Publications

Abstract

Zipf’s law of abbreviation, which posits a negative correlation between word frequency and length, is one of the most famous and robust cross-linguistic generalizations. At the same time, it has been shown that contextual informativity (average surprisal given previous context) is more strongly correlated with word length, although this tendency is not observed consistently, depending on several methodological choices. The present study examines a more diverse sample of languages than the previous studies (Arabic, Finnish, Hungarian, Indonesian, Russian, Spanish and Turkish). I use large web-based corpora from the Leipzig Corpora Collection to estimate word lengths in UTF-8 characters and in phonemes (for some of the languages), as well as word frequency, informativity given previous word and informativity given next word, applying different methods of bigrams processing. The results show different correlations between word length and the corpus-based measure for different languages. I argue that these differences can be explained by the properties of noun phrases in a language, most importantly, by the order of heads and modifiers and their relative morphological complexity, as well as by orthographic conventions

Abstract

We investigate the correlations between A- and P-lability for verbal arguments with other typological parameters using large, syntactically annotated corpora of online news in 28 languages. To estimate how much lability is observed in a language, we measure associations between Verbs or Verb + Noun combinations and the alternating constructions in which they occur. Our correlational analyses show that high P-lability scores correlate strongly with the following parameters: little or no case marking; weaker associations between lexemes and the grammatical roles A and P; rigid order of Subject and Object; and a high proportion of verb-medial clauses (SVO). Low P-lability correlates with the presence of case marking, stronger associations between nouns and grammatical roles, relatively flexible ordering of Subject and Object, and verb-final order. As for A-lability, it is not correlated with any other parameters. A possible reason is that A-lability is a result of more universal discourse processes, such as deprofiling of the object, and also exhibits numerous lexical and semantic idiosyncrasies. The fact that P-lability is strongly correlated with other parameters can be interpreted as evidence for a more general typology of languages, in which some tend to have highly informative morphosyntactic and lexical cues, whereas others rely predominantly on contextual environment, which is possibly due to fixed word order. We also find that P-lability is more strongly correlated with the other parameters than any of these parameters are with each other, which means that it can be a very useful typological variable.

Abstract

There is ample psycholinguistic evidence that speakers behave efficiently, using shorter and less effortful constructions when the meaning is more predictable, and longer and more effortful ones when it is less predictable. However, the Principle of No Synonymy requires that all formally distinct variants should also be functionally different. The question is how much two related constructions should overlap semantically and pragmatically in order to be used for the purposes of efficient communication. The case study focuses on want to + Infinitive and its reduced variant with wanna, which have different stylistic and sociolinguistic connotations. Bayesian mixed-effects regression modelling based on the spoken part of the British National Corpus reveals a very limited effect of efficiency: predictability increases the chances of the reduced variant only in fast speech. We conclude that efficient use of more and less effortful variants is restricted when two variants are associated with different registers or styles. This paper also pursues a methodological goal regarding missing values in speech corpora. We impute missing data based on the existing values. A comparison of regression models with and without imputed values reveals similar tendencies. This means that imputation is useful for dealing with missing values in corpora.

Abstract

The present paper discusses connectivity and proximity maps of causative constructions and combines them with different types of typological data. In the first case study, I show how one can create a connectivity map based on a parallel corpus. This allows us to solve many problems, such as incomplete descriptions, inconsistent terminology and the problem of determining the semantic nodes. The second part focuses on proximity maps based on Multidimensional Scaling and compares the most important semantic distinctions, which are inferred from a parallel corpus of film subtitles and from grammar descriptions. The results suggest that corpus-based maps of tokens are more sensitive to cultural and genre-related differences in the prominence of specific causation scenarios than maps based on constructional types, which are described in reference grammars. The grammar-based maps also reveal a less clear structure, which can be due to incomplete semantic descriptions in grammars. Therefore, each approach has its shortcomings, which researchers need to be aware of.

Abstract

Over the last few years, the number of corpora that can be used for language comparison has dramatically increased. The corpora are so diverse in their structure, size and annotation style, that a novice might not know where to start. The present paper charts this new and changing territory, providing a few landmarks, warning signs and safe paths. Although no corpora corpus at present can replace the traditional type of typological data based on language description in reference grammars, they corpora can help with diverse tasks, being particularly well suited for investigating probabilistic and gradient properties of languages and for discovering and interpreting cross-linguistic generalizations based on processing and communicative mechanisms. At the same time, the use of corpora for typological purposes has not only advantages and opportunities, but also numerous challenges. This paper also contains an empirical case study addressing two pertinent problems: the role of text types in language comparison and the problem of the word as a comparative concept.

Abstract

The present study investigates the construction with help followed by the bare or to-infinitive in seven varieties of web-based English from Australia, Ghana, Great Britain, Hong Kong, India, Jamaica and the USA. In addition to various factors known from the literature, such as register, minimization of cognitive complexity and avoidance of identity (horror aequi), it studies the effect of predictability of the infinitive given help and the other way round on the language user’s choice between the constructional variants. These probabilistic constraints are tested in a series of Bayesian generalized additive mixed-effects regression models. The results demonstrate that the to-infinitive is particularly frequent in contexts with low predictability, or, in information-theoretic terms, with high information content. This tendency is interpreted as communicatively efficient behaviour, when more predictable units of discourse get less formal marking, and less predictable ones get more formal marking. However, the strength, shape and directionality of predictability effects exhibit variation across the countries, which demonstrates the importance of the cross-lectal perspective in research on communicative efficiency and other universal functional principles.

Abstract

Reinstatement of memory-related neural activity measured with high temporal precision potentially provides a useful index for real-time monitoring of the timing of activation of memory content during cognitive processing. The utility of such an index extends to any situation where one is interested in the (relative) timing of activation of different sources of information in memory, a paradigm case of which is tracking lexical activation during language processing. Essential for this approach is that memory reinstatement effects are robust, so that their absence (in the average) definitively indicates that no lexical activation is present. We used electroencephalography to test the robustness of a reported subsequent memory finding involving reinstatement of frequency-specific entrained oscillatory brain activity during subsequent recognition. Participants learned lists of words presented on a background flickering at either 6 or 15 Hz to entrain a steady-state brain response. Target words subsequently presented on a non-flickering background that were correctly identified as previously seen exhibited reinstatement effects at both entrainment frequencies. Reliability of these statistical inferences was however critically dependent on the approach used for multiple comparisons correction. We conclude that effects are not robust enough to be used as a reliable index of lexical activation during language processing.

Abstract

Neurocognitive deficits are frequently observed in patients with schizophrenia and major depressive disorder (MDD). The relations between cognitive features may be represented by neurocognitive graphs based on cognitive features, modeled as Gaussian Markov random fields. However, it is unclear whether it is possible to differentiate between phenotypic patterns associated with the differential diagnosis of schizophrenia and depression using this neurocognitive graph approach. In this study, we enrolled 215 first-episode patients with schizophrenia (FES), 125 with MDD, and 237 demographically-matched healthy controls (HCs). The cognitive performance of all participants was evaluated using a battery of neurocognitive tests. The graphical LASSO model was trained with a one-vs-one scenario to learn the conditional independent structure of neurocognitive features of each group. Participants in the holdout dataset were classified into different groups with the highest likelihood. A partial correlation matrix was transformed from the graphical model to further explore the neurocognitive graph for each group. The classification approach identified the diagnostic class for individuals with an average accuracy of 73.41% for FES vs HC, 67.07% for MDD vs HC, and 59.48% for FES vs MDD. Both of the neurocognitive graphs for FES and MDD had more connections and higher node centrality than those for HC. The neurocognitive graph for FES was less sparse and had more connections than that for MDD. Thus, neurocognitive graphs based on cognitive features are promising for describing endophenotypes that may discriminate schizophrenia from depression.

Abstract

We propose that the choice between the auxiliaries hebben 'have' and zijn 'be' in Dutch is determined by a particular semantic feature of verbs. In particular we propose a feature of meaning [IEPS] for 'inferable eventual position or state' that characterizes whether the action denoted by the verb allows us to determine the eventual position or state of the verb's highest argument. It is argued that only verbs which exhibit the feature [+IEPS] or which obtain the feature compositionally in the syntax select zijn as their auxiliary. Our analysis is then compared to a number of other analyses of auxiliary selection in Dutch.

Abstract

C-reactive protein (CRP) is a sensitive biomarker of chronic low-grade inflammation and is associated with multiple complex diseases. The genetic determinants of chronic inflammation remain largely unknown, and the causal role of CRP in several clinical outcomes is debated. We performed two genome-wide association studies (GWASs), on HapMap and 1000 Genomes imputed data, of circulating amounts of CRP by using data from 88 studies comprising 204,402 European individuals. Additionally, we performed in silico functional analyses and Mendelian randomization analyses with several clinical outcomes. The GWAS meta-analyses of CRP revealed 58 distinct genetic loci (p < 5 × 10−8). After adjustment for body mass index in the regression analysis, the associations at all except three loci remained. The lead variants at the distinct loci explained up to 7.0% of the variance in circulating amounts of CRP. We identified 66 gene sets that were organized in two substantially correlated clusters, one mainly composed of immune pathways and the other characterized by metabolic pathways in the liver. Mendelian randomization analyses revealed a causal protective effect of CRP on schizophrenia and a risk-increasing effect on bipolar disorder. Our findings provide further insights into the biology of inflammation and could lead to interventions for treating inflammation and its clinical consequences.

Abstract

Prediction is an important part of language processing. An open question is to what extent people predict language in challenging circumstances. Here we tested the limits of prediction by asking bilingual Dutch native speakers to interpret Dutch sentences into their English counterparts. In two visual world experiments, we recorded participants’ eye movements to co-present visual objects while they engaged in interpreting tasks (consecutive and simultaneous interpreting). Most participants showed anticipatory eye movements to semantically-related upcoming target words in their L1 source language during both consecutive and simultaneous interpretation. A quarter of participants during simultaneous interpretation however did not move their eyes, an extremely unusual participant behaviour in visual world studies. Overall, the findings suggest that most people predict in the source language under challenging interpreting situations. Further work is required to understand the causes of the absence of (anticipatory) eye movements during simultaneous interpretation in a substantial subset of individuals.

Abstract

As many distributional learning (DL) studies have shown, adult listeners can achieve discrimination of a difficult non-native contrast after a short repetitive exposure to tokens falling at the extremes of that contrast. Such studies have shown using behavioural methods that a short distributional training can induce perceptual learning of vowel and consonant contrasts. However, much less is known about the neurological correlates of DL, and few studies have examined non-native lexical tone contrasts. Here, Australian-English speakers underwent DL training on a Mandarin tone contrast using behavioural (discrimination, identification) and neural (oddball-EEG) tasks, with listeners hearing either a bimodal or a unimodal distribution. Behavioural results show that listeners learned to discriminate tones after both unimodal and bimodal training; while EEG responses revealed more learning for listeners exposed to the bimodal distribution. Thus, perceptual learning through exposure to brief sound distributions (a) extends to non-native tonal contrasts, and (b) is sensitive to task, phonetic distance, and acoustic cue-weighting. Our findings have implications for models of how auditory and phonetic constraints influence speech learning.

Abstract

Reading is an important high‐level cognitive function of the human brain, requiring interaction among multiple brain regions. Revealing differences between children's large‐scale functional brain networks for reading tasks and those of adults helps us to understand how the functional network changes over reading development. Here we used functional magnetic resonance imaging data of 17 adults (19–28 years old) and 16 children (11–13 years old), and graph theoretical analyses to investigate age‐related changes in large‐scale functional networks during rhyming and meaning judgment tasks on pairs of visually presented Chinese characters. We found that: (1) adults had stronger inter‐regional connectivity and nodal degree in occipital regions, while children had stronger inter‐regional connectivity in temporal regions, suggesting that adults rely more on visual orthographic processing whereas children rely more on auditory phonological processing during reading. (2) Only adults showed between‐task differences in inter‐regional connectivity and nodal degree, whereas children showed no task differences, suggesting the topological organization of adults’ reading network is more specialized. (3) Children showed greater inter‐regional connectivity and nodal degree than adults in multiple subcortical regions; the hubs in children were more distributed in subcortical regions while the hubs in adults were more distributed in cortical regions. These findings suggest that reading development is manifested by a shift from reliance on subcortical to cortical regions. Taken together, our study suggests that Chinese reading development is supported by developmental changes in brain connectivity properties, and some of these changes may be domain‐general while others may be specific to the reading domain.

