Displaying 301 - 400 of 1160
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Fisher, S. E., Lai, C. S., & Monaco, a. A. P. (2003). Deciphering the genetic basis of speech and language disorders. Annual Review of Neuroscience, 26, 57-80. doi:10.1146/annurev.neuro.26.041002.131144.
Abstract
A significant number of individuals have unexplained difficulties with acquiring normal speech and language, despite adequate intelligence and environmental stimulation. Although developmental disorders of speech and language are heritable, the genetic basis is likely to involve several, possibly many, different risk factors. Investigations of a unique three-generation family showing monogenic inheritance of speech and language deficits led to the isolation of the first such gene on chromosome 7, which encodes a transcription factor known as FOXP2. Disruption of this gene causes a rare severe speech and language disorder but does not appear to be involved in more common forms of language impairment. Recent genome-wide scans have identified at least four chromosomal regions that may harbor genes influencing the latter, on chromosomes 2, 13, 16, and 19. The molecular genetic approach has potential for dissecting neurological pathways underlying speech and language disorders, but such investigations are only just beginning. -
Fisher, S. E., & Scharff, C. (2009). FOXP2 as a molecular window into speech and language [Review article]. Trends in Genetics, 25, 166-177. doi:10.1016/j.tig.2009.03.002.
Abstract
Rare mutations of the FOXP2 transcription factor gene cause a monogenic syndrome characterized by impaired speech development and linguistic deficits. Recent genomic investigations indicate that its downstream neural targets make broader impacts on common language impairments, bridging clinically distinct disorders. Moreover, the striking conservation of both FoxP2 sequence and neural expression in different vertebrates facilitates the use of animal models to study ancestral pathways that have been recruited towards human speech and language. Intriguingly, reduced FoxP2 dosage yields abnormal synaptic plasticity and impaired motor-skill learning in mice, and disrupts vocal learning in songbirds. Converging data indicate that Foxp2 is important for modulating the plasticity of relevant neural circuits. This body of research represents the first functional genetic forays into neural mechanisms contributing to human spoken language. -
Fisher, S. E., & Vernes, S. C. (2015). Genetics and the Language Sciences. Annual Review of Linguistics, 1, 289-310. doi:10.1146/annurev-linguist-030514-125024.
Abstract
Theories addressing the biological basis of language must be built on
an appreciation of the ways that molecular and neurobiological substrates
can contribute to aspects of human cognition. Here, we lay out
the principles by which a genome could potentially encode the necessary
information to produce a language-ready brain. We describe
what genes are; how they are regulated; and how they affect the formation,
function, and plasticity of neuronal circuits. At each step,
we give examples of molecules implicated in pathways that are important
for speech and language. Finally, we discuss technological advances
in genomics that are revealing considerable genotypic variation in
the human population, from rare mutations to common polymorphisms,
with the potential to relate this variation to natural variability
in speech and language skills. Moving forward, an interdisciplinary
approach to the language sciences, integrating genetics, neurobiology,
psychology, and linguistics, will be essential for a complete understanding
of our unique human capacities. -
Fisher, S. E. (2003). The genetic basis of a severe speech and language disorder. In J. Mallet, & Y. Christen (
Eds. ), Neurosciences at the postgenomic era (pp. 125-134). Heidelberg: Springer. -
Fisher, S. E. (2015). Translating the genome in human neuroscience. In G. Marcus, & J. Freeman (
Eds. ), The future of the brain: Essays by the world's leading neuroscientists (pp. 149-159). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. -
Fitz, H. (2009). Neural syntax. PhD Thesis, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Institute for Logic, Language, and Computation.
Abstract
Children learn their mother tongue spontaneously and effortlessly through communicative interaction with their environment; they do not have to be taught explicitly or learn how to learn first. The ambient language to which children are exposed, however, is highly variable and arguably deficient with regard to the learning target. Nonetheless, most normally developing children learn their native language rapidly and with ease. To explain this accomplishment, many theories of acquisition posit innate constraints on learning, or even a biological endowment for language which is specific to language. Usage-based theories, on the other hand, place more emphasis on the role of experience and domain-general learning mechanisms than on innate language-specific knowledge. But languages are lexically open and combinatorial in structure, so no amount of experience covers their expressivity. Usage-based theories therefore have to explain how children can generalize the properties of their linguistic input to an adult-like grammar. In this thesis I provide an explicit computational mechanism with which usage-based theories of language can be tested and evaluated. The focus of my work lies on complex syntax and the human ability to form sentences which express more than one proposition by means of relativization. This `capacity for recursion' is a hallmark of an adult grammar and, as some have argued, the human language faculty itself. The manuscript is organized as follows. In the second chapter, I give an overview of results that characterize the properties of neural networks as mathematical objects and review previous attempts at modelling the acquisition of complex syntax with such networks. The chapter introduces the conceptual landscape in which the current work is located. In the third chapter, I argue that the construction and use of meaning is essential in child language acquisition and adult processing. Neural network models need to incorporate this dimension of human linguistic behavior. I introduce the Dual-path model of sentence production and syntactic development which is able to represent semantics and learns from exposure to sentences paired with their meaning (cf. Chang et al. 2006). I explain the architecture of this model, motivate critical assumptions behind its design, and discuss existing research using this model. The fourth chapter describes and compares several extensions of the basic architecture to accommodate the processing of multi-clause utterances. These extensions are evaluated against computational desiderata, such as good learning and generalization performance and the parsimony of input representations. A single-best solution for encoding the meaning of complex sentences with restrictive relative clauses is identified, which forms the basis for all subsequent simulations. Chapter five analyzes the learning dynamics in more detail. I first examine the model's behavior for different relative clause types. Syntactic alternations prove to be particularly difficult to learn because they complicate the meaning-to-form mapping the model has to acquire. In the second part, I probe the internal representations the model has developed during learning. It is argued that the model acquires the argument structure of the construction types in its input language and represents the hierarchical organization of distinct multi-clause utterances. The juice of this thesis is contained in chapters six to eight. In chapter six, I test the Dual-path model's generalization capacities in a variety of tasks. I show that its syntactic representations are sufficiently transparent to allow structural generalization to novel complex utterances. Semantic similarities between novel and familiar sentence types play a critical role in this task. The Dual-path model also has a capacity for generalizing familiar words to novel slots in novel constructions (strong semantic systematicity). Moreover, I identify learning conditions under which the model displays recursive productivity. It is argued that the model's behavior is consistent with human behavior in that production accuracy degrades with depth of embedding, and right-branching is learned faster than center-embedding recursion. In chapter seven, I address the issue of learning complex polar interrogatives in the absence of positive exemplars in the input. I show that the Dual-path model can acquire the syntax of these questions from simpler and similar structures which are warranted in a child's linguistic environment. The model's errors closely match children's errors, and it is suggested that children might not require an innate learning bias to acquire auxiliary fronting. Since the model does not implement a traditional kind of language-specific universal grammar, these results are relevant to the poverty of the stimulus debate. English relative clause constructions give rise to similar performance orderings in adult processing and child language acquisition. This pattern matches the typological universal called the noun phrase accessibility hierarchy. I propose an input-based explanation of this data in chapter eight. The Dual-path model displays this ordering in syntactic development when exposed to plausible input distributions. But it is possible to manipulate and completely remove the ordering by varying properties of the input from which the model learns. This indicates, I argue, that patterns of interference and facilitation among input structures can explain the hierarchy when all structures are simultaneously learned and represented over a single set of connection weights. Finally, I draw conclusions from this work, address some unanswered questions, and give a brief outlook on how this research might be continued.Additional information
http://dare.uva.nl/record/328271 -
Fitz, H., & Chang, F. (2009). Syntactic generalization in a connectionist model of sentence production. In J. Mayor, N. Ruh, & K. Plunkett (
Eds. ), Connectionist models of behaviour and cognition II: Proceedings of the 11th Neural Computation and Psychology Workshop (pp. 289-300). River Edge, NJ: World Scientific Publishing.Abstract
We present a neural-symbolic learning model of sentence production which displays strong semantic systematicity and recursive productivity. Using this model, we provide evidence for the data-driven learnability of complex yes/no- questions. -
Flecken, M., Carroll, M., Weimar, K., & Von Stutterheim, C. (2015). Driving along the road or heading for the village? Conceptual differences underlying motion event encoding in French, German, and French-German L2 users. Modern Language Journal, 99(S1), 100-122. doi:10.1111/j.1540-4781.2015.12181.x.
