Publications

Abstract

This paper presents the methods of language documentation as applied in the Awetí Language Documentation Project, one of the projects in the Documentation of Endangered Languages Programme (DOBES). It describes the steps of how a large digital corpus of annotated multi-media data is built. Special attention is devoted to the format of annotation of linguistic data. The Advanced Glossing format is presented and justified

Abstract

This paper describes the different kinds of nominalizations and the main forms used in subordination in Awetí, a Tupian language spoken by ca. 150 people in central Bra-zil in the Upper Xingu area. Awetí does not belong to, but is arguably the closest rela-tive of the well-known Tupí-Guaraní subfamily, the largest branch of the Tupí stock. In our analysis, subordination in Awetí is achieved by means of forms which may have developed from nominalizations, but which are synchronously possibly best classified as verbal moods, belonging into the verbal paradigm. On the other hand, nouns (and in particular nouns derived from verbs) often appear as predicates, especially in equality and cleft sentences.

Abstract

This paper describes the distribution and phonetic properties of accentuation of word forms in Awetí, a Tupian language spoken by ca. 150 people in central Brazil in the Upper Xingu area. Awetí does not belong to, but is arguably the closest relative of the better known Tupí-Guaraní subfamily, the largest branch of the Tupí stock. After a short overview over the word classes and general phonotactics of Awetí (sec-tion 2), we briefly discuss the notion ‘word accent’ and show that, in Awetí, it is generally located on the last syllable of the stem in morphologically simple forms (section 3). We then discuss regular and isolated exceptions to this rule (section 4). In section 5, we describe the distribution of the word accent when inflectional or deriva-tional suffixes are present – usually, the word accent of the word form with suffixes continues to be on the last syllable of the stem. After this descriptive part, we present a preliminary study of the acoustic-phonetic details of the manifestation of the word accent, observing word forms in isolation (section 6) and in different syntactic con-texts (section 7). The results are briefly summarized in the conclusion (section 8)

Abstract

Investigating human cognitive faculties such as language, attention, and memory most often relies on testing small and homogeneous groups of volunteers coming to research facilities where they are asked to participate in behavioral experiments. We show that this limitation and sampling bias can be overcome by using smartphone technology to collect data in cognitive science experiments from thousands of subjects from all over the world. This mass coordinated use of smartphones creates a novel and powerful scientific ‘‘instrument’’ that yields the data necessary to test universal theories of cognition. This increase in power represents a potential revolution in cognitive science

Abstract

This paper analyzes newly collected lexical data from 26 languages of the Aslian subgroup of the Austroasiatic language family using computational phylogenetic methods. We show the most likely topology of the Aslian family tree, discuss rooting and external relationships to other Austroasiatic languages, and investigate differences in the rates of diversification of different branches. Evidence is given supporting the classification of Jah Hut as a fourth top level subgroup of the family. The phylogenetic positions of known geographic and linguistic outlier languages are clarified, and the relationships of the little studied Aslian languages of Southern Thailand to the rest of the family are explored.

Abstract

Languages vary widely but not without limit. The central goal of linguistics is to describe the diversity of human languages and explain the constraints on that diversity. Generative linguists following Chomsky have claimed that linguistic diversity must be constrained by innate parameters that are set as a child learns a language1, 2. In contrast, other linguists following Greenberg have claimed that there are statistical tendencies for co-occurrence of traits reflecting universal systems biases3, 4, 5, rather than absolute constraints or parametric variation. Here we use computational phylogenetic methods to address the nature of constraints on linguistic diversity in an evolutionary framework6. First, contrary to the generative account of parameter setting, we show that the evolution of only a few word-order features of languages are strongly correlated. Second, contrary to the Greenbergian generalizations, we show that most observed functional dependencies between traits are lineage-specific rather than universal tendencies. These findings support the view that—at least with respect to word order—cultural evolution is the primary factor that determines linguistic structure, with the current state of a linguistic system shaping and constraining future states.

Abstract

This paper examines the effects of language standardization and orthography design on the Chukchi linguistic ecology. The process of standardisation has not taken into consideration the gender-based sociolects of colloquial Chukchi and is based on a grammaticaldescriptionwhich does not reflectactual Chukchi use; as a result standard Chukchi has not gained a place in the Chukchi language ecology. The Cyrillic orthography developed for Chukchi is also problematic as it is based on features of Russian phonology, rather than on Chukchi itself: this has meant that a knowledge of written Chukchi is dependent on a knowledge of the principles of Russian orthography. The aspects of language planning have had a large impact on the pre-existing Chukchi language ecology which has contributed to the obsolescence of the colloquial language.

Abstract

Impaired understanding of others' sensations and emotions as well as abnormal experience of their own emotions and sensations is frequently reported in individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). It is hypothesized that these abnormalities are based on altered connectivity within “shared” neural networks involved in emotional awareness of self and others. The insula is considered a central brain region in a network underlying these functions, being located at the transition of information about bodily arousal and the physiological state of the body to subjective feelings. The present study investigated the intrinsic functional connectivity properties of the insula in 14 high-functioning participants with ASD (HF-ASD) and 15 typically developing (TD) participants in the age range between 12 and 20 years by means of “resting state” or “nontask” functional magnetic resonance imaging. Essentially, a distinction was made between anterior and posterior regions of the insular cortex. The results show a reduced functional connectivity in the HF-ASD group, compared with the TD group, between anterior as well as posterior insula and specific brain regions involved in emotional and sensory processing. It is suggested that functional abnormalities in a network involved in emotional and interoceptive awareness might be at the basis of altered emotional experiences and impaired social abilities in ASD, and that these abnormalities are partly based on the intrinsic functional connectivity properties of such a network.

Abstract

In two experiments, we investigated whether body posture influences people’s estimation of quantities. According to the mental-number-line theory, people mentally represent numbers along a line with smaller numbers on the left and larger numbers on the right. We hypothesized that surreptitiously making people lean to the right or to the left would affect their quantitative estimates. Participants answered estimation questions while standing on a Wii Balance Board. Posture was manipulated within subjects so that participants answered some questions while they leaned slightly to the left, some questions while they leaned slightly to the right, and some questions while they stood upright. Crucially, participants were not aware of this manipulation. Estimates were significantly smaller when participants leaned to the left than when they leaned to the right.

Abstract

Perceptual representations of phonemes are flexible and adapt rapidly to accommodate idiosyncratic articulation in the speech of a particular talker. This letter addresses whether such adjustments remain stable over time and under exposure to other talkers. During exposure to a story, listeners learned to interpret an ambiguous sound as [f] or [s]. Perceptual adjustments measured after 12 h were as robust as those measured immediately after learning. Equivalent effects were found when listeners heard speech from other talkers in the 12 h interval, and when they had the opportunity to consolidate learning during sleep.

Abstract

Reviewed work(s): Dying Words: Endangered Languages and What They Have to Tell Us. By Nicholas Evans. Indianapolis: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010. On the Death and Life of Languages. By Claude Hagège, translated by Jody Gladding. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2009.

Abstract

The domain of the human body is an ideal focus for semantic typology, since the body is a physical universal and all languages have terms referring to its parts. Previous research on body part terms has depended on secondary sources (e.g. dictionaries), and has lacked sufficient detail or clarity for a thorough understanding of these terms’ semantics. The present special issue is the outcome of a collaborative project aimed at improving approaches to investigating the semantics of body part terms, by developing materials to elicit information that provides for cross-linguistic comparison. The articles in this volume are original fieldwork-based descriptions of terminology for parts of the body in ten languages. Also included are an elicitation guide and experimental protocol used in gathering data. The contributions provide inventories of body part terms in each language, with analysis of both intensional and extensional aspects of meaning, differences in morphological complexity, semantic relations among terms, and discussion of partonomic structure within the domain.

Abstract

This document is intended for use as an elicitation guide for the field linguist consulting with native speakers in collecting terms for parts of the body, and in the exploration of their semantics.

Abstract

Abstract: This paper reviews current discussion of the issue of just what is lost when a language dies. Special reference is made to the current situation in Laos, a country renowned for its considerable cultural and linguistic diversity. It focuses on the historical, anthropological and ecological knowledge that a language can encode, and the social and cultural consequences of the loss of such traditional knowledge when a language is no longer passed on. Finally, the article points out the paucity of studies and obstacles to field research on minority languages in Laos, which seriously hamper their documentation.

