Publications

Abstract

Words are fundamental to reading and yet over a century of research has not masked the controversies around how words are recognized. We review some old and new research that disproves simple ideas such as words are read as wholes or are simply mapped directly to spoken language. We also review theory and research relevant to the question of sublexical influences in word recognition. We describe orthography and phonology, how they are related to each other and describe a series of new experiments on how these sources of information are processed. Tasks include lexical decision, perceptual identification, and naming. Dependent measures are reaction time, accuracy of performance, and a new measure, initial phoneme duration, that refers to the duration of the first phoneme when the target word is pronounced. Important factors in resolving the controversies include the realization that reading has multiple determinants, as well as evaluating the type of task, proper controls such as familiarity of the test items and accuracy of measurement of the response. We also address potential limitations with measures related to the mapping between orthography and phonology, and show that the existence of a sound-to-spelling consistency effect does not require interactive activation, but can be explained and predicted by a feedforward model, the Fuzzy logical model of perception.

Abstract

Most current theories of lexical access in speech production are designed to capture the behaviour of young adults - typically college students. However, young adults represent a minority of the world's speakers. For theories of speech production, the question arises of how the young adults' speech develops out of the quite different speech observed in children and adolescents and how the speech of young adults evolves into the speech observed in older persons. Though a model of adult speech production need not include a detailed account language development, it should be compatible with current knowledge about the development of language across the lifespan. In this sense, theories of young adults' speech production may be constrained by theories and findings concerning the development of language with age. Conversely, any model of language acquisition or language change in older adults should, of course, be compatible with existing theories of the "ideal" speech found in young speakers. For this SpecialIssue we elicited papers on the development of speech production in childhood, adult speech production, and changes in speech production in older adults. The structure of the Special Issue is roughly chronological, focusing in turn on the language production of children (papers by Behrens; Goffman, Heisler & Chakraborty; Vousden & Maylor), young adults (papers by Roelofs; Schiller, Jansma, Peters & Levelt; Finocchiaro & Caramazza; Hartsuiker & Barkhuysen; Bonin, Malardier, Meot & Fayol) and older adults (papers by Mortensen, Meyer & Humphreys; Spieler & Griffin; Altmann & Kemper). We hope that the work compiled here will encourage researchers in any of these areas to consider the theories and findings in the neighbouring fields.

Abstract

Wider knowledge of New Guinea's Bird's Head Peninsula, home to an indigenous population of 114,000 people who share more than twenty languages, was recently gained through an extensive interdisciplinary research project involving anthropologists, archaeologists, botanists, demographers, geologists, linguists, and specialists in public administration. Analyzing the findings of the project, this book provides a systematic comparison with earlier studies, addressing the geological past, the latest archaeological evidence of early human habitation (dating back at least 26,000 years), and the region's diversity of languages and cultures. The peninsula is an important transitional area between Southeast Asia and Oceania, and this book provides valuable new insights for specialists in both the social and natural sciences into processes of state formation and globalization in the Asia-Pacific zone.

Abstract

This paper reports the results of a study on the prosodic marking of broad and contrastive focus in three language varieties of which two are in contact: bilingual Peruvian Spanish, Quechua and Peninsular Spanish. An interactive communicative task revealed that the prosodic marking of contrastive focus was limited in all three language varieties. No systematic correspondence was observed between specific contour/accent types and focus, and the phonetic marking of contrastive focus was weak and restricted to phrase-final position. Interestingly, we identified two contours for bilingual Peruvian Spanish that were present in Quechua, but not in Peninsular Spanish, providing evidence for a prosodic transfer from Quechua to Spanish in Quechua-Spanish bilinguals.

Abstract

Effekte linguisticher Typologie auf die Sprach-entwicklung. In G. Plehn (Ed.), Jahrbuch der Max-Planck Gesellsch

Abstract

Can studying left- and right-handers inform us about cognition? In this chapter, we give an overview of research showing that studying left- and right-handers is informative for understanding the way the brain is organized (i.e., lateralized), as there appear to be differences between left- and right-handers in this respect, but also on the behavioral level handedness studies can provide new insights. According to theories of embodied cognition, our body can influence cognition. Given that left- and right-handers use their bodies differently, this might reflect their performance on an array of cognitive tasks. Indeed, handedness can have an influence on, for instance, what side of space we judge as more positive, the way we gesture, how we remember things, and how we learn new words. Laterality research can, therefore, provide valuable information as to how we act and why