Abstract
The typological contrast between verb- and satellite-framed languages (Talmy, 1985) has set the basis for many empirical studies on L2 acquisition. The current analysis goes beyond this typology by looking in detail at the conceptualization of the path of motion in a motion event. We take as a starting point the cognitive salience of specific elements of motion events that are relevant when conceptualizing space. When expressing direction in French, specific spatial relations involving the entity in motion (its alignment and its distance toward a [potential] endpoint) are relevant, given a variety of path verbs in the lexicon expressing this information (e.g., se diriger vers, avancer to direct oneself toward,' to advance'). This is not the case in German (manner verbs in the lexicon mainly). In German, spatial information is packaged in adjuncts and particles and the path of motion is typically structured via features of the ground (entlanglaufen/fahren to walk/drive along') or endpoints (to walk/drive to/toward'). We investigate those fundamental differences in spatial conceptualization in French and German, as reflected in pre-articulatory patterns of attention allocation (measured with eye tracking) to moving entities and endpoints in motion scenes in an event description task. Our focus is on spatial conceptualization in an L2 (French L2 users of German), analyzing the extent to which these L2 users display target-like patterns or traces of L1 conceptualization transfer. Findings show that, in line with directional concepts expressed in verbs, L1 French speakers allocate more attention to entities in motion and endpoints, before utterance onset, than L1 German speakers do. The L2 German speakers pattern with L1 German speakers in the use of manner verbs, but they have not fully acquired the spatial concepts and means that structure the path of motion in the L2. This is reflected in pre-articulatory attention allocation patterns, according to which the L2 speakers pattern with native speakers of their L1 (French). The findings show a continued deep entrenchment of L1-based processing patterns and spatial frames of reference when speakers prepare for speech in an L2 -
Flecken, M., Gerwien, J., Carroll, M., & von Stutterheim, C. (2015). Analyzing gaze allocation during language planning: A cross-linguistic study on dynamic events. Language and Cognition, 7(1), 138-166. doi:10.1017/langcog.2014.20.
Abstract
Studies on gaze allocation during sentence production have recently begun to implement cross-linguistic analyses in the investigation of visual and linguistic processing. The underlying assumption is that the aspects of a scene that attract attention prior to articulation are, in part, linked to the specifi c linguistic system and means used for expression. The present study concerns naturalistic, dynamic scenes (video clips) showing causative events (agent acting on an object) and exploits grammatical diff erences in the domain of verbal aspect, and the way in which the status of an event (a specifi c vs. habitual instance of an event) is encoded in English and German. Fixations in agent and action areas of interest were timelocked to utterance onset, and we focused on the pre-articulatory time span to shed light on sentence planning processes, involving message generation and scene conceptualization. -
Flecken, M., Walbert, K., & Dijkstra, T. (2015). ‘Right now, Sophie ∗swims in the pool?!’: Brain potentials of grammatical aspect processing. Frontiers in Psychology, 6: 1764. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01764.
Abstract
We investigated whether brain potentials of grammatical aspect processing resemble semantic or morpho-syntactic processing, or whether they instead are characterized by an entirely distinct pattern in the same individuals. We studied aspect from the perspective of agreement between the temporal information in the context (temporal adverbials, e.g., Right now) and a morpho-syntactic marker of grammatical aspect (e.g., progressive is swimming). Participants read questions providing a temporal context that was progressive (What is Sophie doing in the pool right now?) or habitual (What does Sophie do in the pool every Monday?). Following a lead-in sentence context such as Right now, Sophie…, we measured event-related brain potentials (ERPs) time-locked to verb phrases in four different conditions, e.g., (a) is swimming (control); (b) ∗is cooking (semantic violation); (c) ∗are swimming (morpho-syntactic violation); or (d)?swims (aspect mismatch); …in the pool.” The collected ERPs show typical N400 and P600 effects for semantics and morpho-syntax, while aspect processing elicited an Early Negativity (250–350 ms). The aspect-related Negativity was short-lived and had a central scalp distribution with an anterior onset. This differentiates it not only from the semantic N400 effect, but also from the typical LAN (Left Anterior Negativity), that is frequently reported for various types of agreement processing. Moreover, aspect processing did not show a clear P600 modulation. We argue that the specific context for each item in this experiment provided a trigger for agreement checking with temporal information encoded on the verb, i.e., morphological aspect marking. The aspect-related Negativity obtained for aspect agreement mismatches reflects a violated expectation concerning verbal inflection (in the example above, the expected verb phrase was Sophie is X-ing rather than Sophie X-s in condition d). The absence of an additional P600 for aspect processing suggests that the mismatch did not require additional reintegration or processing costs. This is consistent with participants’ post hoc grammaticality judgements of the same sentences, which overall show a high acceptability of aspect mismatch sentences.Additional information
data sheet 1.docx -
Flecken, M., Athanasopoulos, P., Kuipers, J. R., & Thierry, G. (2015). On the road to somewhere: Brain potentials reflect language effects on motion event perception. Cognition, 141, 41-51. doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2015.04.006.
Abstract
Recent studies have identified neural correlates of language effects on perception in static domains of experience such as colour and objects. The generalization of such effects to dynamic domains like motion events remains elusive. Here, we focus on grammatical differences between languages relevant for the description of motion events and their impact on visual scene perception. Two groups of native speakers of German or English were presented with animated videos featuring a dot travelling along a trajectory towards a geometrical shape (endpoint). English is a language with grammatical aspect in which attention is drawn to trajectory and endpoint of motion events equally. German, in contrast, is a non-aspect language which highlights endpoints. We tested the comparative perceptual saliency of trajectory and endpoint of motion events by presenting motion event animations (primes) followed by a picture symbolising the event (target): In 75% of trials, the animation was followed by a mismatching picture (both trajectory and endpoint were different); in 10% of trials, only the trajectory depicted in the picture matched the prime; in 10% of trials, only the endpoint matched the prime; and in 5% of trials both trajectory and endpoint were matching, which was the condition requiring a response from the participant. In Experiment 1 we recorded event-related brain potentials elicited by the picture in native speakers of German and native speakers of English. German participants exhibited a larger P3 wave in the endpoint match than the trajectory match condition, whereas English speakers showed no P3 amplitude difference between conditions. In Experiment 2 participants performed a behavioural motion matching task using the same stimuli as those used in Experiment 1. German and English participants did not differ in response times showing that motion event verbalisation cannot readily account for the difference in P3 amplitude found in the first experiment. We argue that, even in a non-verbal context, the grammatical properties of the native language and associated sentence-level patterns of event encoding influence motion event perception, such that attention is automatically drawn towards aspects highlighted by the grammar. -
Floyd, S. (2009). Nexos históricos, gramaticales y culturales de los números en cha'palaa [Historical, grammatical and cultural connections of Cha'palaa numerals]. In Proceedings of the Conference on Indigenous Languages of Latin America (CILLA) -IV.
Abstract
Los idiomas sudamericanas tienen una diversidad de sistemas numéricos, desde sistemas con solamente dos o tres términos en algunos idiomas amazónicos hasta sistemas con numerales extendiendo a miles. Una mirada al sistema del idioma cha’palaa de Ecuador demuestra rasgos de base-2, base-5, base-10 y base-20, ligados a diferentes etapas de cambio, desarrollo y contacto lingüístico. Conocer estas etapas nos permite proponer algunas correlaciones con lo que conocemos de la historia de contactos culturales en la región. The South American languages have diverse types of numeral systems, from systems of just two or three terms in some Amazonian languages to systems extending into the thousands. A look a the system of the Cha'palaa language of Ecuador demonstrates base-2, base-5, base-10 and base-20 features, linked to different stages of change, development and language contact. Learning about these stages permits up to propose some correlations between them and what we know about the history of cultural contact in the region. -
Floyd, S. (2015). Other-initiated repair in Cha’palaa. Open linguistics, 1(1), 467-489. doi:10.1515/opli-2015-0014.
