Displaying 201 - 300 of 499
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Kempen, G. (1979). Psychologie van de zinsbouw: Een Wundtiaanse inleiding. Nederlands Tijdschrift voor de Psychologie, 34, 533-551.
Abstract
The psychology of language as developed by Wilhelm Wundt in his fundamental work Die Sprache (1900) has a strongly mentalistic character. The dominating positions held by behaviorism in psychology and structuralism in linguistics have overruled Wundt’s language theory to the effect that it has remained relatively unknown. This situation has changed recently under the influence of transformational linguistics and cognitive psychology. The paper discusses how Wundt applied the basic psychological concepts of apperception and association to language behavior, in particular to the construction and production of sentences during unprepared speech. The final part of the paper is devoted to the work, published in 1917, of the Dutch linguistic scholar Jacques van Ginneken, who elaborated Wundt’s ideas towards an explanation of some syntactic phenomena during the language acquisition of children. -
Kempen, G., Hermans, B., Klinkum, A., Brand, M., & Verhaaren, F. (1969). The word-frequency effect and incongruity perception: Methodological artifacts? Perception and Psychophysics, 5(3), 161-162. doi:10.3758/BF03209549.
Abstract
Two experimental results often reported in support of perceptual interpretations concerning the influence of set on perception are critically examined: (a) the relation between word frequency and recognition threshold, and (b) the so-called compromise reactions between set and stimulus, Alter elimination of certain methodological artifacts (e.g., introduction of a temporal forced-choice method instead of the ascending-limits method), both phenomena disappear; the influence of set on perception appears to be wholly a matter of response bias. -
Kempen, G. (1979). Woordwaarde. De Psycholoog, 14, 577.
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Kemps-Snijders, M., Windhouwer, M., Wittenburg, P., & Wright, S. E. (2009). ISOcat: Remodeling metadata for language resources. International Journal of Metadata, Semantics and Ontologies (IJMSO), 4(4), 261-276. doi:10.1504/IJMSO.2009.029230.
Abstract
The Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics in Nijmegen, The Netherlands, is creating a state-of-the-art web environment for the ISO TC 37 (terminology and other language and content resources) metadata registry. This Data Category Registry (DCR) is called ISOcat and encompasses data categories for a broad range of language resources. Under the governance of the DCR Board, ISOcat provides an open work space for creating data category specifications, defining Data Category Selections (DCSs) (domain-specific groups of data categories), and standardising selected data categories and DCSs. Designers visualise future interactivity among the DCR, reference registries and ontological knowledge spaces -
Kendrick, K. H., & Holler, J. (2017). Gaze direction signals response preference in conversation. Research on Language and Social Interaction, 50(1), 12-32. doi:10.1080/08351813.2017.1262120.
Abstract
In this article, we examine gaze direction in responses to polar questions using both quantitative and conversation analytic (CA) methods. The data come from a novel corpus of conversations in which participants wore eye-tracking glasses to obtain direct measures of their eye movements. The results show that while most preferred responses are produced with gaze toward the questioner, most dispreferred responses are produced with gaze aversion. We further demonstrate that gaze aversion by respondents can occasion self-repair by questioners in the transition space between turns, indicating that the relationship between gaze direction and preference is more than a mere statistical association. We conclude that gaze direction in responses to polar questions functions as a signal of response preference. Data are in American, British, and Canadian English.Additional information
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Ketrez, F. N., Kuntay, A. C., Ozcaliskan, S., & Ozyurek, A. (
Eds. ). (2017). Social environment and cognition in language development: Studies in honor of Ayhan Aksu-Koc. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Abstract
Language development is driven by multiple factors involving both the individual child and the environments that surround the child. The chapters in this volume highlight several such factors as potential contributors to developmental change, including factors that examine the role of immediate social environment (i.e., parent SES, parent and sibling input, peer interaction) and factors that focus on the child’s own cognitive and social development, such as the acquisition of theory of mind, event knowledge, and memory. The discussion of the different factors is presented largely from a crosslinguistic framework, using a multimodal perspective (speech, gesture, sign). The book celebrates the scholarly contributions of Prof. Ayhan Aksu-Koç – a pioneer in the study of crosslinguistic variation in language acquisition, particularly in the domain of evidentiality and theory of mind. This book will serve as an important resource for researchers in the field of developmental psychology, cognitive science, and linguistics across the globe -
Kidd, E., & Holler, J. (2009). Children’s use of gesture to resolve lexical ambiguity. Developmental Science, 12, 903-913.
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Kidd, E. (2009). [Review of the book Constructions at work: The nature of generalization in language by Adele E. Goldberg]. Cognitive Linguistics, 20(2), 425-434. doi:10.1515/COGL.2009.020.
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Kidd, E. (2009). [Review of the book Developmental psycholinguistics; On-line methods in children's language processing ed. by Irina A. Sekerina, Eva M. Hernandez and Harald Clahsen]. Journal of Child Language, 36(2), 471-475. doi:10.1017/S030500090800901X.
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Kirjavainen, M., Kidd, E., & Lieven, E. (2017). How do language-specific characteristics affect the acquisition of different relative clause types? Evidence from Finnish. Journal of Child Language, 44(1), 120-157. doi:10.1017/s0305000915000768.
Abstract
We report three studies (one corpus, two experimental) that investigated the acquisition of relative clauses (RCs) in Finnish-speaking children. Study 1 found that Finnish children's naturalistic exposure to RCs predominantly consists of non-subject relatives (i.e. oblique, object) which typically have inanimate head nouns. Study 2 tested children's comprehension of subject, object, and two types of oblique relatives. No difference was found in the children's performance on different structures, including a lack of previously widely reported asymmetry between subject and object relatives. However, children's comprehension was modulated by animacy of the head referent. Study 3 tested children's production of the same RC structures using sentence repetition. Again we found no subject–object asymmetry. The pattern of results suggested that distributional frequency patterns and the relative complexity of the relativizer contribute to the difficulty associated with particular RC structures. -
Kirkham, J. A., & Kidd, E. (2017). The effect of Steiner, Montessori, and national curriculum education upon children's pretence and creativity. Journal of Creative Behavior, 51(1), 20-34. doi:10.1002/jocb.83.
Abstract
Pretence and creativity are often regarded as ubiquitous characteristics of childhood, yet not all education systems value or promote these attributes to the same extent. Different pedagogies and practices are evident within the UK National Curriculum, Steiner and Montessori schools. In this study, 20 children participated from each of these school systems (N = 60, aged 6;10–8;11) completing the test of creative thinking—drawing production (TCT-DP; K. K. Urban, & H. G. Jellen, 1996) and a pretend actions task (W. F. Overton & J. P. Jackson, 1973). Overall, Steiner pupils performed significantly higher on the TCT-DP than both the Montessori and National Curriculum pupils who performed similarly. Steiner pupils also performed significantly better on the pretend actions task than the Montessori pupils, but no other significant differences were found. Overall, there was also a significant positive correlation between pretence and creativity in the current sample, supporting previous research suggesting that these skills are related (e.g., A.S. Kaugars & S. W. Russ, 2009; P. Y. Mullineaux & L. F. Dilalla, 2009). -
Kita, S., Alibali, M. W., & Chu, M. (2017). How Do Gestures Influence Thinking and Speaking? The Gesture-for-Conceptualization Hypothesis. Psychological Review, 124(3), 245-266. doi:10.1037/rev0000059.
Abstract
People spontaneously produce gestures during speaking and thinking. The authors focus here on gestures that depict or indicate information related to the contents of concurrent speech or thought (i.e., representational gestures). Previous research indicates that such gestures have not only communicative functions, but also self-oriented cognitive functions. In this article, the authors propose a new theoretical framework, the gesture-for-conceptualization hypothesis, which explains the self-oriented functions of representational gestures. According to this framework, representational gestures affect cognitive processes in 4 main ways: gestures activate, manipulate, package, and explore spatio-motoric information for speaking and thinking. These four functions are shaped by gesture's ability to schematize information, that is, to focus on a small subset of available information that is potentially relevant to the task at hand. The framework is based on the assumption that gestures are generated from the same system that generates practical actions, such as object manipulation; however, gestures are distinct from practical actions in that they represent information. The framework provides a novel, parsimonious, and comprehensive account of the self-oriented functions of gestures. The authors discuss how the framework accounts for gestures that depict abstract or metaphoric content, and they consider implications for the relations between self-oriented and communicative functions of gestures -
Klein, W. (2017). Statt einer Einleitung: Brigitte Schlieben-Lange zum Gedenken. Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik, 30(4), 5-10. doi:10.1007/BF03379240.
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Klein, W. (1979). Einleitung. Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik; Metzler, Stuttgart, 9(33), 7-8.
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Klein, W., & Dittmar, N. (1979). Developing grammars. Berlin: Springer.
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Klein, M., Van Donkelaar, M., Verhoef, E., & Franke, B. (2017). Imaging genetics in neurodevelopmental psychopathology. American Journal of Medical Genetics Part B: Neuropsychiatric Genetics, 174(5), 485-537. doi:10.1002/ajmg.b.32542.
Abstract
Neurodevelopmental disorders are defined by highly heritable problems during development and brain growth. Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), autism spectrum disorders (ASDs), and intellectual disability (ID) are frequent neurodevelopmental disorders, with common comorbidity among them. Imaging genetics studies on the role of disease-linked genetic variants on brain structure and function have been performed to unravel the etiology of these disorders. Here, we reviewed imaging genetics literature on these disorders attempting to understand the mechanisms of individual disorders and their clinical overlap. For ADHD and ASD, we selected replicated candidate genes implicated through common genetic variants. For ID, which is mainly caused by rare variants, we included genes for relatively frequent forms of ID occurring comorbid with ADHD or ASD. We reviewed case-control studies and studies of risk variants in healthy individuals. Imaging genetics studies for ADHD were retrieved for SLC6A3/DAT1, DRD2, DRD4, NOS1, and SLC6A4/5HTT. For ASD, studies on CNTNAP2, MET, OXTR, and SLC6A4/5HTT were found. For ID, we reviewed the genes FMR1, TSC1 and TSC2, NF1, and MECP2. Alterations in brain volume, activity, and connectivity were observed. Several findings were consistent across studies, implicating, for example, SLC6A4/5HTT in brain activation and functional connectivity related to emotion regulation. However, many studies had small sample sizes, and hypothesis-based, brain region-specific studies were common. Results from available studies confirm that imaging genetics can provide insight into the link between genes, disease-related behavior, and the brain. However, the field is still in its early stages, and conclusions about shared mechanisms cannot yet be drawn. -
Klein, W., & Kreuzer, H. (
Eds. ). (1969). Literarische und naturwissenschaftliche Intelligenz. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. -
Klein, W., & Li, P. (
Eds. ). (2009). The expression of time. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. -
Klein, W. (1979). Wegauskünfte. Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik, 33, 9-57.
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Klepp, A., Niccolai, V., Sieksmeyer, J., Arnzen, S., Indefrey, P., Schnitzler, A., & Biermann-Ruben, K. (2017). Body-part specific interactions of action verb processing with motor behaviour. Behavioural Brain Research, 328, 149-158. doi:10.1016/j.bbr.2017.04.002.
Abstract
The interaction of action-related language processing with actual movement is an indicator of the functional role of motor cortical involvement in language understanding. This paper describes two experiments using single action verb stimuli. Motor responses were performed with the hand or the foot. To test the double dissociation of language-motor facilitation effects within subjects, Experiments 1 and 2 used a priming procedure where both hand and foot reactions had to be performed in response to different geometrical shapes, which were preceded by action verbs. In Experiment 1, the semantics of the verbs could be ignored whereas Experiment 2 included semantic decisions. Only Experiment 2 revealed a clear double dissociation in reaction times: reactions were facilitated when preceded by verbs describing actions with the matching effector. In Experiment 1, by contrast, there was an interaction between verb-response congruence and a semantic variable related to motor features of the verbs. Thus, the double dissociation paradigm of semantic motor priming was effective, corroborating the role of the motor system in action-related language processing. Importantly, this effect was body part specific.Files private
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Kong, X., Song, Y., Zhen, Z., & Liu, J. (2017). Genetic Variation in S100B Modulates Neural Processing of Visual Scenes in Han Chinese. Cerebral Cortex, 27(2), 1326-1336. doi:10.1093/cercor/bhv322.