Abstract

Fundamental human traits, such as language and bipedalism, are associated with a range of anatomical adaptations in craniofacial shaping and skeletal remodeling. However, it is unclear how such morphological features arose during hominin evolution. FOXP2 is a brain-expressed transcription factor implicated in a rare disorder involving speech apraxia and language impairments. Analysis of its evolutionary history suggests that this gene may have contributed to the emergence of proficient spoken language. In the present study, through analyses of skeleton-specific knockout mice, we identified roles of Foxp2 in skull shaping and bone remodeling. Selective ablation of Foxp2 in cartilage disrupted pup vocalizations in a similar way to that of global Foxp2 mutants, which may be due to pleiotropic effects on craniofacial morphogenesis. Our findings also indicate that Foxp2 helps to regulate strength and length of hind limbs and maintenance of joint cartilage and intervertebral discs, which are all anatomical features that are susceptible to adaptations for bipedal locomotion. In light of the known roles of Foxp2 in brain circuits that are important for motor skills and spoken language, we suggest that this gene may have been well placed to contribute to coevolution of neural and anatomical adaptations related to speech and bipedal locomotion.

Abstract

Mutations of the renal-specific chloride channel (CLCN5) gene, which is located on chromosome Xp11.22, are associated with hypercalciuric nephrolithiasis (kidney stones) in the Northern European and Japanese populations. CLCN5 encodes a 746 amino acid channel (CLC-5) that has approximately 12 transmembrane domains, and heterologous expression of wild-type CLC-5 in Xenopus oocytes has yielded outwardly rectifying chloride currents that were markedly reduced or abolished by these mutations. In order to assess further the structural and functional relationships of this recently cloned chloride channel, additional CLCN5 mutations have been identified in five unrelated families with this disorder. Three of these mutations were missense (G57V, G512R and E527D), one was a nonsense (R648Stop) and one was an insertion (30:H insertion). In addition, two of the mutations (30:H insertion and E527D) were demonstrated to be de novo, and the G57V and E527D mutations were identified in families of Afro-American and Indian origin, respectively. The G57V and 30:H insertion mutations represent the first CLCN5 mutations to be identified in the N-terminus region, and the R648Stop mutation, which has been observed previously in an unrelated family, suggests that this codon may be particularly prone to mutations. Heterologous expression of the mutations resulted in a marked reduction or abolition of the chloride currents, thereby establishing their functional importance. These results help to elucidate further the structure-function relationships of this renal chloride channel.

Abstract

Recurrent processing is a crucial feature in human visual processing supporting perceptual grouping, figure-ground segmentation, and recognition under challenging conditions. There is a clear need to incorporate recurrent processing in deep convolutional neural networks (DCNNs) but the computations underlying recurrent processing remain unclear. In this paper, we tested a form of recurrence in deep residual networks (ResNets) to capture recurrent processing signals in the human brain. Though ResNets are feedforward networks, they approximate an excitatory additive form of recurrence. Essentially, this form of recurrence consists of repeating excitatory activations in response to a static stimulus. Here, we used ResNets of varying depths (reflecting varying levels of recurrent processing) to explain electroencephalography (EEG) activity within a visual masking paradigm. Sixty-two humans and fifty artificial agents (10 ResNet models of depths - 4, 6, 10, 18 and 34) completed an object categorization task. We show that deeper networks (ResNet-10, 18 and 34) explained more variance in brain activity compared to shallower networks (ResNet-4 and 6). Furthermore, all ResNets captured differences in brain activity between unmasked and masked trials, with differences starting at ∼98ms (from stimulus onset). These early differences indicated that EEG activity reflected ‘pure’ feedforward signals only briefly (up to ∼98ms). After ∼98ms, deeper networks showed a significant increase in explained variance which peaks at ∼200ms, but only within unmasked trials, not masked trials. In summary, we provided clear evidence that excitatory additive recurrent processing in ResNets captures some of the recurrent processing in humans.

Abstract

Studies exploring the influence of executive functions (EF) on perspective-taking have focused on inhibition and working memory in young adults or clinical populations. Less consideration has been given to more complex capacities that also involve switching attention between perspectives, or to changes in EF and concomitant effects on perspective-taking across the lifespan. To address this, we assessed whether individual differences in inhibition and attentional switching in healthy adults (ages 17–84) predict performance on a task in which speakers identified targets for a listener with size-contrasting competitors in common or privileged ground. Modification differences across conditions decreased with age. Further, perspective taking interacted with EF measures: youngest adults’ sensitivity to perspective was best captured by their inhibitory performance; oldest adults’ sensitivity was best captured by switching performance. Perspective-taking likely involves multiple aspects of EF, as revealed by considering a wider range of EF tasks and individual capacities across the lifespan.

Abstract

In recent years, there has been renewed interest in the biological and cultural evolution of music, and specifically in the role played by perceptual and cognitive factors in shaping core features of musical systems, such as melody, harmony, and rhythm. One proposal originates in the language sciences. It holds that aspects of musical systems evolve by adapting gradually, in the course of successive generations, to the structural and functional characteristics of the sensory and memory systems of learners and “users” of music. This hypothesis has found initial support in laboratory experiments on music transmission. In this article, we first review some of the most important theoretical and empirical contributions to the field of music evolution. Next, we identify a major current limitation of these studies, i.e., the lack of direct neural support for the hypothesis of cognitive adaptation. Finally, we discuss a recent experiment in which this issue was addressed by using event-related potentials (ERPs). We suggest that the introduction of neurophysiology in cultural transmission research may provide novel insights on the micro-evolutionary origins of forms of variation observed in cultural systems.

Abstract

Typological comparisons have revealed that signers can use manual elements and/or a non-manual marker to express standard negation, but little is known about how such systematic marking emerges from its gestural counterparts as a new sign language arises. We analyzed 1.73 h of spontaneous language data, featuring six deaf native signers from generations III-V of the sign language isolate Kata Kolok (Bali). These data show that Kata Kolok cannot be classified as a manual dominant or non-manual dominant sign language since both the manual negative sign and a side-to-side headshake are used extensively. Moreover, the intergenerational comparisons indicate a considerable increase in the use of headshake spreading for generation V which is unlikely to have resulted from contact with Indonesian Sign Language varieties. We also attest a specialized negative existential marker, namely, tongue protrusion, which does not appear in co-speech gesture in the surrounding community. We conclude that Kata Kolok is uniquely placed in the typological landscape of sign language negation, and that grammaticalization theory is essential to a deeper understanding of the emergence of grammatical structure from gesture.

Abstract

Name signs are based on descriptions, initialization, and loan translations. Nyst and Baker (2003) have found crosslinguistic similarities in the phonology of name signs, such as a preference for one-handed signs and for the head location. Studying Kata Kolok (KK), a rural sign language without indigenous fingerspelling, strongly suggests that one-handedness is not correlated to initialization, but represents a more general feature of name sign phonology. Like in other sign languages, the head location is used frequently in both KK and Sign Language of the Netherlands (NGT) name signs. The use of nonmanuals, however, is strikingly different. NGT name signs are always accompanied by mouthings, which are absent in KK. Instead, KK name signs may use mouth gestures; these may disambiguate manually identical name signs, and even form independent name signs without any manual features

Abstract

Endophoric demonstratives such as this and that are among the most frequently used words in written texts. Nevertheless, it remains unclear how exactly they should be subdivided and classified in terms of their different types of use. Here, we develop a new taxonomy of endophoric demonstratives based on a large-scale corpus including three written genres: news items, encyclopedic texts, and book reviews. The taxonomy enables analysts to reliably code endophoric demonstratives based on objectively applicable criteria, while at the same time making them aware of many subtle borderline cases. We consider the taxonomy as a theoretical foundation for future theoretical and empirical work into endophoric demonstratives, and as an analytical tool allowing researchers to unify and compare the results of studies on endophoric demonstratives coming from different genres and languages.

Abstract

The existence of language-specific abstract sound-structure units (such as the phoneme) is largely uncontroversial in phonology. However, whether the brain performs abstractions comparable to those assumed in phonology has been difficult to ascertain. Using intracranial electroencephalography (EEG) recorded during a passive listening task, this study investigates the representation of phonological units in the brain and the relationship between those units, auditory sensory input, and higher levels of language organization, namely morphology. Leveraging the phonological neutralization of coronal stops to tap in English, this study provides evidence of a dissociation between acoustic similarity and phonemic identity in the neural response to speech. Moreover, leveraging morphophonological alternations of the regular plural and past tense, this study further demonstrates early (<500ms) evidence of dissociation between phonological form and morphological exponence. Together these results highlight the central nature of language-specific knowledge in sublexical language processing and improve our understanding of the ways language-specific knowledge structures and organizes speech perception in the brain.

Abstract

Background

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is heritable and a potential consequence of exposure to traumatic stress. Evidence suggests that a quantitative approach to PTSD phenotype measurement and incorporation of lifetime trauma exposure (LTE) information could enhance the discovery power of PTSD genome-wide association studies (GWASs).
Methods

A GWAS on PTSD symptoms was performed in 51 cohorts followed by a fixed-effects meta-analysis (N = 182,199 European ancestry participants). A GWAS of LTE burden was performed in the UK Biobank cohort (N = 132,988). Genetic correlations were evaluated with linkage disequilibrium score regression. Multivariate analysis was performed using Multi-Trait Analysis of GWAS. Functional mapping and annotation of leading loci was performed with FUMA. Replication was evaluated using the Million Veteran Program GWAS of PTSD total symptoms.
Results

GWASs of PTSD symptoms and LTE burden identified 5 and 6 independent genome-wide significant loci, respectively. There was a 72% genetic correlation between PTSD and LTE. PTSD and LTE showed largely similar patterns of genetic correlation with other traits, albeit with some distinctions. Adjusting PTSD for LTE reduced PTSD heritability by 31%. Multivariate analysis of PTSD and LTE increased the effective sample size of the PTSD GWAS by 20% and identified 4 additional loci. Four of these 9 PTSD loci were independently replicated in the Million Veteran Program.
Conclusions

Through using a quantitative trait measure of PTSD, we identified novel risk loci not previously identified using prior case-control analyses. PTSD and LTE have a high genetic overlap that can be leveraged to increase discovery power through multivariate methods.

Abstract

Is there a universal hierarchy of the senses, such that some senses (e.g., vision) are more accessible to consciousness and linguistic description than others (e.g., smell)? The long-standing presumption in Western thought has been that vision and audition are more objective than the other senses, serving as the basis of knowledge and understanding, whereas touch, taste, and smell are crude and of little value. This predicts that humans ought to be better at communicating about sight and hearing than the other senses, and decades of work based on English and related languages certainly suggests this is true. However, how well does this reflect the diversity of languages and communities worldwide? To test whether there is a universal hierarchy of the senses, stimuli from the five basic senses were used to elicit descriptions in 20 diverse languages, including 3 unrelated sign languages. We found that languages differ fundamentally in which sensory domains they linguistically code systematically, and how they do so. The tendency for better coding in some domains can be explained in part by cultural preoccupations. Although languages seem free to elaborate specific sensory domains, some general tendencies emerge: for example, with some exceptions, smell is poorly coded. The surprise is that, despite the gradual phylogenetic accumulation of the senses, and the imbalances in the neural tissue dedicated to them, no single hierarchy of the senses imposes itself upon language.

Abstract

People struggle to name odors, but this
limitation is not universal. Majid and
Kruspe investigate whether superior
olfactory performance is due to
subsistence, ecology, or language family.
By comparing closely related
communities in the Malay Peninsula, they
find that only hunter-gatherers are
proficient odor namers, suggesting that
subsistence is crucial.