Abstract
This article describes the interactional patterns and linguistic structures associated with otherinitiated repair, as observed in a corpus of video-recorded conversation in the Cha’palaa (a Barbacoan language spoken in north-western Ecuador). Special attention is given to the relation of repair formats to the morphosyntactic and intonational systems of the language. It examines the distinctive falling intonation observed with interjections and content question formats and the pattern of a held mid-high tone observed in polarity questions, as well as the function of Cha’palaa grammatical features such as the case marking system, the nominal classifiers and the verb classification system as formats for repair initiation. It considers a selection of examples from a video corpus to illustrate a broad range of sequence types of opened and restricted other-initiated repair, noting that Cha’palaa had the highest relative rate of open repair in the cross-linguistic sample. It also considers the extension of OIR to other practices such as news uptake and disagreement in the Cha’palaa corpus. -
Floyd, S. (2015). Transparência semântica e o ‘calque’ cultural no noroeste amazônico [Portuguese transl. of Semantic transparency and cultural calquing in the Northwest Amazon, 2013]. Wamon: Revista dos alunos do PpGas/UFAM, 1(1), 95-117. Retrieved from http://www.periodicos.ufam.edu.br/index.php/wamon/article/view/946.
Abstract
The ethnographic literature has described the northwest Amazon as an area of shared culture across linguistic groups. This paper illustrates how a principle of semantic transparency across languages is a key means of establishing elements of a common regional culture through practices like the calquing of ethnonyms and toponyms so that they are semantically, but not phonologically, equivalent across languages. It places the northwest Amazon in a general discussion of cross-linguistic naming practices in South America and considers the extent to which a preference for semantic transparency can be linked to cases of widespread cultural “calquing”. It also addresses the principle of semantic transparency beyond specific referential phrases and into larger discourse structures. It concludes that an attention to semiotic practices in multilingual settings can provide new and more complex ways of thinking about the idea of shared culture -
Foley, W., & Van Valin Jr., R. D. (2009). Functional syntax and universal grammar (Repr.). Cambridge University Press.
Abstract
The key argument of this book, originally published in 1984, is that when human beings communicate with each other by means of a natural language they typically do not do so in simple sentences but rather in connected discourse - complex expressions made up of a number of clauses linked together in various ways. A necessary precondition for intelligible discourse is the speaker’s ability to signal the temporal relations between the events that are being discussed and to refer to the participants in those events in such a way that it is clear who is being talked about. A great deal of the grammatical machinery in a language is devoted to this task, and Functional Syntax and Universal Grammar explores how different grammatical systems accomplish it. This book is an important attempt to integrate the study of linguistic form with the study of language use and meaning. It will be of particular interest to field linguists and those concerned with typology and language universals, and also to anthropologists involved in the study of language function. -
Folia, V., Forkstam, C., Hagoort, P., & Petersson, K. M. (2009). Language comprehension: The interplay between form and content. In N. Taatgen, & H. van Rijn (
Eds. ), Proceedings of the 31th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (pp. 1686-1691). Austin, TX: Cognitive Science Society.Abstract
In a 2x2 event-related FMRI study we find support for the idea that the inferior frontal cortex, centered on Broca’s region and its homologue, is involved in constructive unification operations during the structure-building process in parsing for comprehension. Tentatively, we provide evidence for a role of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex centered on BA 9/46 in the control component of the language system. Finally, the left temporo-parietal cortex, in the vicinity of Wernicke’s region, supports the interaction between the syntax of gender agreement and sentence-level semantics. -
Forkel, S. J. (2015). Heinrich Sachs (1863–1928). Journal of Neurology, 262, 498-500. doi:10.1007/s00415-014-7517-2.
Abstract
The nineteenth century witnessed some of the greatest neuroanatomists of all times. Amongst them is the largely forgotten Heinrich Sachs, a student of Carl Wernicke in Breslau. -
Forkel, S. J., Mahmood, S., Vergani, F., & Catani, M. (2015). The white matter of the human cerebrum: Part I The occipital lobe by Heinrich Sachs. Cortex, 62, 182-202. doi:10.1016/j.cortex.2014.10.023.
Abstract
This is the first complete translation of Heinrich Sachs' outstanding white matter atlas dedicated to the occipital lobe. This work is accompanied by a prologue by Prof Carl Wernicke who for many years was Sachs' mentor in Breslau and enthusiastically supported his work. -
Forkstam, C., Jansson, A., Ingvar, M., & Petersson, K. M. (2009). Modality transfer of acquired structural regularities: A preference for an acoustic route. In N. Taatgen, & H. Van Rijn (
Eds. ), Proceedings of the 31th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society. Austin, TX: Cognitive Science Society.Abstract
Human implicit learning can be investigated with implicit artificial grammar learning, a simple model for aspects of natural language acquisition. In this paper we investigate the remaining effect of modality transfer in syntactic classification of an acquired grammatical sequence structure after implicit grammar acquisition. Participants practiced either on acoustically presented syllable sequences or visually presented consonant letter sequences. During classification we independently manipulated the statistical frequency-based and rule-based characteristics of the classification stimuli. Participants performed reliably above chance on the within modality classification task although more so for those working on syllable sequence acquisition. These subjects were also the only group that kept a significant performance level in transfer classification. We speculate that this finding is of particular relevance in consideration of an ecological validity in the input signal in the use of artificial grammar learning and in language learning paradigms at large. -
Francken, J. C., Meijs, E. L., Ridderinkhof, O. M., Hagoort, P., de Lange, F. P., & van Gaal, S. (2015). Manipulating word awareness dissociates feed-forward from feedback models of language-perception interactions. Neuroscience of consciousness, 1. doi:10.1093/nc/niv003.
Abstract
Previous studies suggest that linguistic material can modulate visual perception, but it is unclear at which level of processing these interactions occur. Here we aim to dissociate between two competing models of language–perception interactions: a feed-forward and a feedback model. We capitalized on the fact that the models make different predictions on the role of feedback. We presented unmasked (aware) or masked (unaware) words implying motion (e.g. “rise,” “fall”), directly preceding an upward or downward visual motion stimulus. Crucially, masking leaves intact feed-forward information processing from low- to high-level regions, whereas it abolishes subsequent feedback. Under this condition, participants remained faster and more accurate when the direction implied by the motion word was congruent with the direction of the visual motion stimulus. This suggests that language–perception interactions are driven by the feed-forward convergence of linguistic and perceptual information at higher-level conceptual and decision stages. -
Francken, J. C., Meijs, E. L., Hagoort, P., van Gaal, S., & de Lange, F. P. (2015). Exploring the automaticity of language-perception interactions: Effects of attention and awareness. Scientific Reports, 5: 17725. doi:10.1038/srep17725.
Abstract
Previous studies have shown that language can modulate visual perception, by biasing and/
or enhancing perceptual performance. However, it is still debated where in the brain visual and
linguistic information are integrated, and whether the effects of language on perception are
automatic and persist even in the absence of awareness of the linguistic material. Here, we aimed
to explore the automaticity of language-perception interactions and the neural loci of these
interactions in an fMRI study. Participants engaged in a visual motion discrimination task (upward
or downward moving dots). Before each trial, a word prime was briefly presented that implied
upward or downward motion (e.g., “rise”, “fall”). These word primes strongly influenced behavior:
congruent motion words sped up reaction times and improved performance relative to incongruent
motion words. Neural congruency effects were only observed in the left middle temporal gyrus,
showing higher activity for congruent compared to incongruent conditions. This suggests that higherlevel
conceptual areas rather than sensory areas are the locus of language-perception interactions.
When motion words were rendered unaware by means of masking, they still affected visual motion
perception, suggesting that language-perception interactions may rely on automatic feed-forward
integration of perceptual and semantic material in language areas of the brain.Additional information
srep17725-s1.pdf http://www.nature.com/articles/srep17725#supplementary-information -
Francken, J. C., Kok, P., Hagoort, P., & De Lange, F. P. (2015). The behavioral and neural effects of language on motion perception. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 27(1), 175-184. doi:10.1162/jocn_a_00682.
Abstract
Perception does not function as an isolated module but is tightly linked with other cognitive functions. Several studies have demonstrated an influence of language on motion perception, but it remains debated at which level of processing this modulation takes place. Some studies argue for an interaction in perceptual areas, but it is also possible that the interaction is mediated by "language areas" that integrate linguistic and visual information. Here, we investigated whether language-perception interactions were specific to the language-dominant left hemisphere by comparing the effects of language on visual material presented in the right (RVF) and left visual fields (LVF). Furthermore, we determined the neural locus of the interaction using fMRI. Participants performed a visual motion detection task. On each trial, the visual motion stimulus was presented in either the LVF or in the RVF, preceded by a centrally presented word (e.g., "rise"). The word could be congruent, incongruent, or neutral with regard to the direction of the visual motion stimulus that was presented subsequently. Participants were faster and more accurate when the direction implied by the motion word was congruent with the direction of the visual motion stimulus. Interestingly, the speed benefit was present only for motion stimuli that were presented in the RVF. We observed a neural counterpart of the behavioral facilitation effects in the left middle temporal gyrus, an area involved in semantic processing of verbal material. Together, our results suggest that semantic information about motion retrieved in language regions may automatically modulate perceptual decisions about motion. -
Francks, C., DeLisi, L. E., Fisher, S. E., Laval, S. H., Rue, J. E., Stein, J. F., & Monaco, A. P. (2003). Confirmatory evidence for linkage of relative hand skill to 2p12-q11 [Letter to the editor]. American Journal of Human Genetics, 72(2), 499-502. doi:10.1086/367548.