Abstract

This article presents a description of nominal expressions for parts of the human body conventionalised in Lao, a Southwestern Tai language spoken in Laos, Northeast Thailand, and Northeast Cambodia. An inventory of around 170 Lao expressions is listed, with commentary where some notability is determined, usually based on explicit comparison to the metalanguage, English. Notes on aspects of the grammatical and semantic structure of the set of body part terms are provided, including a discussion of semantic relations pertaining among members of the set of body part terms. I conclude that the semantic relations which pertain between terms for different parts of the body not only include part/whole relations, but also relations of location, connectedness, and general association. Calling the whole system a ‘partonomy’ attributes greater centrality to the part/whole relation than is warranted.

Abstract

This article examines vocabulary for taste and flavor in two neighboring but unrelated languages (Lao and Kri) spoken in Laos, Southeast Asia. There are very close similarities in underlying semantic distinctions made in the taste/flavor domain in these two languages, not just in the set of basic tastes distinguished (sweet, salty, bitter, sour, umami or glutamate), but in a series of further basic terms for flavors, specifying texture and other sensations in the mouth apart from pure taste (e.g. starchy, dry in the mouth, minty, tingly, spicy). After presenting sets of taste/flavor vocabulary in the two languages and showing their high degree of convergence, the article discusses some methodological and theoretical issues that arise from the observation of close convergence in semantic structure across languages, in particular the issue of how much inter-speaker variation is possible not only across apparently highly convergent systems, but also within languages. The final section raises possible causes for the close convergence of semantic structure in the two languages. The conclusion is that the likely cause of this convergence is historical social contact between speech communities in the area, although the precise mode of influence (e.g. direction of transmission) is unknown.

Abstract

The social world is an ecological complex in which cultural meanings and knowledges (linguistic and non-linguistic) personally embodied by individuals are intercalibrated via common attention to commonly accessible semiotic structures. This interpersonal ecology bridges realms which are the subject matter of both anthropology and linguistics, allowing the public maintenance of a system of assumptions and counter-assumptions among individuals as to what is mutually known (about), in general and/or in any particular context. The mutual assumption of particular cultural ideas provides human groups with common premises for predictably convergent inferential processes. This process of people collectively using effectively identical assumptions in interpreting each other's actions—i.e. hypothesizing as to each other's motivations and intentions—may be termed cultural logic. This logic relies on the establishment of stereotypes and other kinds of precedents, catalogued in individuals’ personal libraries, as models and scenarios which may serve as reference in inferring and attributing motivations behind people's actions, and behind other mysterious phenomena. This process of establishing conceptual convention depends directly on semiotics, since groups of individuals rely on external signs as material for common focus and, thereby, agreement. Social intelligence binds signs in the world (e.g. speech sounds impressing upon eardrums), with individually embodied representations (e.g. word meanings and contextual schemas). The innate tendency for people to model the intentions of others provides an ultimately biological account for the logic behind culture. Ethnographic examples are drawn from Laos and Australia.

Abstract

In mainstream phonology, contrastive properties, like stem-final voicing, are simply listed in the lexicon. This article reviews experimental evidence that such contrastive properties may be predictable to some degree and that the relevant statistically gradient generalizations form an inherent part of the grammar. The evidence comes from the underlying voice specification of stem-final obstruents in Dutch. Contrary to received wisdom, this voice specification is partly predictable from the obstruent’s manner and place of articulation and from the phonological properties of the preceding segments. The degree of predictability, which depends on the exact contents of the lexicon, directs speakers’ guesses of underlying voice specifications. Moreover, existing words that disobey the generalizations are disadvantaged by being recognized and produced more slowly and less accurately, also under natural conditions.We discuss how these observations can be accounted for in two types of different approaches to grammar, Stochastic Optimality Theory and exemplar-based modeling.

Abstract

Words are often pronounced very differently in formal speech than in everyday conversations. In conversational speech, they may contain weaker segments, fewer sounds, and even fewer syllables. The English word yesterday, for instance, may be pronounced as [j epsilon integral eI]. This article forms an introduction to the phenomenon of reduced pronunciation variants and to the eight research articles in this issue on the characteristics, production, and comprehension of these variants. We provide a description of the phenomenon, addressing its high frequency of occurrence in casual conversations in various languages, the gradient nature of many reduction processes, and the intelligibility of reduced variants to native listeners. We also describe the relevance of research on reduced variants for linguistic and psychological theories as well as for applications in speech technology and foreign language acquisition. Since reduced variants occur more often in spontaneous than in formal speech, they are hard to study in the laboratory under well controlled conditions. We discuss the advantages and disadvantages of possible solutions, including the research methods employed in the articles in this special issue, based on corpora and experiments. This article ends with a short overview of the articles in this issue.

Abstract

Acoustic duration and degree of vowel reduction are known to correlate with a word’s frequency of occurrence. The present study broadens the research on the role of frequency in speech production to voice assimilation. The test case was regressive voice assimilation in Dutch. Clusters from a corpus of read speech were more often perceived as unassimilated in lower-frequency words and as either completely voiced regressive assimilation or, unexpectedly, as completely voiceless progressive assimilation in higher-frequency words. Frequency did not predict the voice classifications over and above important acoustic cues to voicing, suggesting that the frequency effects on the classifications were carried exclusively by the acoustic signal. The duration of the cluster and the period of glottal vibration during the cluster decreased while the duration of the release noises increased with frequency. This indicates that speakers reduce articulatory effort for higher-frequency words, with some acoustic cues signaling more voicing and others less voicing. A higher frequency leads not only to acoustic reduction but also to more assimilation.

Abstract

Langerin mediates the carbohydrate-dependent uptake of pathogens by Langerhans cells in the first step of antigen presentation to the adaptive immune system. Langerin binds to an unusually diverse number of endogenous and pathogenic cell surface carbohydrates, including mannose-containing O-specific polysaccharides derived from bacterial lipopolysaccharides identified here by probing a microarray of bacterial polysaccharides. Crystal structures of the carbohydrate-recognition domain from human langerin bound to a series of oligomannose compounds, the blood group B antigen, and a fragment of β-glucan reveal binding to mannose, fucose, and glucose residues by Ca(2+) coordination of vicinal hydroxyl groups with similar stereochemistry. Oligomannose compounds bind through a single mannose residue, with no other mannose residues contacting the protein directly. There is no evidence for a second Ca(2+)-independent binding site. Likewise, a β-glucan fragment, Glcβ1-3Glcβ1-3Glc, binds to langerin through the interaction of a single glucose residue with the Ca(2+) site. The fucose moiety of the blood group B trisaccharide Galα1-3(Fucα1-2)Gal also binds to the Ca(2+) site, and selective binding to this glycan compared to other fucose-containing oligosaccharides results from additional favorable interactions of the nonreducing terminal galactose, as well as of the fucose residue. Surprisingly, the equatorial 3-OH group and the axial 4-OH group of the galactose residue in 6SO(4)-Galβ1-4GlcNAc also coordinate Ca(2+), a heretofore unobserved mode of galactose binding in a C-type carbohydrate-recognition domain bearing the Glu-Pro-Asn signature motif characteristic of mannose binding sites. Salt bridges between the sulfate group and two lysine residues appear to compensate for the nonoptimal binding of galactose at this site.

Abstract

Studies of dyslexia provide vital insights into the cognitive architecture underpinning both disordered and normal reading. It is well established that inherited factors contribute to dyslexia susceptibility, but only very recently has evidence emerged to implicate specific candidate genes. In this article, we provide an accessible overview of four prominent examples--DYX1C1, KIAA0319, DCDC2 and ROBO1--and discuss their relevance for cognition. In each case correlations have been found between genetic variation and reading impairments, but precise risk variants remain elusive. Although none of these genes is specific to reading-related neuronal circuits, or even to the human brain, they have intriguing roles in neuronal migration or connectivity. Dissection of cognitive mechanisms that subserve reading will ultimately depend on an integrated approach, uniting data from genetic investigations, behavioural studies and neuroimaging.