Abstract

Olfaction presents a particularly interesting arena to explore abstraction in language. Like other abstract domains, such as time, odours can be difficult to conceptualize. An odour cannot be seen or held, it can be difficult to locate in space, and for most people odours are difficult to verbalize. On the other hand, odours give rise to primary sensory experiences. Every time we inhale we are using olfaction to make sense of our environment. We present new experimental data from 30 Jahai hunter-gatherers from the Malay Peninsula and 30 matched Dutch participants from the Netherlands in an odour naming experiment. Participants smelled monomolecular odorants and named odours while reaction times, odour descriptors and facial expressions were measured. We show that while Dutch speakers relied on concrete descriptors, i.e. they referred to odour sources (e.g. smells like lemon), the Jahai used abstract vocabulary to name the same odours (e.g. musty). Despite this differential linguistic categorization, analysis of facial expressions showed that the two groups, nevertheless, had the same initial emotional reactions to odours. Critically, these cross-cultural data present a challenge for how to think about abstraction in language.

Abstract

When two people read the same story, they might both end up liking it very much. However, this does not necessarily mean that their reasons for liking it were identical. We therefore ask what factors contribute to “liking” a story, and—most importantly—how people vary in this respect. We found that readers like stories because they find them interesting, amusing, suspenseful and/or beautiful. However, the degree to which these components of appreciation were related to how much readers liked stories differed between individuals. Interestingly, the individual slopes of the relationships between many of the components and liking were (positively or negatively) correlated. This indicated, for instance, that individuals displaying a relatively strong relationship between interest and liking, generally display a relatively weak relationship between sadness and liking. The individual differences in the strengths of the relationships between the components and liking were not related to individual differences in expertize, a characteristic strongly associated with aesthetic appreciation of visual art. Our work illustrates that it is important to take into consideration the fact that individuals differ in how they arrive at their evaluation of literary stories, and that it is possible to quantify these differences in empirical experiments. Our work suggests that future research should be careful about “overfitting” theories of aesthetic appreciation to an “idealized reader,” but rather take into consideration variations across individuals in the reason for liking a particular story.

Abstract

Boundary extension (BE) is a memory error in which observers remember more of a scene than they actually viewed. This error reflects one’s prediction that a scene naturally continues and is driven by scene schema and contextual knowledge. In two separate experiments we investigated the necessity of context and scene schema in BE. In Experiment 1, observers viewed scenes that either contained semantically consistent or inconsistent objects as well as objects on white backgrounds. In both types of scenes and in the no-background condition there was a BE effect; critically, semantic inconsistency in scenes reduced the magnitude of BE. In Experiment 2 when we used abstract shapes instead of meaningful objects, there was no BE effect. We suggest that although scene schema is necessary to elicit BE, contextual consistency is not required.

Abstract

Prior knowledge about the visual world can change how a visual stimulus is processed. Two forms of prior knowledge are often distinguished: stimulus familiarity (i.e., whether a stimulus has been seen before) and stimulus expectation (i.e., whether a stimulus is expected to occur, based on the context). Neurophysiological studies in monkeys have shown suppression of spiking activity both for expected and for familiar items in object-selective inferotemporal cortex. It is an open question, however, if and how these types of knowledge interact in their modulatory effects on the sensory response. To address this issue and to examine whether previous findings generalize to noninvasively measured neural activity in humans, we separately manipulated stimulus familiarity and expectation while noninvasively recording human brain activity using magnetoencephalography. We observed independent suppression of neural activity by familiarity and expectation, specifically in the lateral occipital complex, the putative human homologue of monkey inferotemporal cortex. Familiarity also led to sharpened response dynamics, which was predominantly observed in early visual cortex. Together, these results show that distinct types of sensory knowledge jointly determine the amount of neural resources dedicated to object processing in the visual ventral stream.

Abstract

Background

Autism is a dimensional condition, representing the extreme end of a continuum of social competence that extends throughout the general population. Currently, little is known about how autistic social traits (ASTs), measured across the full spectrum of severity, develop during childhood and adolescence, including whether there are developmental differences between boys and girls. Therefore, we sought to chart the trajectories of ASTs in the general population across childhood and adolescence, with a focus on gender differences.
Methods

Participants were 9,744 males (n = 4,784) and females (n = 4,960) from ALSPAC, a UK birth cohort study. ASTs were assessed when participants were aged 7, 10, 13 and 16 years, using the parent‐report Social Communication Disorders Checklist. Data were modelled using latent growth curve analysis.
Results

Developmental trajectories of males and females were nonlinear, showing a decline from 7 to 10 years, followed by an increase between 10 and 16 years. At 7 years, males had higher levels of ASTs than females (mean raw score difference = 0.88, 95% CI [.72, 1.04]), and were more likely (odds ratio [OR] = 1.99; 95% CI, 1.82, 2.16) to score in the clinical range on the SCDC. By 16 years this gender difference had disappeared: males and females had, on average, similar levels of ASTs (mean difference = 0.00, 95% CI [−0.19, 0.19]) and were equally likely to score in the SCDC's clinical range (OR = 0.91, 95% CI, 0.73, 1.10). This was the result of an increase in females’ ASTs between 10 and 16 years.
Conclusions

There are gender‐specific trajectories of autistic social impairment, with females more likely than males to experience an escalation of ASTs during early‐ and midadolescence. It remains to be discovered whether the observed female adolescent increase in ASTs represents the genuine late onset of social difficulties or earlier, subtle, pre‐existing difficulties becoming more obvious.

Abstract

Speech produced in noise (Lombard speech) is more intelligible than speech produced in quiet (plain speech). Previous research on the Lombard intelligibility benefit focused almost entirely on how native speakers produce and perceive Lombard speech. In this study, we investigate the size of the Lombard intelligibility benefit of both native (American-English) and non-native (native Dutch) English for native and non-native listeners (Dutch and Spanish). We used a glimpsing metric to measure the energetic masking potential of speech, which predicted that both native and non-native Lombard speech could withstand greater amounts of masking to a similar extent, compared to plain speech. In an intelligibility experiment, native English, Spanish, and Dutch listeners listened to the same words, mixed with noise. While the non-native listeners appeared to benefit more from Lombard speech than the native listeners did, each listener group experienced a similar benefit for native and non-native Lombard speech. Energetic masking, as captured by the glimpsing metric, only accounted for part of the Lombard benefit, indicating that the Lombard intelligibility benefit does not only result from a shift in spectral distribution. Despite subtle native language influences on non-native Lombard speech, both native and non-native speech provides a Lombard benefit.

Abstract

Language processing requires us to integrate incoming linguistic representations with representations of past input, often across intervening words and phrases. This computational situation has been argued to require retrieval of the appropriate representations from memory via a set of features or representations serving as retrieval cues. However, even within in a cue-based retrieval account of language comprehension, both the structure of retrieval cues and the particular computation that underlies direct-access retrieval are still underspecified. Evidence from two event-related brain potential (ERP) experiments that show cue-based interference from different types of linguistic representations during ellipsis comprehension are consistent with an architecture wherein different cue types are integrated, and where the interaction of cue with the recent contents of memory determines processing outcome, including expression of the interference effect in ERP componentry. I conclude that retrieval likely includes a computation where cues are integrated with the contents of memory via a linear weighting scheme, and I propose vector addition as a candidate formalization of this computation. I attempt to account for these effects and other related phenomena within a broader cue-based framework of language processing.

Abstract

Language comprehension involves coping with ambiguity and recovering from misanalysis. Syntactic ambiguity resolution is associated with increased reading times, a classic finding that has shaped theories of sentence processing. However, reaction times conflate the time it takes a process to complete with the quality of the behavior-related information available to the system. We therefore used the speed-accuracy tradeoff procedure (SAT) to derive orthogonal estimates of processing time and interpretation accuracy, and tested whether stronger retrieval cues (via semantic relatedness: neighed->horse vs. fell->horse) aid interpretation during recovery. On average, ambiguous sentences took 250ms longer (SAT rate) to interpret than unambiguous controls, demonstrating veridical differences in processing time. Retrieval cues more strongly related to the true subject always increased accuracy, regardless of ambiguity. These findings are consistent with a language processing architecture where cue-driven operations give rise to interpretation, and wherein diagnostic cues aid retrieval, regardless of parsing difficulty or structural uncertainty.

Abstract

Listeners are known to use adjacent contextual speech rate in processing temporally ambiguous speech sounds. For instance, an ambiguous vowel between short /A/ and long /a:/ in Dutch sounds relatively long (i.e., as /a:/) embedded in a fast precursor sentence, but short in a slow sentence. Besides the local speech rate, listeners also track talker-specific global speech rates. However, it is yet unclear whether other talkers' global rates are encoded with reference to a listener's self-produced rate. Three experiments addressed this question. In Experiment 1, one group of participants was instructed to speak fast, whereas another group had to speak slowly. The groups were compared on their perception of ambiguous /A/-/a:/ vowels embedded in neutral rate speech from another talker. In Experiment 2, the same participants listened to playback of their own speech and again evaluated target vowels in neutral rate speech. Neither of these experiments provided support for the involvement of self-produced speech in perception of another talker's speech rate. Experiment 3 repeated Experiment 2 but with a new participant sample that was unfamiliar with the participants from Experiment 2. This experiment revealed fewer /a:/ responses in neutral speech in the group also listening to a fast rate, suggesting that neutral speech sounds slow in the presence of a fast talker and vice versa. Taken together, the findings show that self-produced speech is processed differently from speech produced by others. They carry implications for our understanding of the perceptual and cognitive mechanisms involved in rate-dependent speech perception in dialogue settings.

Abstract

In the following self-paced reading study, we assess the cognitive realism of six widely used corpus-derived measures of association strength between words (collocated modifier–noun combinations like vast majority): MI, MI3, Dice coefficient, T-score, Z-score, and log-likelihood. The ability of these collocation metrics to predict reading times is tested against predictors of lexical processing cost that are widely established in the psycholinguistic and usage-based literature, respectively: forward/backward transition probability and bigram frequency. In addition, the experiment includes the treatment variable of task: it is split into two blocks which only differ in the format of interleaved comprehension questions (multiple choice vs. typed free response). Results show that the traditional corpus-linguistic metrics are outperformed by both backward transition probability and bigram frequency. Moreover, the multiple-choice condition elicits faster overall reading times than the typed condition, and the two winning metrics show stronger facilitation on the critical word (i.e. the noun in the bigrams) in the multiple-choice condition. In the typed condition, we find an effect that is weaker and, in the case of bigram frequency, longer lasting, continuing into the first spillover word. We argue that insufficient attention to task effects might have obscured the cognitive correlates of association scores in earlier research.

Abstract

Scientists who study the brain try to understand how it performs everyday behaviors like language, memory, and emotion. Scientists learn a lot by studying how these behaviors change when the brain is damaged. Over the past 200 years, they have made many discoveries by studying individuals with brain damage. For example, one patient could not form sentences after damaging a specific area of his brain. The scientist who studied him concluded that the damaged brain area was important for producing speech. This approach is called the lesion method, and it has taught us a lot about the brain. In this article, we introduce five patients throughout history who forever changed our understanding of the brain. We describe how researchers use these early discoveries to ask new questions about the brain, and we conclude by discussing how the lesion method is used today.

Abstract

Recurrent deletions of a ~600-kb region of 16p11.2 have been associated with a highly penetrant form of childhood apraxia of speech (CAS). Yet prior findings have been based on a small, potentially biased sample using retrospectively collected data. We examine the prevalence of CAS in a larger cohort of individuals with 16p11.2 deletion using a prospectively designed assessment battery. The broader speech and language phenotype associated with carrying this deletion was also examined. 55 participants with 16p11.2 deletion (47 children, 8 adults) underwent deep phenotyping to test for the presence of CAS and other speech and language diagnoses. Standardized tests of oral motor functioning, speech production, language, and non-verbal IQ were conducted. The majority of children (77%) and half of adults (50%) met criteria for CAS. Other speech outcomes were observed including articulation or phonological errors (i.e., phonetic and cognitive-linguistic errors, respectively), dysarthria (i.e., neuromuscular speech disorder), minimal verbal output, and even typical speech in some. Receptive and expressive language impairment was present in 73% and 70% of children, respectively. Co-occurring neurodevelopmental conditions (e.g., autism) and non-verbal IQ did not correlate with the presence of CAS. Findings indicate that CAS is highly prevalent in children with 16p11.2 deletion with symptoms persisting into adulthood for many. Yet CAS occurs in the context of a broader speech and language profile and other neurobehavioral deficits. Further research will elucidate specific genetic and neural pathways leading to speech and language deficits in individuals with 16p11.2 deletions, resulting in more targeted speech therapies addressing etiological pathways.