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Francks, C. (2009). 13 - LRRTM1: A maternally suppressed genetic effect on handedness and schizophrenia. In I. E. C. Sommer, & R. S. Kahn (
Eds. ), Cerebral lateralization and psychosis (pp. 181-196). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Abstract
The molecular, developmental, and evolutionary bases of human brain asymmetry are almost completely unknown. Genetic linkage and association mapping have pin-pointed a gene called LRRTM1 (leucine-rich repeat transmembrane neuronal 1) that may contribute to variability in human handedness. Here I describe how LRRTM1's involvement in handedness was discovered, and also the latest knowledge of its functions in brain development and disease. The association of LRRTM1 with handedness was derived entirely from the paternally inherited gene, and follow-up analysis of gene expression confirmed that LRRTM1 is one of a small number of genes that are imprinted in the human genome, for which the maternally inherited copy is suppressed. The same variation at LRRTM1 that was associated paternally with mixed-/left-handedness was also over-transmitted paternally to schizophrenic patients in a large family study.
LRRTM1 is expressed in specific regions of the developing and adult forebrain by post-mitotic neurons, and the protein may be involved in axonal trafficking. Thus LRRTM1 has a probable role in neurodevelopment, and its association with handedness suggests that one of its functions may be in establishing or consolidating human brain asymmetry.
LRRTM1 is the first gene for which allelic variation has been associated with human handedness. The genetic data also suggest indirectly that the epigenetic regulation of this gene may yet prove more important than DNA sequence variation for influencing brain development and disease.
Intriguingly, the parent-of-origin activity of LRRTM1 suggests that men and women have had conflicting interests in relation to the outcome of lateralized brain development in their offspring. -
Francks, C., Fisher, S. E., Marlow, A. J., MacPhie, I. L., Taylor, K. E., Richardson, A. J., Stein, J. F., & Monaco, A. P. (2003). Familial and genetic effects on motor coordination, laterality, and reading-related cognition. American Journal of Psychiatry, 160(11), 1970-1977. doi:10.1176/appi.ajp.160.11.1970.
Abstract
OBJECTIVE: Recent research has provided evidence for a genetically mediated association between language or reading-related cognitive deficits and impaired motor coordination. Other studies have identified relationships between lateralization of hand skill and cognitive abilities. With a large sample, the authors aimed to investigate genetic relationships between measures of reading-related cognition, hand motor skill, and hand skill lateralization.
METHOD: The authors applied univariate and bivariate correlation and familiality analyses to a range of measures. They also performed genomewide linkage analysis of hand motor skill in a subgroup of 195 sibling pairs.
RESULTS: Hand motor skill was significantly familial (maximum heritability=41%), as were reading-related measures. Hand motor skill was weakly but significantly correlated with reading-related measures, such as nonword reading and irregular word reading. However, these correlations were not significantly familial in nature, and the authors did not observe linkage of hand motor skill to any chromosomal regions implicated in susceptibility to dyslexia. Lateralization of hand skill was not correlated with reading or cognitive ability.
CONCLUSIONS: The authors confirmed a relationship between lower motor ability and poor reading performance. However, the genetic effects on motor skill and reading ability appeared to be largely or wholly distinct, suggesting that the correlation between these traits may have arisen from environmental influences. Finally, the authors found no evidence that reading disability and/or low general cognitive ability were associated with ambidexterity.Additional information
https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ajp.161.1.185 -
Francks, C., DeLisi, L. E., Shaw, S. H., Fisher, S. E., Richardson, A. J., Stein, J. F., & Monaco, A. P. (2003). Parent-of-origin effects on handedness and schizophrenia susceptibility on chromosome 2p12-q11. Human Molecular Genetics, 12(24), 3225-3230. doi:10.1093/hmg/ddg362.
Abstract
Schizophrenia and non-right-handedness are moderately associated, and both traits are often accompanied by abnormalities of asymmetrical brain morphology or function. We have found linkage previously of chromosome 2p12-q11 to a quantitative measure of handedness, and we have also found linkage of schizophrenia/schizoaffective disorder to this same chromosomal region in a separate study. Now, we have found that in one of our samples (191 reading-disabled sibling pairs), the relative hand skill of siblings was correlated more strongly with paternal than maternal relative hand skill. This led us to re-analyse 2p12-q11 under parent-of-origin linkage models. We found linkage of relative hand skill in the RD siblings to 2p12-q11 with P=0.0000037 for paternal identity-by-descent sharing, whereas the maternally inherited locus was not linked to the trait (P>0.2). Similarly, in affected-sib-pair analysis of our schizophrenia dataset (241 sibling pairs), we found linkage to schizophrenia for paternal sharing with LOD=4.72, P=0.0000016, within 3 cM of the peak linkage to relative hand skill. Maternal linkage across the region was weak or non-significant. These similar paternal-specific linkages suggest that the causative genetic effects on 2p12-q11 are related. The linkages may be due to a single maternally imprinted influence on lateralized brain development that contains common functional polymorphisms. -
Francks, C. (2009). Understanding the genetics of behavioural and psychiatric traits will only be achieved through a realistic assessment of their complexity. Laterality: Asymmetries of Body, Brain and Cognition, 14(1), 11-16. doi:10.1080/13576500802536439.
Abstract
Francks et al. (2007) performed a recent study in which the first putative genetic effect on human handedness was identified (the imprinted locus LRRTM1 on human chromosome 2). In this issue of Laterality, Tim Crow and colleagues present a critique of that study. The present paper presents a personal response to that critique which argues that Francks et al. (2007) published a substantial body of evidence implicating LRRTM1 in handedness and schizophrenia. Progress will now be achieved by others trying to validate, refute, or extend those findings, rather than by further armchair discussion. -
Francks, C. (2015). Exploring human brain lateralization with molecular genetics and genomics. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1359, 1-13. doi:10.1111/nyas.12770.
Abstract
Lateralizations of brain structure and motor behavior have been observed in humans as early as the first trimester of gestation, and are likely to arise from asymmetrical genetic–developmental programs, as in other animals. Studies of gene expression levels in postmortem tissue samples, comparing the left and right sides of the human cerebral cortex, have generally not revealed striking transcriptional differences between the hemispheres. This is likely due to lateralization of gene expression being subtle and quantitative. However, a recent re-analysis and meta-analysis of gene expression data from the adult superior temporal and auditory cortex found lateralization of transcription of genes involved in synaptic transmission and neuronal electrophysiology. Meanwhile, human subcortical mid- and hindbrain structures have not been well studied in relation to lateralization of gene activity, despite being potentially important developmental origins of asymmetry. Genetic polymorphisms with small effects on adult brain and behavioral asymmetries are beginning to be identified through studies of large datasets, but the core genetic mechanisms of lateralized human brain development remain unknown. Identifying subtly lateralized genetic networks in the brain will lead to a new understanding of how neuronal circuits on the left and right are differently fine-tuned to preferentially support particular cognitive and behavioral functions. -
Frank, S. L., Koppen, M., Noordman, L. G. M., & Vonk, W. (2003). A model for knowledge-based pronoun resolution. In F. Detje, D. Dörner, & H. Schaub (
Eds. ), The logic of cognitive systems (pp. 245-246). Bamberg: Otto-Friedrich Universität.Abstract
Several sources of information are used in choosing the intended referent of an ambiguous pronoun. The two sources considered in this paper are foregrounding and context. The first refers to the accessibility of discourse entities. An entity that is foregrounded is more likely to become the pronoun’s referent than an entity that is not. Context information affects pronoun resolution when world knowledge is needed to find the referent. The model presented here simulates how world knowledge invoked by context, together with foregrounding, influences pronoun resolution. It was developed as an extension to the Distributed Situation Space (DSS) model of knowledge-based inferencing in story comprehension (Frank, Koppen, Noordman, & Vonk, 2003), which shall be introduced first. -
Frank, S. L., Koppen, M., Noordman, L. G. M., & Vonk, W. (2003). Modeling knowledge-based inferences in story comprehension. Cognitive Science, 27(6), 875-910. doi:10.1016/j.cogsci.2003.07.002.