Abstract
Spatial navigation is a crucial ability for living. Previous animal studies have shown that the S100B gene is causally related to spatial navigation performance in mice. However, the genetic factors influencing human navigation and its neural substrates remain unclear. Here, we provided the first evidence that the S100B gene modulates neural processing of navigationally relevant scenes in humans. First, with a novel protocol, we demonstrated that the spatial pattern of S100B gene expression in postmortem brains was associated with brain activation pattern for spatial navigation in general, and for scene processing in particular. Further, in a large fMRI cohort of healthy adults of Han Chinese (N = 202), we found that S100B gene polymorphisms modulated scene selectivity in the retrosplenial cortex (RSC) and parahippocampal place area. Finally, the serum levels of S100B protein mediated the association between S100B gene polymorphism and scene selectivity in the RSC. Our study takes the first step toward understanding the neurogenetic mechanism of human spatial navigation and suggests a novel approach to discover candidate genes modulating cognitive functions.Additional information
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Kong, X., Wang, X., Pu, Y., Huang, L., Hao, X., Zhen, Z., & Liu, J. (2017). Human navigation network: The intrinsic functional organization and behavioral relevance. Brain Structure and Function, 222(2), 749-764. doi:10.1007/s00429-016-1243-8.
Abstract
Spatial navigation is a crucial ability for living. Previous work has revealed multiple distributed brain regions associated with human navigation. However, little is known about how these regions work together as a network (referred to as navigation network) to support flexible navigation. In a novel protocol, we combined neuroimaging meta-analysis, and functional connectivity and behavioral data from the same subjects. Briefly, we first constructed the navigation network for each participant, by combining a large-scale neuroimaging meta-analysis (with the Neurosynth) and resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging. Then, we investigated multiple topological properties of the navigation networks, including small-worldness, modularity, and highly connected hubs. Finally, we explored the behavioral relevance of these intrinsic properties in a large sample of healthy young adults (N = 190). We found that navigation networks showed small-world and modular organization at global level. More importantly, we found that increased small-worldness and modularity of the navigation network were associated with better navigation ability. Finally, we found that the right retrosplenial complex (RSC) acted as one of the hubs in the navigation network, and that higher betweenness of this region correlated with better navigation ability, suggesting a critical role of the RSC in modulating the navigation network in human brain. Our study takes one of the first steps toward understanding the underlying organization of the navigation network. Moreover, these findings suggest the potential applications of the novel approach to investigating functionally meaningful networks in human brain and their relations to the behavioral impairments in the aging and psychiatric patients. -
Kong, X., Huang, Y., Hu, S., & Liu, J. (2017). Sex-linked association between cortical scene selectivity and navigational ability. NeuroImage, 158, 397-405. doi:10.1016/j.neuroimage.2017.07.031.
Abstract
Spatial navigation is a crucial ability for living. Previous studies have shown that males are better at navigation than females, but little is known about the neural basis underlying the sex differences. In this study, we investigated whether cortical scene processing in three well-established scene-selective regions was sexually different, by examining sex differences in scene selectivity and its behavioral relevance to navigation. To do this, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to scan the parahippocampal place area (PPA), retrosplenial complex (RSC), and occipital place area (OPA) in a large cohort of healthy young adults viewing navigationally relevant scenes (N = 202), and correlated their neural selectivity to scenes with their self-reported navigational ability. Behaviorally, we replicated the previous finding that males were better at navigation than females. Neurally, we found that the scene selectivity in the bilateral PPA, not in the RSC or OPA, was significantly higher in males than females. Such differences could not be explained by confounding factors including brain size and fMRI data quality. Importantly, males, not females, with stronger scene selectivity in the left PPA possessed better navigational ability. This brain-behavior association could not be accounted for by non-navigational abilities (i.e., intelligence and mental rotation ability). Overall, our study provides novel empirical evidence demonstrating sex differences in the brain activity, inviting further studies on sex differences in the neural network for spatial navigation.Additional information
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Konopka, A. E., & Bock, K. (2009). Lexical or syntactic control of sentence formulation? Structural generalizations from idiom production. Cognitive Psychology, 58, 68-101. doi:10.1016/j.cogpsych.2008.05.002.
Abstract
To compare abstract structural and lexicalist accounts of syntactic processes in sentence formulation, we examined the effectiveness of nonidiomatic and idiomatic phrasal verbs in inducing structural generalizations. Three experiments made use of a syntactic priming paradigm in which participants recalled sentences they had read in rapid serial visual presentation. Prime and target sentences contained phrasal verbs with particles directly following the verb (pull off a sweatshirt) or following the direct object (pull a sweatshirt off). Idiomatic primes used verbs whose figurative meaning cannot be straightforwardly derived from the literal meaning of the main verb (e.g., pull off a robbery) and are commonly treated as stored lexical units. Particle placement in sentences was primed by both nonidiomatic and idiomatic verbs. Experiment 1 showed that the syntax of idiomatic and nonidiomatic phrasal verbs is amenable to priming, and Experiments 2 and 3 compared the priming patterns created by idiomatic and nonidiomatic primes. Despite differences in idiomaticity and structural flexibility, both types of phrasal verbs induced structural generalizations and differed little in their ability to do so. The findings are interpreted in terms of the role of abstract structural processes in language production. -
Konopka, A. E., & Benjamin, A. (2009). Schematic knowledge changes what judgments of learning predict in a source memory task. Memory & Cognition, 37(1), 42-51. doi:10.3758/MC.37.1.42.
Abstract
Source monitoring can be influenced by information that is external to the study context, such as beliefs and general knowledge (Johnson, Hashtroudi, & Lindsay, 1993). We investigated the extent to which metamnemonic judgments predict memory for items and sources when schematic information about the sources is or is not provided at encoding. Participants made judgments of learning (JOLs) to statements presented by two speakers and were informed of the occupation of each speaker either before or after the encoding session. Replicating earlier work, prior knowledge decreased participants' tendency to erroneously attribute statements to schematically consistent but episodically incorrect speakers. The origin of this effect can be understood by examining the relationship between JOLs and performance: JOLs were equally predictive of item and source memory in the absence of prior knowledge, but were exclusively predictive of source memory when participants knew of the relationship between speakers and statements during study. Background knowledge determines the information that people solicit in service of metamnemonic judgments, suggesting that these judgments reflect control processes during encoding that reduce schematic errors. -
Kooijman, V., Hagoort, P., & Cutler, A. (2009). Prosodic structure in early word segmentation: ERP evidence from Dutch ten-month-olds. Infancy, 14, 591 -612. doi:10.1080/15250000903263957.
Abstract
Recognizing word boundaries in continuous speech requires detailed knowledge of the native language. In the first year of life, infants acquire considerable word segmentation abilities. Infants at this early stage in word segmentation rely to a large extent on the metrical pattern of their native language, at least in stress-based languages. In Dutch and English (both languages with a preferred trochaic stress pattern), segmentation of strong-weak words develops rapidly between 7 and 10 months of age. Nevertheless, trochaic languages contain not only strong-weak words but also words with a weak-strong stress pattern. In this article, we present electrophysiological evidence of the beginnings of weak-strong word segmentation in Dutch 10-month-olds. At this age, the ability to combine different cues for efficient word segmentation does not yet seem to be completely developed. We provide evidence that Dutch infants still largely rely on strong syllables, even for the segmentation of weak-strong words. -
Kopecka, A. (2009). L'expression du déplacement en Français: L'interaction des facteurs sémantiques, aspectuels et pragmatiques dans la construction du sens spatial. Langages, 173, 54-75.
Abstract
The paper investigates the use of manner verbs (e.g. marcher 'to walk', courir 'to run') with so-called locative prepositions (e.g. dans 'in', sous 'under') in the descriptions of motion in French, as in Il a couru dans le bureau 'He ran in (to) the office', to explore the type of events such constructions express and the factors that influence their interpretation. Based on an extensive corpus survey, the study shows that, contrary to the general claim according to which such constructions express typically motion in some location, they are also frequently used to express change of location. The study discusses the interplay of various factors that contribute to the interpretation of these constructions, including semantic, aspectual and pragmatic factors. -
Kösem, A., & Van Wassenhove, V. (2017). Distinct contributions of low and high frequency neural oscillations to speech comprehension. Language, Cognition and Neuroscience, 32(5), 536-544. doi:10.1080/23273798.2016.1238495.
Abstract
In the last decade, the involvement of neural oscillatory mechanisms in speech comprehension has been increasingly investigated. Current evidence suggests that low-frequency and high-frequency neural entrainment to the acoustic dynamics of speech are linked to its analysis. One crucial question is whether acoustical processing primarily modulates neural entrainment, or whether entrainment instead reflects linguistic processing. Here, we review studies investigating the effect of linguistic manipulations on neural oscillatory activity. In light of the current findings, we argue that theta (3–8 Hz) entrainment may primarily reflect the analysis of the acoustic features of speech. In contrast, recent evidence suggests that delta (1–3 Hz) and high-frequency activity (>40 Hz) are reliable indicators of perceived linguistic representations. The interdependence between low-frequency and high-frequency neural oscillations, as well as their causal role on speech comprehension, is further discussed with regard to neurophysiological models of speech processing -
Koten Jr., J. W., Wood, G., Hagoort, P., Goebel, R., Propping, P., Willmes, K., & Boomsma, D. I. (2009). Genetic contribution to variation in cognitive function: An fMRI study in twins. Science, 323(5922), 1737-1740. doi:10.1126/science.1167371.
Abstract
Little is known about the genetic contribution to individual differences in neural networks subserving cognition function. In this functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) twin study, we found a significant genetic influence on brain activation in neural networks supporting digit working memory tasks. Participants activating frontal-parietal networks responded faster than individuals relying more on language-related brain networks.There were genetic influences on brain activation in language-relevant brain circuits that were atypical for numerical working memory tasks as such. This suggests that differences in cognition might be related to brain activation patterns that differ qualitatively among individuals. -
De Kovel, C. G. F., Lisgo, S., Karlebach, G., Ju, J., Cheng, G., Fisher, S. E., & Francks, C. (2017). Left-right asymmetry of maturation rates in human embryonic neural development. Biological Psychiatry, 82(3), 204-212. doi:10.1016/j.biopsych.2017.01.016.
Abstract
Background
Left-right asymmetry is a fundamental organizing feature of the human brain, and neuro-psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia sometimes involve alterations of brain asymmetry. As early as 8 weeks post conception, the majority of human fetuses move their right arms more than their left arms, but because nerve fibre tracts are still descending from the forebrain at this stage, spinal-muscular asymmetries are likely to play an important developmental role.
Methods
We used RNA sequencing to measure gene expression levels in the left and right spinal cords, and left and right hindbrains, of 18 post-mortem human embryos aged 4-8 weeks post conception. Genes showing embryonic lateralization were tested for an enrichment of signals in genome-wide association data for schizophrenia.
Results
The left side of the embryonic spinal cord was found to mature faster than the right side. Both sides transitioned from transcriptional profiles associated with cell division and proliferation at earlier stages, to neuronal differentiation and function at later stages, but the two sides were not in synchrony (p = 2.2 E-161). The hindbrain showed a left-right mirrored pattern compared to the spinal cord, consistent with the well-known crossing over of function between these two structures. Genes that showed lateralization in the embryonic spinal cord were enriched for association signals with schizophrenia (p = 4.3 E-05).