Abstract

The human language processor is conceived as a system that consists of several interrelated subsystems. Each subsystem performs a specific task in the complex process of language comprehension and production. A subsystem receives a particular input, performs certain specific operations on this input and yields a particular output. The subsystems can be characterized in terms of the transformations that relate the input representations to the output representations. An important issue in describing the language processing system is to identify the subsystems and to specify the relations between the subsystems. These relations can be conceived in two different ways. In one conception the subsystems are autonomous. They are related to each other only by the input-output channels. The operations in one subsystem are not affected by another system. The subsystems are modular, that is they are independent. In the other conception, the different subsystems influence each other. A subsystem affects the processes in another subsystem. In this conception there is an interaction between the subsystems.

Abstract

Our bodily experiences play an important role in the way that we think and speak. Abstract language is, however, difficult to reconcile with this body-centred view, unless we appreciate the role metaphors play. To explore the role of the senses across semantic domains, we focus on perception metaphors, and examine their realisation across diverse languages, methods, and approaches. To what extent do mappings in perception metaphor adhere to predictions based on our biological propensities; and to what extent is there space for cross-linguistic and cross-cultural variation? We find that while some metaphors have widespread commonality, there is more diversity attested than should be comfortable for universalist accounts.

Abstract

Language production involves the retrieval of information from memory, the planning of an articulatory program, and executive control and self-monitoring. These processes can be related to the domains of long-term memory, motor control, and executive control. Here, we argue that studying neuronal oscillations provides an important opportunity to understand how general neuronal computational principles support language production, also helping elucidate relationships between language and other domains of cognition. For each relevant domain, we provide a brief review of the findings in the literature with respect to neuronal oscillations. Then, we show how similar patterns are found in the domain of language production, both through review of previous literature and novel findings. We conclude that neurophysiological mechanisms, as reflected in modulations of neuronal oscillations, may act as a fundamental basis for bringing together and enriching the fields of language and cognition.

Abstract

Although humans are the ultimate “natural language generators”, the area of psycholinguistic modeling has been somewhat underrepresented in recent approaches to Natural Language Generation in computer science. To draw attention to the area and illustrate its potential relevance to Natural Language Generation, I provide an overview of recent work on psycholinguistic modeling of language production together with some key empirical findings, state-of-the-art experimental techniques, and their historical roots. The techniques include analyses of speech-error corpora, chronometric analyses, eyetracking, and neuroimaging.
The overview is built around the issue of cognitive control in natural language generation, concentrating on the production of single words, which is an essential ingredient of the generation of larger utterances. Most of the work exploited the fact that human speakers are good but not perfect at resisting temptation, which has provided some critical clues about the nature of the underlying system.

Abstract

This paper deals with the Shawi nominalizing suffixes -su’~-ru’~-nu’ ‘general nominalizer’, -napi/-te’/-tun‘performer/agent nominalizer’, -pi’‘patient nominalizer’, and -nan ‘instrument nominalizer’. The goal of this article is to provide a description of nominalization in Shawi. Throughout this paper I apply the Generalized Scale Model (GSM) (Malchukov, 2006) to Shawi verbal nominalizations, with the intention of presenting a formal representation that will provide a basis for future areal and typological studies of nominalization. In addition, I dialogue with Shibatani’s model to see how the loss or gain of categories correlates with the lexical or grammatical nature of nominalizations. strong nominalization in Shawi correlates with lexical nominalization, whereas weak nominalizations correlate with grammatical nominalization. A typology which takes into account the productivity of the nominalizers is also discussed.

Abstract

Listeners’ signals of recipiency, such as “Mm-hm” or “uh-huh” in English, are the most elementary or minimal “conversational turns” possible. Minimal, because apart from acknowledging recipiency and inviting the speaker to continue with his/her next turn, they do not add any new information to the discourse of the conversation. The goal of this project is to gather cross cultural information on listeners’ feedback behaviour during conversation. Listeners in a conversation usually provide short signals that indicate to the speaker that they are still “with the speaker”. These signals could be verbal (like for instance “mm hm” in English or “hm hm” in Dutch) or nonverbal (visual), like nodding. Often, these signals are produced in overlap with the speaker’s vocalisation. If listeners do not produce these signals, speakers often invite them explicitly (e.g. “are you still there?” in a telephone conversation). Our goal is to investigate what kind of signals are used by listeners of different languages to signal “recipiency” to the speaker.