Abstract
A computational model of inference during story comprehension is presented, in which story situations are represented distributively as points in a high-dimensional “situation-state space.” This state space organizes itself on the basis of a constructed microworld description. From the same description, causal/temporal world knowledge is extracted. The distributed representation of story situations is more flexible than Golden and Rumelhart’s [Discourse Proc 16 (1993) 203] localist representation. A story taking place in the microworld corresponds to a trajectory through situation-state space. During the inference process, world knowledge is applied to the story trajectory. This results in an adjusted trajectory, reflecting the inference of propositions that are likely to be the case. Although inferences do not result from a search for coherence, they do cause story coherence to increase. The results of simulations correspond to empirical data concerning inference, reading time, and depth of processing. An extension of the model for simulating story retention shows how coherence is preserved during retention without controlling the retention process. Simulation results correspond to empirical data concerning story recall and intrusion. -
Franken, M. K., McQueen, J. M., Hagoort, P., & Acheson, D. J. (2015). Assessing the link between speech perception and production through individual differences. In Proceedings of the 18th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences. Glasgow: the University of Glasgow.
Abstract
This study aims to test a prediction of recent
theoretical frameworks in speech motor control: if speech production targets are specified in auditory
terms, people with better auditory acuity should have more precise speech targets.
To investigate this, we had participants perform speech perception and production tasks in a counterbalanced order. To assess speech perception acuity, we used an adaptive speech discrimination
task. To assess variability in speech production, participants performed a pseudo-word reading task; formant values were measured for each recording.
We predicted that speech production variability to correlate inversely with discrimination performance.
The results suggest that people do vary in their production and perceptual abilities, and that better discriminators have more distinctive vowel production targets, confirming our prediction. This
study highlights the importance of individual
differences in the study of speech motor control, and sheds light on speech production-perception interaction. -
Franken, M. K., Hagoort, P., & Acheson, D. J. (2015). Modulations of the auditory M100 in an Imitation Task. Brain and Language, 142, 18-23. doi:10.1016/j.bandl.2015.01.001.
Abstract
Models of speech production explain event-related suppression of the auditory cortical
response as reflecting a comparison between auditory predictions and feedback. The present MEG
study was designed to test two predictions from this framework: 1) whether the reduced auditory
response varies as a function of the mismatch between prediction and feedback; 2) whether individual
variation in this response is predictive of speech-motor adaptation.
Participants alternated between online imitation and listening tasks. In the imitation task, participants
began each trial producing the same vowel (/e/) and subsequently listened to and imitated auditorilypresented
vowels varying in acoustic distance from /e/.
Results replicated suppression, with a smaller M100 during speaking than listening. Although we did
not find unequivocal support for the first prediction, participants with less M100 suppression were
better at the imitation task. These results are consistent with the enhancement of M100 serving as an
error signal to drive subsequent speech-motor adaptation. -
Frazier, T., Embacher, R., Tilot, A. K., Koenig, K., Mester, J., & Eng, C. (2015). Molecular and phenotypic abnormalities in individuals with germline heterozygous PTEN mutations and autism. Molecular Psychiatry., 20, 1132-1138. doi:10.1038/mp.2014.125.
Abstract
PTEN is a tumor suppressor associated with an inherited cancer syndrome and an important regulator of ongoing neural connectivity and plasticity. The present study examined molecular and phenotypic characteristics of individuals with germline heterozygous PTEN mutations and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) (PTEN-ASD), with the aim of identifying pathophysiologic markers that specifically associate with PTEN-ASD and that may serve as targets for future treatment trials. PTEN-ASD patients (n=17) were compared with idiopathic (non-PTEN) ASD patients with (macro-ASD, n=16) and without macrocephaly (normo-ASD, n=38) and healthy controls (n=14). Group differences were evaluated for PTEN pathway protein expression levels, global and regional structural brain volumes and cortical thickness measures, neurocognition and adaptive behavior. RNA expression patterns and brain characteristics of a murine model of Pten mislocalization were used to further evaluate abnormalities observed in human PTEN-ASD patients. PTEN-ASD had a high proportion of missense mutations and showed reduced PTEN protein levels. Compared with the other groups, prominent white-matter and cognitive abnormalities were specifically associated with PTEN-ASD patients, with strong reductions in processing speed and working memory. White-matter abnormalities mediated the relationship between PTEN protein reductions and reduced cognitive ability. The Ptenm3m4 murine model had differential expression of genes related to myelination and increased corpus callosum. Processing speed and working memory deficits and white-matter abnormalities may serve as useful features that signal clinicians that PTEN is etiologic and prompting referral to genetic professionals for gene testing, genetic counseling and cancer risk management; and could reveal treatment targets in trials of treatments for PTEN-ASD.Additional information
http://www.nature.com/mp/journal/vaop/ncurrent/extref/mp2014125x1.doc -
Friedlaender, J., Hunley, K., Dunn, M., Terrill, A., Lindström, E., Reesink, G., & Friedlaender, F. (2009). Linguistics more robust than genetics [Letter to the editor]. Science, 324, 464-465. doi:10.1126/science.324_464c.
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Fusaroli, R., Perlman, M., Mislove, A., Paxton, A., Matlock, T., & Dale, R. (2015). Timescales of massive human entrainment. PLoS One, 10: e0122742. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0122742.
Abstract
The past two decades have seen an upsurge of interest in the collective behaviors of complex systems composed of many agents entrained to each other and to external events. In this paper, we extend the concept of entrainment to the dynamics of human collective attention. We conducted a detailed investigation of the unfolding of human entrainment—as expressed by the content and patterns of hundreds of thousands of messages on Twitter—during the 2012 US presidential debates. By time-locking these data sources, we quantify the impact of the unfolding debate on human attention at three time scales. We show that collective social behavior covaries second-by-second to the interactional dynamics of the debates: A candidate speaking induces rapid increases in mentions of his name on social media and decreases in mentions of the other candidate. Moreover, interruptions by an interlocutor increase the attention received. We also highlight a distinct time scale for the impact of salient content during the debates: Across well-known remarks in each debate, mentions in social media start within 5–10 seconds after it occurs; peak at approximately one minute; and slowly decay in a consistent fashion across well-known events during the debates. Finally, we show that public attention after an initial burst slowly decays through the course of the debates. Thus we demonstrate that large-scale human entrainment may hold across a number of distinct scales, in an exquisitely time-locked fashion. The methods and results pave the way for careful study of the dynamics and mechanisms of large-scale human entrainment.Additional information
Fusaroli_etal_2015_supporing information.zip -
Gaby, A., & Faller, M. (2003). Reciprocity questionnaire. In N. J. Enfield (
Ed. ), Field research manual 2003, part I: Multimodal interaction, space, event representation (pp. 77-80). Nijmegen: Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics. doi:10.17617/2.877641.Abstract
This project is part of a collaborative project with the research group “Reciprocals across languages” led by Nick Evans. One goal of this project is to develop a typology of reciprocals. This questionnaire is designed to help field workers get an overview over the type of markers used in the expression of reciprocity in the language studied. -
Galizia, E. C., Myers, C. T., Leu, C., De Kovel, C. G. F., Afrikanova, T., Cordero-Maldonado, M. L., Martins, T. G., Jacmin, M., Drury, S., Chinthapalli, V. K., Muhle, H., Pendziwiat, M., Sander, T., Ruppert, A. K., Moller, R. S., Thiele, H., Krause, R., Schubert, J., Lehesjoki, A. E., Nurnberg, P. and 28 moreGalizia, E. C., Myers, C. T., Leu, C., De Kovel, C. G. F., Afrikanova, T., Cordero-Maldonado, M. L., Martins, T. G., Jacmin, M., Drury, S., Chinthapalli, V. K., Muhle, H., Pendziwiat, M., Sander, T., Ruppert, A. K., Moller, R. S., Thiele, H., Krause, R., Schubert, J., Lehesjoki, A. E., Nurnberg, P., Lerche, H., Palotie, A., Coppola, A., Striano, S., Del Gaudio, L., Boustred, C., Schneider, A. L., Lench, N., Jocic-Jakubi, B., Covanis, A., Capovilla, G., Veggiotti, P., Piccioli, M., Parisi, P., Cantonetti, L., Sadleir, L. G., Mullen, S. A., Berkovic, S. F., Stephani, U., Helbig, I., Crawford, A. D., Esguerra, C. V., Trenite, D., Koeleman, B. P. C., Mefford, H. C., Scheffer, I. E., Sisodiya, S. M., & EURO Epinomics CoGIE Consortium (2015). CHD2 variants are a risk factor for photosensitivity in epilepsy. Brain, 138(5), 1198-1207. doi:10.1093%2Fbrain%2Fawv052.