Conclusions
These are the earliest-stage left-right differences of human neural development ever reported. Disruption of the lateralised developmental programme may play a role in the genetic susceptibility to schizophrenia.Additional information
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De Kovel, C. G. F., Syrbe, S., Brilstra, E. H., Verbeek, N., Kerr, B., Dubbs, H., Bayat, A., Desai, S., Naidu, S., Srivastava, S., Cagaylan, H., Yis, U., Saunders, C., Rook, M., Plugge, S., Muhle, H., Afawi, Z., Klein, K. M., Jayaraman, V., Rajagopalan, R. and 15 moreDe Kovel, C. G. F., Syrbe, S., Brilstra, E. H., Verbeek, N., Kerr, B., Dubbs, H., Bayat, A., Desai, S., Naidu, S., Srivastava, S., Cagaylan, H., Yis, U., Saunders, C., Rook, M., Plugge, S., Muhle, H., Afawi, Z., Klein, K. M., Jayaraman, V., Rajagopalan, R., Goldberg, E., Marsh, E., Kessler, S., Bergqvist, C., Conlin, L. K., Krok, B. L., Thiffault, I., Pendziwiat, M., Helbig, I., Polster, T., Borggraefe, I., Lemke, J. R., Van den Boogaardt, M. J., Moller, R. S., & Koeleman, B. P. C. (2017). Neurodevelopmental Disorders Caused by De Novo Variants in KCNB1 Genotypes and Phenotypes. JAMA Neurology, 74(10), 1228-1236. doi:10.1001/jamaneurol.2017.1714.
Abstract
Importance Knowing the range of symptoms seen in patients with a missense or loss-of-function variant in KCNB1 and how these symptoms correlate with the type of variant will help clinicians with diagnosis and prognosis when treating new patients. Objectives To investigate the clinical spectrum associated with KCNB1 variants and the genotype-phenotype correlations. Design, Setting, and Participants This study summarized the clinical and genetic information of patients with a presumed pathogenic variant in KCNB1.Patients were identified in research projects or during clinical testing. Information on patients from previously published articles was collected and authors contacted if feasible. All patients were seen at a clinic at one of the participating institutes because of presumed genetic disorder. They were tested in a clinical setting or included in a research project. Main Outcomes and Measures The genetic variant and its inheritance and information on the patient's symptoms and characteristics in a predefined format. All variants were identified with massive parallel sequencing and confirmed with Sanger sequencing in the patient. Absence of the variant in the parents could be confirmed with Sanger sequencing in all families except one. Results Of 26 patients (10 female, 15 male, 1 unknown; mean age at inclusion, 9.8 years; age range, 2-32 years) with developmental delay, 20 (77%) carried a missense variant in the ion channel domain of KCNB1, with a concentration of variants in region S5 to S6. Three variants that led to premature stops were located in the C-terminal and 3 in the ion channel domain. Twenty-one of 25 patients (84%) had seizures, with 9 patients (36%) starting with epileptic spasms between 3 and 18 months of age. All patients had developmental delay, with 17 (65%) experiencing severe developmental delay; 14 (82%) with severe delay had behavioral problems. The developmental delay was milder in 4 of 6 patients with stop variants and in a patient with a variant in the S2 transmembrane element rather than the S4 to S6 region. Conclusions and Relevance De novo KCNB1 missense variants in the ion channel domain and loss-of-function variants in this domain and the C-terminal likely cause neurodevelopmental disorders with or without seizures. Patients with presumed pathogenic variants in KCNB1 have a variable phenotype. However, the type and position of the variants in the protein are (imperfectly) correlated with the severity of the disorder. -
Kuiper, K., Bimesl, N., Kempen, G., & Ogino, M. (2017). Initial vs. non-initial placement of agent constructions in spoken clauses: A corpus-based study of language production under time pressure. Language Sciences, 64, 16-33. doi:10.1016/j.langsci.2017.06.001.
Abstract
In this exploratory study we test the hypothesis that the retrieval from memory of proper noun Agents (PNAs) under processing pressure causes a greater proportion of such semantic arguments to be placed to the right of the initial position in a clause than would be the case if such retrieval from memory were not necessary. This effect is manifest in sports commentary. Processing pressure on sports commentators is modulated by the speed at which the sport is played and reported. Non-initial placement is also facilitated by formulae which have slots in non-initial position. It follows that the non-initial placement of PNAs is not always semantically or pragmatically motivated. This finding therefore runs counter to a strong form of the functionalist hypothesis that syntactic choices available in the systemic structure of the syntax of a language offer solely semantic or pragmatic choices. It is an open question in a weak functionalist account of language and language use how processing and communicative functions interact in general. -
Kunert, R., & Jongman, S. R. (2017). Entrainment to an auditory signal: Is attention involved? Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 146(1), 77-88. doi:10.1037/xge0000246.
Abstract
Many natural auditory signals, including music and language, change periodically. The effect of such auditory rhythms on the brain is unclear however. One widely held view, dynamic attending theory, proposes that the attentional system entrains to the rhythm and increases attention at moments of rhythmic salience. In support, 2 experiments reported here show reduced response times to visual letter strings shown at auditory rhythm peaks, compared with rhythm troughs. However, we argue that an account invoking the entrainment of general attention should further predict rhythm entrainment to also influence memory for visual stimuli. In 2 pseudoword memory experiments we find evidence against this prediction. Whether a pseudoword is shown during an auditory rhythm peak or not is irrelevant for its later recognition memory in silence. Other attention manipulations, dividing attention and focusing attention, did result in a memory effect. This raises doubts about the suggested attentional nature of rhythm entrainment. We interpret our findings as support for auditory rhythm perception being based on auditory-motor entrainment, not general attention entrainment. -
Kurt, S., Groszer, M., Fisher, S. E., & Ehret, G. (2009). Modified sound-evoked brainstem potentials in Foxp2 mutant mice. Brain Research, 1289, 30-36. doi:10.1016/j.brainres.2009.06.092.
Abstract
Heterozygous mutations of the human FOXP2 gene cause a developmental disorder involving impaired learning and production of fluent spoken language. Previous investigations of its aetiology have focused on disturbed function of neural circuits involved in motor control. However, Foxp2 expression has been found in the cochlea and auditory brain centers and deficits in auditory processing could contribute to difficulties in speech learning and production. Here, we recorded auditory brainstem responses (ABR) to assess two heterozygous mouse models carrying distinct Foxp2 point mutations matching those found in humans with FOXP2-related speech/language impairment. Mice which carry a Foxp2-S321X nonsense mutation, yielding reduced dosage of Foxp2 protein, did not show systematic ABR differences from wildtype littermates. Given that speech/language disorders are observed in heterozygous humans with similar nonsense mutations (FOXP2-R328X), our findings suggest that auditory processing deficits up to the midbrain level are not causative for FOXP2-related language impairments. Interestingly, however, mice harboring a Foxp2-R552H missense mutation displayed systematic alterations in ABR waves with longer latencies (significant for waves I, III, IV) and smaller amplitudes (significant for waves I, IV) suggesting that either the synchrony of synaptic transmission in the cochlea and in auditory brainstem centers is affected, or fewer auditory nerve fibers and fewer neurons in auditory brainstem centers are activated compared to wildtypes. Therefore, the R552H mutation uncovers possible roles for Foxp2 in the development and/or function of the auditory system. Since ABR audiometry is easily accessible in humans, our data call for systematic testing of auditory functions in humans with FOXP2 mutations. -
Lai, V. T., Curran, T., & Menn, L. (2009). Comprehending conventional and novel metaphors: An ERP study. Brain Research, 1284, 145-155. doi:10.1016/j.brainres.2009.05.088.
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Lam, K. J. Y., Bastiaansen, M. C. M., Dijkstra, T., & Rueschemeyer, S. A. (2017). Making sense: motor activation and action plausibility during sentence processing. Language, Cognition and Neuroscience, 32(5), 590-600. doi:10.1080/23273798.2016.1164323.
Abstract
The current electroencephalography study investigated the relationship between the motor and (language) comprehension systems by simultaneously measuring mu and N400 effects. Specifically, we examined whether the pattern of motor activation elicited by verbs depends on the larger sentential context. A robust N400 congruence effect confirmed the contextual manipulation of action plausibility, a form of semantic congruency. Importantly, this study showed that: (1) Action verbs elicited more mu power decrease than non-action verbs when sentences described plausible actions. Action verbs thus elicited more motor activation than non-action verbs. (2) In contrast, when sentences described implausible actions, mu activity was present but the difference between the verb types was not observed. The increased processing associated with a larger N400 thus coincided with mu activity in sentences describing implausible actions. Altogether, context-dependent motor activation appears to play a functional role in deriving context-sensitive meaning -
De Lange, F. P., Koers, A., Kalkman, J. S., Bleijenberg, G., Hagoort, P., Van der Meer, J. W. M., & Toni, I. (2009). Reply to: "Can CBT substantially change grey matter volume in chronic fatigue syndrome" [Letter to the editor]. Brain, 132(6), e111. doi:10.1093/brain/awn208.
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De Lange, F., Bleijenberg, G., Van der Meer, J. W. M., Hagoort, P., & Toni, I. (2009). Reply: Change in grey matter volume cannot be assumed to be due to cognitive behavioural therapy [Letter to the editor]. Brain, 132(7), e120. doi:10.1093/brain/awn359.
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De Lange, F. P., Knoop, H., Bleijenberg, G., Van der Meer, J. W. M., Hagoort, P., & Toni, I. (2009). The experience of fatigue in the brain [Letter to the editor]. Psychological Medicine, 39, 523-524. doi:10.1017/S0033291708004844.
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Lausberg, H., & Sloetjes, H. (2009). Coding gestural behavior with the NEUROGES-ELAN system. Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, & Computers, 41(3), 841-849. doi:10.3758/BRM.41.3.841.
Abstract
We present a coding system combined with an annotation tool for the analysis of gestural behavior. The NEUROGES coding system consists of three modules that progress from gesture kinetics to gesture function. Grounded on empirical neuropsychological and psychological studies, the theoretical assumption behind NEUROGES is that its main kinetic and functional movement categories are differentially associated with specific cognitive, emotional, and interactive functions. ELAN is a free, multimodal annotation tool for digital audio and video media. It supports multileveled transcription and complies with such standards as XML and Unicode. ELAN allows gesture categories to be stored with associated vocabularies that are reusable by means of template files. The combination of the NEUROGES coding system and the annotation tool ELAN creates an effective tool for empirical research on gestural behavior. -
Lev-Ari, S., & Shao, Z. (2017). How social network heterogeneity facilitates lexical access and lexical prediction. Memory & Cognition, 45(3), 528-538. doi:10.3758/s13421-016-0675-y.
Abstract
People learn language from their social environment. As individuals differ in their social networks, they might be exposed to input with different lexical distributions, and these might influence their linguistic representations and lexical choices. In this article we test the relation between linguistic performance and 3 social network properties that should influence input variability, namely, network size, network heterogeneity, and network density. In particular, we examine how these social network properties influence lexical prediction, lexical access, and lexical use. To do so, in Study 1, participants predicted how people of different ages would name pictures, and in Study 2 participants named the pictures themselves. In both studies, we examined how participants’ social network properties related to their performance. In Study 3, we ran simulations on norms we collected to see how age variability in one’s network influences the distribution of different names in the input. In all studies, network age heterogeneity influenced performance leading to better prediction, faster response times for difficult-to-name items, and less entropy in input distribution. These results suggest that individual differences in social network properties can influence linguistic behavior. Specifically, they show that having a more heterogeneous network is associated with better performance. These results also show that the same factors influence lexical prediction and lexical production, suggesting the two might be related. -
Lev-Ari, S., & Peperkamp, S. (2017). Language for $200: Success in the environment influences grammatical alignment. Journal of Language Evolution, 2(2), 177-187. doi:10.1093/jole/lzw012.
Abstract
Speakers constantly learn language from the environment by sampling their linguistic input and adjusting their representations accordingly. Logically, people should attend more to the environment and adjust their behavior in accordance with it more the lower their success in the environment is. We test whether the learning of linguistic input follows this general principle in two studies: a corpus analysis of a TV game show, Jeopardy, and a laboratory task modeled after Go Fish. We show that lower (non-linguistic) success in the task modulates learning of and reliance on linguistic patterns in the environment. In Study 1, we find that poorer performance increases conformity with linguistic norms, as reflected by increased preference for frequent grammatical structures. In Study 2, which consists of a more interactive setting, poorer performance increases learning from the immediate social environment, as reflected by greater repetition of others’ grammatical structures. We propose that these results have implications for models of language production and language learning and for the propagation of language change. In particular, they suggest that linguistic changes might spread more quickly in times of crisis, or when the gap between more and less successful people is larger. The results might also suggest that innovations stem from successful individuals while their propagation would depend on relatively less successful individuals. We provide a few historical examples that are in line with the first suggested implication, namely, that the spread of linguistic changes is accelerated during difficult times, such as war time and an economic downturn -
Lev-Ari, S., van Heugten, M., & Peperkamp, S. (2017). Relative difficulty of understanding foreign accents as a marker of proficiency. Cognitive Science, 41(4), 1106-1118. doi:10.1111/cogs.12394.