Abstract

The rise of molecular genetics is having a pervasive influence in a wide variety of fields, including research into neurodevelopmental disorders like dyslexia, speech and language impairments, and autism. There are many studies underway which are attempting to determine the roles of genetic factors in the aetiology of these disorders. Beyond the obvious implications for diagnosis, treatment and understanding, success in these efforts promises to shed light on the links between genes and aspects of cognition and behaviour. However, the deceptive simplicity of finding correlations between genetic and phenotypic variation has led to a common misconception that there exist straightforward linear relationships between specific genes and particular behavioural and/or cognitive outputs. The problem is exacerbated by the adoption of an abstract view of the nature of the gene, without consideration of molecular, developmental or ontogenetic frameworks. To illustrate the limitations of this perspective, I select two cases from recent research into the genetic underpinnings of neurodevelopmental disorders. First, I discuss the proposal that dyslexia can be dissected into distinct components specified by different genes. Second, I review the story of the FOXP2 gene and its role in human speech and language. In both cases, adoption of an abstract concept of the gene can lead to erroneous conclusions, which are incompatible with current knowledge of molecular and developmental systems. Genes do not specify behaviours or cognitive processes; they make regulatory factors, signalling molecules, receptors, enzymes, and so on, that interact in highly complex networks, modulated by environmental influences, in order to build and maintain the brain. I propose that it is necessary for us to fully embrace the complexity of biological systems, if we are ever to untangle the webs that link genes to cognition.

Abstract

The human capacity to acquire complex language seems to be without parallel in the natural world. The origins of this remarkable trait have long resisted adequate explanation, but advances in fields that range from molecular genetics to cognitive neuroscience offer new promise. Here we synthesize recent developments in linguistics, psychology and neuroimaging with progress in comparative genomics, gene-expression profiling and studies of developmental disorders. We argue that language should be viewed not as a wholesale innovation, but as a complex reconfiguration of ancestral systems that have been adapted in evolutionarily novel ways.

Abstract

The present study addresses questions concerning bilinguals’ attainment in the two languages by investigating the extent to which early bilinguals manage to apply the information structure required in each language when producing a complex text. In re-narrating the content of a film, speakers have to break down the perceived series of dynamic situations and structure relevant information into units that are suited for linguistic expression. The analysis builds on typological studies of Germanic and Romance languages which investigate the role of grammaticized concepts in determining core features in information structure. It takes a global perspective in that it focuses on factors that determine information selection and information structure that hold in macrostructural terms for the text as a whole (factors driving information selection, the temporal frame used to locate events on the time line, and the means used in reference management). A first comparison focuses on Dutch and German monolingual native speakers and shows that despite overall typological similarities, there are subtle though systematic differences between the two languages in the aforementioned areas of information structure. The analyses of the bilinguals focus on their narratives in both languages, and compares the patterns found to those found in the monolingual narratives. Findings show that the method used provides insights into the individual bilingual’s attainment in the two languages and identifies either balanced levels of attainment, patterns showing higher degrees of conformity with one of the languages, as well as bilingual-specific patterns of performance.

Abstract

This experimental study investigates event construal by early Dutch–German bilinguals, as reflected in their oral depiction of everyday events shown in video clips. The starting point is the finding that the expression of an aspectual perspective (progressive aspect), and its consequences for event construal, is dependent on the extent to which means are grammaticalized, as in English (e.g., progressive aspect) or not, as in German (von Stutterheim & Carroll, 2006). The present study shows that although speakers of Dutch and German have comparable means to mark this aspectual concept, at a first glance at least, they differ markedly both in the contexts as well as in the extent to which this aspectual perspective is selected, being highly frequent in specific contexts in Dutch, but not in German. The present experimental study investigates factors that lead to the use of progressive aspect by early bilinguals, using video clips (with different types of events varied along specific dimensions on a systematic basis). The study includes recordings of eye movements, and examines how far an aspectual perspective drives allocation of attention during information intake while viewing the stimulus material, both for and while speaking. Although the bilinguals have acquired the means to express progressive aspect in Dutch, their use shows a pattern that differs from monolingual Dutch speakers. Interestingly, these differences are reflected in different patterns in the direction of attention (eye movements) when verbalizing information on events.

Abstract

This paper focuses on native speaker judgments of a construction in Dutch that functions as a progressive aspectual marker (aan het X zijn, referred to as aan het-construction) and represents an event as in progression at the time of speech. The method was chosen in order to investigate how native speakers assess the scope and conditions of use of a construction which is in the process of grammaticalization. It allows for the inclusion of a large group of participants of different age groups and an investigation of potential age-related differences. The study systematically covers a range of temporal variables that were shown to be relevant in elicitation and corpus-based studies on the grammaticalization of progressive aspect constructions. The results provide insights into the selectional preferences and constraints of the aan het-construction in contemporary Dutch, as judged by native speakers, and the extent to which they correlate with production tasks.

Abstract

This article describes the adjective class in Quechua, countering many previous accounts of the language as a linguistic type with no adjective/noun distinction. It applies a set of common crosslinguistic criteria for distinguishing adjectives to data from several dialects of Ecuadorian Highland Quechua (EHQ), analyzing examples from a natural speech audio/video corpus, speaker intuitions of grammaticality, and controlled elicitation exercises. It is concluded that by virtually any standard Quechua shows clear evidence for a distinct class of attributive noun modifiers, and that in the future Quechua should not be considered a “flexible” noun/adjective language for the purposes of crosslinguistic comparison.

Abstract

The first objective of this study was to compare the brain network engaged by preference classification and the standard grammaticality classification after implicit artificial syntax acquisition by re-analyzing previously reported event-related fMRI data. The results show that preference and grammaticality classification engage virtually identical brain networks, including Broca’s region, consistent with previous behavioral findings. Moreover, the results showed that the effects related to artificial syntax in Broca’s region were essentially the same when masked with variability related to natural syntax processing in the same participants. The second objective was to explore CNTNAP2-related effects in implicit artificial syntax learning by analyzing behavioral and event-related fMRI data from a subsample. The CNTNAP2 gene has been linked to specific language impairment and is controlled by the FOXP2 transcription factor. CNTNAP2 is expressed in language related brain networks in the developing human brain and the FOXP2–CNTNAP2 pathway provides a mechanistic link between clinically distinct syndromes involving disrupted language. Finally, we discuss the implication of taking natural language to be a neurobiological system in terms of bounded recursion and suggest that the left inferior frontal region is a generic on-line sequence processor that unifies information from various sources in an incremental and recursive manner.

Abstract

The human brain supports acquisition mechanisms that extract structural regularities implicitly from experience without the induction of an explicit model. It has been argued that the capacity to generalize to new input is based on the acquisition of abstract representations, which reflect underlying structural regularities in the input ensemble. In this study, we explored the outcome of this acquisition mechanism, and to this end, we investigated the neural correlates of artificial syntactic classification using event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging. The participants engaged once a day during an 8-day period in a short-term memory acquisition task in which consonant-strings generated from an artificial grammar were presented in a sequential fashion without performance feedback. They performed reliably above chance on the grammaticality classification tasks on days 1 and 8 which correlated with a corticostriatal processing network, including frontal, cingulate, inferior parietal, and middle occipital/occipitotemporal regions as well as the caudate nucleus. Part of the left inferior frontal region (BA 45) was specifically related to syntactic violations and showed no sensitivity to local substring familiarity. In addition, the head of the caudate nucleus correlated positively with syntactic correctness on day 8 but not day 1, suggesting that this region contributes to an increase in cognitive processing fluency.

Abstract

Family and twin studies consistently demonstrate a significant role for genetic factors in the aetiology of the reading disorder dyslexia. However, dyslexia is complex at both the genetic and phenotypic levels, and currently the nature of the core deficit or deficits remains uncertain. Traditional approaches for mapping disease genes, originally developed for single-gene disorders, have limited success when there is not a simple relationship between genotype and phenotype. Recent advances in high-throughput genotyping technology and quantitative statistical methods have made a new approach to identifying genes involved in complex disorders possible. The method involves assessing the genetic similarity of many sibling pairs along the lengths of all their chromosomes and attempting to correlate this similarity with that of their phenotypic scores. We are adopting this approach in an ongoing genome-wide search for genes involved in dyslexia susceptibility, and have already successfully applied the method by replicating results from previous studies suggesting that a quantitative trait locus at 6p21.3 influences reading disability.