Abstract

The study endeavors a detailed and systematic classification of linguistic simultaneity expressions. Further, it aims at a well described survey of how simultaneity is expressed by native speakers in their own language. On the basis of real production data the book answers the questions of how native speakers express temporal simultaneity in general, and how learners at different levels of proficiency deal with this situation under experimental test conditions. Furthermore, the results of this study shed new light on our understanding of aspect in general, and on its acquisition by adult learners.

Abstract

German Version of (1996) Classificatory particles in Kilivila. New York: Oxford University Press

Abstract

This paper describes how the Trobriand Islanders of Papua New Guinea used to construct their big seagoing masawa canoes and how they used to make their sails, what forms of different knowledge and expertise they needed to do this during various stages of the construction processes, how this knowledge was socially distributed, and the social implications of all the joint communal activities that were necessary until a new canoe could be launched. Then it tries to answer the question why the complex distributed knowledge of how to make a masawa has been gradually getting lost in most of the village communities on the Trobriand Islands; and finally it outlines and discusses the implications of this loss for the Trobriand Islanders' culture, for their social construction of reality, and for their indigenous cognitive capacities.

Abstract

When we communicate, we communicate in a certain context, and this context shapes our utterances. Natural languages are context-bound and deixis 'concerns the ways in which languages encode or grammaticalise features of the context of utterance or speech event, and thus also concerns ways in which the interpretation of utterances depends on the analysis of that context of utterance' (Stephen Levinson). The systems of deixis and demonstratives in the Oceanic languages represented in the contributions to this volume illustrate the fascinating complexity of spatial reference in these languages. Some of the studies presented here highlight social aspects of deictic reference illustrating de Leon's point that 'reference is a collaborative task' . It is hoped that this anthology will contribute to a better understanding of this area and provoke further studies in this extremely interesting, though still rather underdeveloped, research area.

Abstract

Human ethologists have shown that humans are both attracted to others and at the same time fear them. They refer to this kind of fear with the technical term ‘social fear’ and claim that “it is alleviated with personal acquaintance but remains a principle characteristic of interpersonal behaviour. As a result, we maintain various degrees of greater distance between ourselves and others depending on the amount of confidence we have in the other” (Eibl-Eibesfeldt 1989: 335). The goal of this task is to conduct exploratory, heuristic research to establish a new subproject that – based on a corpus of video data – will investigate various forms of human spatial behaviour cross-culturally.

Abstract

Die Sprachwissenschaft hat den Begriff und das Konzept ›Rituelle Kommunikation‹ von der vergleichenden Verhaltensforschung übernommen. Humanethologen unterscheiden eine Reihe von sogenannten ›Ausdrucksbewegungen‹, die in der Mimik, der Gestik, der Personaldistanz (Proxemik) und der Körperhaltung (Kinesik) zum Ausdruck kommen. Viele dieser Ausdrucksbewegungen haben sich zu spezifischen Signalen entwickelt. Ethologen definieren Ritualisierung als Veränderung von Verhaltensweisen im Dienst der Signalbildung. Die zu Signalen ritualisierten Verhaltensweisen sind Rituale. Im Prinzip kann jede Verhaltensweise zu einem Signal werden, entweder im Laufe der Evolution oder durch Konventionen, die in einer bestimmten Gemeinschaft gültig sind, die solche Signale kulturell entwickelt hat und die von ihren Mitgliedern tradiert und gelernt werden.

Abstract

This entry takes an interdisciplinary approach to linguistic pragmatics. It discusses how the meaning of utterances can only be understood in relation to overall cultural, social, and interpersonal contexts, as well as to culture-specific conventions and the speech events in which they are embedded. The entry discusses core issues of pragmatics such as speech act theory, conversational implicature, deixis, gesture, interaction strategies, ritual communication, phatic communion, linguistic relativity, ethnography of speaking, ethnomethodology, and conversation analysis. It takes a transdisciplinary view of the field, showing that linguistic pragmatics has its predecessors in other disciplines such as philosophy, psychology, ethology, ethnology, and sociology.

