Linguistic intelligence

Linguistic Intelligence is a part of Howard Gardner's multiple intelligence theory that deals with individuals' ability to understand both spoken and written language, as well as their ability to speak and write themselves. In a practical sense, linguistic intelligence is the extent to which an individual can use language, both written and verbal, to achieve goals. In addition to this, high linguistic intelligence has been linked to improved problem solving, as well as to increased abstract reasoning.

In many cases, only the verbal aspects are taken into consideration. This is usually referred to as verbal intelligence or verbal fluency, and is commonly a reflection of an individual's overall linguistic intelligence.

In order to understand linguistic intelligence, it is important to understand the mechanisms that control speech and language. These mechanisms can be broken down into four major groups: speech generation (talking), speech comprehension (hearing), writing generation (writing), and writing comprehension (reading).

Speech production is process by which a thought in the brain is converted into an understandable auditory form. This is a multistage mechanism that involves many different areas of the brain. The first stage is planning, where the brain constructs words and sentences that turn the thought into an understandable form. This occurs primarily in the inferior frontal cortex, specifically in an area known as Broca's area. Next, the brain must plan how to physically create the sounds necessary for speech by linking the planned speech with known sounds, or phonemes. While the location of these associations is not known, it is known that the supplementary motor area plays a key role in this step. Finally, the brain must signal for the words to actually be spoken. This is carried out by the premotor cortex and the motor cortex.

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