Abstract

Segmentation (and, indeed, definition) of the human body in Kuuk Thaayorre (a Paman language of Cape York Peninsula, Australia) is in some respects typologically unusual, while at other times it conforms to cross-linguistic patterns. The process of deriving complex body part terms from monolexemic items is revealing of metaphorical associations between parts of the body. Associations between parts of the body and entities and phenomena in the broader environment are evidenced by the ubiquity of body part terms (in their extended uses) throughout Thaayorre speech. Understanding the categorisation of the body is therefore prerequisite to understanding the Thaayorre language and worldview.

Abstract

This study addressed the question as to whether grammatical properties of a first language are transferred to a second language. Dutch-English bilinguals classified Dutch words in white print according to their grammatical gender and colored words (i.e. Dutch common and neuter words, and their English translations) according to their color. Both the classifications were made with the same hand (congruent trials) or different hands (incongruent trials). Performance was more erroneous and the error-elated negativity was enhanced on incongruent compared with congruent trials. This effect was independent of the language in which words were presented. These results provide evidence for the fact thatbilinguals may transfer grammatical characteristics oftheir first language to a second language, even when such characteristics are absent in the grammar of the latter.

Abstract

The Error-Related Negativity (ERN) is a component of the event-related brain potential (ERP) that is associated with action monitoring and error detection. The present study addressed the question whether or not an ERN occurs after verbal error detection, e.g., during phoneme monitoring.We obtained an ERN following verbal errors which showed a typical decrease in amplitude under severe time pressure. This result demonstrates that the functioning of the verbal self-monitoring system is comparable to other performance monitoring, such as action monitoring. Furthermore, we found that participants made more errors in phoneme monitoring under time pressure than in a control condition. This may suggest that time pressure decreases the amount of resources available to a capacity-limited self-monitor thereby leading to more errors.

Abstract

Speech production long avoided electrophysiological experiments due to the suspicion that potential artifacts caused by muscle activity of overt speech may lead to a bad signal-to-noise ratio in the measurements. Therefore, researchers have sought to assess speech production by using indirect speech production tasks, such as tacit or implicit naming, delayed naming, or metalinguistic tasks, such as phoneme monitoring. Covert speech may, however, involve different processes than overt speech production. Recently, overt speech has been investigated using EEG. As the number of papers published is rising steadily, this clearly indicates the increasing interest and demand for overt speech research within the field of cognitive neuroscience of language. Our main goal here is to review all currently available results of overt speech production involving EEG measurements, such as picture naming, Stroop naming, and reading aloud. We conclude that overt speech production can be successfully studied using electrophysiological measures, for instance, event-related brain potentials (ERPs). We will discuss possible relevant components in the ERP waveform of speech production and aim to address the issue of how to interpret the results of ERP research using overt speech, and whether the ERP components in language production are comparable to results from other fields.

Abstract

The methylation of cytosines in CpG dinucleotides is essential for cellular differentiation and the progression of many cancers, and it plays an important role in gametic imprinting. To assess variation and inheritance of genome-wide patterns of DNA methylation simultaneously in humans, we applied reduced representation bisulfite sequencing (RRBS) to somatic DNA from six members of a three-generation family. We observed that 8.1% of heterozygous SNPs are associated with differential methylation in cis, which provides a robust signature for Mendelian transmission and relatedness. The vast majority of differential methylation between homologous chromosomes (>92%) occurs on a particular haplotype as opposed to being associated with the gender of the parent of origin, indicating that genotype affects DNA methylation of far more loci than does gametic imprinting. We found that 75% of genotype-dependent differential methylation events in the family are also seen in unrelated individuals and that overall genotype can explain 80% of the variation in DNA methylation. These events are under-represented in CpG islands, enriched in intergenic regions, and located in regions of low evolutionary conservation. Even though they are generally not in functionally constrained regions, 22% (twice as many as expected by chance) of genes harboring genotype-dependent DNA methylation exhibited allele-specific gene expression as measured by RNA-seq of a lymphoblastoid cell line, indicating that some of these events are associated with gene expression differences. Overall, our results demonstrate that the influence of genotype on patterns of DNA methylation is widespread in the genome and greatly exceeds the influence of imprinting on genome-wide methylation patterns.

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Lower cognitive functioning in early childhood has been proposed as a risk factor for depression in later life but its association with depressive symptoms during adolescence has rarely been investigated. Our study examines the relationship between total intelligence quotient (IQ) score at age 8 years, and depressive symptoms at 11, 13, 14 and 17 years. METHOD: Study participants were 5250 children and adolescents from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and their Children (ALSPAC), UK, for whom longitudinal data on depressive symptoms were available. IQ was assessed with the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children III, and self-reported depressive symptoms were measured with the Short Mood and Feelings Questionnaire (SMFQ). RESULTS: Multi-level analysis on continuous SMFQ scores showed that IQ at age 8 years was inversely associated with depressive symptoms at age 11 years, but the association changed direction by age 13 and 14 years (age-IQ interaction, p<}0.0001; age squared-IQ interaction, p{<}0.0001) when a higher IQ score was associated with a higher risk of depressive symptoms. This change in IQ effect was also found in relation to pubertal stage (pubertal stage-IQ interaction, 0.00049{

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Abstract

The scavenger receptor C-type lectin (SRCL) is a glycan-binding receptor that has the capacity to mediate endocytosis of glycoproteins carrying terminal Lewis(x) groups (Galβ1-4(Fucα1-3)GlcNAc). A screen for glycoprotein ligands for SRCL using affinity chromatography on immobilized SRCL followed by mass spectrometry-based proteomic analysis revealed that soluble glycoproteins from secondary granules of neutrophils, including lactoferrin and matrix metalloproteinases 8 and 9, are major ligands. Binding competition and surface plasmon resonance analysis showed affinities in the low micromolar range. Comparison of SRCL binding to neutrophil and milk lactoferrin indicates that the binding is dependent on cell-specific glycosylation in the neutrophils, as the milk form of the glycoprotein is a much poorer ligand. Binding to neutrophil glycoproteins is fucose dependent and mass spectrometry-based glycomic analysis of neutrophil and milk lactoferrin was used to establish a correlation between high affinity binding to SRCL and the presence of multiple, clustered terminal Lewis(x) groups on a heterogeneous mixture of branched glycans, some with poly N-acetyllactosamine extensions. The ability of SRCL to mediate uptake of neutrophil lactoferrin was confirmed using fibroblasts transfected with SRCL. The common presence of Lewis(x) groups in granule protein glycans can thus target granule proteins for clearance by SRCL. PCR and immunohistochemical analysis confirms that SRCL is widely expressed on endothelial cells and thus represents a distributed system which could scavenge released neutrophil glycoproteins both locally at sites of inflammation or systemically when they are released in the circulation.

Abstract

Languages, like molecules, document evolutionary history. Darwin(1) observed that evolutionary change in languages greatly resembled the processes of biological evolution: inheritance from a common ancestor and convergent evolution operate in both. Despite many suggestions(2-4), few attempts have been made to apply the phylogenetic methods used in biology to linguistic data. Here we report a parsimony analysis of a large language data set. We use this analysis to test competing hypotheses - the "express-train''(5) and the "entangled-bank''(6,7) models - for the colonization of the Pacific by Austronesian-speaking peoples. The parsimony analysis of a matrix of 77 Austronesian languages with 5,185 lexical items produced a single most-parsimonious tree. The express-train model was converted into an ordered geographical character and mapped onto the language tree. We found that the topology of the language tree was highly compatible with the express-train model.

Abstract

To study the time course of sentence formulation, we monitored the eye movements of speakers as they described simple events. The similarity between speakers' initial eye movements and those of observers performing a nonverbal event-comprehension task suggested that response-relevant information was rapidly extracted from scenes, allowing speakers to select grammatical subjects based on comprehended events rather than salience. When speaking extemporaneously, speakers began fixating pictured elements less than a second before naming them within their descriptions, a finding consistent with incremental lexical encoding. Eye movements anticipated the order of mention despite changes in picture orientation, in who-did-what-to-whom, and in sentence structure. The results support Wundt's theory of sentence production.