Abstract

Computational models can reflect the complexity of human behaviour by implementing multiple constraints within their architecture, and/or by taking into account the variety and richness of the environment to which the human is responding. We explore the second alternative in a model of word recognition that learns to map spoken words to visual and semantic representations of the words’ concepts. Critically, we employ a phonological representation utilising coarse-coding of the auditory stream, to mimic early stages of language development that are not dependent on individual phonemes to be isolated in the input, which may be a consequence of literacy development. The model was tested at different stages during training, and was able to simulate key behavioural features of word recognition in children: a developing effect of semantic information as a consequence of language learning, and a small but earlier effect of phonological information on word processing. We additionally tested the role of visual information in word processing, generating predictions for behavioural studies, showing that visual information could have a larger effect than semantics on children’s performance, but that again this affects recognition later in word processing than phonological information. The model also provides further predictions for performance of a mature word recognition system in the absence of fine-coding of phonology, such as in adults who have low literacy skills. The model demonstrated that such phonological effects may be reduced but are still evident even when multiple distractors from various modalities are present in the listener’s environment. The model demonstrates that complexity in word recognition can emerge from a simple associative system responding to the interactions between multiple sources of information in the language learner’s environment.

Abstract

E-Prime® is the leading software suite by Psychology Software Tools for designing and running Psychology lab experiments. The E-Primer is the perfect accompanying guide: It provides all the necessary knowledge to make E-Prime accessible to everyone. You can learn the tools of Psychological science by following the E-Primer through a series of entertaining, step-by-step recipes that recreate classic experiments. The updated E-Primer expands its proven combination of simple explanations, interesting tutorials and fun exercises, and makes even the novice student quickly confident to create their dream experiment.

Abstract

Metaphor allows us to think and talk about one thing in terms of another, ratcheting up our cognitive and expressive capacity. It gives us concrete terms for abstract phenomena, for example, ideas become things we can grasp or let go of. Perceptual experience—characterised as physical and relatively concrete—should be an ideal source domain in metaphor, and a less likely target. But is this the case across diverse languages? And are some sensory modalities perhaps more concrete than others? This volume presents critical new data on perception metaphors from over 40 languages, including many which are under-studied. Aside from the wealth of data from diverse languages—modern and historical; spoken and signed—a variety of methods (e.g., natural language corpora, experimental) and theoretical approaches are brought together. This collection highlights how perception metaphor can offer both a bedrock of common experience and a source of continuing innovation in human communication

Abstract

When people request information, they have a variety of means for eliciting the information. In English two of the primary resources for eliciting information include asking questions, making statements about their interlocutor (thereby generating confirmation or revision). But within these types there are a variety of ways that these information elicitors can be designed. The goal of this task is to examine how different languages seek and provide information, the extent to which syntax vs prosodic resources are used (e.g., in questions), and the extent to which the design of information seeking actions and their responses display a structural preference to promote social solidarity.

Abstract

Previous studies show that children do not become adult-like in learning to set the scene and introduce referents in their narrations until 9 years of age and even beyond. However, they investigated spoken languages, thus we do not know much about how these skills are acquired in sign languages, where events are expressed in visually similar ways to the real world events, unlike in spoken languages. The results of the current study demonstrate that deaf children (3;5–9;10 years) acquiring Turkish Sign Language, and hearing children (3;8–9;11 years) acquiring spoken Turkish both acquire scene-setting and referent introduction skills at similar ages. Thus the modality of the language being acquired does not have facilitating or hindering effects in the development of these skills.

Abstract

This work presents a salvage grammar of the Biri language of Eastern Central Queensland, a Pama-Nyungan language belonging to the large Maric subgroup. As the language is no longer used, the grammatical description is based on old written sources and on recordings made by linguists in the 1960s and 1970s. Biri is in many ways typical of the Pama-Nyungan languages of Southern Queensland. It has split case marking systems, marking nouns according to an ergative/absolutive system and pronouns according to a nominative/accusative system. Unusually for its area, Biri also has bound pronouns on its verb, cross-referencing the person, number and case of core participants. As far as it is possible, the grammatical discussion is ‘theory neutral’. The first four chapters deal with the phonology, morphology, and syntax of the language. The last two chapters contain a substantial discussion of Biri’s place in the Pama-Nyungan family. In chapter 6 the numerous dialects of the Biri language are discussed. In chapter 7 the close linguistic relationship between Biri and the surrounding languages is examined.