Abstract
Foreign-accented speech is generally harder to understand than native-accented speech. This difficulty is reduced for non-native listeners who share their first language with the non-native speaker. It is currently unclear, however, how non-native listeners deal with foreign-accented speech produced by speakers of a different language. We show that the process of (second) language acquisition is associated with an increase in the relative difficulty of processing foreign-accented speech. Therefore, experiencing greater relative difficulty with foreign-accented speech compared with native speech is a marker of language proficiency. These results contribute to our understanding of how phonological categories are acquired during second language learning. -
Lev-Ari, S. (2017). Talking to fewer people leads to having more malleable linguistic representations. PLoS One, 12(8): e0183593. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0183593.
Abstract
We learn language from our social environment. In general, the more sources we have, the less informative each of them is, and the less weight we should assign it. If this is the case, people who interact with fewer others should be more susceptible to the influence of each of their interlocutors. This paper tests whether indeed people who interact with fewer other people have more malleable phonological representations. Using a perceptual learning paradigm, this paper shows that individuals who regularly interact with fewer others are more likely to change their boundary between /d/ and /t/ following exposure to an atypical speaker. It further shows that the effect of number of interlocutors is not due to differences in ability to learn the speaker’s speech patterns, but specific to likelihood of generalizing the learned pattern. These results have implications for both language learning and language change, as they suggest that individuals with smaller social networks might play an important role in propagating linguistic changes.Additional information
5343619.zip -
Levelt, W. J. M. (1969). R.N. Haber, Contemporary theory and research in visual perception [Book review]. Nederlands tijdschrift voor de psychologie, 24, 463-464.
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Levelt, W. J. M. (1969). A re-analysis of some adjective/noun intersection data. Heymans Bulletins, HB-69-31EX.
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Levelt, W. J. M. (1969). E.J. Brière, A psycholinguistic study of phonological interference [Book review]. Lingua, 22, 119-120.
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Levelt, W. J. M., Zwanenburg, W., & Ouweneel, G. R. E. (1969). Ambiguous surface structure and phonetic form in French. Heymans Bulletins, (HB-69-28EX).
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Levelt, W. J. M. (1969). Hierarchical chunking in sentence processing. Heymans Bulletins, HB-69-31EX.
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Levelt, W. J. M. (1969). Psychological representations of syntactic structures. Heymans Bulletins, HB-69-36EX.
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Levelt, W. J. M. (1969). R.M. Warren en R.P. Warren, Helmholtz on perception, its physiology and development [Book review]. Nederlands tijdschrift voor de psychologie, 24, 463-464.
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Levelt, W. J. M., & Ouweneel, G. R. E. (1969). The perception of French sentences with a surface ambiguity. Nederlands Tijdschrift voor de Psychologie en haar Grensgebieden, 24, 245-248.
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Levelt, W. J. M. (1969). The perception of syntactic structure. Heymans Bulletins, HB-69-30EX.
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Levelt, W. J. M. (1969). The scaling of syntactic relatedness: A new method in psycholinguistic research. Psychonomic Science, 17(6), 351-352.
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Levelt, W. J. M. (1979). On learnability: A reply to Lasnik and Chomsky. Unpublished manuscript.
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Levinson, S. C. (1979). Activity types and language. Linguistics, 17, 365-399.
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Levinson, S. C., & Burenhult, N. (2009). Semplates: A new concept in lexical semantics? Language, 85, 153-174. doi:10.1353/lan.0.0090.
Abstract
This short report draws attention to an interesting kind of configuration in the lexicon that seems to have escaped theoretical or systematic descriptive attention. These configurations, which we dub SEMPLATES, consist of an abstract structure or template, which is recurrently instantiated in a number of lexical sets, typically of different form classes. A number of examples from different language families are adduced, and generalizations made about the nature of semplates, which are contrasted to other, perhaps similar, phenomena -
Lewis, A. G., Schoffelen, J.-M., Hoffmann, C., Bastiaansen, M. C. M., & Schriefers, H. (2017). Discourse-level semantic coherence influences beta oscillatory dynamics and the N400 during sentence comprehension. Language, Cognition and Neuroscience, 32(5), 601-617. doi:10.1080/23273798.2016.1211300.
Abstract
In this study, we used electroencephalography to investigate the influence of discourse-level semantic coherence on electrophysiological signatures of local sentence-level processing. Participants read groups of four sentences that could either form coherent stories or were semantically unrelated. For semantically coherent discourses compared to incoherent ones, the N400 was smaller at sentences 2–4, while the visual N1 was larger at the third and fourth sentences. Oscillatory activity in the beta frequency range (13–21 Hz) was higher for coherent discourses. We relate the N400 effect to a disruption of local sentence-level semantic processing when sentences are unrelated. Our beta findings can be tentatively related to disruption of local sentence-level syntactic processing, but it cannot be fully ruled out that they are instead (or also) related to disrupted local sentence-level semantic processing. We conclude that manipulating discourse-level semantic coherence does have an effect on oscillatory power related to local sentence-level processing. -
Liljeström, M., Hulten, A., Parkkonen, L., & Salmelin, R. (2009). Comparing MEG and fMRI views to naming actions and objects. Human Brain Mapping, 30, 1845-1856. doi:10.1002/hbm.20785.
Abstract
Most neuroimaging studies are performed using one imaging method only, either functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), electroencephalography (EEG), or magnetoencephalography (MEG). Information on both location and timing has been sought by recording fMRI and EEG, simultaneously, or MEG and fMRI in separate sessions. Such approaches assume similar active areas whether detected via hemodynamic or electrophysiological signatures. Direct comparisons, after independent analysis of data from each imaging modality, have been conducted primarily on low-level sensory processing. Here, we report MEG (timing and location) and fMRI (location) results in 11 subjects when they named pictures that depicted an action or an object. The experimental design was exactly the same for the two imaging modalities. The MEG data were analyzed with two standard approaches: a set of equivalent current dipoles and a distributed minimum norm estimate. The fMRI blood-oxygenlevel dependent (BOLD) data were subjected to the usual random-effect contrast analysis. At the group level, MEG and fMRI data showed fairly good convergence, with both overall activation patterns and task effects localizing to comparable cortical regions. There were some systematic discrepancies, however, and the correspondence was less compelling in the individual subjects. The present analysis should be helpful in reconciling results of fMRI and MEG studies on high-level cognitive functionsAdditional information
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/hbm.20785/suppinfo -
Liszkowski, U., Schäfer, M., Carpenter, M., & Tomasello, M. (2009). Prelinguistic infants, but not chimpanzees, communicate about absent entities. Psychological Science, 20, 654-660.
Abstract
One of the defining features of human language is displacement, the ability to make reference to absent entities. Here we show that prelinguistic, 12-month-old infants already can use a nonverbal pointing gesture to make reference to absent entities. We also show that chimpanzees—who can point for things they want humans to give them—do not point to refer to absent entities in the same way. These results demonstrate that the ability to communicate about absent but mutually known entities depends not on language, but rather on deeper social-cognitive skills that make acts of linguistic reference possible in the first place. These nonlinguistic skills for displaced reference emerged apparently only after humans' divergence from great apes some 6 million years ago. -
Little, H., Eryilmaz, K., & de Boer, B. (2017). Conventionalisation and Discrimination as Competing Pressures on Continuous Speech-like Signals. Interaction studies, 18(3), 355-378. doi:10.1075/is.18.3.04lit.
Abstract
Arbitrary communication systems can emerge from iconic beginnings through processes of conventionalisation via interaction. Here, we explore whether this process of conventionalisation occurs with continuous, auditory signals. We conducted an artificial signalling experiment. Participants either created signals for themselves, or for a partner in a communication game. We found no evidence that the speech-like signals in our experiment became less iconic or simpler through interaction. We hypothesise that the reason for our results is that when it is difficult to be iconic initially because of the constraints of the modality, then iconicity needs to emerge to enable grounding before conventionalisation can occur. Further, pressures for discrimination, caused by the expanding meaning space in our study, may cause more complexity to emerge, again as a result of the restrictive signalling modality. Our findings have possible implications for the processes of conventionalisation possible in signed and spoken languages, as the spoken modality is more restrictive than the manual modality. -
Little, H., Rasilo, H., van der Ham, S., & Eryılmaz, K. (2017). Empirical approaches for investigating the origins of structure in speech. Interaction studies, 18(3), 332-354. doi:10.1075/is.18.3.03lit.
Abstract
In language evolution research, the use of computational and experimental methods to investigate the emergence of structure in language is exploding. In this review, we look exclusively at work exploring the emergence of structure in speech, on both a categorical level (what drives the emergence of an inventory of individual speech sounds), and a combinatorial level (how these individual speech sounds emerge and are reused as part of larger structures). We show that computational and experimental methods for investigating population-level processes can be effectively used to explore and measure the effects of learning, communication and transmission on the emergence of structure in speech. We also look at work on child language acquisition as a tool for generating and validating hypotheses for the emergence of speech categories. Further, we review the effects of noise, iconicity and production effects. -
Little, H. (2017). Introduction to the Special Issue on the Emergence of Sound Systems. Journal of Language Evolution, 2(1), 1-3. doi:10.1093/jole/lzx014.
Abstract
How did human sound systems get to be the way they are? Collecting contributions implementing a wealth of methods to address this question, this special issue treats language and speech as being the result of a complex adaptive system. The work throughout provides evidence and theory at the levels of phylogeny, glossogeny and ontogeny. In taking a multi-disciplinary approach that considers interactions within and between these levels of selection, the papers collectively provide a valuable, integrated contribution to existing work on the evolution of speech and sound systems. -
Little, H., Eryılmaz, K., & de Boer, B. (2017). Signal dimensionality and the emergence of combinatorial structure. Cognition, 168, 1-15. doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2017.06.011.
Abstract
In language, a small number of meaningless building blocks can be combined into an unlimited set of meaningful utterances. This is known as combinatorial structure. One hypothesis for the initial emergence of combinatorial structure in language is that recombining elements of signals solves the problem of overcrowding in a signal space. Another hypothesis is that iconicity may impede the emergence of combinatorial structure. However, how these two hypotheses relate to each other is not often discussed. In this paper, we explore how signal space dimensionality relates to both overcrowding in the signal space and iconicity. We use an artificial signalling experiment to test whether a signal space and a meaning space having similar topologies will generate an iconic system and whether, when the topologies differ, the emergence of combinatorially structured signals is facilitated. In our experiments, signals are created from participants' hand movements, which are measured using an infrared sensor. We found that participants take advantage of iconic signal-meaning mappings where possible. Further, we use trajectory predictability, measures of variance, and Hidden Markov Models to measure the use of structure within the signals produced and found that when topologies do not match, then there is more evidence of combinatorial structure. The results from these experiments are interpreted in the context of the differences between the emergence of combinatorial structure in different linguistic modalities (speech and sign).Additional information
mmc1.zip -
Lopopolo, A., Frank, S. L., Van den Bosch, A., & Willems, R. M. (2017). Using stochastic language models (SLM) to map lexical, syntactic, and phonological information processing in the brain. PLoS One, 12(5): e0177794. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0177794.
Abstract
Language comprehension involves the simultaneous processing of information at the phonological, syntactic, and lexical level. We track these three distinct streams of information in the brain by using stochastic measures derived from computational language models to detect neural correlates of phoneme, part-of-speech, and word processing in an fMRI experiment. Probabilistic language models have proven to be useful tools for studying how language is processed as a sequence of symbols unfolding in time. Conditional probabilities between sequences of words are at the basis of probabilistic measures such as surprisal and perplexity which have been successfully used as predictors of several behavioural and neural correlates of sentence processing. Here we computed perplexity from sequences of words and their parts of speech, and their phonemic transcriptions. Brain activity time-locked to each word is regressed on the three model-derived measures. We observe that the brain keeps track of the statistical structure of lexical, syntactic and phonological information in distinct areas.Additional information
Data availability -
Lutte, G., Mönks, F., Kempen, G., & Sarti, S. (1969). Ideaalbeelden van de Europese jeugd: Onderzoek in zeven landen van Europa: België - Belgique, Bundesrepublik Deutschland, España, France, Italia, Nederland, Portugal. 's-Hertogenbosch: L.C.G. Malmberg.