Abstract
Photosensitivity is a heritable abnormal cortical response to flickering light, manifesting as particular electroencephalographic changes, with or without seizures. Photosensitivity is prominent in a very rare epileptic encephalopathy due to de novo CHD2 mutations, but is also seen in epileptic encephalopathies due to other gene mutations. We determined whether CHD2 variation underlies photosensitivity in common epilepsies, specific photosensitive epilepsies and individuals with photosensitivity without seizures. We studied 580 individuals with epilepsy and either photosensitive seizures or abnormal photoparoxysmal response on electroencephalography, or both, and 55 individuals with photoparoxysmal response but no seizures. We compared CHD2 sequence data to publicly available data from 34 427 individuals, not enriched for epilepsy. We investigated the role of unique variants seen only once in the entire data set. We sought CHD2 variants in 238 exomes from familial genetic generalized epilepsies, and in other public exome data sets. We identified 11 unique variants in the 580 individuals with photosensitive epilepsies and 128 unique variants in the 34 427 controls: unique CHD2 variation is over-represented in cases overall (P = 2·17 × 10−5). Among epilepsy syndromes, there was over-representation of unique CHD2 variants (3/36 cases) in the archetypal photosensitive epilepsy syndrome, eyelid myoclonia with absences (P = 3·50 × 10−4). CHD2 variation was not over-represented in photoparoxysmal response without seizures. Zebrafish larvae with chd2 knockdown were tested for photosensitivity. Chd2 knockdown markedly enhanced mild innate zebrafish larval photosensitivity. CHD2 mutation is the first identified cause of the archetypal generalized photosensitive epilepsy syndrome, eyelid myoclonia with absences. Unique CHD2 variants are also associated with photosensitivity in common epilepsies. CHD2 does not encode an ion channel, opening new avenues for research into human cortical excitability. -
Galucio, A. V., Meira, S., Birchall, J., Moore, D., Gabas Junior, N., Drude, S., Storto, L., Picanço, G., & Rodrigues, C. R. (2015). Genealogical relations and lexical distances within the Tupian linguistic family. Boletim do Museu Paraense Emilio Goeldi:Ciencias Humanas, 10, 229-274. doi:10.1590/1981-81222015000200004.
Abstract
In this paper we present the first results of the application of computational methods, inspired by the ideas in McMahon & McMahon (2005), to a dataset collected from languages of every branch of the Tupian family (including all living non-Tupí-Guaraní languages) in order to produce a classification of the family based on lexical distance. We used both a Swadesh list (with historically stabler terms) and a list of animal and plant names for results comparison. In addition, we also selected more (HiHi) and less (LoLo) stable terms from the Swadesh list to form sublists for indepedent treatment. We compared the resulting NeighborNet networks and neighbor-joining cladograms and drew conclusions about their significance for the current understanding of the classification of Tupian languages. One important result is the lack of support for the currently discussed idea of an Eastern-Western division within Tupí -
Ganushchak, L. Y., & Schiller, N. O. (2009). Speaking in one’s second language under time pressure: An ERP study on verbal self-monitoring in German-Dutch bilinguals. Psychophysiology, 46, 410-419. doi:10.1111/j.1469-8986.2008.00774.x.
Abstract
This study addresses how verbal self-monitoring and the Error-Related Negativity (ERN) are affected by time pressure
when a task is performed in a second language as opposed to performance in the native language. German–Dutch
bilinguals were required to perform a phoneme-monitoring task in Dutch with and without a time pressure manipulation.
We obtained an ERN following verbal errors that showed an atypical increase in amplitude under time
pressure. This finding is taken to suggest that under time pressure participants had more interference from their native
language, which in turn led to a greater response conflict and thus enhancement of the amplitude of the ERN. This
result demonstrates once more that the ERN is sensitive to psycholinguistic manipulations and suggests that the
functioning of the verbal self-monitoring systemduring speaking is comparable to other performance monitoring, such
as action monitoring. -
Garcia, N., Lenkiewicz, P., Freire, M., & Monteiro, P. (2009). A new architecture for optical burst switching networks based on cooperative control. In Proceeding of the 8th IEEE International Symposium on Network Computing and Applications (IEEE NCA09) (pp. 310-313).
Abstract
This paper presents a new architecture for optical burst switched networks where the control plane of the network functions in a cooperative manner. Each node interprets the data conveyed by the control packet and forwards it to the next nodes, making the control plane of the network distribute the relevant information to all the nodes in the network. A cooperation transmission tree is used, thus allowing all the nodes to store the information related to the traffic management in the network, and enabling better network resource planning at each node. A model of this network architecture is proposed, and its performance is evaluated. -
Garrido, L., Eisner, F., McGettigan, C., Stewart, L., Sauter, D., Hanley, J. R., Schweinberger, S. R., Warren, J. D., & Duchaine, B. (2009). Developmental phonagnosia: A selective deficit of vocal identity recognition. Neuropsychologia, 47(1), 123-131. doi:10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2008.08.003.
Abstract
Phonagnosia, the inability to recognize familiar voices, has been studied in brain-damaged patients but no cases due to developmental problems have been reported. Here we describe the case of KH, a 60-year-old active professional woman who reports that she has always experienced severe voice recognition difficulties. Her hearing abilities are normal, and an MRI scan showed no evidence of brain damage in regions associated with voice or auditory perception. To better understand her condition and to assess models of voice and high-level auditory processing, we tested KH on behavioural tasks measuring voice recognition, recognition of vocal emotions, face recognition, speech perception, and processing of environmental sounds and music. KH was impaired on tasks requiring the recognition of famous voices and the learning and recognition of new voices. In contrast, she performed well on nearly all other tasks. Her case is the first report of developmental phonagnosia, and the results suggest that the recognition of a speaker’s vocal identity depends on separable mechanisms from those used to recognize other information from the voice or non-vocal auditory stimuli. -
Gascoyne, D. M., Spearman, H., Lyne, L., Puliyadi, R., Perez-Alcantara, M., Coulton, L., Fisher, S. E., Croucher, P. I., & Banham, A. H. (2015). The forkhead transcription factor FOXP2 is required for regulation of p21 WAF1/CIP1 in 143B osteosarcoma cell growth arrest. PLoS One, 10(6): e0128513. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0128513.
Abstract
Mutations of the forkhead transcription factor FOXP2 gene have been implicated in inherited speech-and-language disorders, and specific Foxp2 expression patterns in neuronal populations and neuronal phenotypes arising from Foxp2 disruption have been described. However, molecular functions of FOXP2 are not completely understood. Here we report a requirement for FOXP2 in growth arrest of the osteosarcoma cell line 143B. We observed endogenous expression of this transcription factor both transiently in normally developing murine osteoblasts and constitutively in human SAOS-2 osteosarcoma cells blocked in early osteoblast development. Critically, we demonstrate that in 143B osteosarcoma cells with minimal endogenous expression, FOXP2 induced by growth arrest is required for up-regulation of p21WAF1/CIP1. Upon growth factor withdrawal, FOXP2 induction occurs rapidly and precedes p21WAF1/CIP1 activation. Additionally, FOXP2 expression could be induced by MAPK pathway inhibition in growth-arrested 143B cells, but not in traditional cell line models of osteoblast differentiation (MG-63, C2C12, MC3T3-E1). Our data are consistent with a model in which transient upregulation of Foxp2 in pre-osteoblast mesenchymal cells regulates a p21-dependent growth arrest checkpoint, which may have implications for normal mesenchymal and osteosarcoma biologyAdditional information
http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0128513#sec020 -
Gazendam, L., Wartena, C., Malaise, V., Schreiber, G., De Jong, A., & Brugman, H. (2009). Automatic annotation suggestions for audiovisual archives: Evaluation aspects. Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, 34(2/3), 172-188. doi:10.1179/174327909X441090.