Abstract

In this article, sensory vocabulary relating to color, texture, and other sensory experiences in Yucatec Maya (a language spoken in Mexico) is examined, and its possible relation to material culture practices explored. In Yucatec Maya, some perceptual experience can be expressed in a fine-grained way through a compact one-word adjective. Complex notions can be succinctly expressed by combining roots with a general meaning and applying templates or compounds to those sensory roots. For instance, the root tak’, which means ‘adhere/adherence,’ can be derived to express the notion of ‘dirty red’ chak-tak’-e’en or ‘sticky with an unbounded pattern’ tak’aknak, or the root ts’ap ‘piled-up’ can express ‘several tones of green (e.g. in the forest)’ ya’axts’ape’en or ‘piled-up, known through a tactile experience’ ts’aplemak. The productive nature of this linguistic system seems at first glance to be very well fitted to orient practices relating to the production of local material culture. In examining several hours of video-recorded natural data contrasting work and non-work directed interactions, it emerges that sensory vocabulary is not used for calibrating knowledge but is instead recruited by speakers to achieve vividness in an effort to verbally reproduce the way speakers experience percepts

Abstract

This paper aims at providing a systematic framework for investigating differences in how people point to existing spaces. Pointing is considered according to two conditions: (1) A non-transposed condition where the body of the speaker always constitutes the origo and where the various types of pointing are differentiated by the status of the target and (2) a transposed condition where both the distant figure and the distant ground are identified and their relation specified according to two frames of reference (FoRs): the egocentric FoR (where spatial relationships are coded with respect to the speaker's point of view) and the geocentric FoR (where spatial relationships are coded in relation to external cues in the environment). The preference for one or the other frame of reference not only has consequences for pointing to real spaces but has some resonance in other domains, constraining the production of gesture in these related domains.

Abstract

In previous analyses of the influence of language on cognition, speech has been the main channel examined. In studies conducted among Yucatec Mayas, efforts to determine the preferred frame of reference in use in this community have failed to reach an agreement (Bohnemeyer & Stolz, 2006; Levinson, 2003 vs. Le Guen, 2006, 2009). This paper argues for a multimodal analysis of language that encompasses gesture as well as speech, and shows that the preferred frame of reference in Yucatec Maya is only detectable through the analysis of co-speech gesture and not through speech alone. A series of experiments compares knowledge of the semantics of spatial terms, performance on nonlinguistic tasks and gestures produced by men and women. The results show a striking gender difference in the knowledge of the semantics of spatial terms, but an equal preference for a geocentric frame of reference in nonverbal tasks. In a localization task, participants used a variety of strategies in their speech, but they all exhibited a systematic preference for a geocentric frame of reference in their gestures.

Abstract

This paper outlines some reasons for why gestures are relevant to the study of SLA. First, given cross-cultural and cross-linguistic gestural repertoires, gestures can be treated as part of what learners can acquire in a target language. Gestures can therefore be studied as a developing system in their own right both in L2 production and comprehension. Second, because of the close link between gestures, language, and speech, learners' gestures as deployed in L2 usage and interaction can offer valuable insights into the processes of acquisition, such as the handling of expressive difficulties, the influence of the first language, interlanguage phenomena, and possibly even into planning and processing difficulties. As a form of input to learners and to their interlocutors alike, finally, gestures also play a potential role for comprehension and learning.

Abstract

This study investigates whether addressees visually attend to speakers’ gestures in interaction and whether attention is modulated by changes in social setting and display size. We compare a live face-to-face setting to two video conditions. In all conditions, the face dominates as a fixation target and only a minority of gestures draw fixations. The social and size parameters affect gaze mainly when combined and in the opposite direction from the predicted with fewer gestures fixated on video than live. Gestural holds and speakers’ gaze at their own gestures reliably attract addressees’ fixations in all conditions. The attraction force of holds is unaffected by changes in social and size parameters, suggesting a bottom-up response, whereas speaker-fixated gestures draw significantly less attention in both video conditions, suggesting a social effect for overt gaze-following and visual joint attention. The study provides and validates a video-based paradigm enabling further experimental but ecologically valid explorations of cross-modal information processing.

Abstract

The production of cohesive discourse, especially maintained reference, poses problems for early second language (L2) speakers. This paper considers a communicative account of overexplicit L2 discourse by focusing on the interdependence between spoken and gestural cohesion, the latter being expressed by anchoring of referents in gesture space. Specifically, this study investigates whether overexplicit maintained reference in speech (lexical noun phrases [NPs]) and gesture (anaphoric gestures) constitutes an interactional communication strategy. We examine L2 speech and gestures of 16 Dutch learners of French retelling stories to addressees under two visibility conditions. The results indicate that the overexplicit properties of L2 speech are not motivated by interactional strategic concerns. The results for anaphoric gestures are more complex. Although their presence is not interactionally

Abstract

During face-to-face communication, one does not only hear speech but also see a speaker's communicative hand movements. It has been shown that such hand gestures play an important role in communication where the two modalities influence each other's interpretation. A gesture typically temporally overlaps with coexpressive speech, but the gesture is often initiated before (but not after) the coexpressive speech. The present ERP study investigated what degree of asynchrony in the speech and gesture onsets are optimal for semantic integration of the concurrent gesture and speech. Videos of a person gesturing were combined with speech segments that were either semantically congruent or incongruent with the gesture. Although gesture and speech always overlapped in time, gesture and speech were presented with three different degrees of asynchrony. In the SOA 0 condition, the gesture onset and the speech onset were simultaneous. In the SOA 160 and 360 conditions, speech was delayed by 160 and 360 msec, respectively. ERPs time locked to speech onset showed a significant difference between semantically congruent versus incongruent gesture–speech combinations on the N400 for the SOA 0 and 160 conditions. No significant difference was found for the SOA 360 condition. These results imply that speech and gesture are integrated most efficiently when the differences in onsets do not exceed a certain time span because of the fact that iconic gestures need speech to be disambiguated in a way relevant to the speech context.

Abstract

In this study, event-related brain potential ffects of speech processing are obtained and compared to similar effects in sentence reading. In two experiments sentences were presented that contained three different types of grammatical violations. In one experiment sentences were presented word by word at a rate of four words per second. The grammatical violations elicited a Syntactic Positive Shift (P600/SPS), 500 ms after the onset of the word that rendered the sentence ungrammatical. The P600/SPS consisted of two phases, an early phase with a relatively equal anterior-posterior distribution and a later phase with a strong posterior distribution. We interpret the first phase as an indication of structural integration complexity, and the second phase as an indication of failing parsing operations and/or an attempt at reanalysis. In the second experiment the same syntactic violations were presented in sentences spoken at a normal rate and with normal intonation. These violations elicited a P600/SPS with the same onset as was observed for the reading of these sentences. In addition two of the three violations showed a preceding frontal negativity, most clearly over the left hemisphere.

Abstract

In this study, event-related brain potential effects of speech processing are obtained and compared to similar effects insentence reading. In two experiments spoken sentences were presented with semantic violations in sentence-signal or mid-sentence positions. For these violations N400 effects were obtained that were very similar to N400 effects obtained in reading. However, the N400 effects in speech were preceded by an earlier negativity (N250). This negativity is not commonly observed with written input. The early effect is explained as a manifestation of a mismatch between the word forms expected on the basis of the context, and the actual cohort of activated word candidates that is generated on the basis of the speech signal.

Abstract

We explore the nature of the oscillatory dynamics in the EEG of subjects reading sentences that contain a semantic violation. More specifically, we examine whether increases in theta (≈3–7 Hz) and gamma (around 40 Hz) band power occur in response to sentences that were either semantically correct or contained a semantically incongruent word (semantic violation). ERP results indicated a classical N400 effect. A wavelet-based time-frequency analysis revealed a theta band power increase during an interval of 300–800 ms after critical word onset, at temporal electrodes bilaterally for both sentence conditions, and over midfrontal areas for the semantic violations only. In the gamma frequency band, a predominantly frontal power increase was observed during the processing of correct sentences. This effect was absent following semantic violations. These results provide a characterization of the oscillatory brain dynamics, and notably of both theta and gamma oscillations, that occur during language comprehension.