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Magyari, L., De Ruiter, J. P., & Levinson, S. C. (2017). Temporal preparation for speaking in question-answer sequences. Frontiers in Psychology, 8: 211. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2017.00211.
Abstract
In every-day conversations, the gap between turns of conversational partners is most frequently between 0 and 200 ms. We were interested how speakers achieve such fast transitions. We designed an experiment in which participants listened to pre-recorded questions about images presented on a screen and were asked to answer these questions. We tested whether speakers already prepare their answers while they listen to questions and whether they can prepare for the time of articulation by anticipating when questions end. In the experiment, it was possible to guess the answer at the beginning of the questions in half of the experimental trials. We also manipulated whether it was possible to predict the length of the last word of the questions. The results suggest when listeners know the answer early they start speech production already during the questions. Speakers can also time when to speak by predicting the duration of turns. These temporal predictions can be based on the length of anticipated words and on the overall probability of turn durations.Additional information
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Mainz, N., Shao, Z., Brysbaert, M., & Meyer, A. S. (2017). Vocabulary Knowledge Predicts Lexical Processing: Evidence from a Group of Participants with Diverse Educational Backgrounds. Frontiers in Psychology, 8: 1164. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01164.
Abstract
Vocabulary knowledge is central to a speaker's command of their language. In previous research, greater vocabulary knowledge has been associated with advantages in language processing. In this study, we examined the relationship between individual differences in vocabulary and language processing performance more closely by (i) using a battery of vocabulary tests instead of just one test, and (ii) testing not only university students (Experiment 1) but young adults from a broader range of educational backgrounds (Experiment 2). Five vocabulary tests were developed, including multiple-choice and open antonym and synonym tests and a definition test, and administered together with two established measures of vocabulary. Language processing performance was measured using a lexical decision task. In Experiment 1, vocabulary and word frequency were found to predict word recognition speed while we did not observe an interaction between the effects. In Experiment 2, word recognition performance was predicted by word frequency and the interaction between word frequency and vocabulary, with high-vocabulary individuals showing smaller frequency effects. While overall the individual vocabulary tests were correlated and showed similar relationships with language processing as compared to a composite measure of all tests, they appeared to share less variance in Experiment 2 than in Experiment 1. Implications of our findings concerning the assessment of vocabulary size in individual differences studies and the investigation of individuals from more varied backgrounds are discussed. -
Majid, A. (
Ed. ). (2009). Field manual volume 12. Nijmegen: Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics.Additional information
http://fieldmanuals.mpi.nl/volumes/2009/ -
Majid, A., Speed, L., Croijmans, I., & Arshamian, A. (2017). What makes a better smeller? Perception, 46, 406-430. doi:10.1177/0301006616688224.
Abstract
Olfaction is often viewed as difficult, yet the empirical evidence suggests a different picture. A closer look shows people around the world differ in their ability to detect, discriminate, and name odors. This gives rise to the question of what influences our ability to smell. Instead of focusing on olfactory deficiencies, this review presents a positive perspective by focusing on factors that make someone a better smeller. We consider three driving forces in improving olfactory ability: one’s biological makeup, one’s experience, and the environment. For each factor, we consider aspects proposed to improve odor perception and critically examine the evidence; as well as introducing lesser discussed areas. In terms of biology, there are cases of neurodiversity, such as olfactory synesthesia, that serve to enhance olfactory ability. Our lifetime experience, be it typical development or unique training experience, can also modify the trajectory of olfaction. Finally, our odor environment, in terms of ambient odor or culinary traditions, can influence odor perception too. Rather than highlighting the weaknesses of olfaction, we emphasize routes to harnessing our olfactory potential. -
Mansbridge, M. P., Tamaoka, K., Xiong, K., & Verdonschot, R. G. (2017). Ambiguity in the processing of Mandarin Chinese relative clauses: One factor cannot explain it all. PLoS One, 12(6): e0178369. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0178369.
Abstract
This study addresses the question of whether native Mandarin Chinese speakers process and comprehend subject-extracted relative clauses (SRC) more readily than objectextracted relative clauses (ORC) in Mandarin Chinese. Presently, this has been a hotly debated issue, with various studies producing contrasting results. Using two eye-tracking experiments with ambiguous and unambiguous RCs, this study shows that both ORCs and SRCs have different processing requirements depending on the locus and time course during reading. The results reveal that ORC reading was possibly facilitated by linear/ temporal integration and canonicity. On the other hand, similarity-based interference made ORCs more difficult, and expectation-based processing was more prominent for unambiguous ORCs. Overall, RC processing in Mandarin should not be broken down to a single ORC (dis) advantage, but understood as multiple interdependent factors influencing whether ORCs are either more difficult or easier to parse depending on the task and context at hand. -
Martin, A. E., & Doumas, L. A. A. (2017). A mechanism for the cortical computation of hierarchical linguistic structure. PLoS Biology, 15(3): e2000663. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.2000663.
Abstract
Biological systems often detect species-specific signals in the environment. In humans, speech and language are species-specific signals of fundamental biological importance. To detect the linguistic signal, human brains must form hierarchical representations from a sequence of perceptual inputs distributed in time. What mechanism underlies this ability? One hypothesis is that the brain repurposed an available neurobiological mechanism when hierarchical linguistic representation became an efficient solution to a computational problem posed to the organism. Under such an account, a single mechanism must have the capacity to perform multiple, functionally related computations, e.g., detect the linguistic signal and perform other cognitive functions, while, ideally, oscillating like the human brain. We show that a computational model of analogy, built for an entirely different purpose—learning relational reasoning—processes sentences, represents their meaning, and, crucially, exhibits oscillatory activation patterns resembling cortical signals elicited by the same stimuli. Such redundancy in the cortical and machine signals is indicative of formal and mechanistic alignment between representational structure building and “cortical” oscillations. By inductive inference, this synergy suggests that the cortical signal reflects structure generation, just as the machine signal does. A single mechanism—using time to encode information across a layered network—generates the kind of (de)compositional representational hierarchy that is crucial for human language and offers a mechanistic linking hypothesis between linguistic representation and cortical computation -
Martin, A. E., Huettig, F., & Nieuwland, M. S. (2017). Can structural priming answer the important questions about language? A commentary on Branigan and Pickering "An experimental approach to linguistic representation". Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 40: e304. doi:10.1017/S0140525X17000528.
Abstract
While structural priming makes a valuable contribution to psycholinguistics, it does not allow direct observation of representation, nor escape “source ambiguity.” Structural priming taps into implicit memory representations and processes that may differ from what is used online. We question whether implicit memory for language can and should be equated with linguistic representation or with language processing. -
Martin, A. E., & McElree, B. (2009). Memory operations that support language comprehension: Evidence from verb-phrase ellipsis. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 35(5), 1231-1239. doi:10.1037/a0016271.
Abstract
Comprehension of verb-phrase ellipsis (VPE) requires reevaluation of recently processed constituents, which often necessitates retrieval of information about the elided constituent from memory. A. E. Martin and B. McElree (2008) argued that representations formed during comprehension are content addressable and that VPE antecedents are retrieved from memory via a cue-dependent direct-access pointer rather than via a search process. This hypothesis was further tested by manipulating the location of interfering material—either before the onset of the antecedent (proactive interference; PI) or intervening between antecedent and ellipsis site (retroactive interference; RI). The speed–accuracy tradeoff procedure was used to measure the time course of VPE processing. The location of the interfering material affected VPE comprehension accuracy: RI conditions engendered lower accuracy than PI conditions. Crucially, location did not affect the speed of processing VPE, which is inconsistent with both forward and backward search mechanisms. The observed time-course profiles are consistent with the hypothesis that VPE antecedents are retrieved via a cue-dependent direct-access operation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved) -
Martin, A. E., Monahan, P. J., & Samuel, A. G. (2017). Prediction of agreement and phonetic overlap shape sublexical identification. Language and Speech, 60(3), 356-376. doi:10.1177/0023830916650714.
Abstract
The mapping between the physical speech signal and our internal representations is rarely straightforward. When faced with uncertainty, higher-order information is used to parse the signal and because of this, the lexicon and some aspects of sentential context have been shown to modulate the identification of ambiguous phonetic segments. Here, using a phoneme identification task (i.e., participants judged whether they heard [o] or [a] at the end of an adjective in a noun–adjective sequence), we asked whether grammatical gender cues influence phonetic identification and if this influence is shaped by the phonetic properties of the agreeing elements. In three experiments, we show that phrase-level gender agreement in Spanish affects the identification of ambiguous adjective-final vowels. Moreover, this effect is strongest when the phonetic characteristics of the element triggering agreement and the phonetic form of the agreeing element are identical. Our data are consistent with models wherein listeners generate specific predictions based on the interplay of underlying morphosyntactic knowledge and surface phonetic cues. -
Massaro, D. W., & Jesse, A. (2009). Read my lips: Speech distortions in musical lyrics can be overcome (slightly) by facial information. Speech Communication, 51(7), 604-621. doi:10.1016/j.specom.2008.05.013.
Abstract
Understanding the lyrics of many contemporary songs is difficult, and an earlier study [Hidalgo-Barnes, M., Massaro, D.W., 2007. Read my lips: an animated face helps communicate musical lyrics. Psychomusicology 19, 3–12] showed a benefit for lyrics recognition when seeing a computer-animated talking head (Baldi) mouthing the lyrics along with hearing the singer. However, the contribution of visual information was relatively small compared to what is usually found for speech. In the current experiments, our goal was to determine why the face appears to contribute less when aligned with sung lyrics than when aligned with normal speech presented in noise. The first experiment compared the contribution of the talking head with the originally sung lyrics versus the case when it was aligned with the Festival text-to-speech synthesis (TtS) spoken at the original duration of the song’s lyrics. A small and similar influence of the face was found in both conditions. In the three experiments, we compared the presence of the face when the durations of the TtS were equated with the duration of the original musical lyrics to the case when the lyrics were read with typical TtS durations and this speech embedded in noise. The results indicated that the unusual temporally distorted durations of musical lyrics decreases the contribution of the visible speech from the face. -
Massaro, D. W., & Perlman, M. (2017). Quantifying iconicity’s contribution during language acquisition: Implications for vocabulary learning. Frontiers in Communication, 2: 4. doi:10.3389/fcomm.2017.00004.