Abstract

Language is a unique trait of the human species, of which the genetic architecture remains largely unknown. Through language disorders studies, many candidate genes were identified. However, such complex and multifactorial trait is unlikely to be driven by only few genes and case-control studies, suffering from a lack of power, struggle to uncover significant variants. In parallel, neuroimaging has significantly contributed to the understanding of structural and functional aspects of language in the human brain and the recent availability of large scale cohorts like UK Biobank have made possible to study language via image-derived endophenotypes in the general population. Because of its strong relationship with task-based fMRI (tbfMRI) activations and its easiness of acquisition, resting-state functional MRI (rsfMRI) have been more popularised, making it a good surrogate of functional neuronal processes. Taking advantage of such a synergistic system by aggregating effects across spatially distributed traits, we performed a multivariate genome-wide association study (mvGWAS) between genetic variations and resting-state functional connectivity (FC) of classical brain language areas in the inferior frontal (pars opercularis, triangularis and orbitalis), temporal and inferior parietal lobes (angular and supramarginal gyri), in 32,186 participants from UK Biobank. Twenty genomic loci were found associated with language FCs, out of which three were replicated in an independent replication sample. A locus in 3p11.1, regulating EPHA3 gene expression, is found associated with FCs of the semantic component of the language network, while a locus in 15q14, regulating THBS1 gene expression is found associated with FCs of the perceptual-motor language processing, bringing novel insights into the neurobiology of language.

Abstract

Background

While it is well established that second language (L2) learning success changes with age and across individuals, the underlying neural mechanisms responsible for this developmental shift and these individual differences are largely unknown. We will study the behavioral and neural factors that subserve new grammar and word learning in a large cross-sectional developmental sample. This study falls under the NWO (Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek [Dutch Research Council]) Language in Interaction consortium (website: https://www.languageininteraction.nl/).
Methods

We will sample 360 healthy individuals across a broad age range between 8 and 25 years. In this paper, we describe the study design and protocol, which involves multiple study visits covering a comprehensive behavioral battery and extensive magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) protocols. On the basis of these measures, we will create behavioral and neural fingerprints that capture age-based and individual variability in new language learning. The behavioral fingerprint will be based on first and second language proficiency, memory systems, and executive functioning. We will map the neural fingerprint for each participant using the following MRI modalities: T1‐weighted, diffusion-weighted, resting-state functional MRI, and multiple functional-MRI paradigms. With respect to the functional MRI measures, half of the sample will learn grammatical features and half will learn words of a new language. Combining all individual fingerprints allows us to explore the neural maturation effects on grammar and word learning.
Discussion

This will be one of the largest neuroimaging studies to date that investigates the developmental shift in L2 learning covering preadolescence to adulthood. Our comprehensive approach of combining behavioral and neuroimaging data will contribute to the understanding of the mechanisms influencing this developmental shift and individual differences in new language learning. We aim to answer: (I) do these fingerprints differ according to age and can these explain the age-related differences observed in new language learning? And (II) which aspects of the behavioral and neural fingerprints explain individual differences (across and within ages) in grammar and word learning? The results of this study provide a unique opportunity to understand how the development of brain structure and function influence new language learning success.

Abstract

During speech processing, neural activity in non-autistic adults and infants tracks the speech envelope. Recent research in adults indicates that this neural tracking relates to linguistic knowledge and may be reduced in autism. Such reduced tracking, if present already in infancy, could impede language development. In the current study, we focused on children with a family history of autism, who often show a delay in first language acquisition. We investigated whether differences in tracking of sung nursery rhymes during infancy relate to language development and autism symptoms in childhood. We assessed speech-brain coherence at either 10 or 14 months of age in a total of 22 infants with high likelihood of autism due to family history and 19 infants without family history of autism. We analyzed the relationship between speech-brain coherence in these infants and their vocabulary at 24 months as well as autism symptoms at 36 months. Our results showed significant speech-brain coherence in the 10- and 14-month-old infants. We found no evidence for a relationship between speech-brain coherence and later autism symptoms. Importantly, speech-brain coherence in the stressed syllable rate (1–3 Hz) predicted later vocabulary. Follow-up analyses showed evidence for a relationship between tracking and vocabulary only in 10-month-olds but not 14-month-olds and indicated possible differences between the likelihood groups. Thus, early tracking of sung nursery rhymes is related to language development in childhood.

Abstract

Subjects named pictures while hearing distractor words that shared word-initial or word-final segments with the picture names or were unrelated to the picture names. The relative timing of distractor and picture presentation was varied. Compared with unrelated distractors, both types of related distractors facilitated picture naming under certain timing conditions. Begin-related distractors facilitated the naming responses if the shared segments began 150 ms before, at, or 150 ms after picture onset. By contrast, end-related distractors only facilitated the responses if the shared segments began at or 150 ms after picture onset. The results suggest that the phonological encoding of the beginning of a word is initiated before the encoding of its end.

Abstract

Eight experiments were carried out investigating whether different parts of a syllable must be phonologically encoded in a specific order or whether they can be encoded in any order. A speech production task was used in which the subjects in each test trial had to utter one out of three or five response words as quickly as possible. In the so-called homogeneous condition these words were related in form, while in the heterogeneous condition they were unrelated in form. For monosyllabic response words shorter reaction times were obtained in the homogeneous than in the heterogeneous condition when the words had the same onset, but not when they had the same rhyme. Similarly, for disyllabic response words, the reaction times were shorter in the homogeneous than in the heterogeneous condition when the words shared only the onset of the first syllable, but not when they shared only its rhyme. Furthermore, a stronger facilitatory effect was observed when the words had the entire first syllable in common than when they only shared the onset, or the onset and the nucleus, but not the coda of the first syllable. These results suggest that syllables are phonologically encoded in two ordered steps, the first of which is dedicated to the onset and the second to the rhyme.

Abstract

As conversation is the most important way of using language, linguists and psychologists should combine forces to investigate how interlocutors deal with the cognitive demands arising during conversation. Linguistic analyses of corpora of conversation are needed to understand the structure of conversations, and experimental work is indispensable for understanding the underlying cognitive processes. We argue that joint consideration of corpus and experimental data is most informative when the utterances elicited in a lab experiment match those extracted from a corpus in relevant ways. This requirement to compare like with like seems obvious but is not trivial to achieve. To illustrate this approach, we report two experiments where responses to polar (yes/no) questions were elicited in the lab and the response latencies were compared to gaps between polar questions and answers in a corpus of conversational speech. We found, as expected, that responses were given faster when they were easy to plan and planning could be initiated earlier than when they were harder to plan and planning was initiated later. Overall, in all but one condition, the latencies were longer than one would expect based on the analyses of corpus data. We discuss the implication of this partial match between the data sets and more generally how corpus and experimental data can best be combined in studies of conversation.

Abstract

In everyday life, we actively engage in different activities from a first-person perspective. However, experimental psychological research in the field of event perception is often limited to relatively passive, third-person computer-based paradigms. In the present study, we tested the feasibility of using immersive virtual reality in combination with eye tracking with participants in active motion. Behavioral research has shown that speakers of aspectual and non-aspectual languages attend to goals (endpoints) in motion events differently, with speakers of non-aspectual languages showing relatively more attention to goals (endpoint bias). In the current study, native speakers of German (non-aspectual) and English (aspectual) walked on a treadmill across 3-D terrains in VR, while their eye gaze was continuously tracked. Participants encountered landmark objects on the side of the road, and potential endpoint objects at the end of it. Using growth curve analysis to analyze fixation patterns over time, we found no differences in eye gaze behavior between German and English speakers. This absence of cross-linguistic differences was also observed in behavioral tasks with the same participants. Methodologically, based on the quality of the data, we conclude that our dynamic eye-tracking setup can be reliably used to study what people look at while moving through rich and dynamic environments that resemble the real world.

Abstract

What are the phonological representations that listeners use to map information about the segmental content of speech onto the mental lexicon during spoken-word recognition? Recent evidence from perceptual-learning paradigms seems to support (context-dependent) allophones as the basic representational units in spoken-word recognition. But recent evidence from a selective-adaptation paradigm seems to suggest that context-independent phonemes also play a role. We present three experiments using selective adaptation that constitute strong tests of these representational hypotheses. In Experiment 1, we tested generalization of selective adaptation using different allophones of Dutch /r/ and /l/ – a case where generalization has not been found with perceptual learning. In Experiments 2 and 3, we tested generalization of selective adaptation using German back fricatives in which allophonic and phonemic identity were varied orthogonally. In all three experiments, selective adaptation was observed only if adaptors and test stimuli shared allophones. Phonemic identity, in contrast, was neither necessary nor sufficient for generalization of selective adaptation to occur. These findings and other recent data using the perceptual-learning paradigm suggest that pre-lexical processing during spoken-word recognition is based on allophones, and not on context-independent phonemes

Abstract

Autosomal recessive Achromatopsia (ACHM) is a rare inherited disorder associated with dysfunctional cone photoreceptors resulting in a congenital absence of cone input to visual cortex. This might lead to distinct changes in cortical architecture with a negative impact on the success of gene augmentation therapies. To investigate the status of the visual cortex in these patients, we performed a multi-centre study focusing on the cortical structure of regions that normally receive predominantly cone input. Using high-resolution T1-weighted MRI scans and surface-based morphometry, we compared cortical thickness, surface area and grey matter volume in foveal, parafoveal and paracentral representations of primary visual cortex in 15 individuals with ACHM and 42 normally sighted, healthy controls (HC). In ACHM, surface area was reduced in all tested representations, while thickening of the cortex was found highly localized to the most central representation. These results were comparable to more widespread changes in brain structure reported in congenitally blind individuals, suggesting similar developmental processes, i.e., irrespective of the underlying cause and extent of vision loss. The cortical differences we report here could limit the success of treatment of ACHM in adulthood. Interventions earlier in life when cortical structure is not different from normal would likely offer better visual outcomes for those with ACHM.

Abstract

Propagation of novel linguistic terms is an important aspect of language use and language
change. Here, we test how social network size influences people’s likelihood of adopting novel
labels by examining hashtag use on Twitter. Specifically, we test whether following fewer Twitter
users leads to more varied and malleable hashtag use on Twitter , because each followed user is
ascribed greater weight and thus exerts greater influence on the following user. Focusing on Dutch
users tweeting about the terrorist attack in Brussels in 2016, we show that people who follow
fewer other users use a larger number of unique hashtags to refer to the event, reflecting greater
malleability and variability in use. These results have implications for theories of language learning, language use, and language change.

Abstract

Increasing evidence implicates the sensorimotor systems with high-level cognition, but the extent to which these systems play a functional role remains debated. Using an elegant design, Shebani and Pulvermüller (2013) reported that carrying out a demanding rhythmic task with the hands led to selective impairment of working memory for hand-related words (e.g., clap), while carrying out the same task with the feet led to selective memory impairment for foot-related words (e.g., kick). Such a striking double dissociation is acknowledged even by critics to constitute strong evidence for an embodied account of working memory. Here, we report on an attempt at a direct replication of this important finding. We followed a sequential sampling design and stopped data collection at N=77 (more than five times the original sample size), at which point the evidence for the lack of the critical selective interference effect was very strong (BF01 = 91). This finding constitutes strong evidence against a functional contribution of the motor system to keeping action words in working memory. Our finding fits into the larger emerging picture in the field of embodied cognition that sensorimotor simulations are neither required nor automatic in high-level cognitive processes, but that they may play a role depending on the task. Importantly, we urge researchers to engage in transparent, high-powered, and fully pre-registered experiments like the present one to ensure the field advances on a solid basis.

Abstract

The Action-sentence Compatibility Effect (ACE) is a well-known demonstration of the role of motor activity in the comprehension of language. Participants are asked to make sensibility judgments on sentences by producing movements toward the body or away from the body. The ACE is the finding that movements are faster when the direction of the movement (e.g., toward) matches the direction of the action in the to-be-judged sentence (e.g., Art gave you the pen describes action toward you). We report on a pre- registered, multi-lab replication of one version of the ACE. The results show that none of the 18 labs involved in the study observed a reliable ACE, and that the meta-analytic estimate of the size of the ACE was essentially zero.