Abstract
In the context of large and ever growing archives, generating annotation suggestions automatically from textual resources related to the documents to be archived is an interesting option in theory. It could save a lot of work in the time consuming and expensive task of manual annotation and it could help cataloguers attain a higher inter-annotator agreement. However, some questions arise in practice: what is the quality of the automatically produced annotations? How do they compare with manual annotations and with the requirements for annotation that were defined in the archive? If different from the manual annotations, are the automatic annotations wrong? In the CHOICE project, partially hosted at the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision, the Dutch public archive for audiovisual broadcasts, we automatically generate annotation suggestions for cataloguers. In this paper, we define three types of evaluation of these annotation suggestions: (1) a classic and strict evaluation measure expressing the overlap between automatically generated keywords and the manual annotations, (2) a loosened evaluation measure for which semantically very similar annotations are also considered as relevant matches, and (3) an in-use evaluation of the usefulness of manual versus automatic annotations in the context of serendipitous browsing. During serendipitous browsing, the annotations (manual or automatic) are used to retrieve and visualize semantically related documents. -
Gebre, B. G. (2015). Machine learning for gesture recognition from videos. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
Additional information
full text via Radboud Repository -
Genetics of Personality Consortium (2015). Meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies for neuroticism, and the polygenic association with major depressive disorder. JAMA Psychiatry, 72(7), 642-650. doi:10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2015.0554.
Abstract
Importance
Neuroticism is a pervasive risk factor for psychiatric conditions. It genetically overlaps with major depressive disorder (MDD) and is therefore an important phenotype for psychiatric genetics. The Genetics of Personality Consortium has created a resource for genome-wide association analyses of personality traits in more than 63 000 participants (including MDD cases).Objectives
To identify genetic variants associated with neuroticism by performing a meta-analysis of genome-wide association results based on 1000 Genomes imputation; to evaluate whether common genetic variants as assessed by single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) explain variation in neuroticism by estimating SNP-based heritability; and to examine whether SNPs that predict neuroticism also predict MDD.Design, Setting, and Participants
Genome-wide association meta-analysis of 30 cohorts with genome-wide genotype, personality, and MDD data from the Genetics of Personality Consortium. The study included 63 661 participants from 29 discovery cohorts and 9786 participants from a replication cohort. Participants came from Europe, the United States, or Australia. Analyses were conducted between 2012 and 2014.Main Outcomes and Measures
Neuroticism scores harmonized across all 29 discovery cohorts by item response theory analysis, and clinical MDD case-control status in 2 of the cohorts.Results
A genome-wide significant SNP was found on 3p14 in MAGI1 (rs35855737; P = 9.26 × 10−9 in the discovery meta-analysis). This association was not replicated (P = .32), but the SNP was still genome-wide significant in the meta-analysis of all 30 cohorts (P = 2.38 × 10−8). Common genetic variants explain 15% of the variance in neuroticism. Polygenic scores based on the meta-analysis of neuroticism in 27 cohorts significantly predicted neuroticism (1.09 × 10−12 <} P {<} .05) and MDD (4.02 × 10−9 {<} P {< .05) in the 2 other cohorts.Conclusions and Relevance
This study identifies a novel locus for neuroticism. The variant is located in a known gene that has been associated with bipolar disorder and schizophrenia in previous studies. In addition, the study shows that neuroticism is influenced by many genetic variants of small effect that are either common or tagged by common variants. These genetic variants also influence MDD. Future studies should confirm the role of the MAGI1 locus for neuroticism and further investigate the association of MAGI1 and the polygenic association to a range of other psychiatric disorders that are phenotypically correlated with neuroticism.Additional information
http://archpsyc.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=2294268#tab12Files private
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Gentner, D., & Bowerman, M. (2009). Why some spatial semantic categories are harder to learn than others: The typological prevalence hypothesis. In J. Guo, E. Lieven, N. Budwig, S. Ervin-Tripp, K. Nakamura, & S. Ozcaliskan (
Eds. ), Crosslinguistic approaches to the psychology of language: Research in the tradition of Dan Isaac Slobin (pp. 465-480). New York: Psychology Press. -
Gerwien, J., & Flecken, M. (2015). There is no prime for time: the missing link between form and concept of progressive aspect in L2 production. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 18(5), 561-587. doi:10.1080/13670050.2015.1027144.
Abstract
The acquisition of linguistic structures that require perspective-taking at the level of message generation is challenging. We investigate use of progressive aspect in L2 event encoding, using a sentence priming paradigm. We focus on Dutch, in which use of progressive aspect is optional. The progressive consists of a prepositional phrase (‘aan het,’ at-the), plus a verbal infinitive. We ask, to what extent L2 speakers, in comparison to native speakers, show priming effects in relation to form (prepositional phrase) or conceptual (progressive aspect) prime sentences. In native Dutch speakers we find a priming effect for the ‘progressive prime,’ compared to a ‘neutral prime’ (aspectually neutral event description). In L2 speakers this effect was absent. For the form prime, no priming effects were obtained in native speakers, rather, we find evidence for a partial blocking effect in L2 speakers. Results suggest that the strength of the link between concept and form of progressive aspect differs in native and L2 speakers. Specific factors contributed to the L2 findings, e.g., level of L2 proficiency and degree of L2 exposure. We conclude that (1) the conceptual basis of grammatical aspect can be primed in native speakers, and (2) in L2 speakers, access to conceptual information is less automatized.Files private
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Geurts, B., & Rubio-Fernández, P. (2015). Pragmatics and processing. Ratio: an international journal of analytic philosophy, 28(4), 446-469. doi:10.1111/rati.12113.
Abstract
Gricean pragmatics has often been criticised for being implausible from a psychological point of view. This line of criticism is never backed up by empirical evidence, but more importantly, it ignores the fact that Grice never meant to advance a processing theory, in the first place. Taking our lead from Marr (1982), we distinguish between two levels of explanation: at the W-level, we are concerned with what agents do and why; at the H-level, we ask how agents do whatever it is they do. Whereas pragmatics is pitched at the W-level, processing theories are at the H-level. This is not to say that pragmatics has no implications for psychology at all, but it is to say that its implications are less direct than is often supposed. -
Gialluisi, A. (2015). Investigating the genetic basis of reading and language skills. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
Additional information
full text via Radboud Repository -
Giering, E., Tinbergen, M., & Verbunt, A. (2009). Research Report 2007 | 2008. Nijmegen: Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics.
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Gilbers, S., Fuller, C., Gilbers, D., Broersma, M., Goudbeek, M., Free, R., & Başkent, D. (2015). Normal-hearing listeners' and cochlear implant users' perception of pitch cues in emotional speech. i-Perception, 6(5), 1-19. doi:0.1177/0301006615599139.
Abstract
In cochlear implants (CIs), acoustic speech cues, especially for pitch, are delivered in a degraded form. This study's aim is to assess whether due to degraded pitch cues, normal-hearing listeners and CI users employ different perceptual strategies to recognize vocal emotions, and, if so, how these differ. Voice actors were recorded pronouncing a nonce word in four different emotions: anger, sadness, joy, and relief. These recordings' pitch cues were phonetically analyzed. The recordings were used to test 20 normal-hearing listeners' and 20 CI users' emotion recognition. In congruence with previous studies, high-arousal emotions had a higher mean pitch, wider pitch range, and more dominant pitches than low-arousal emotions. Regarding pitch, speakers did not differentiate emotions based on valence but on arousal. Normal-hearing listeners outperformed CI users in emotion recognition, even when presented with CI simulated stimuli. However, only normal-hearing listeners recognized one particular actor's emotions worse than the other actors'. The groups behaved differently when presented with similar input, showing that they had to employ differing strategies. Considering the respective speaker's deviating pronunciation, it appears that for normal-hearing listeners, mean pitch is a more salient cue than pitch range, whereas CI users are biased toward pitch range cues -
Gingras, B., Honing, H., Peretz, I., Trainor, L. J., & Fisher, S. E. (2015). Defining the biological bases of individual differences in musicality. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series B: Biological Sciences, 370: 20140092. doi:10.1098/rstb.2014.0092.
Abstract
Advances in molecular technologies make it possible to pinpoint genomic factors associated with complex human traits. For cognition and behaviour, identification of underlying genes provides new entry points for deciphering the key neurobiological pathways. In the past decade, the search for genetic correlates of musicality has gained traction. Reports have documented familial clustering for different extremes of ability, including amusia and absolute pitch (AP), with twin studies demonstrating high heritability for some music-related skills, such as pitch perception. Certain chromosomal regions have been linked to AP and musical aptitude, while individual candidate genes have been investigated in relation to aptitude and creativity. Most recently, researchers in this field started performing genome-wide association scans. Thus far, studies have been hampered by relatively small sample sizes and limitations in defining components of musicality, including an emphasis on skills that can only be assessed in trained musicians. With opportunities to administer standardized aptitude tests online, systematic large-scale assessment of musical abilities is now feasible, an important step towards high-powered genome-wide screens. Here, we offer a synthesis of existing literatures and outline concrete suggestions for the development of comprehensive operational tools for the analysis of musical phenotypes. -
Gisladottir, R. S., Chwilla, D., & Levinson, S. C. (2015). Conversation electrified: ERP correlates of speech act recognition in underspecified utterances. PLoS One, 10(3): e0120068. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0120068.