Abstract
Previous research found that iconicity—the motivated correspondence between word form and meaning—contributes to expressive vocabulary acquisition. We present two new experiments with two different databases and with novel analyses to give a detailed quantification of how iconicity contributes to vocabulary acquisition across development, including both receptive understanding and production. The results demonstrate that iconicity is more prevalent early in acquisition and diminishes with increasing age and with increasing vocabulary. In the first experiment, we found that the influence of iconicity on children’s production vocabulary decreased gradually with increasing age. These effects were independent of the observed influence of concreteness, difficulty of articulation, and parental input frequency. Importantly, we substantiated the independence of iconicity, concreteness, and systematicity—a statistical regularity between sounds and meanings. In the second experiment, we found that the average iconicity of both a child’s receptive vocabulary and expressive vocabulary diminished dramatically with increases in vocabulary size. These results indicate that iconic words tend to be learned early in the acquisition of both receptive vocabulary and expressive vocabulary. We recommend that iconicity be included as one of the many different influences on a child’s early vocabulary acquisition. Facing the logically insurmountable challenge to link the form of a novel word (e.g., “gavagai”) with its particular meaning (e.g., “rabbit”; Quine, 1960, 1990/1992), children manage to learn words with incredible ease. Interest in this process has permeated empirical and theoretical research in developmental psychology, psycholinguistics, and language studies more generally. Investigators have studied which words are learned and when they are learned (Fenson et al., 1994), biases in word learning (Markman, 1990, 1991); the perceptual, social, and linguistic properties of the words (Gentner, 1982; Waxman, 1999; Maguire et al., 2006; Vosoughi et al., 2010), the structure of the language being learned (Gentner and Boroditsky, 2001), and the influence of the child’s milieu on word learning (Hart and Risley, 1995; Roy et al., 2015). A growing number of studies also show that the iconicity of words might be a significant factor in word learning (Imai and Kita, 2014; Perniss and Vigliocco, 2014; Perry et al., 2015). Iconicity refers generally to a correspondence between the form of a signal (e.g., spoken word, sign, and written character) and its meaning. For example, the sign for tree is iconic in many signed languages: it resembles a branching tree waving above the ground in American Sign Language, outlines the shape of a tree in Danish Sign Language and forms a tree trunk in Chinese Sign Language. In contrast to signed languages, the words of spoken languages have traditionally been treated as arbitrary, with the assumption that the forms of most words bear no resemblance to their meaning (e.g., Hockett, 1960; Pinker and Bloom, 1990). However, there is now a large body of research showing that iconicity is prevalent in the lexicons of many spoken languages (Nuckolls, 1999; Dingemanse et al., 2015). Most languages have an inventory of iconic words for sounds—onomatopoeic words such as splash, slurp, and moo, which sound somewhat like the sound of the real-world event to which they refer. Rhodes (1994), for example, counts more than 100 of these words in English. Many languages also contain large inventories of ideophones—a distinctively iconic class of words that is used to express a variety of sensorimotor-rich meanings (Nuckolls, 1999; Voeltz and Kilian-Hatz, 2001; Dingemanse, 2012). For example, in Japanese, the word “koron”—with a voiceless [k] refers to a light object rolling once, the reduplicated “korokoro” to a light object rolling repeatedly, and “gorogoro”—with a voiced [g]—to a heavy object rolling repeatedly (Imai and Kita, 2014). And in Siwu, spoken in Ghana, ideophones include words like fwεfwε “springy, elastic” and saaa “cool sensation” (Dingemanse et al., 2015). Outside of onomatopoeia and ideophones, there is also evidence that adjectives and verbs—which also tend to convey sensorimotor imagery—are also relatively iconic (Nygaard et al., 2009; Perry et al., 2015). Another domain of iconic words involves some correspondence between the point of articulation of a word and its meaning. For example, there appears to be some prevalence across languages of nasal consonants in words for nose and bilabial consonants in words for lip (Urban, 2011). Spoken words can also have a correspondence between a word’s meaning and other aspects of its pronunciation. The word teeny, meaning small, is pronounced with a relatively small vocal tract, with high front vowels characterized by retracted lips and a high-frequency second formant (Ohala, 1994). Thus, teeny can be recognized as iconic of “small” (compared to the larger vocal tract configuration of the back, rounded vowel in huge), a pattern that is documented in the lexicons of a diversity of languages (Ultan, 1978; Blasi et al., 2016). Lewis and Frank (2016) have studied a more abstract form of iconicity that more meaningfully complex words tend to be longer. An evaluation of many diverse languages revealed that conceptually more complex meanings tend to have longer spoken forms. In their study, participants tended to assign a relatively long novel word to a conceptually more complex referent. Understanding that more complex meaning is usually represented by a longer word could aid a child’s parsing of a stream of spoken language and thus facilitate word learning. Some developmental psychologists have theorized that iconicity helps young children learn words by “bootstrapping” or “bridging” the association between a symbol and its referent (Imai and Kita, 2014; Perniss and Vigliocco, 2014). According to this idea, children begin to master word learning with the aid of iconic cues, which help to profile the connection between the form of a word and its meaning out in the world. The learning of verbs in particular may benefit from iconicity, as the referents of verbs are more abstract and challenging for young children to identify (Gentner, 1982; Snedeker and Gleitman, 2004). By helping children gain a firmer grasp of the concept of a symbol, iconicity might set the stage for the ensuing word-learning spurt of non-iconic words. The hypothesis that iconicity plays a role in word learning is supported by experimental studies showing that young children are better at learning words—especially verbs—when they are iconic (Imai et al., 2008; Kantartzis et al., 2011; Yoshida, 2012). In one study, for example, 3-year-old Japanese children were taught a set of novel verbs for actions. Some of the words the children learned were iconic (“sound-symbolic”), created on the basis of iconic patterns found in Japanese mimetics (e.g., the novel word nosunosu for a slow manner of walking; Imai et al., 2008). The results showed that children were better able to generalize action words across agents when the verb was iconic of the action compared to when it was not. A subsequent study also using novel verbs based on Japanese mimetics replicated the finding with 3-year-old English-speaking children (Kantartzis et al., 2011). However, it remains to be determined whether children trained in an iconic condition can generalize their learning to a non-iconic condition that would not otherwise be learned. Children as young as 14 months of age have been shown to benefit from iconicity in word learning (Imai et al., 2015). These children were better at learning novel words for spikey and rounded shapes when the words were iconic, corresponding to kiki and bouba sound symbolism (e.g., Köhler, 1947; Ramachandran and Hubbard, 2001). If iconic words are indeed easier to learn, there should be a preponderance of iconic words early in the learning of natural languages. There is evidence that this is the case in signed languages, which are widely recognized to contain a prevalence of iconic signs [Klima and Bellugi, 1979; e.g., as evident in Signing Savvy (2016)]. Although the role of iconicity in sign acquisition has been disputed [e.g., Orlansky and Bonvillian, 1984; see Thompson (2011) for discussion], the most thorough study to date found that signs of British Sign Language (BSL) that were learned earlier by children tended to be more iconic (Thompson et al., 2012). Thompson et al.’s measure of the age of acquisition of signs came from parental reports from a version of the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory (MCDI; Fenson et al., 1994) adapted for BSL (Woolfe et al., 2010). The iconicity of signs was taken from norms based on BSL signers’ judgments using a scale of 1 (not at all iconic) to 7 [highly iconic; see Vinson et al. (2008), for norming details and BSL videos]. Thompson et al. (2012) found a positive correlation between iconicity judgments and words understood and produced. This relationship held up even after controlling for the contribution of imageability and familiarity. Surprisingly, however, there was a significantly stronger correlation for older children (21- to 30-month olds) than for younger children (age 11- to 20-month olds). Thompson et al. suggested that the larger role for iconicity for the older children may result from their increasing cognitive abilities or their greater experience in understanding meaningful form-meaning mappings. However, this suggestion does not fit with the expectation that iconicity should play a larger role earlier in language use. Thus, although supporting a role for iconicity in word learning, the larger influence for older children is inconsistent with the bootstrapping hypothesis, in which iconicity should play a larger role earlier in vocabulary learning (Imai and Kita, 2014; Perniss and Vigliocco, 2014). There is also evidence in spoken languages that earlier learned words tend to be more iconic. Perry et al. (2015) collected iconicity ratings on the roughly 600 English and Spanish words that are learned earliest by children, selected from their respective MCDIs. Native speakers on Amazon Mechanical Turk rated the iconicity of the words on a scale from −5 to 5, where 5 indicated that a word was highly iconic, −5 that it sounded like the opposite of its meaning, and 0 that it was completely arbitrary. Their instructions to raters are given in the Appendix because the same instructions were used for acquiring our iconicity ratings. The Perry et al. (2015) results showed that the likelihood of a word in children’s production vocabulary in both English and Spanish at 30 months was positively correlated with the iconicity ratings, even when several other possible contributing factors were partialed out, including log word frequency, concreteness, and word length. The pattern in Spanish held for two collections of iconicity ratings, one with the verbs of the 600-word set presented in infinitive form, and one with the verbs conjugated in the third person singular form. In English, the correlation between age of acquisition and iconicity held when the ratings were collected for words presented in written form only and in written form plus a spoken recording. It also held for ratings based on a more implicit measure of iconicity in which participants rated how accurately a space alien could guess the meaning of the word based on its sound alone. The pattern in English also held when Perry et al. (2015) factored out the systematicity of words [taken from Monaghan et al. (2014)]. Systematicity is measured as a correlation between form similarity and meaning similarity—that is, the degree to which words with similar meanings have similar forms. Monaghan et al. computed systematicity for a large number of English words and found a negative correlation with the age of acquisition of the word from 2 to 13+ years of age—more systematic words are learned earlier. Monaghan et al. (2014) and Christiansen and Chater (2016) observe that consistent sound-meaning patterns may facilitate early vocabulary acquisition, but the child would soon have to master arbitrary relationships necessitated by increases in vocabulary size. In theory, systematicity, sometimes called “relative iconicity,” is independent of iconicity. For example, the English cluster gl– occurs systematically in several words related to “vision” and “light,” such as glitter, glimmer, and glisten (Bergen, 2004), but the segments bear no obvious resemblance to this meaning. Monaghan et al. (2014) question whether spoken languages afford sufficient degrees of articulatory freedom for words to be iconic but not systematic. As evidence, they give the example of onomatopoeic words for the calls of small animals (e.g., peep and cheep) versus calls of big animals (roar and grrr), which would systematically reflect the size of the animal. Although Perry et al. (2015) found a positive effect of iconicity at 30 months, they did not evaluate its influence across the first years of a child’s life. To address this question, we conduct a more detailed examination of the time course of iconicity in word learning across the first 4 years of expressive vocabulary acquisition. In addition, we examine the role of iconicity in the acquisition of receptive vocabulary as well as productive vocabulary. There is some evidence that although receptive vocabulary and productive vocabulary are correlated with one another, a variable might not have equivalent influences on these two expressions of vocabulary. Massaro and Rowe (2015), for example, showed that difficulty of articulation had a strong effect on word production but not word comprehension. Thus, it is possible that the influence of iconicity on vocabulary development differs between production and comprehension. In particular, a larger influence on comprehension might follow from the emphasis of the bootstrapping hypothesis on iconicity serving to perceptually cue children to the connection between the sound of a word and its meaning -
McLaughlin, R. L., Schijven, D., Van Rheenen, W., Van Eijk, K. R., O’Brien, M., Project MinE GWAS Consortium, Schizophrenia Working Group of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium, Kahn, R. S., Ophoff, R. A., Goris, A., Bradley, D. G., Al-Chalabi, A., van den Berg, L. H., Luykx, J. J., Hardiman, O., & Veldink, J. H. (2017). Genetic correlation between amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and schizophrenia. Nature Communications, 8: 14774. doi:10.1038/ncomms14774.
Abstract
We have previously shown higher-than-expected rates of schizophrenia in relatives of patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), suggesting an aetiological relationship between the diseases. Here, we investigate the genetic relationship between ALS and schizophrenia using genome-wide association study data from over 100,000 unique individuals. Using linkage disequilibrium score regression, we estimate the genetic correlation between ALS and schizophrenia to be 14.3% (7.05–21.6; P=1 × 10−4) with schizophrenia polygenic risk scores explaining up to 0.12% of the variance in ALS (P=8.4 × 10−7). A modest increase in comorbidity of ALS and schizophrenia is expected given these findings (odds ratio 1.08–1.26) but this would require very large studies to observe epidemiologically. We identify five potential novel ALS-associated loci using conditional false discovery rate analysis. It is likely that shared neurobiological mechanisms between these two disorders will engender novel hypotheses in future preclinical and clinical studies. -
McQueen, J. M. (2009). Al sprekende leert men [Inaugural lecture]. Arnhem: Drukkerij Roos en Roos.
Abstract
Rede uitgesproken bij de aanvaarding van het ambt van hoogleraar Leren en plasticiteit aan de Faculteit der Sociale Wetenschappen van de Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen op donderdag 1 oktober 2009 -
McQueen, J. M., Jesse, A., & Norris, D. (2009). No lexical–prelexical feedback during speech perception or: Is it time to stop playing those Christmas tapes? Journal of Memory and Language, 61, 1-18. doi:10.1016/j.jml.2009.03.002.