Abstract

Communication disorder is common in Koolen de Vries syndrome (KdVS), yet its specific symptomatology has not been examined, limiting prognostic counselling and application of targeted therapies. Here we examine the communication phenotype associated with KdVS. Twenty-nine participants (12 males, 4 with KANSL1 variants, 25 with 17q21.31 microdeletion), aged 1.0–27.0 years were assessed for oral-motor, speech, language, literacy, and social functioning. Early history included hypotonia and feeding difficulties. Speech and language development was delayed and atypical from onset of first words (2; 5–3; 5 years of age on average). Speech was characterised by apraxia (100%) and dysarthria (93%), with stuttering in some (17%). Speech therapy and multi-modal communication (e.g., sign-language) was critical in preschool. Receptive and expressive language abilities were typically commensurate (79%), both being severely affected relative to peers. Children were sociable with a desire to communicate, although some (36%) had pragmatic impairments in domains, where higher-level language was required. A common phenotype was identified, including an overriding ‘double hit’ of oral hypotonia and apraxia in infancy and preschool, associated with severely delayed speech development. Remarkably however, speech prognosis was positive; apraxia resolved, and although dysarthria persisted, children were intelligible by mid-to-late childhood. In contrast, language and literacy deficits persisted, and pragmatic deficits were apparent. Children with KdVS require early, intensive, speech motor and language therapy, with targeted literacy and social language interventions as developmentally appropriate. Greater understanding of the linguistic phenotype may help unravel the relevance of KANSL1 to child speech and language development.

Abstract

A relatively new analysis technique, known as neural decoding or multivariate pattern analysis (MVPA), has become increasingly popular for cognitive neuroimaging studies over recent years. These techniques promise to uncover the representational contents of neural signals, as well as the underlying code and the dynamic profile thereof. A field in which these techniques have led to novel insights in particular is that of visual working memory (VWM). In the present study, we subjected human volunteers to a combined VWM/imagery task while recording their neural signals using magnetoencephalography (MEG). We applied multivariate decoding analyses to uncover the temporal profile underlying the neural representations of the memorized item. Analysis of gaze position however revealed that our results were contaminated by systematic eye movements, suggesting that the MEG decoding results from our originally planned analyses were confounded. In addition to the eye movement analyses, we also present the original analyses to highlight how these might have readily led to invalid conclusions. Finally, we demonstrate a potential remedy, whereby we train the decoders on a functional localizer that was specifically designed to target bottom-up sensory signals and as such avoids eye movements. We conclude by arguing for more awareness of the potentially pervasive and ubiquitous effects of eye movement-related confounds.

Abstract

We conducted three neighborhood experiments with Dutch-English bilinguals to test effects of L2 proficiency and neighborhood characteristics within and between languages. In the past 20 years, the English (L2) proficiency of this population has considerably increased. To consider the impact of this development on neighborhood effects, we conducted a strict replication of the English lexical decision task by van Heuven, Dijkstra, & Grainger (1998, Exp. 4). In line with our prediction, English characteristics (neighborhood size, word and bigram frequency) dominated the word and nonword responses, while the nonwords also revealed an interaction of English and Dutch neighborhood size.
The prominence of English was tested again in two experiments introducing a stronger neighborhood manipulation. In English lexical decision and progressive demasking, English items with no orthographic neighbors at all were contrasted with items having neighbors in English or Dutch (‘hermits’) only, or in both languages. In both tasks, target processing was affected strongly by the presence of English neighbors, but only weakly by Dutch neighbors. Effects are interpreted in terms of two underlying processing mechanisms: language-specific global lexical activation and lexical competition.

Abstract

NBEA is a candidate gene for autism, and de novo variants have been reported in neurodevelopmental disease (NDD) cohorts. However, NBEA has not been rigorously evaluated as a disease gene, and associated phenotypes have not been delineated. We identified 24 de novo NBEA variants in patients with NDD, establishing NBEA as an NDD gene. Most patients had epilepsy with onset in the first few years of life, often characterized by generalized seizure types, including myoclonic and atonic seizures. Our data show a broader phenotypic spectrum than previously described, including a myoclonic-astatic epilepsy–like phenotype in a subset of patients.

Abstract

The ability to comprehend phrases is an essential integrative property of the brain. Here we evaluate the neural processes that enable the transition from single word processing to a minimal compositional scheme. Previous research has reported conflicting timing effects of composition, and disagreement persists with respect to inferior frontal and posterior temporal contributions. To address these issues, 19 patients (10 male, 19 female) implanted with penetrating depth or surface subdural intracranial electrodes heard auditory recordings of adjective-noun, pseudoword-noun and adjective-pseudoword phrases and judged whether the phrase matched a picture. Stimulus-dependent alterations in broadband gamma activity, low frequency power and phase-locking values across the language-dominant left hemisphere were derived. This revealed a mosaic located on the lower bank of the posterior superior temporal sulcus (pSTS), in which closely neighboring cortical sites displayed exclusive sensitivity to either lexicality or phrase structure, but not both. Distinct timings were found for effects of phrase composition (210–300 ms) and pseudoword processing (approximately 300–700 ms), and these were localized to neighboring electrodes in pSTS. The pars triangularis and temporal pole encoded anticipation of composition in broadband low frequencies, and both regions exhibited greater functional connectivity with pSTS during phrase composition. Our results suggest that the pSTS is a highly specialized region comprised of sparsely interwoven heterogeneous constituents that encodes both lower and higher level linguistic features. This hub in pSTS for minimal phrase processing may form the neural basis for the human-specific computational capacity for forming hierarchically organized linguistic structures.

Abstract

Using individual differences approaches, a growing body of literature finds positive associations between musicality and language-related abilities, complementing prior findings of links between musical training and language skills. Despite these associations, musicality has been often overlooked in mainstream models of individual differences in language acquisition and development. To better understand the biological basis of these individual differences, we propose the Musical Abilities, Pleiotropy, Language, and Environment (MAPLE) framework. This novel integrative framework posits that musical and language-related abilities likely share some common genetic architecture (i.e., genetic pleiotropy) in addition to some degree of overlapping neural endophenotypes, and genetic influences on musically and linguistically enriched environments. Drawing upon recent advances in genomic methodologies for unraveling pleiotropy, we outline testable predictions for future research on language development and how its underlying neurobiological substrates may be supported by genetic pleiotropy with musicality. In support of the MAPLE framework, we review and discuss findings from over seventy behavioral and neural studies, highlighting that musicality is robustly associated with individual differences in a range of speech-language skills required for communication and development. These include speech perception-in-noise, prosodic perception, morphosyntactic skills, phonological skills, reading skills, and aspects of second/foreign language learning. Overall, the current work provides a clear agenda and framework for studying musicality-language links using individual differences approaches, with an emphasis on leveraging advances in the genomics of complex musicality and language traits.

Abstract

Substantial genetic correlations have been reported across psychiatric disorders and numerous cross-disorder genetic variants have been detected. To identify the genetic variants underlying general psychopathology in childhood, we performed a genome-wide association study using a total psychiatric problem score. We analyzed 6,844,199 common SNPs in 38,418 school-aged children from 20 population-based cohorts participating in the EAGLE consortium. The SNP heritability of total psychiatric problems was 5.4% (SE = 0.01) and two loci reached genome-wide significance: rs10767094 and rs202005905. We also observed an association of SBF2, a gene associated with neuroticism in previous GWAS, with total psychiatric problems. The genetic effects underlying the total score were shared with common psychiatric disorders only (attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, anxiety, depression, insomnia) (rG > 0.49), but not with autism or the less common adult disorders (schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, or eating disorders) (rG < 0.01). Importantly, the total psychiatric problem score also showed at least a moderate genetic correlation with intelligence, educational attainment, wellbeing, smoking, and body fat (rG > 0.29). The results suggest that many common genetic variants are associated with childhood psychiatric symptoms and related phenotypes in general instead of with specific symptoms. Further research is needed to establish causality and pleiotropic mechanisms between related traits.

Abstract

Moving in synchrony to the beat is a fundamental component of musicality. Here we conducted a genome-wide association study to identify common genetic variants associated with beat synchronization in 606,825 individuals. Beat synchronization exhibited a highly polygenic architecture, with 69 loci reaching genome-wide significance (P < 5 × 10−8) and single-nucleotide-polymorphism-based heritability (on the liability scale) of 13%–16%. Heritability was enriched for genes expressed in brain tissues and for fetal and adult brain-specific gene regulatory elements, underscoring the role of central-nervous-system-expressed genes linked to the genetic basis of the trait. We performed validations of the self-report phenotype (through separate experiments) and of the genome-wide association study (polygenic scores for beat synchronization were associated with patients algorithmically classified as musicians in medical records of a separate biobank). Genetic correlations with breathing function, motor function, processing speed and chronotype suggest shared genetic architecture with beat synchronization and provide avenues for new phenotypic and genetic explorations.

Abstract

Do people routinely pre-activate the meaning and even the phonological form of upcoming words? The most acclaimed evidence for phonological prediction comes from a 2005 Nature Neuroscience publication by DeLong, Urbach and Kutas, who observed a graded modulation of electrical brain potentials (N400) to nouns and preceding articles by the probability that people use a word to continue the sentence fragment (‘cloze’). In our direct replication study spanning 9 laboratories (N=334), pre-registered replication-analyses and exploratory Bayes factor analyses successfully replicated the noun-results but, crucially, not the article-results. Pre-registered single-trial analyses also yielded a statistically significant effect for the nouns but not the articles. Exploratory Bayesian single-trial analyses showed that the article-effect may be non-zero but is likely far smaller than originally reported and too small to observe without very large sample sizes. Our results do not support the view that readers routinely pre-activate the phonological form of predictable words.

Abstract

This study compares the role of exemplars in native and non-native listening. Two English identity priming experiments were conducted with native English, Dutch non-native, and Spanish non-native listeners. In Experiment 1, primes and targets were spoken in the same or a different voice. Only the native listeners showed exemplar effects. In Experiment 2, primes and targets had the same or a different degree of vowel reduction. The Dutch, but not the Spanish, listeners were familiar with this reduction pattern from their L1 phonology. In this experiment, exemplar effects only arose for the Spanish listeners. We propose that in these lexical decision experiments the use of exemplars is co-determined by listeners’ available processing resources, which is modulated by the familiarity with the variation type from their L1 phonology. The use of exemplars differs between native and non-native listening, suggesting qualitative differences between native and non-native speech comprehension processes.

Abstract

We present a significant extension of the Brain Imaging Data Structure (BIDS) to support the specific
aspects of magnetoencephalography (MEG) data. MEG measures brain activity with millisecond
temporal resolution and unique source imaging capabilities. So far, BIDS was a solution to organise
magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data. The nature and acquisition parameters of MRI and MEG data
are strongly dissimilar. Although there is no standard data format for MEG, we propose MEG-BIDS as a
principled solution to store, organise, process and share the multidimensional data volumes produced
by the modality. The standard also includes well-defined metadata, to facilitate future data
harmonisation and sharing efforts. This responds to unmet needs from the multimodal neuroimaging
community and paves the way to further integration of other techniques in electrophysiology. MEGBIDS
builds on MRI-BIDS, extending BIDS to a multimodal data structure. We feature several dataanalytics
software that have adopted MEG-BIDS, and a diverse sample of open MEG-BIDS data
resources available to everyone.

Abstract

Our senses are constantly bombarded with a myriad of signals. To make sense of this cacophony, the brain needs to integrate signals emanating from a common source, but segregate signals originating from the different sources. Thus, multisensory perception relies critically on inferring the world’s causal structure (i. e. one common vs. multiple independent sources). Behavioural research has shown that the brain arbitrates between sensory integration and segregation consistent with the principles of Bayesian Causal Inference. At the neural level, recent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and electroencephalography (EEG) studies have shown that the brain accomplishes Bayesian Causal Inference by dynamically encoding multiple perceptual estimates across the sensory processing hierarchies. Only at the top of the hierarchy in anterior parietal cortices did the brain form perceptual estimates that take into account the observer’s uncertainty about the world’s causal structure consistent with Bayesian Causal Inference.