Abstract

The present paper seeks to clarify the position of the Maco [wpc] language of the lower Ventuari, Venezuela, since there has been some uncertainty in the literature on this matter. Maco-Ventuari, not to be confused with other languages with a similar name, is so far poorly documented, but the present paper shows that it is nevertheless possible to show that it is a dialect of Piaroa or a language closely related to Piaroa

Abstract

The present paper describes the ongoing project LangDoc to make a bibliography website for linguistic typology, with a near-complete database of references to documents that contain descriptive data on the languages of the world. This is intended to provide typologists with a more precise and comprehensive way to search for information on languages, and for the specific kind information that they are interested in. The annotation scheme devised is a trade-off between annotation effort and search desiderata. The end goal is a website with browse, search, update, new items subscription and download facilities, which can hopefully be enriched by spontaneous collaborative efforts.

Abstract

This article surveys work on Unsupervised Learning of Morphology. We define Unsupervised Learning of Morphology as the problem of inducing a description (of some kind, even if only morpheme segmentation) of how orthographic words are built up given only raw text data of a language. We briefly go through the history and motivation of this problem. Next, over 200 items of work are listed with a brief characterization, and the most important ideas in the field are critically discussed. We summarize the achievements so far and give pointers for future developments.

Abstract

We examined whether Slovak-German bilinguals apply native Slovak phonological and lexical knowledge when segmenting German speech. When Slovaks listen to their native language (Hanulíková, McQueen, & Mitterer, 2010), segmentation is impaired when fixed-stress cues are absent, and, following the Possible-Word Constraint (PWC; Norris, McQueen, Cutler, & Butterfield, 1997), lexical candidates are disfavored if segmentation leads to vowelless residues, unless those residues are existing Slovak words. In the present study, fixed-stress cues on German target words were again absent. Nevertheless, in support of the PWC, both German and Slovak listeners recognized German words (e.g., Rose "rose") faster in syllable contexts (suckrose) than in single- onsonant contexts (krose, trose). But only the Slovak listeners recognized Rose, for example, faster in krose than in trose (k is a Slovak word, t is not). It appears that non-native listeners can suppress native stress segmentation procedures, but that they suffer from prevailing interference from native lexical knowledge

Abstract

Bilinguals are slower when naming a picture in their second language than when naming it in their first language. Although the phenomenon has been frequently replicated, it is not known what causes the delay in the second language. In this article we discuss at what processing stages a delay might arise according to current models of bilingual processing and how the available behavioural and neurocognitive evidence relates to these proposals. Suggested plausible mechanisms, such as frequency or interference effects, are compatible with a naming delay arising at different processing stages. Haemodynamic and electrophysiological data seem to point to a postlexical stage but are still too scarce to support a definite conclusion.

Abstract

Both adults and adolescents often conform their behavior and opinions to peer groups, even when they themselves know better. The current study investigated this phenomenon in 24 groups of 4 children between 4;2 and 4;9 years of age. Children often made their judgments conform to those of 3 peers, who had made obviously erroneous but unanimous public judgments right before them. A follow-up study with 18 groups of 4 children between 4;0 and 4;6 years of age revealed that children did not change their “real” judgment of the situation, but only their public expression of it. Preschool children are subject to peer pressure, indicating sensitivity to peers as a primary social reference group already during the preschool years.

Abstract

Comparatively little is known about the inherited primate background underlying human cognition, the human cognitive “wild-type.” Yet it is possible to trace the evolution of human cognitive abilities and tendencies by contrasting the skills of our nearest cousins, not just chimpanzees, but all the extant great apes, thus showing what we are likely to have inherited from the common ancestor [1]. By looking at human infants early in cognitive development, we can also obtain insights into native cognitive biases in our species [2]. Here, we focus on spatial memory, a central cognitive domain. We show, first, that all nonhuman great apes and 1-year-old human infants exhibit a preference for place over feature strategies for spatial memory. This suggests the common ancestor of all great apes had the same preference. We then examine 3-year-old human children and find that this preference reverses. Thus, the continuity between our species and the other great apes is masked early in human ontogeny. These findings, based on both phylogenetic and ontogenetic contrasts, open up the prospect of a systematic evolutionary psychology resting upon the cladistics of cognitive preferences.

Abstract

Current approaches to human cognition often take a strong nativist stance based on Western adult performance, backed up where possible by neonate and infant research and almost never by comparative research across the Hominidae. Recent research suggests considerable cross-cultural differences in cognitive strategies, including relational thinking, a domain where infant research is impossible because of lack of cognitive maturation. Here, we apply the same paradigm across children and adults of different cultures and across all nonhuman great ape genera. We find that both child and adult spatial cognition systematically varies with language and culture but that, nevertheless, there is a clear inherited bias for one spatial strategy in the great apes. It is reasonable to conclude, we argue, that language and culture mask the native tendencies in our species. This cladistic approach suggests that the correct perspective on human cognition is neither nativist uniformitarian nor ‘‘blank slate’’ but recognizes the powerful impact that language and culture can have on our shared primate cognitive biases.

Abstract

Despite the global universality of physical space, different cultural groups vary substantially as to how they memorize it. Although European participants mostly prefer egocentric strategies (“left, right, front, back”) to memorize spatial relations, others use mostly allocentric strategies (“north, south, east, west”). Prior research has shown that some cultures show a general preference to memorize object locations and even also body movements in relation to the larger environment rather than in relation to their own body. Here, we investigate whether this cultural bias also applies to movements specifically directed at the participants' own body, emphasizing the role of ego. We show that even participants with generally allocentric biases preferentially memorize self-directed movements using egocentric spatial strategies. These results demonstrate an intricate system of interacting cultural biases and momentary situational characteristics.

Abstract

We investigate decision-making behaviour in all four non-human great ape species. Apes chose between a safe and a risky option across trials of varying expected values. All species chose the safe option more often with decreasing probability of success. While all species were risk-seeking, orangutans and chimpanzees chose the risky option more often than gorillas and bonobos. Hence all four species' preferences were ordered in a manner consistent with normative dictates of expected value, but varied predictably in their willingness to take risks.

Abstract

The present paper explores cross-cultural variation in spatial cognition by comparing spatial reconstruction tasks by Dutch and Namibian elementary school children. These two communities differ in the way they predominantly express spatial relations in language. Four experiments investigate cognitive strategy preferences across different levels of task-complexity and instruction. Data show a correlation between dominant linguistic spatial frames of reference and performance patterns in non-linguistic spatial memory tasks. This correlation is shown to be stable across an increase of complexity in the spatial array. When instructed to use their respective non-habitual cognitive strategy, participants were not easily able to switch between strategies and their attempts to do so impaired their performance. These results indicate a difference not only in preference but also in competence and suggest that spatial language and non-linguistic preferences and competences in spatial cognition are systematically aligned across human populations.

Abstract

Interrogative structures such as ‘Could you pass the salt? and ‘Couldn’t you pass the salt?’ can be used for making requests. A study of such pairs within a conversation analytic framework suggests that these are not used interchangeably, and that they have different impacts on the interaction. Focusing on Danish interactions between elderly care recipients and their home help assistants, I demonstrate how the care recipient displays different degrees of stance towards whether she is entitled to make a request or not, depending on whether she formats her request as a positive or a negative interrogative. With a positive interrogative request, the care recipient orients to her request as one she is not entitled to make. This is underscored by other features, such as the use of mitigating devices and the choice of verb. When accounting for this type of request, the care recipient ties the request to the specific situation she is in, at the moment in which the request is produced. In turn, the home help assistant orients to the lack of entitlement by resisting the request. With a negative interrogative request, the care recipient, in contrast, orients to her request as one she is entitled to make. This is strengthened by the choice of verb and the lack of mitigating devices. When such requests are accounted for, the requested task is treated as something that should be routinely performed, and hence as something the home help assistant has neglected to do. In turn, the home help assistant orients to the display of entitlement by treating the request as unproblematic, and by complying with it immediately.