Abstract
The strongest support for feedback in speech perception comes from evidence of apparent lexical influence on prelexical fricative-stop compensation for coarticulation. Lexical knowledge (e.g., that the ambiguous final fricative of Christma? should be [s]) apparently influences perception of following stops. We argue that all such previous demonstrations can be explained without invoking lexical feedback. In particular, we show that one demonstration [Magnuson, J. S., McMurray, B., Tanenhaus, M. K., & Aslin, R. N. (2003). Lexical effects on compensation for coarticulation: The ghost of Christmash past. Cognitive Science, 27, 285–298] involved experimentally-induced biases (from 16 practice trials) rather than feedback. We found that the direction of the compensation effect depended on whether practice stimuli were words or nonwords. When both were used, there was no lexically-mediated compensation. Across experiments, however, there were lexical effects on fricative identification. This dissociation (lexical involvement in the fricative decisions but not in the following stop decisions made on the same trials) challenges interactive models in which feedback should cause both effects. We conclude that the prelexical level is sensitive to experimentally-induced phoneme-sequence biases, but that there is no feedback during speech perception. -
Mead, S., Poulter, M., Uphill, J., Beck, J., Whitfield, J., Webb, T. E., Campbell, T., Adamson, G., Deriziotis, P., Tabrizi, S. J., Hummerich, H., Verzilli, C., Alpers, M. P., Whittaker, J. C., & Collinge, J. (2009). Genetic risk factors for variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease: A genome-wide association study. Lancet Neurology, 8(1), 57-66. doi:10.1016/S1474-4422(08)70265-5.
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Human and animal prion diseases are under genetic control, but apart from PRNP (the gene that encodes the prion protein), we understand little about human susceptibility to bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) prions, the causal agent of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD).METHODS: We did a genome-wide association study of the risk of vCJD and tested for replication of our findings in samples from many categories of human prion disease (929 samples) and control samples from the UK and Papua New Guinea (4254 samples), including controls in the UK who were genotyped by the Wellcome Trust Case Control Consortium. We also did follow-up analyses of the genetic control of the clinical phenotype of prion disease and analysed candidate gene expression in a mouse cellular model of prion infection. FINDINGS: The PRNP locus was strongly associated with risk across several markers and all categories of prion disease (best single SNP [single nucleotide polymorphism] association in vCJD p=2.5 x 10(-17); best haplotypic association in vCJD p=1 x 10(-24)). Although the main contribution to disease risk was conferred by PRNP polymorphic codon 129, another nearby SNP conferred increased risk of vCJD. In addition to PRNP, one technically validated SNP association upstream of RARB (the gene that encodes retinoic acid receptor beta) had nominal genome-wide significance (p=1.9 x 10(-7)). A similar association was found in a small sample of patients with iatrogenic CJD (p=0.030) but not in patients with sporadic CJD (sCJD) or kuru. In cultured cells, retinoic acid regulates the expression of the prion protein. We found an association with acquired prion disease, including vCJD (p=5.6 x 10(-5)), kuru incubation time (p=0.017), and resistance to kuru (p=2.5 x 10(-4)), in a region upstream of STMN2 (the gene that encodes SCG10). The risk genotype was not associated with sCJD but conferred an earlier age of onset. Furthermore, expression of Stmn2 was reduced 30-fold post-infection in a mouse cellular model of prion disease. INTERPRETATION: The polymorphic codon 129 of PRNP was the main genetic risk factor for vCJD; however, additional candidate loci have been identified, which justifies functional analyses of these biological pathways in prion disease. -
Menenti, L., Petersson, K. M., Scheeringa, R., & Hagoort, P. (2009). When elephants fly: Differential sensitivity of right and left inferior frontal gyri to discourse and world knowledge. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 21, 2358-2368. doi:10.1162/jocn.2008.21163.
Abstract
Both local discourse and world knowledge are known to influence sentence processing. We investigated how these two sources of information conspire in language comprehension. Two types of critical sentences, correct and world knowledge anomalies, were preceded by either a neutral or a local context. The latter made the world knowledge anomalies more acceptable or plausible. We predicted that the effect of world knowledge anomalies would be weaker for the local context. World knowledge effects have previously been observed in the left inferior frontal region (Brodmann's area 45/47). In the current study, an effect of world knowledge was present in this region in the neutral context. We also observed an effect in the right inferior frontal gyrus, which was more sensitive to the discourse manipulation than the left inferior frontal gyrus. In addition, the left angular gyrus reacted strongly to the degree of discourse coherence between the context and critical sentence. Overall, both world knowledge and the discourse context affect the process of meaning unification, but do so by recruiting partly different sets of brain areas. -
Menks, W. M., Furger, R., Lenz, C., Fehlbaum, L. V., Stadler, C., & Raschle, N. M. (2017). Microstructural white matter alterations in the corpus callosum of girls with conduct disorder. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 56, 258-265. doi:10.1016/j.jaac.2016.12.006.
Abstract
Objective
Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) studies in adolescent conduct disorder (CD) have demonstrated white matter alterations of tracts connecting functionally distinct fronto-limbic regions, but only in boys or mixed-gender samples. So far, no study has investigated white matter integrity in girls with CD on a whole-brain level. Therefore, our aim was to investigate white matter alterations in adolescent girls with CD.
Method
We collected high-resolution DTI data from 24 girls with CD and 20 typically developing control girls using a 3T magnetic resonance imaging system. Fractional anisotropy (FA) and mean diffusivity (MD) were analyzed for whole-brain as well as a priori−defined regions of interest, while controlling for age and intelligence, using a voxel-based analysis and an age-appropriate customized template.
Results
Whole-brain findings revealed white matter alterations (i.e., increased FA) in girls with CD bilaterally within the body of the corpus callosum, expanding toward the right cingulum and left corona radiata. The FA and MD results in a priori−defined regions of interest were more widespread and included changes in the cingulum, corona radiata, fornix, and uncinate fasciculus. These results were not driven by age, intelligence, or attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder comorbidity.
Conclusion
This report provides the first evidence of white matter alterations in female adolescents with CD as indicated through white matter reductions in callosal tracts. This finding enhances current knowledge about the neuropathological basis of female CD. An increased understanding of gender-specific neuronal characteristics in CD may influence diagnosis, early detection, and successful intervention strategies. -
Menon, S., Rosenberg, K., Graham, S. A., Ward, E. M., Taylor, M. E., Drickamer, K., & Leckband, D. E. (2009). Binding-site geometry and flexibility in DC-SIGN demonstrated with surface force measurements. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 106, 11524-11529. doi:10.1073/pnas.0901783106.
Abstract
The dendritic cell receptor DC-SIGN mediates pathogen recognition by binding to glycans characteristic of pathogen surfaces, including those found on HIV. Clustering of carbohydrate-binding sites in the receptor tetramer is believed to be critical for targeting of pathogen glycans, but the arrangement of these sites remains poorly understood. Surface force measurements between apposed lipid bilayers displaying the extracellular domain of DC-SIGN and a neoglycolipid bearing an oligosaccharide ligand provide evidence that the receptor is in an extended conformation and that glycan docking is associated with a conformational change that repositions the carbohydrate-recognition domains during ligand binding. The results further show that the lateral mobility of membrane-bound ligands enhances the engagement of multiple carbohydrate-recognition domains in the receptor oligomer with appropriately spaced ligands. These studies highlight differences between pathogen targeting by DC-SIGN and receptors in which binding sites at fixed spacing bind to simple molecular patternsAdditional information
Menon_2009_Supporting_Information.pdf -
Meyer, A. S., & Gerakaki, S. (2017). The art of conversation: Why it’s harder than you might think. Contact Magazine, 43(2), 11-15. Retrieved from http://contact.teslontario.org/the-art-of-conversation-why-its-harder-than-you-might-think/.
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Meyer, A. S. (2017). Structural priming is not a Royal Road to representations. Commentary on Branigan and Pickering "An experimental approach to linguistic representation". Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 40: e305. doi:10.1017/S0140525X1700053X.
Abstract
Branigan & Pickering (B&P) propose that the structural priming paradigm is a Royal Road to linguistic representations of any kind, unobstructed by in fl uences of psychological processes. In my view, however, they are too optimistic about the versatility of the paradigm and, more importantly, its ability to provide direct evidence about the nature of stored linguistic representations. -
Mitterer, H., & McQueen, J. M. (2009). Foreign subtitles help but native-language subtitles harm foreign speech perception. PLoS ONE, 4(11), e7785. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0007785.
Abstract
Understanding foreign speech is difficult, in part because of unusual mappings between sounds and words. It is known that listeners in their native language can use lexical knowledge (about how words ought to sound) to learn how to interpret unusual speech-sounds. We therefore investigated whether subtitles, which provide lexical information, support perceptual learning about foreign speech. Dutch participants, unfamiliar with Scottish and Australian regional accents of English, watched Scottish or Australian English videos with Dutch, English or no subtitles, and then repeated audio fragments of both accents. Repetition of novel fragments was worse after Dutch-subtitle exposure but better after English-subtitle exposure. Native-language subtitles appear to create lexical interference, but foreign-language subtitles assist speech learning by indicating which words (and hence sounds) are being spoken. -
Mitterer, H., & McQueen, J. M. (2009). Processing reduced word-forms in speech perception using probabilistic knowledge about speech production. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 35(1), 244-263. doi:10.1037/a0012730.
Abstract
Two experiments examined how Dutch listeners deal with the effects of connected-speech processes, specifically those arising from word-final /t/ reduction (e.g., whether Dutch [tas] is tas, bag, or a reduced-/t/ version of tast, touch). Eye movements of Dutch participants were tracked as they looked at arrays containing 4 printed words, each associated with a geometrical shape. Minimal pairs (e.g., tas/tast) were either both above (boven) or both next to (naast) different shapes. Spoken instructions (e.g., “Klik op het woordje tas boven de ster,” [Click on the word bag above the star]) thus became unambiguous only on their final words. Prior to disambiguation, listeners' fixations were drawn to /t/-final words more when boven than when naast followed the ambiguous sequences. This behavior reflects Dutch speech-production data: /t/ is reduced more before /b/ than before /n/. We thus argue that probabilistic knowledge about the effect of following context in speech production is used prelexically in perception to help resolve lexical ambiguities caused by continuous-speech processes. -
Mitterer, H., Horschig, J. M., Müsseler, J., & Majid, A. (2009). The influence of memory on perception: It's not what things look like, it's what you call them. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 35(6), 1557-1562. doi:10.1037/a0017019.
Abstract
World knowledge influences how we perceive the world. This study shows that this influence is at least partly mediated by declarative memory. Dutch and German participants categorized hues from a yellow-to-orange continuum on stimuli that were prototypically orange or yellow and that were also associated with these color labels. Both groups gave more “yellow” responses if an ambiguous hue occurred on a prototypically yellow stimulus. The language groups were also tested on a stimulus (traffic light) that is associated with the label orange in Dutch and with the label yellow in German, even though the objective color is the same for both populations. Dutch observers categorized this stimulus as orange more often than German observers, in line with the assumption that declarative knowledge mediates the influence of world knowledge on color categorization.Files private
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Moers, C., Meyer, A. S., & Janse, E. (2017). Effects of word frequency and transitional probability on word reading durations of younger and older speakers. Language and Speech, 60(2), 289-317. doi:10.1177/0023830916649215.
Abstract
High-frequency units are usually processed faster than low-frequency units in language comprehension and language production. Frequency effects have been shown for words as well as word combinations. Word co-occurrence effects can be operationalized in terms of transitional probability (TP). TPs reflect how probable a word is, conditioned by its right or left neighbouring word. This corpus study investigates whether three different age groups–younger children (8–12 years), adolescents (12–18 years) and older (62–95 years) Dutch speakers–show frequency and TP context effects on spoken word durations in reading aloud, and whether age groups differ in the size of these effects. Results show consistent effects of TP on word durations for all age groups. Thus, TP seems to influence the processing of words in context, beyond the well-established effect of word frequency, across the entire age range. However, the study also indicates that age groups differ in the size of TP effects, with older adults having smaller TP effects than adolescent readers. Our results show that probabilistic reduction effects in reading aloud may at least partly stem from contextual facilitation that leads to faster reading times in skilled readers, as well as in young language learners. -
Moisik, S. R., & Dediu, D. (2017). Anatomical biasing and clicks: Evidence from biomechanical modeling. Journal of Language Evolution, 2(1), 37-51. doi:10.1093/jole/lzx004.