Abstract

Psycholinguistic theories are based on a very small set of unrepresentative languages, so it is as yet unclear how typological variation shapes mechanisms supporting language use. In this article we report the first on-line experimental study of sentence production in an Australian free word order language: Murrinhpatha. Forty-six adult native speakers of Murrinhpatha described a series of unrelated transitive scenes that were manipulated for humanness (±human) in the agent and patient roles while their eye movements were recorded. Speakers produced a large range of word orders, consistent with the language having flexible word order, with variation significantly influenced by agent and patient humanness. An analysis of eye movements showed that Murrinhpatha speakers' first fixation on an event character did not alone determine word order; rather, early in speech planning participants rapidly encoded both event characters and their relationship to each other. That is, they engaged in relational encoding, laying down a very early conceptual foundation for the word order they eventually produced. These results support a weakly hierarchical account of sentence production and show that speakers of a free word order language encode the relationships between event participants during earlier stages of sentence planning than is typically observed for languages with fixed word orders.

Abstract

We propose that word recognition in continuous speech is subject to constraints on what may constitute a viable word of the language. This Possible-Word Constraint (PWC) reduces activation of candidate words if their recognition would imply word status for adjacent input which could not be a word - for instance, a single consonant. In two word-spotting experiments, listeners found it much harder to detectapple,for example, infapple(where [f] alone would be an impossible word), than invuffapple(wherevuffcould be a word of English). We demonstrate that the PWC can readily be implemented in a competition-based model of continuous speech recognition, as a constraint on the process of competition between candidate words; where a stretch of speech between a candidate word and a (known or likely) word boundary is not a possible word, activation of the candidate word is reduced. This implementation accurately simulates both the present results and data from a range of earlier studies of speech segmentation.

Abstract

Background: Perioperative assessment of language function in brain tumor patients commonly relies on administration of object naming during stimulation mapping. Ample research, however, points to the benefit of adding verb tasks to the testing paradigm in order to delineate and preserve postoperative language function more comprehensively. This research uses a case series approach to explore the feasibility and added value of a dual-task protocol that includes both a noun task (object naming) and a verb task (action naming) in perioperative delineation of language functions.

Materials and Methods: Seven neurosurgical cases underwent perioperative language assessment with both object and action naming. This entailed preoperative baseline testing, preoperative stimulation mapping with navigated Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (nTMS) with subsequent white matter visualization, intraoperative mapping with Direct Electrical Stimulation (DES) in 4 cases, and postoperative imaging and examination of language change.

Results: We observed a divergent pattern of language organization and decline between cases who showed lesions close to the delineated language network and hence underwent DES mapping, and those that did not. The latter displayed no new impairment postoperatively consistent with an unharmed network for the neural circuits of both object and action naming. For the cases who underwent DES, on the other hand, a higher sensitivity was found for action naming over object naming. Firstly, action naming preferentially predicted the overall language state compared to aphasia batteries. Secondly, it more accurately predicted intraoperative positive language areas as revealed by DES. Thirdly, double dissociations between postoperatively unimpaired object naming and impaired action naming and vice versa indicate segregated skills and neural representation for noun versus verb processing, especially in the ventral stream. Overlaying postoperative imaging with object and action naming networks revealed that dual-task nTMS mapping can explain the drop in performance in those cases where the network appeared in proximity to the resection cavity.

Conclusion: Using a dual-task protocol for visualization of cortical and subcortical language areas through nTMS mapping proved to be able to capture network-to-deficit relations in our case series. Ultimately, adding action naming to clinical nTMS and DES mapping may help prevent postoperative deficits of this seemingly segregated skill.

Abstract

We conduct a genome-wide association study (GWAS) of educational attainment (EA) in a sample of ~3 million individuals and identify 3,952 approximately uncorrelated genome-wide-significant single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). A genome-wide polygenic predictor, or polygenic index (PGI), explains 12–16% of EA variance and contributes to risk prediction for ten diseases. Direct effects (i.e., controlling for parental PGIs) explain roughly half the PGI’s magnitude of association with EA and other phenotypes. The correlation between mate-pair PGIs is far too large to be consistent with phenotypic assortment alone, implying additional assortment on PGI-associated factors. In an additional GWAS of dominance deviations from the additive model, we identify no genome-wide-significant SNPs, and a separate X-chromosome additive GWAS identifies 57.

Abstract

The centrosome provides an intracellular anchor for the cytoskeleton, regulating cell division, cell migration, and cilia formation. We used spatial proteomics to elucidate protein interaction networks at the centrosome of human induced pluripotent stem cell–derived neural stem cells (NSCs) and neurons. Centrosome-associated proteins were largely cell type–specific, with protein hubs involved in RNA dynamics. Analysis of neurodevelopmental disease cohorts identified a significant overrepresentation of NSC centrosome proteins with variants in patients with periventricular heterotopia (PH). Expressing the PH-associated mutant pre-mRNA-processing factor 6 (PRPF6) reproduced the periventricular misplacement in the developing mouse brain, highlighting missplicing of transcripts of a microtubule-associated kinase with centrosomal location as essential for the phenotype. Collectively, cell type–specific centrosome interactomes explain how genetic variants in ubiquitous proteins may convey brain-specific phenotypes.

Abstract

Prediction is one characteristic of the human mind. But what does it mean to say the mind is a ’prediction machine’ and inherently forward looking as is frequently claimed? In natural languages, many contexts are not easily predictable in a forward fashion. In English for example many frequent verbs do not carry unique meaning on their own, but instead rely on another word or words that follow them to become meaningful. Upon reading take a the processor often cannot easily predict walk as the next word. But the system can ‘look back’ and integrate walk more easily when it follows take a (e.g., as opposed to make|get|have a walk). In the present paper we provide further evidence for the importance of both forward and backward looking in language processing. In two self-paced reading tasks and an eye-tracking reading task, we found evidence that adult English native speakers’ sensitivity to word forward and backward conditional probability significantly explained variance in reading times over and above psycholinguistic predictors of reading latencies. We conclude that both forward and backward-looking (prediction and integration) appear to be important characteristics of language processing. Our results thus suggest that it makes just as much sense to call the mind an ’integration machine’ which is inherently backward looking.

Abstract

Implicit up/down words, such as bird and foot, systematically influence performance on visual tasks involving immediately following targets in compatible vs. incompatible locations. Recent studies have observed that the semantic relation between prime words and target pictures can strongly influence the size and even the direction of the effect: Semantically related targets are processed faster in congruent vs. incongruent locations (location-specific priming), whereas unrelated targets are processed slower in congruent locations. Here, we used eye-tracking to investigate the moment-to-moment processes underlying this pattern. Our reaction time results for related targets replicated the location-specific priming effect and showed a trend towards interference for unrelated targets. We then used growth curve analysis to test how up/down words and their match vs. mismatch with immediately following targets in terms of semantics and vertical location influences concurrent saccadic eye movements. There was a strong main effect of spatial association on linear growth with up words biasing changes in y-coordinates over time upwards relative to down words (and vice versa). Similar to the RT data, this effect was strongest for semantically related targets and reversed for unrelated targets. Intriguingly, all conditions showed a bias in the congruent direction in the initial stage of the saccade. Then, at around halfway into the saccade the effect kept increasing in the semantically related condition, and reversed in the unrelated condition. These results suggest that online processing of up/down words triggers direction-specific oculomotor processes that are dynamically modulated by the semantic relation between prime words and targets.

Abstract

The field of bioacoustics is rapidly developing and characterized by diverse methodologies, approaches and aims. For instance, bioacoustics encompasses studies on the perception of pure tones in meticulously controlled laboratory settings, documentation of species’ presence and activities using recordings from the field, and analyses of circadian calling patterns in animal choruses. Newcomers to the field are confronted with a vast and fragmented literature, and a lack of accessible reference papers or textbooks. In this paper we contribute towards filling this gap. Instead of a classical list of “dos” and “don’ts”, we review some key papers which, we believe, embody best practices in several bioacoustic subfields. In the first three case studies, we discuss how bioacoustics can help identify the ‘who’, ‘where’ and ‘how many’ of animals within a given ecosystem. Specifically, we review cases in which bioacoustic methods have been applied with success to draw inferences regarding species identification, population structure, and biodiversity. In fourth and fifth case studies, we highlight how structural properties in signal evolution can emerge via ecological constraints or cultural transmission. Finally, in a sixth example, we discuss acoustic methods that have been used to infer predator–prey dynamics in cases where direct observation was not feasible. Across all these examples, we emphasize the importance of appropriate recording parameters and experimental design. We conclude by highlighting common best practices across studies as well as caveats about our own overview. We hope our efforts spur a more general effort in standardizing best practices across the subareas we’ve highlighted in order to increase compatibility among bioacoustic studies and inspire cross-pollination across the discipline.

Abstract

In this increasingly data-rich world, visual recordings of human behavior are often unable to be shared due to concerns about privacy. Consequently, data sharing in fields such as behavioral science, multimodal communication, and human movement research is often limited. In addition, in legal and other non-scientific contexts, privacy-related concerns may preclude the sharing of video recordings and thus remove the rich multimodal context that humans recruit to communicate. Minimizing the risk of identity exposure while preserving critical behavioral information would maximize utility of public resources (e.g., research grants) and time invested in audio–visual​ research. Here we present an open-source computer vision tool that masks the identities of humans while maintaining rich information about communicative body movements. Furthermore, this masking tool can be easily applied to many videos, leveraging computational tools to augment the reproducibility and accessibility of behavioral research. The tool is designed for researchers and practitioners engaged in kinematic and affective research. Application areas include teaching/education, communication and human movement research, CCTV, and legal contexts.

Abstract

Although humans can understand speech using the auditory modality alone, in noisy environments visual speech information from the talker’s mouth can rescue otherwise unintelligible auditory speech. To investigate the neural substrates of multisensory speech perception, we compared neural activity from the human superior temporal gyrus (STG) in two datasets. One dataset consisted of direct neural recordings (electrocorticography, ECoG) from surface electrodes implanted in epilepsy patients (this dataset has been previously published). The second dataset consisted of indirect measures of neural activity using blood oxygen level dependent functional magnetic resonance imaging (BOLD fMRI). Both ECoG and fMRI participants viewed the same clear and noisy audiovisual speech stimuli and performed the same speech recognition task. Both techniques demonstrated a sharp functional boundary in the STG, spatially coincident with an anatomical boundary defined by the posterior edge of Heschl’s gyrus. Cortex on the anterior side of the boundary responded more strongly to clear audiovisual speech than to noisy audiovisual speech while cortex on the posterior side of the boundary did not. For both ECoG and fMRI measurements, the transition between the functionally distinct regions happened within 10 mm of anterior-to-posterior distance along the STG. We relate this boundary to the multisensory neural code underlying speech perception and propose that it represents an important functional division within the human speech perception network.

Abstract

Hearing one’s own voice is critical for fluent speech production as it allows for the detection and correction of vocalization errors in real time. This behavior known as the auditory feedback control of speech is impaired in various neurological disorders ranging from stuttering to aphasia; however, the underlying neural mechanisms are still poorly understood. Computational models of speech motor control suggest that, during speech production, the brain uses an efference copy of the motor command to generate an internal estimate of the speech output. When actual feedback differs from this internal estimate, an error signal is generated to correct the internal estimate and update necessary motor commands to produce intended speech. We were able to localize the auditory error signal using electrocorticographic recordings from neurosurgical participants during a delayed auditory feedback (DAF) paradigm. In this task, participants hear their voice with a time delay as they produced words and sentences (similar to an echo on a conference call), which is well known to disrupt fluency by causing slow and stutter-like speech in humans. We observed a significant response enhancement in auditory cortex that scaled with the duration of feedback delay, indicating an auditory speech error signal. Immediately following auditory cortex, dorsal precentral gyrus (dPreCG), a region that has not been implicated in auditory feedback processing before, exhibited a markedly similar response enhancement, suggesting a tight coupling between the 2 regions. Critically, response enhancement in dPreCG occurred only during articulation of long utterances due to a continuous mismatch between produced speech and reafferent feedback. These results suggest that dPreCG plays an essential role in processing auditory error signals during speech production to maintain fluency.