Abstract

Recent work demonstrates that learning to understand noise-vocoded (NV) speech alters sublexical perceptual processes but is enhanced by the simultaneous provision of higher-level, phonological, but not lexical content (Hervais-Adelman, Davis, Johnsrude, & Carlyon, 2008), consistent with top-down learning (Davis, Johnsrude, Hervais-Adelman, Taylor, & McGettigan, 2005; Hervais-Adelman et al., 2008). Here, we investigate whether training listeners with specific types of NV speech improves intelligibility of vocoded speech with different acoustic characteristics. Transfer of perceptual learning would provide evidence for abstraction from variable properties of the speech input. In Experiment 1, we demonstrate that learning of NV speech in one frequency region generalizes to an untrained frequency region. In Experiment 2, we assessed generalization among three carrier signals used to create NV speech: noise bands, pulse trains, and sine waves. Stimuli created using these three carriers possess the same slow, time-varying amplitude information and are equated for naive intelligibility but differ in their temporal fine structure. Perceptual learning generalized partially, but not completely, among different carrier signals. These results delimit the functional and neural locus of perceptual learning of vocoded speech. Generalization across frequency regions suggests that learning occurs at a stage of processing at which some abstraction from the physical signal has occurred, while incomplete transfer across carriers indicates that learning occurs at a stage of processing that is sensitive to acoustic features critical for speech perception (e.g., noise, periodicity).

Abstract

In this review we will focus on delineating the neural substrates of the executive control of language in the bilingual brain, based on the existing neuroimaging, intracranial, transcranial magnetic stimulation, and neuropsychological evidence. We will also offer insights from ongoing brain-imaging studies into the development of expertise in multilingual language control. We will concentrate specifically on evidence regarding how the brain selects and controls languages for comprehension and production. This question has been addressed in a number of ways and using various tasks, including language switching during production or perception, translation, and interpretation. We will attempt to synthesize existing evidence in order to bring to light the neural substrates that are crucial to executive control of language.

Abstract

Imagine describing the particular characteristics of the hue of a flower, or the quality of its scent, or the texture of its petal. Introspection suggests the expression of such sensory experiences in words is something quite different than the task of naming artifacts. The particular challenges in the linguistic encoding of sensorial experiences pose questions regarding how languages manage semantic gaps and “ineffability.” That is, what strategies do speakers have available to manage phenomena or domains of experience that are inexpressible or difficult to express in their language? This article considers this issue with regard to color in Umpila, an Aboriginal Australian language of the Paman family. The investigation of color naming and ineffability in Umpila reveals rich associations and mappings between color and visual perceptual qualities more generally, categorization of the human social world, and the environment. “Gaps” in the color system are filled or supported by associations with two of the most linguistically and culturally salient domains for Umpila - kinship and the environment

Abstract

When faced with the noun phrase (NP) versus sentence (S) coordination ambiguity as in, for example, The thief shot the jeweller and the cop hellip, readers prefer the reading with NP-coordination (e.g., "The thief shot the jeweller and the cop yesterday") over one with two conjoined sentences (e.g., "The thief shot the jeweller and the cop panicked"). A corpus study is presented showing that NP-coordinations are produced far more often than S-coordinations, which in frequency-based accounts of parsing might be taken to explain the NP-coordination preference. In addition, we describe an eye-tracking experiment investigating S-coordinated sentences such as Jasper sanded the board and the carpenter laughed, where the poor thematic fit between carpenter and sanded argues against NP-coordination. Our results indicate that information regarding poor thematic fit was used rapidly, but not without leaving some residual processing difficulty. This is compatible with claims that thematic information can reduce but not completely eliminate garden-path effects.

Abstract

Mimicry has been observed regarding a range of nonverbal behaviors, but only recently have researchers started to investigate mimicry in co-speech gestures. These gestures are considered to be crucially different from other aspects of nonverbal behavior due to their tight link with speech. This study provides evidence of mimicry in co-speech gestures in face-to-face dialogue, the most common forum of everyday talk. In addition, it offers an analysis of the functions that mimicked co-speech gestures fulfill in the collaborative process of creating a mutually shared understanding of referring expressions. The implications bear on theories of gesture production, research on grounding, and the mechanisms underlying behavioral mimicry.

Abstract

There is evidence that co-speech gestures communicate information to addressees and that they are often communicatively intended. However, we still know comparatively little about the role of gestures in the actual process of communication. The present study offers a systematic investigation of speakers’ gesture use before and after addressee feedback. The findings show that when speakers responded to addressees’ feedback gesture rate remained constant when this feedback encouraged clarification, elaboration or correction. However, speakers gestured proportionally less often after feedback when providing confirmatory responses. That is, speakers may not be drawing on gesture in response to addressee feedback per se, but particularly with responses that enhance addressees’ understanding. Further, the large majority of speakers’ gestures changed in their form. They tended to be more precise, larger, or more visually prominent after feedback. Some changes in gesture viewpoint were also observed. In addition, we found that speakers used deixis in speech and gaze to increase the salience of gestures occurring in response to feedback. Speakers appear to conceive of gesture as a useful modality in redesigning utterances to make them more accessible to addressees. The findings further our understanding of recipient design and co-speech gestures in face-to-face dialogue.
Highlights

► Gesture rate remains constant in response to addressee feedback when the response aims to correct or clarify understanding. ► But gesture rate decreases when speakers provide confirmatory responses to feedback signalling correct understanding. ► Gestures are more communicative in response to addressee feedback, particularly in terms of precision, size and visual prominence. ► Speakers make gestures in response to addressee feedback more salient by using deictic markers in speech and gaze.

Abstract

This paper describes a computerized alternative to glottochronology for estimating elapsed time since parent languages diverged into daughter languages. The method, developed by the Automated Similarity Judgment Program (ASJP) consortium, is different from glottochronology in four major respects: (1) it is automated and thus is more objective, (2) it applies a uniform analytical approach to a single database of worldwide languages, (3) it is based on lexical similarity as determined from Levenshtein (edit) distances rather than on cognate percentages, and (4) it provides a formula for date calculation that mathematically recognizes the lexical heterogeneity of individual languages, including parent languages just before their breakup into daughter languages. Automated judgments of lexical similarity for groups of related languages are calibrated with historical, epigraphic, and archaeological divergence dates for 52 language groups. The discrepancies between estimated and calibration dates are found to be on average 29% as large as the estimated dates themselves, a figure that does not differ significantly among language families. As a resource for further research that may require dates of known level of accuracy, we offer a list of ASJP time depths for nearly all the world’s recognized language families and for many subfamilies.

Abstract

Objective: Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a highly heritable disorder. The NOS1 gene encoding nitric oxide synthase is a candidate gene for ADHD and has been previously linked with impulsivity. In the present study, the authors investigated the effect of a functional variable number of tandem repeats (VNTR) polymorphism in NOS1 (NOS1 exon 1f-VNTR) on the processing of rewards, one of the cognitive deficits in ADHD. Method: A sample of 136 participants, consisting of 87 adult ADHD patients and 49 healthy comparison subjects, completed a reward-related impulsivity task. A total of 104 participants also underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging during a reward anticipation task. The effect of the NOS1 exon 1f-VNTR genotype on reward-related impulsivity and reward-related ventral striatal activity was examined. Results: ADHD patients had higher impulsivity scores and lower ventral striatal activity than healthy comparison subjects. The association between the short allele and increased impulsivity was confirmed. However, independent of disease status, homozygous carriers of the short allele of NOS1, the ADHD risk genotype, demonstrated higher ventral striatal activity than carriers of the other NOS1 VNTR genotypes. Conclusions: The authors suggest that the NOS1 genotype influences impulsivity and its relation with ADHD is mediated through effects on this behavioral trait. Increased ventral striatal activity related to NOS1 may be compensatory for effects in other brain regions.

