure to an ambiguous phrase—in other words, they make a mistake. ‘When we hear a sentence, the brain automatically links the first word to the nearest verb and then has to reinterpret the structure if the context suggests another meaning. These perception errors are a goldmine for researchers, as they reveal exactly how humans comprehend language,’ explained Irina Sekerina.

In the 1990s, the use of eye-tracking in reading experiments revolutionised research methods. 

Scientists could now see precisely where a reader’s gaze faltered when processing an ambiguous sentence. Later, electrophysiological techniques—such as recording event-related brain potentials—were introduced, allowing researchers to capture responses to syntactic errors within fractions of a second.

Since the early 21st century, psycholinguistics has shifted from traditional models to statistical and computational ones. Today, researchers study predictability—the ability to anticipate the next word in a sentence—as well as individual differences in this skill.

At the same time, psycholinguistics has become truly international. 

While in the 1990s nearly all experiments involved native English speakers, today research increasingly focuses on Spanish, Chinese, Kazakh, and Slavic languages. 

In Eastern Europe, new laboratories are being established and united into networked consortia—stretching from Warsaw to Moscow.

A major challenge for all experimental sciences today is the reproducibility crisis. ‘We must be certain that our data is reliable. This is why international initiatives such as ManyBabies and ManyLabs have emerged, where dozens of laboratories replicate each other’s experiments across different languages and participant samples,’ explained the professor.

However, this goal is still rarely achieved in psycholinguistics. In 2015, an international consortium of 270 researchers attempted to replicate one hundred key psychological experiments—yet only 39% of them were successfully reproduced.

To improve transparency, scientists are now adopting pre-registration for studies, uploading their materials to open repositories, and publishing their findings regardless of whether their hypotheses were confirmed.

Today, psycholinguistics—like many other sciences—has entered the digital realm. Online platforms make it possible to conduct experiments remotely, using web-based eye trackers and browser interfaces as a substitute for expensive laboratory equipment. 

‘We live in an era when a laboratory can fit inside a laptop,’ said Irina Sekerina. ‘What matters most now is training a new generation of researchers who possess knowledge of understudied languages, statistics, and coding. Without them, the further development of experimental linguistics is impossible.’ In conclusion, the professor noted that psycholinguistics has long ceased to be the domain of a narrow circle of specialists and is now a field where cognitive psychology, AI, neuroscience, and linguistics interact actively.

Bilingualism as a Superpower

The presentation by Olga Dragoy, Director of the HSE Centre for Language and Brain, focused on linguistic diversity and the ongoing revolution in linguistics. She pointed out that almost all existing data is based on English-language research. For half a century, English has been the universal language of science—not only serving as an instrument but also as the main object of study.

‘English still dominates psycholinguistic and cognitive research,’ said Olga Dragoy. ‘This is neither good nor bad—simply a historical fact. However, when conclusions about language in general are drawn from the material of a single language, it inevitably distorts our understanding of human cognition.’

This research bias has even been given a name—the WEIRD effect, from the English acronym for Western, educated, industrialised, rich, and democratic.

It was precisely participants from such societies—Western, educated, industrialised, wealthy, and democratic—who became the typical subjects of psychological and linguistic experiments in the 20thcentury.

© HSE University

On the linguistic map of the world shown by Olga Dragoy, more than 7,000 languages are marked. Yet most have never been the subject of experimental research: psycholinguistic experiments have so far studied only 57 languages—less than 1%. ‘All our knowledge about language is therefore based on an extremely narrow, primarily European, sample of languages,’ she emphasised.

According to the scholar, such limitations lead to false generalisations. For instance, in English, interrogative sentences are formed through word order inversion. However, in most of the world’s languages, questions are expressed using a particle or intonation alone—without any change in sentence structure.

What seems natural in English actually occurs in only 2–3% of all languages. This means that the so-called universals on which much of linguistics is built may, in fact, be illusions.

Today, according to the researcher, linguistics is undergoing a quiet yet profound revolution. The era of English-language centralisation is giving way to the principle of linguistic diversity. The HSE Centre for Language and Brain is one of the pioneers of this new approach. Its researchers work not only in Moscow but also on field expeditions across Russia, studying Nenets, Bashkir, Yakut, Koryak, Tatar, and other languages.

Olga Dragoy

© HSE University

‘For us, it is not just about recording grammar or vocabulary,’ explained Olga Dragoy. ‘We want to understand how language lives in the human mind—how children in bilingual environments acquire both Russian and their native language, and how bilingualism influences the development of cognitive functions. This is the key to understanding how the brain processes language at all.’

Until recently, bilingualism was seen as an exception—even a problem to be ‘corrected’ in education.

Today, there is a growing recognition that most people on the planet speak more than one language, and this is a cognitive advantage.

Bilingual individuals have cognitive processes that are organised differently: they tend to show better attention, control, and task-switching abilities. Bilingualism has moved from being viewed as an anomaly to being seen as the new norm.

HSE researchers observe this in children growing up in bilingual environments in various parts of Russia—from Adygea to the Nenets Autonomous Okrug. Although these children enter school with varying levels of proficiency in Russian, by the age of seven or eight they have mastered both linguistic systems and developed their own cognitive strategies.

The Centre’s studies extend beyond children and encompass adults, including patients undergoing neurosurgical procedures.

Digital tests developed at HSE make it possible to map the brain’s language areas to help preserve them during surgery.

‘Patients increasingly ask to be tested not only in Russian but also in their native languages—Kazakh, Tatar, or Bashkir,’ said the researcher. ‘This is not just a sign of respect for one’s culture—it is a guarantee that after the operation, a person will retain the ability to speak all the languages that make up their identity.’

One of the Centre’s major projects involves developing digital tools for assessing speech and cognitive functions. The team has created the tests KORABLIK (for diagnosing children’s speech) and LexiMetr (for assessing reading skills), which are now being adapted for different languages spoken across Russia and neighbouring countries.

‘We dream of a future where such tests exist in every language spoken in Russia—and where linguistics is no longer monolingual,’ Olga Dragoy concluded. ‘Only a truly multilingual science can give an authentic description of what it means to be human.’