Abstract

Evaluation plays a role in the telling and understanding of narratives, in communicative interaction, emotional understanding, and in psychological well-being. This article reports a study of evaluation by describing how readers monitor the concerns of characters over the course of a narrative. The main hypothesis is that readers tract the well-being via the expression of a character's internal states. Reader evaluations were revealed in think aloud protocols obtained during reading of narrative texts, one sentence at a time. Five kinds of evaluative inferences were found: appraisals (good versus bad), preferences (like versus don't like), emotions (happy versus frustrated), goals (want versus don't want), or purposes (to attain or maintain X versus to prevent or avoid X). Readers evaluated all sentences. The mean rate of evaluation per sentence was 0.55. Positive and negative evaluations over the course of the story indicated that things initially went badly for characters, improved with the formulation and execution of goal plans, declined with goal failure, and improved as characters formulated new goals and succeeded. The kind of evaluation made depended upon the episodic category of the event and the event's temporal location in the story. Evaluations also served to explain or predict events. In making evaluations, readers stayed within the frame of the story and perspectives of the character or narrator. They also moved out of the narrative frame and addressed evaluations towards the experimenter in a communicative context.

Abstract

When combined with source modeling, magneto- (MEG) and electroencephalography (EEG) can be used to study
long-range interactions among cortical processes non-invasively. Estimation of such inter-areal connectivity is
nevertheless hindered by instantaneous field spread and volume conduction, which artificially introduce linear
correlations and impair source separability in cortical current estimates. To overcome the inflating effects of linear
source mixing inherent to standard interaction measures, alternative phase- and amplitude-correlation based
connectivity measures, such as imaginary coherence and orthogonalized amplitude correlation have been proposed.
Being by definition insensitive to zero-lag correlations, these techniques have become increasingly popular
in the identification of correlations that cannot be attributed to field spread or volume conduction. We show here,
however, that while these measures are immune to the direct effects of linear mixing, they may still reveal large
numbers of spurious false positive connections through field spread in the vicinity of true interactions. This
fundamental problem affects both region-of-interest-based analyses and all-to-all connectome mappings. Most
importantly, beyond defining and illustrating the problem of spurious, or “ghost” interactions, we provide a
rigorous quantification of this effect through extensive simulations. Additionally, we further show that signal
mixing also significantly limits the separability of neuronal phase and amplitude correlations. We conclude that
spurious correlations must be carefully considered in connectivity analyses in MEG/EEG source space even when
using measures that are immune to zero-lag correlations.

Abstract

Temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE), a common drug-resistant epilepsy in adults, is primarily a limbic network disorder associated with predominant unilateral hippocampal pathology. Structural MRI has provided an in vivo window into whole-brain grey matter structural alterations in TLE relative to controls, by either mapping (i) atypical inter-hemispheric asymmetry or (ii) regional atrophy. However, similarities and differences of both atypical asymmetry and regional atrophy measures have not been systematically investigated.

Here, we addressed this gap using the multi-site ENIGMA-Epilepsy dataset comprising MRI brain morphological measures in 732 TLE patients and 1,418 healthy controls. We compared spatial distributions of grey matter asymmetry and atrophy in TLE, contextualized their topographies relative to spatial gradients in cortical microstructure and functional connectivity calculated using 207 healthy controls obtained from Human Connectome Project and an independent dataset containing 23 TLE patients and 53 healthy controls, and examined clinical associations using machine learning.

We identified a marked divergence in the spatial distribution of atypical inter-hemispheric asymmetry and regional atrophy mapping. The former revealed a temporo-limbic disease signature while the latter showed diffuse and bilateral patterns. Our findings were robust across individual sites and patients. Cortical atrophy was significantly correlated with disease duration and age at seizure onset, while degrees of asymmetry did not show a significant relationship to these clinical variables.

Our findings highlight that the mapping of atypical inter-hemispheric asymmetry and regional atrophy tap into two complementary aspects of TLE-related pathology, with the former revealing primary substrates in ipsilateral limbic circuits and the latter capturing bilateral disease effects. These findings refine our notion of the neuropathology of TLE and may inform future discovery and validation of complementary MRI biomarkers in TLE.

Abstract

Visual selective attention operates through top–down mechanisms of signal enhancement and suppression, mediated by a-band oscillations. The effects of such top–down signals on local processing in primary visual cortex (V1) remain poorly understood. In this work, we characterize the interplay between large-s cale interactions and local activity changes in V1 that orchestrat es selective attention, using Granger-causality and phase-amplitude coupling (PAC) analysis of EEG source signals. The task required participants to either attend to or ignore oriented gratings. Results from time-varying, directed connectivity analysis revealed frequency-specific effects of attentional selection: bottom–up g-band influences from visual areas increased rapidly in response to attended stimuli while distributed top–down a-band influences originated from parietal cortex in response to ignored stimuli. Importantly, the results revealed a critical interplay between top–down parietal signals and a–g PAC in visual areas.
Parietal a-band influences disrupted the a–g coupling in visual cortex, which in turn reduced the amount of g-band outflow from visual area s. Our results are a first demon stration of how directed interactions affect cross-frequency coupling in downstream areas depending on task demands. These findings suggest that parietal cortex realizes selective attention by disrupting cross-frequency coupling at target regions, which prevents them from propagating task-irrelevant information.

Abstract

In many musical styles, vocalists manually gesture while they sing. Coupling between gesture kinematics and vocalization has been examined in speech contexts, but it is an open question how these couple in music making. We examine this in a corpus of South Indian, Karnatak vocal music that includes motion-capture data. Through peak magnitude analysis (linear mixed regression) and continuous time-series analyses (generalized additive modeling), we assessed whether vocal trajectories around peaks in vertical velocity, speed, or acceleration were coupling with changes in vocal acoustics (namely, F0 and amplitude). Kinematic coupling was stronger for F0 change versus amplitude, pointing to F0's musical significance. Acceleration was the most predictive for F0 change and had the most reliable magnitude coupling, showing a one-third power relation. That acceleration, rather than other kinematics, is maximally predictive for vocalization is interesting because acceleration entails force transfers onto the body. As a theoretical contribution, we argue that gesturing in musical contexts should be understood in relation to the physical connections between gesturing and vocal production that are brought into harmony with the vocalists’ (enculturated) performance goals. Gesture–vocal coupling should, therefore, be viewed as a neuro–bodily distributed aesthetic entanglement.

Abstract

The use of immersive virtual reality as a research tool is rapidly increasing in numerous scientific disciplines. By combining ecological validity with strict experimental control, immersive virtual reality provides the potential to develop and test scientific theory in rich environments that closely resemble everyday settings. This article introduces the first standardized database of colored three-dimensional (3D) objects that can be used in virtual reality and augmented reality research and applications. The 147 objects have been normed for name agreement, image agreement, familiarity, visual complexity, and corresponding lexical characteristics of the modal object names. The availability of standardized 3D-objects for virtual reality research is important, as reaching valid theoretical conclusions critically hinges on the use of well controlled experimental stimuli. Sharing standardized 3D-objects across different virtual reality labs will allow for science to move forward more quickly.

Abstract

Bilinguals often switch languages as a function of the language background of their addressee. The control mechanisms supporting bilinguals' ability to select the contextually appropriate language are heavily debated. Here we present four experiments in which unbalanced bilinguals named pictures in their first language Dutch and their second language English in mixed and blocked contexts. Immersive virtual reality technology was used to increase the ecological validity of the cued language-switching paradigm. Behaviorally, we consistently observed symmetrical switch costs, reversed language dominance, and asymmetrical mixing costs. These findings indicate that unbalanced bilinguals apply sustained inhibition to their dominant L1 in mixed language settings. Consequent enhanced processing costs for the L1 in a mixed versus a blocked context were reflected by a sustained positive component in event-related potentials. Methodologically, the use of virtual reality opens up a wide range of possibilities to study language and communication in bilingual and other communicative settings.

Abstract

Models on L3/Ln acquisition differ with respect to how they envisage degree (holistic
vs. selective transfer of the L1, L2 or both) and/or timing (initial stages vs. development) of how
the influence of source languages unfolds. This study uses EEG/ERPs to examine these models,
bringing together two types of bilinguals: heritage speakers (HSs) (Italian-German, n = 15) compared
to adult L2 learners (L1 German, L2 English, n = 28) learning L3/Ln Latin. Participants were trained
on a selected Latin lexicon over two sessions and, afterward, on two grammatical properties: case
(similar between German and Latin) and adjective–noun order (similar between Italian and Latin).
Neurophysiological findings show an N200/N400 deflection for the HSs in case morphology and a
P600 effect for the German L2 group in adjectival position. None of the current L3/Ln models predict
the observed results, which questions the appropriateness of this methodology. Nevertheless, the
results are illustrative of differences in how HSs and L2 learners approach the very initial stages of
additional language learning, the implications of which are discussed

Abstract

The present study uses EEG time-frequency representations (TFRs) with a Flanker task to investigate if and how individual differences in bilingual language experience modulate neurocognitive outcomes (oscillatory dynamics) in two bilingual group types: late bilinguals (L2 learners) and early bilinguals (heritage speakers—HSs). TFRs were computed for both incongruent and congruent trials. The difference between the two (Flanker effect vis-à-vis cognitive interference) was then (1) compared between the HSs and the L2 learners, (2) modeled as a function of individual differences with bilingual experience within each group separately and (3) probed for its potential (a)symmetry between brain and behavioral data. We found no differences at the behavioral and neural levels for the between-groups comparisons. However, oscillatory dynamics (mainly theta increase and alpha suppression) of inhibition and cognitive control were found to be modulated by individual differences in bilingual language experience, albeit distinctly within each bilingual group. While the results indicate adaptations toward differential brain recruitment in line with bilingual language experience variation overall, this does not manifest uniformly. Rather, earlier versus later onset to bilingualism—the bilingual type—seems to constitute an independent qualifier to how individual differences play out.

Abstract

Humans have the ability to learn surprisingly complicated statistical information in a variety of modalities and situations, often based on relatively little input. These statistical learning (SL) skills appear to underlie many kinds of learning, but despite their ubiquity, we still do not fully understand precisely what SL is and what individual differences on SL tasks reflect. Here, we present experimental work suggesting that at least some individual differences arise from stimulus-specific variation in perceptual fluency: the ability to rapidly or efficiently code and remember the stimuli that SL occurs over. Experiment 1 demonstrates that participants show improved SL when the stimuli are simple and familiar; Experiment 2 shows that this improvement is not evident for simple but unfamiliar stimuli; and Experiment 3 shows that for the same stimuli (Chinese characters), SL is higher for people who are familiar with them (Chinese speakers) than those who are not (English speakers matched on age and education level). Overall, our findings indicate that performance on a standard SL task varies substantially within the same (visual) modality as a function of whether the stimuli involved are familiar or not, independent of stimulus complexity. Moreover, test–retest correlations of performance in an SL task using stimuli of the same level of familiarity (but distinct items) are stronger than correlations across the same task with stimuli of different levels of familiarity. Finally, we demonstrate that SL performance is predicted by an independent measure of stimulus-specific perceptual fluency that contains no SL component at all. Our results suggest that a key component of SL performance may be related to stimulus-specific processing and familiarity.