Abstract

Dutch-learning and English-learning 9-month-olds were tested, using the Headturn Preference Procedure, for their ability to segment Dutch words with strong/weak stress patterns from fluent Dutch speech. This prosodic pattern is highly typical for words of both languages. The infants were familiarized with pairs of words and then tested on four passages, two that included the familiarized words and two that did not. Both the Dutch- and the English-learning infants gave evidence of segmenting the targets from the passages, to an equivalent degree. Thus, English-learning infants are able to extract words from fluent speech in a language that is phonetically different from English. We discuss the possibility that this cross-language segmentation ability is aided by the similarity of the typical rhythmic structure of Dutch and English words.

Abstract

We investigated reasoning about spatial relational similarity in three great ape species: chimpanzees, bonobos, and orangutans. Apes were presented with three spatial mapping tasks in which they were required to find a reward in an array of three cups, after observing a reward being hidden in a different array of three cups. To obtain a food reward, apes needed to choose the cup that was in the same relative position (i.e., on the left) as the baited cup in the other array. The three tasks differed in the constellation of the two arrays. In Experiment 1, the arrays were placed next to each other, forming a line. In Experiment 2, the positioning of the two arrays varied each trial, being placed either one behind the other in two rows, or next to each other, forming a line. Finally, in Experiment 3, the two arrays were always positioned one behind the other in two rows, but misaligned. Results suggested that apes compared the two arrays and recognized that they were similar in some way. However, we believe that instead of mapping the left–left, middle–middle, and right–right cups from each array, they mapped the cups that shared the most similar relations to nearby landmarks (table’s visual boundaries).

Abstract

Four eye-tracking experiments examined whether semantic and visual-shape representations are routinely retrieved from printed-word displays and used during language-mediated visual search. Participants listened to sentences containing target words which were similar semantically or in shape to concepts invoked by concurrently-displayed printed words. In Experiment 1 the displays contained semantic and shape competitors of the targets, and two unrelated words. There were significant shifts in eye gaze as targets were heard towards semantic but not shape competitors. In Experiments 2-4, semantic competitors were replaced with unrelated words, semantically richer sentences were presented to encourage visual imagery, or participants rated the shape similarity of the stimuli before doing the eye-tracking task. In all cases there were no immediate shifts in eye gaze to shape competitors, even though, in response to the Experiment 1 spoken materials, participants looked to these competitors when they were presented as pictures (Huettig & McQueen, 2007). There was a late shape-competitor bias (more than 2500 ms after target onset) in all experiments. These data show that shape information is not used in online search of printed-word displays (whereas it is used with picture displays). The nature of the visual environment appears to induce implicit biases towards particular modes of processing during language-mediated visual search.

Abstract

We describe the key features of the visual world paradigm and review the main research areas where it has been used. In our discussion we highlight that the paradigm provides information about the way language users integrate linguistic information with information derived from the visual environment. Therefore the paradigm is well suited to study one of the key issues of current cognitive psychology, namely the interplay between linguistic and visual information processing. However, conclusions about linguistic processing (e.g., about activation, competition, and timing of access of linguistic representations) in the absence of relevant visual information must be drawn with caution.

Abstract

In the visual world paradigm, participants are more likely to fixate a visual referent that has some semantic relationship with a heard word, than they are to fixate an unrelated referent [Cooper, R. M. (1974). The control of eye fixation by the meaning of spoken language. A new methodology for the real-time investigation of speech perception, memory, and language processing. Cognitive Psychology, 6, 813–839]. Here, this method is used to examine the psychological validity of models of high-dimensional semantic space. The data strongly suggest that these corpus-based measures of word semantics predict fixation behavior in the visual world and provide further evidence that language-mediated eye movements to objects in the concurrent visual environment are driven by semantic similarity rather than all-or-none categorical knowledge. The data suggest that the visual world paradigm can, together with other methodologies, converge on the evidence that may help adjudicate between different theoretical accounts of the psychological semantics.

Abstract

Three eye-tracking experiments investigated the influence of stored colour knowledge, perceived surface colour, and conceptual category of visual objects on language-mediated overt attention. Participants heard spoken target words whose concepts are associated with a diagnostic colour (e.g., "spinach"; spinach is typically green) while their eye movements were monitored to (a) objects associated with a diagnostic colour but presented in black and white (e.g., a black-and-white line drawing of a frog), (b) objects associated with a diagnostic colour but presented in an appropriate but atypical colour (e.g., a colour photograph of a yellow frog), and (c) objects not associated with a diagnostic colour but presented in the diagnostic colour of the target concept (e.g., a green blouse; blouses are not typically green). We observed that colour-mediated shifts in overt attention are primarily due to the perceived surface attributes of the visual objects rather than stored knowledge about the typical colour of the object. In addition our data reveal that conceptual category information is the primary determinant of overt attention if both conceptual category and surface colour competitors are copresent in the visual environment.

Abstract

In the visual world paradigm as used in psycholinguistics, eye gaze (i.e. visual orienting) is measured in order to draw conclusions about linguistic processing. However, current theories are underspecified with respect to how visual attention is guided on the basis of linguistic representations. In the visual search paradigm as used within the area of visual attention research, investigators have become more and more interested in how visual orienting is affected by higher order representations, such as those involved in memory and language. Within this area more specific models of orienting on the basis of visual information exist, but they need to be extended with mechanisms that allow for language-mediated orienting. In the present paper we review the evidence from these two different – but highly related – research areas. We arrive at a model in which working memory serves as the nexus in which long-term visual as well as linguistic representations (i.e. types) are bound to specific locations (i.e. tokens or indices). The model predicts that the interaction between language and visual attention is subject to a number of conditions, such as the presence of the guiding representation in working memory, capacity limitations, and cognitive control mechanisms.

Abstract

The influence of formal literacy on spoken language-mediated visual orienting was investigated by using a simple look and listen task (cf. Huettig & Altmann, 2005) which resembles every day behavior. In Experiment 1, high and low literates listened to spoken sentences containing a target word (e.g., 'magar', crocodile) while at the same time looking at a visual display of four objects (a phonological competitor of the target word, e.g., 'matar', peas; a semantic competitor, e.g., 'kachuwa', turtle, and two unrelated distractors). In Experiment 2 the semantic competitor was replaced with another unrelated distractor. Both groups of participants shifted their eye gaze to the semantic competitors (Experiment 1). In both experiments high literates shifted their eye gaze towards phonological competitors as soon as phonological information became available and moved their eyes away as soon as the acoustic information mismatched. Low literates in contrast only used phonological information when semantic matches between spoken word and visual referent were impossible (Experiment 2) but in contrast to high literates these phonologically-mediated shifts in eye gaze were not closely time-locked to the speech input. We conclude that in high literates language-mediated shifts in overt attention are co-determined by the type of information in the visual environment, the timing of cascaded processing in the word- and object-recognition systems, and the temporal unfolding of the spoken language. Our findings indicate that low literates exhibit a similar cognitive behavior but instead of participating in a tug-of-war among multiple types of cognitive representations, word-object mapping is achieved primarily at the semantic level. If forced, for instance by a situation in which semantic matches are not present (Experiment 2), low literates may on occasion have to rely on phonological information but do so in a much less proficient manner than their highly literate counterparts.

Abstract

This article presents the results of a meta-analysis of 30 hemodynamic experiments comparing first language (L1) and second language (L2) processing in a range of tasks. The results suggest that reliably stronger activation during L2 processing is found (a) only for task-specific subgroups of L2 speakers and (b) within some, but not all regions that are also typically activated in native language processing. A tentative interpretation based on the functional roles of frontal and temporal regions is suggested.

Abstract

This volume is a harvest of articles from the first conference in a series on the cognitive neuroscience of language. The first conference focused on the cognitive neuroscience of second language acquisition (henceforth SLA). It brought together experts from as diverse fields as second language acquisition, bilingualism, cognitive neuroscience, and neuroanatomy. The articles and discussion articles presented here illustrate state-of-the-art findings and represent a wide range of theoretical approaches to classic as well as newer SLA issues. The theoretical themes cover age effects in SLA related to the so-called Critical Period Hypothesis and issues of ultimate attainment and focus both on age effects pertaining to childhood and to aging. Other familiar SLA topics are the effects of proficiency and learning as well as issues concerning the difference between the end product and the process that yields that product, here discussed in terms of convergence and degeneracy. A topic more related to actual usage of a second language once acquired concerns how multilingual speakers control and regulate their two languages.