Abstract
It has been observed by several researchers that the Khoisan palate tends to lack a prominent alveolar ridge. A biomechanical model of click production was created to examine if these sounds might be subject to an anatomical bias associated with alveolar ridge size. Results suggest the bias is plausible, taking the form of decreased articulatory effort and improved volume change characteristics; however, further modeling and experimental research is required to solidify the claim.Additional information
lzx004_Supp.zip -
Moisik, S. R., & Gick, B. (2017). The quantal larynx: The stable regions of laryngeal biomechanics and implications for speech production. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 60, 540-560. doi:10.1044/2016_JSLHR-S-16-0019.
Abstract
Purpose: Recent proposals suggest that (a) the high dimensionality of speech motor control may be reduced via modular neuromuscular organization that takes advantage of intrinsic biomechanical regions of stability and (b) computational modeling provides a means to study whether and how such modularization works. In this study, the focus is on the larynx, a structure that is fundamental to speech production because of its role in phonation and numerous articulatory functions. Method: A 3-dimensional model of the larynx was created using the ArtiSynth platform (http://www.artisynth.org). This model was used to simulate laryngeal articulatory states, including inspiration, glottal fricative, modal prephonation, plain glottal stop, vocal–ventricular stop, and aryepiglotto– epiglottal stop and fricative. Results: Speech-relevant laryngeal biomechanics is rich with “quantal” or highly stable regions within muscle activation space. Conclusions: Quantal laryngeal biomechanics complement a modular view of speech control and have implications for the articulatory–biomechanical grounding of numerous phonetic and phonological phenomena -
Monaghan, P. (2017). Canalization of language structure from environmental constraints: A computational model of word learning from multiple cues. Topics in Cognitive Science, 9(1), 21-34. doi:10.1111/tops.12239.
Abstract
There is substantial variation in language experience, yet there is surprising similarity in the language structure acquired. Constraints on language structure may be external modulators that result in this canalization of language structure, or else they may derive from the broader, communicative environment in which language is acquired. In this paper, the latter perspective is tested for its adequacy in explaining robustness of language learning to environmental variation. A computational model of word learning from cross‐situational, multimodal information was constructed and tested. Key to the model's robustness was the presence of multiple, individually unreliable information sources to support learning. This “degeneracy” in the language system has a detrimental effect on learning, compared to a noise‐free environment, but has a critically important effect on acquisition of a canalized system that is resistant to environmental noise in communication. -
Monaghan, P., & Rowland, C. F. (2017). Combining language corpora with experimental and computational approaches for language acquisition research. Language Learning, 67(S1), 14-39. doi:10.1111/lang.12221.
Abstract
Historically, first language acquisition research was a painstaking process of observation, requiring the laborious hand coding of children's linguistic productions, followed by the generation of abstract theoretical proposals for how the developmental process unfolds. Recently, the ability to collect large-scale corpora of children's language exposure has revolutionized the field. New techniques enable more precise measurements of children's actual language input, and these corpora constrain computational and cognitive theories of language development, which can then generate predictions about learning behavior. We describe several instances where corpus, computational, and experimental work have been productively combined to uncover the first language acquisition process and the richness of multimodal properties of the environment, highlighting how these methods can be extended to address related issues in second language research. Finally, we outline some of the difficulties that can be encountered when applying multimethod approaches and show how these difficulties can be obviated -
Monaghan, P., Chang, Y.-N., Welbourne, S., & Brysbaert, M. (2017). Exploring the relations between word frequency, language exposure, and bilingualism in a computational model of reading. Journal of Memory and Language, 93, 1-27. doi:10.1016/j.jml.2016.08.003.
Abstract
Individuals show differences in the extent to which psycholinguistic variables predict their responses for lexical processing tasks. A key variable accounting for much variance in lexical processing is frequency, but the size of the frequency effect has been demonstrated to reduce as a consequence of the individual’s vocabulary size. Using a connectionist computational implementation of the triangle model on a large set of English words, where orthographic, phonological, and semantic representations interact during processing, we show that the model demonstrates a reduced frequency effect as a consequence of amount of exposure to the language, a variable that was also a cause of greater vocabulary size in the model. The model was also trained to learn a second language, Dutch, and replicated behavioural observations that increased proficiency in a second language resulted in reduced frequency effects for that language but increased frequency effects in the first language. The model provides a first step to demonstrating causal relations between psycholinguistic variables in a model of individual differences in lexical processing, and the effect of bilingualism on interacting variables within the language processing system -
Mongelli, V., Dehaene, S., Vinckier, F., Peretz, I., Bartolomeo, P., & Cohen, L. (2017). Music and words in the visual cortex: The impact of musical expertise. Cortex, 86, 260-274. doi:10.1016/j.cortex.2016.05.016.
Abstract
How does the human visual system accommodate expertise for two simultaneously acquired
symbolic systems? We used fMRI to compare activations induced in the visual
cortex by musical notation, written words and other classes of objects, in professional
musicians and in musically naı¨ve controls. First, irrespective of expertise, selective activations
for music were posterior and lateral to activations for words in the left occipitotemporal
cortex. This indicates that symbols characterized by different visual features
engage distinct cortical areas. Second, musical expertise increased the volume of activations
for music and led to an anterolateral displacement of word-related activations. In
musicians, there was also a dramatic increase of the brain-scale networks connected to the
music-selective visual areas. Those findings reveal that acquiring a double visual expertise
involves an expansion of category-selective areas, the development of novel long-distance
functional connectivity, and possibly some competition between categories for the colonization
of cortical space -
Montero-Melis, G., & Bylund, E. (2017). Getting the ball rolling: the cross-linguistic conceptualization of caused motion. Language and Cognition, 9(3), 446–472. doi:10.1017/langcog.2016.22.
Abstract
Does the way we talk about events correspond to how we conceptualize them? Three experiments (N = 135) examined how Spanish and Swedish native speakers judge event similarity in the domain of caused motion (‘He rolled the tyre into the barn’). Spanish and Swedish motion descriptions regularly encode path (‘into’), but differ in how systematically they include manner information (‘roll’). We designed a similarity arrangement task which allowed participants to give varying weights to different dimensions when gauging event similarity. The three experiments progressively reduced the likelihood that speakers were using language to solve the task. We found that, as long as the use of language was possible (Experiments 1 and 2), Swedish speakers were more likely than Spanish speakers to base their similarity arrangements on object manner (rolling/sliding). However, when recruitment of language was hindered through verbal interference, cross-linguistic differences disappeared (Experiment 3). A compound analysis of all experiments further showed that (i) cross-linguistic differences were played out against a backdrop of commonly represented event components, and (ii) describing vs. not describing the events did not augment cross-linguistic differences, but instead had similar effects across languages. We interpret these findings as suggesting a dynamic role of language in event conceptualization. -
Montero-Melis, G., Eisenbeiss, S., Narasimhan, B., Ibarretxe-Antuñano, I., Kita, S., Kopecka, A., Lüpke, F., Nikitina, T., Tragel, I., Jaeger, T. F., & Bohnemeyer, J. (2017). Satellite- vs. Verb-Framing Underpredicts Nonverbal Motion Categorization: Insights from a Large Language Sample and Simulations. Cognitive Semantics, 3(1), 36-61. doi:10.1163/23526416-00301002.
Abstract
Is motion cognition influenced by the large-scale typological patterns proposed in Talmy’s (2000) two-way distinction between verb-framed (V) and satellite-framed (S) languages? Previous studies investigating this question have been limited to comparing two or three languages at a time and have come to conflicting results. We present the largest cross-linguistic study on this question to date, drawing on data from nineteen genealogically diverse languages, all investigated in the same behavioral paradigm and using the same stimuli. After controlling for the different dependencies in the data by means of multilevel regression models, we find no evidence that S- vs. V-framing affects nonverbal categorization of motion events. At the same time, statistical simulations suggest that our study and previous work within the same behavioral paradigm suffer from insufficient statistical power. We discuss these findings in the light of the great variability between participants, which suggests flexibility in motion representation. Furthermore, we discuss the importance of accounting for language variability, something which can only be achieved with large cross-linguistic samples.Additional information
Data and analysis scripts are publicly accessible via the Harvard Dataverse -
Murakami, S., Verdonschot, R. G., Kreiborg, S., Kakimoto, N., & Kawaguchi, A. (2017). Stereoscopy in dental education: An investigation. Journal of Dental Education, 81(4), 450-457. doi:10.21815/JDE.016.002.
Abstract
The aim of this study was to investigate whether stereoscopy can play a meaningful role in dental education. The study used an anaglyph technique in which two images were presented separately to the left and right eyes (using red/cyan filters), which, combined in the brain, give enhanced depth perception. A positional judgment task was performed to assess whether the use of stereoscopy would enhance depth perception among dental students at Osaka University in Japan. Subsequently, the optimum angle was evaluated to obtain maximum ability to discriminate among complex anatomical structures. Finally, students completed a questionnaire on a range of matters concerning their experience with stereoscopic images including their views on using stereoscopy in their future careers. The results showed that the students who used stereoscopy were better able than students who did not to appreciate spatial relationships between structures when judging relative positions. The maximum ability to discriminate among complex anatomical structures was between 2 and 6 degrees. The students' overall experience with the technique was positive, and although most did not have a clear vision for stereoscopy in their own practice, they did recognize its merits for education. These results suggest that using stereoscopic images in dental education can be quite valuable as stereoscopy greatly helped these students' understanding of the spatial relationships in complex anatomical structures. -
Need, A. C., Ge, D., Weale, M. E., Maia, J., Feng, S., Heinzen, E. L., Shianna, K. V., Yoon, W., Kasperavičiūtė, D., Gennarelli, M., Strittmatter, W. J., Bonvicini, C., Rossi, G., Jayathilake, K., Cola, P. A., McEvoy, J. P., Keefe, R. S. E., Fisher, E. M. C., St. Jean, P. L., Giegling, I. and 13 moreNeed, A. C., Ge, D., Weale, M. E., Maia, J., Feng, S., Heinzen, E. L., Shianna, K. V., Yoon, W., Kasperavičiūtė, D., Gennarelli, M., Strittmatter, W. J., Bonvicini, C., Rossi, G., Jayathilake, K., Cola, P. A., McEvoy, J. P., Keefe, R. S. E., Fisher, E. M. C., St. Jean, P. L., Giegling, I., Hartmann, A. M., Möller, H.-J., Ruppert, A., Fraser, G., Crombie, C., Middleton, L. T., St. Clair, D., Roses, A. D., Muglia, P., Francks, C., Rujescu, D., Meltzer, H. Y., & Goldstein, D. B. (2009). A genome-wide investigation of SNPs and CNVs in schizophrenia. PLoS Genetics, 5(2), e1000373. doi:10.1371/journal.pgen.1000373.
Abstract
We report a genome-wide assessment of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and copy number variants (CNVs) in schizophrenia. We investigated SNPs using 871 patients and 863 controls, following up the top hits in four independent cohorts comprising 1,460 patients and 12,995 controls, all of European origin. We found no genome-wide significant associations, nor could we provide support for any previously reported candidate gene or genome-wide associations. We went on to examine CNVs using a subset of 1,013 cases and 1,084 controls of European ancestry, and a further set of 60 cases and 64 controls of African ancestry. We found that eight cases and zero controls carried deletions greater than 2 Mb, of which two, at 8p22 and 16p13.11-p12.4, are newly reported here. A further evaluation of 1,378 controls identified no deletions greater than 2 Mb, suggesting a high prior probability of disease involvement when such deletions are observed in cases. We also provide further evidence for some smaller, previously reported, schizophrenia-associated CNVs, such as those in NRXN1 and APBA2. We could not provide strong support for the hypothesis that schizophrenia patients have a significantly greater “load” of large (>100 kb), rare CNVs, nor could we find common CNVs that associate with schizophrenia. Finally, we did not provide support for the suggestion that schizophrenia-associated CNVs may preferentially disrupt genes in neurodevelopmental pathways. Collectively, these analyses provide the first integrated study of SNPs and CNVs in schizophrenia and support the emerging view that rare deleterious variants may be more important in schizophrenia predisposition than common polymorphisms. While our analyses do not suggest that implicated CNVs impinge on particular key pathways, we do support the contribution of specific genomic regions in schizophrenia, presumably due to recurrent mutation. On balance, these data suggest that very few schizophrenia patients share identical genomic causation, potentially complicating efforts to personalize treatment regimens.
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