Abstract

Considerable evidence now shows that all languages, signed and spoken, exhibit a significant amount of iconicity. We examined how the visual-gestural modality of signed languages facilitates iconicity for different kinds of lexical meanings compared to the auditory-vocal modality of spoken languages. We used iconicity ratings of hundreds of signs and words to compare iconicity across the vocabularies of two signed languages – American Sign Language and British Sign Language, and two spoken languages – English and Spanish. We examined (1) the correlation in iconicity ratings between the languages; (2) the relationship between iconicity and an array of semantic variables (ratings of concreteness, sensory experience, imageability, perceptual strength of vision, audition, touch, smell and taste); (3) how iconicity varies between broad lexical classes (nouns, verbs, adjectives, grammatical words and adverbs); and (4) between more specific semantic categories (e.g., manual actions, clothes, colors). The results show several notable patterns that characterize how iconicity is spread across the four vocabularies. There were significant correlations in the iconicity ratings between the four languages, including English with ASL, BSL, and Spanish. The highest correlation was between ASL and BSL, suggesting iconicity may be more transparent in signs than words. In each language, iconicity was distributed according to the semantic variables in ways that reflect the semiotic affordances of the modality (e.g., more concrete meanings more iconic in signs, not words; more auditory meanings more iconic in words, not signs; more tactile meanings more iconic in both signs and words). Analysis of the 220 meanings with ratings in all four languages further showed characteristic patterns of iconicity across broad and specific semantic domains, including those that distinguished between signed and spoken languages (e.g., verbs more iconic in ASL, BSL, and English, but not Spanish; manual actions especially iconic in ASL and BSL; adjectives more iconic in English and Spanish; color words especially low in iconicity in ASL and BSL). These findings provide the first quantitative account of how iconicity is spread across the lexicons of signed languages in comparison to spoken languages

Abstract

Iconicity – the correspondence between form and meaning – may help young children learn to use new words. Early-learned words are higher in iconicity than later learned words. However, it remains unclear what role iconicity may play in actual language use. Here, we ask whether iconicity relates not just to the age at which words are acquired, but also to how frequently children and adults use the words in their speech. If iconicity serves to bootstrap word learning, then we would expect that children should say highly iconic words more frequently than less iconic words, especially early in development. We would also expect adults to use iconic words more often when speaking to children than to other adults. We examined the relationship between frequency and iconicity for approximately 2000 English words. Replicating previous findings, we found that more iconic words are learned earlier. Moreover, we found that more iconic words tend to be used more by younger children, and adults use more iconic words when speaking to children than to other adults. Together, our results show that young children not only learn words rated high in iconicity earlier than words low in iconicity, but they also produce these words more frequently in conversation – a pattern that is reciprocated by adults when speaking with children. Thus, the earliest conversations of children are relatively higher in iconicity, suggesting that this iconicity scaffolds the production and comprehension of spoken language during early development.

Abstract

Understanding the role of the medial temporal lobe (MTL) in learning and memory is an important problem in cognitive neuroscience. Memory and learning processes that depend on the function of the MTL and related diencephalic structures (e.g., the anterior and mediodorsal thalamic nuclei) are defined as declarative. We have studied the MTL activity as indicated by regional cerebral blood flow with positron emission tomography and statistical parametric mapping during recall of abstract designs in a less practiced memory state as well as in a well-practiced (well-encoded) memory state. The results showed an increased activity of the MTL bilaterally (including parahippocampal gyrus extending into hippocampus proper, as well as anterior lingual and anterior fusiform gyri) during retrieval in the less practiced memory state compared to the well-practiced memory state, indicating a dynamic role of the MTL in retrieval during the learning processes. The results also showed that the activation of the MTL decreases as the subjects learn to draw abstract designs from memory, indicating a changing role of the MTL during recall in the earlier stages of acquisition compared to the well-encoded declarative memory state.

Abstract

Different frequency bands in the electroencephalogram are postulated to support distinct language functions. Studies have suggested
that alpha–beta power decreases may index word-retrieval processes. In context-driven word retrieval, participants hear
lead-in sentences that either constrain the final word (‘He locked the door with the’) or not (‘She walked in here with the’). The last
word is shown as a picture to be named. Previous studies have consistently found alpha–beta power decreases prior to picture
onset for constrained relative to unconstrained sentences, localised to the left lateral-temporal and lateral-frontal lobes. However,
the relative contribution of temporal versus frontal areas to alpha–beta power decreases is unknown. We recorded the electroencephalogram
from patients with stroke lesions encompassing the left lateral-temporal and inferior-parietal regions or left-lateral
frontal lobe and from matched controls. Individual participant analyses revealed a behavioural sentence context facilitation effect
in all participants, except for in the two patients with extensive lesions to temporal and inferior parietal lobes. We replicated the
alpha–beta power decreases prior to picture onset in all participants, except for in the two same patients with extensive posterior
lesions. Thus, whereas posterior lesions eliminated the behavioural and oscillatory context effect, frontal lesions did not. Hierarchical
clustering analyses of all patients’ lesion profiles, and behavioural and electrophysiological effects identified those two
patients as having a unique combination of lesion distribution and context effects. These results indicate a critical role for the left
lateral-temporal and inferior parietal lobes, but not frontal cortex, in generating the alpha–beta power decreases underlying context-
driven word production.

Abstract

Language, humans’ most distinctive trait, still remains a ‘mystery’ for evolutionary theory. It is underpinned by a universal infrastructure—cooperative turn-taking—which has been suggested as an ancient mechanism bridging the existing gap between the articulate human species and their inarticulate primate cousins. However, we know remarkably little about turn-taking systems of non-human animals, and methodological confounds have often prevented meaningful cross-species comparisons. Thus, the extent to which cooperative turn-taking is uniquely human or represents a homologous and/or analogous trait is currently unknown. The present paper draws attention to this promising research avenue by providing an overview of the state of the art of turn-taking in four animal taxa—birds, mammals, insects and anurans. It concludes with a new comparative framework to spur more research into this research domain and to test which elements of the human turn-taking system are shared across species and taxa.

Abstract

In this study we test a number of different claims about the nature of stylistic variation at the “single-word” stage by examining the relation between variation in early vocabulary composition, variation in early language use, and variation in the structural and functional propreties of mothers' child-directed speech. Maternal-report and observational data were collected for 26 children at 10, 50, and 100 words, These were then correlated with a variety of different measures of maternal speech at 10 words, The results show substantial variation in the percentage of common nouns and unanalyzed phrases in children's vocabularies, and singficant relations between this variation and the way in which language is used by the child. They also reveal singficant relations between the way in whch mothers use language at 10 words and the way in chich their children use language at 50 words and between certain formal properties of mothers speech at 10 words and the percentage of common nouns and unanalyzed phrases in children's early vocabularies, However, most of these relations desappear when an attempt is made to control for ossible effects of the child on the mother at Time 1. The exception is a singficant negative correlation between mothers tendency to produce speech that illustrates word boundaries and the percentage of unanalyzed phrases at 50 and 100 words. This suggests that mothers whose sprech provides the child with information about where new words begin and end tend to have children with few unanalyzed. phrases in their early vocabularies.

Abstract

It has been suggested that external and/or internal limitations paradoxically may lead to superior learning, that is, the concepts of starting small and less is more (Elman, 1993; Newport, 1990). In this paper, we explore the type of incremental ordering during training that might help learning, and what mechanism explains this facilitation. We report four artificial grammar learning experiments with human participants. In Experiments 1a and 1b we found a beneficial effect of starting small using two types of simple recursive grammars: right‐branching and center‐embedding, with recursive embedded clauses in fixed positions and fixed length. This effect was replicated in Experiment 2 (N = 100). In Experiment 3 and 4, we used a more complex center‐embedded grammar with recursive loops in variable positions, producing strings of variable length. When participants were presented an incremental ordering of training stimuli, as in natural language, they were better able to generalize their knowledge of simple units to more complex units when the training input “grew” according to structural complexity, compared to when it “grew” according to string length. Overall, the results suggest that starting small confers an advantage for learning complex center‐embedded structures when the input is organized according to structural complexity.

Abstract

Many word forms exist in multiple languages, and can have either the same meaning (cognates) or a different meaning (interlingual homographs). Previous experiments have shown that processing of interlingual homographs in a bilingual’s second language is slowed down by recent experience with these words in the bilingual’s native language, while processing of cognates can be speeded up (Poort et al., 2016; Poort & Rodd, 2019a). The current experiment replicated Poort and Rodd’s (2019a) Experiment 2 but switched the direction of priming: Dutch–English bilinguals (n = 106) made Dutch semantic relatedness judgements to probes related to cognates (n = 50), interlingual homographs (n = 50) and translation equivalents (n = 50) they had seen 15 minutes previously embedded in English sentences. The current experiment is the first to show that a single encounter with an interlingual homograph in one’s second language can also affect subsequent processing in one’s native language. Cross-lingual priming did not affect the cognates. The experiment also extended Poort and Rodd (2019a)’s finding of a large interlingual homograph inhibition effect in a semantic relatedness task in the participants’ L2 to their L1, but again found no evidence for a cognate facilitation effect in a semantic relatedness task. These findings extend the growing literature that emphasises the high level of interaction in a bilingual’s mental lexicon, by demonstrating the influence of L2 experience on the processing of L1 words. Data, scripts, materials and pre-registration available via https://osf.io/2swyg/?view_only=b2ba2e627f6f4eaeac87edab2b59b236.

Abstract

Oscillatory activity in the alpha and gamma bands is considered key in shaping functional brain architecture. Power
increases in the high-frequency gamma band are typically reported in parallel to decreases in the low-frequency alpha
band. However, their functional significance and in particular their interactions are not well understood. The present
study shows that, in the context of an N-backworking memory task, alpha power decreases in the dorsal visual stream
are related to gamma power increases in early visual areas. Granger causality analysis revealed directed interregional
interactions from dorsal to ventral stream areas, in accordance with task demands. Present results reveal a robust,
behaviorally relevant, and architectonically decisive power-to-power relationship between alpha and gamma activity.
This relationship suggests that anatomically distant power fluctuations in oscillatory activity can link cerebral network
dynamics on trial-by-trial basis during cognitive operations such as working memory

Abstract

The auditory steady state evoked response (ASSR) is a robust and frequently utilized
phenomenon in psychophysiological research. It reflects the auditory cortical response
to an amplitude-modulated constant carrier frequency signal. The present report
provides a concrete example of a group analysis of the EEG data from 29 healthy human
participants, recorded during an ASSR paradigm, using the FieldTrip toolbox. First, we
demonstrate sensor-level analysis in the time domain, allowing for a description of the
event-related potentials (ERPs), as well as their statistical evaluation. Second, frequency
analysis is applied to describe the spectral characteristics of the ASSR, followed by
group level statistical analysis in the frequency domain. Third, we show how timeand
frequency-domain analysis approaches can be combined in order to describe
the temporal and spectral development of the ASSR. Finally, we demonstrate source
reconstruction techniques to characterize the primary neural generators of the ASSR.
Throughout, we pay special attention to explaining the design of the analysis pipeline
for single subjects and for the group level analysis. The pipeline presented here can be
adjusted to accommodate other experimental paradigms and may serve as a template
for similar analyses.

Abstract

A key challenge for cognitive neuroscience is deciphering the representational schemes of the brain. Stimulus-feature-based encoding models are becoming increasingly popular for inferring the dimensions of neural representational spaces from stimulus-feature spaces. We argue that such inferences are not always valid because successful prediction can occur even if the two representational spaces use different, but correlated, representational schemes. We support this claim with three simulations in which we achieved high prediction accuracy despite systematic differences in the geometries and dimensions of the underlying representations. Detailed analysis of the encoding models' predictions showed systematic deviations from ground-truth, indicating that high prediction accuracy is insufficient for making representational inferences. This fallacy applies to the prediction of actual neural patterns from stimulus-feature spaces and we urge caution in inferring the nature of the neural code from such methods. We discuss ways to overcome these inferential limitations, including model comparison, absolute model performance, visualization techniques and attentional modulation.

Abstract

Combining academics and athletics is challenging but important for the psychological and psychosocial development of those involved. However, little is known about how experiences in academics spill over and relate to athletics. Drawing on the enrichment mechanisms proposed by the Work-Home Resources model, we posit that study crafting behaviours are positively related to volatile personal resources, which, in turn, are related to higher athletic achievement. Via structural equation modelling, we examine a path model among 243 student-athletes, incorporating study crafting behaviours and personal resources (i.e., positive affect and study engagement), and self- and coach-rated athletic achievement measured two weeks later. Results show that optimising the academic environment by crafting challenging study demands relates positively to positive affect and study engagement. In turn, positive affect related positively to self-rated athletic achievement, whereas – unexpectedly – study engagement related negatively to coach-rated athletic achievement. Optimising the academic environment through cognitive crafting and crafting social study resources did not relate to athletic outcomes. We discuss how these findings offer new insights into the interplay between academics and athletics.