PhD project: Statistical Mechanics of Language Change
Project description
Statistical mechanics is set up to handle the complexity that emerges in physical systems that comprise many interacting particles and that are governed by some known (classical or quantum mechanical) equations of motion. Many other systems exist where interactions between many entities lead to emergent regularities, but where we don't have the luxury of knowing the underlying equations of motion. A particularly interesting case is that of human language, a system of interconnected words and meanings that is richly structured and changes over time to accommodate the communicative needs of speakers.
Over the past few years we have worked in collaboration with linguists and psychologists to build stochastic models of social learning of linguistic behaviour [1]. This involves consideration of how people estimate the frequencies with which words are used to convey given meanings, how meanings are ascribed to words under uncertainty, how long individual instances of use are retained in memory, and what social attitudes speakers hold with respect to each other. A big challenge is the fact that parameters in these models are hard to measure directly. However, recent progress has allowed us to estimate parameter values by looking at historical linguistic data, as recorded in large databases like Google Books or corpora carefully curated by linguists [2,3]. This allows us to understand how individual behaviour relates to the structure of a language as a whole, gaining new insights into an important cultural phenomenon. There is considerable scope to develop these models further, and to answer new questions about the process of language change.
Since language is one example of an evolutionary process, this work connects to evolutionary modelling in the biological and cultural realms. There are several consequences of this, for example, the development of data analysis methods that can be applied also to genetic data [4], the discovery of new socially- or cognitively-driven mechanisms for cultural selection [5] and the possibility to extend to other forms of cultural evolution.
[1] R. A. Blythe (2015) Colloquium: Hierarchy of scales in language dynamics. EPJB 88, 295.
[2] R. A. Blythe and W. Croft (2021) How individuals change language. PLOS ONE 16, e0252582.
[3] J. Guerrero Montero, A. Karjus, K. Smith and R. A. Blythe (2023). CLLT in press.
[4] J. Guerrero Montero and R. A. Blythe (2023) Genetics iyad092.
[5] R. A. Blythe and W. Croft (2012) Language 88 269.
Project supervisor
- Professor Richard Blythe (School of Physics & Astronomy, University of Edinburgh)
The project supervisor welcomes informal enquiries about this project.
Find out more about this research area
The links below summarise our research in the area(s) relevant to this project:
- Find out more about Statistical Physics and Complexity.
- Find out more about the Institute for Condensed Matter and Complex Systems.
What next?
- Find out how to apply for our PhD degrees.
- Find out about fees and funding and studentship opportunities.
- View and complete the application form (on the main University website).
- Find out how to contact us for more information.