Abstract
The ability to recognize speech acts (verbal actions) in conversation is critical for everyday interaction. However, utterances are often underspecified for the speech act they perform, requiring listeners to rely on the context to recognize the action. The goal of this study was to investigate the time-course of auditory speech act recognition in action-underspecified utterances and explore how sequential context (the prior action) impacts this process. We hypothesized that speech acts are recognized early in the utterance to allow for quick transitions between turns in conversation. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded while participants listened to spoken dialogues and performed an action categorization task. The dialogues contained target utterances that each of which could deliver three distinct speech acts depending on the prior turn. The targets were identical across conditions, but differed in the type of speech act performed and how it fit into the larger action sequence. The ERP results show an early effect of action type, reflected by frontal positivities as early as 200 ms after target utterance onset. This indicates that speech act recognition begins early in the turn when the utterance has only been partially processed. Providing further support for early speech act recognition, actions in highly constraining contexts did not elicit an ERP effect to the utterance-final word. We take this to show that listeners can recognize the action before the final word through predictions at the speech act level. However, additional processing based on the complete utterance is required in more complex actions, as reflected by a posterior negativity at the final word when the speech act is in a less constraining context and a new action sequence is initiated. These findings demonstrate that sentence comprehension in conversational contexts crucially involves recognition of verbal action which begins as soon as it can.Additional information
http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0120068#sec024 -
Gisladottir, R. S. (2015). Conversation electrified: The electrophysiology of spoken speech act recognition. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
Additional information
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Gisladottir, R. S. (2015). Other-initiated repair in Icelandic. Open Linguistics, 1(1), 309-328. doi:10.1515/opli-2015-0004.
Abstract
The ability to repair problems with hearing or understanding in conversation is critical for successful communication. This article describes the linguistic practices of other-initiated repair (OIR) in Icelandic through quantitative and qualitative analysis of a corpus of video-recorded conversations. The study draws on the conceptual distinctions developed in the comparative project on repair described in the introduction to this issue. The main aim is to give an overview of the formats for OIR in Icelandic and the type of repair practices engendered by them. The use of repair initiations in social actions not aimed at solving comprehension problems is also briefly discussed. In particular, the interjection ha has a rich usage extending beyond open other-initiation of repair. By describing the linguistic machinery for other-initiated repair in Icelandic, this study contributes to the typology of conversational structure and to the still nascent field of Icelandic social interaction studies. -
Gisselgard, J., Petersson, K. M., Baddeley, A., & Ingvar, M. (2003). The irrelevant speech effect: A PET study. Neuropsychologia, 41, 1899-1911. doi:10.1016/S0028-3932(03)00122-2.
Abstract
Positron emission tomography (PET) was performed in normal volunteers during a serial recall task under the influence of irrelevant speech comprising both single item repetition and multi-item sequences. An interaction approach was used to identify brain areas specifically related to the irrelevant speech effect. We interpreted activations as compensatory recruitment of complementary working memory processing, and decreased activity in terms of suppression of task relevant areas invoked by the irrelevant speech. The interaction between the distractors and working memory revealed a significant effect in the left, and to a lesser extent in the right, superior temporal region, indicating that initial phonological processing was relatively suppressed. Additional areas of decreased activity were observed in an a priori defined cortical network related to verbalworking memory, incorporating the bilateral superior temporal and inferior/middle frontal corticesn extending into Broca’s area on the left. We also observed a weak activation in the left inferior parietal cortex, a region suggested to reflect the phonological store, the subcomponent where the interference is assumed to take place. The results suggest that the irrelevant speech effect is correlated with and thus tentatively may be explained in terms of a suppression of components of the verbal working memory network as outlined. The results can be interpreted in terms of inhibitory top–down attentional mechanisms attenuating the influence of the irrelevant speech, although additional studies are clearly necessary to more fully characterize the nature of this phenomenon and its theoretical implications for existing short-term memory models -
Glaser, B., & Holmans, P. (2009). Comparison of methods for combining case-control and family-based association studies. Human Heredity, 68(2), 106-116. doi:10.1159/000212503.
Abstract
OBJECTIVES: Combining the analysis of family-based samples with unrelated individuals can enhance the power of genetic association studies. Various combined analysis techniques have been recently developed; as yet, there have been no comparisons of their power, or robustness to confounding factors. We investigated empirically the power of up to six combined methods using simulated samples of trios and unrelated cases/controls (TDTCC), trios and unrelated controls (TDTC), and affected sibpairs with parents and unrelated cases/controls (ASPFCC). METHODS: We simulated multiplicative, dominant and recessive models with varying risk parameters in single samples. Additionally, we studied false-positive rates and investigated, if possible, the coverage of the true genetic effect (TDTCC). RESULTS/CONCLUSIONS: Under the TDTCC design, we identified four approaches with equivalent power and false-positive rates. Combined statistics were more powerful than single-sample statistics or a pooled chi(2)-statistic when risk parameters were similar in single samples. Adding parental information to the CC part of the joint likelihood increased the power of generalised logistic regression under the TDTC but not the TDTCC scenario. Formal testing of differences between risk parameters in subsamples was the most sensitive approach to avoid confounding in combined analysis. Non-parametric analysis based on Monte-Carlo testing showed the highest power for ASPFCC samples. -
De Goede, D., Shapiro, L. P., Wester, F., Swinney, D. A., & Bastiaanse, Y. R. M. (2009). The time course of verb processing in Dutch sentences. Journal of Psycholinguistic Research, 38(3), 181-199. doi:10.1007/s10936-009-9117-3.
Abstract
The verb has traditionally been characterized as the central element in a sentence. Nevertheless, the exact role of the verb during the actual ongoing comprehension of a sentence as it unfolds in time remains largely unknown. This paper reports the results of two Cross-Modal Lexical Priming (CMLP) experiments detailing the pattern of verb priming during on-line processing of Dutch sentences. Results are contrasted with data from a third CMLP experiment on priming of nouns in similar sentences. It is demonstrated that the meaning of a matrix verb remains active throughout the entire matrix clause, while this is not the case for the meaning of a subject head noun. Activation of the meaning of the verb only dissipates upon encountering a clear signal as to the start of a new clause. -
Goldin-Meadow, S., Ozyurek, A., Sancar, B., & Mylander, C. (2009). Making language around the globe: A cross-linguistic study of homesign in the United States, China, and Turkey. In J. Guo, E. Lieven, N. Budwig, S. Ervin-Tripp, K. Nakamura, & S. Ozcaliskan (
Eds. ), Crosslinguistic approaches to the psychology of language: Research in the tradition of Dan Isaac Slobin (pp. 27-39). New York: Psychology Press. -
Goldin-Meadow, S., Gentner, D., Ozyurek, A., & Gurcanli, O. (2009). Spatial language supports spatial cognition: Evidence from deaf homesigners [abstract]. Cognitive Processing, 10(Suppl. 2), S133-S134.
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Goldin-Meadow, S., Namboodiripad, S., Mylander, C., Ozyurek, A., & Sancar, B. (2015). The resilience of structure built around the predicate: Homesign gesture systems in Turkish and American deaf children. Journal of Cognition and Development, 16, 55-80. doi:10.1080/15248372.2013.803970.
Abstract
Deaf children whose hearing losses prevent them from accessing spoken language and whose hearing parents have not exposed them to sign language develop gesture systems, called homesigns, which have many of the properties of natural language—the so-called resilient properties of language. We explored the resilience of structure built around the predicate—in particular, how manner and path are mapped onto the verb—in homesign systems developed by deaf children in Turkey and the United States. We also asked whether the Turkish homesigners exhibit sentence-level structures previously identified as resilient in American and Chinese homesigners. We found that the Turkish and American deaf children used not only the same production probability and ordering patterns to indicate who does what to whom, but also used the same segmentation and conflation patterns to package manner and path. The gestures that the hearing parents produced did not, for the most part, display the patterns found in the children's gestures. Although cospeech gesture may provide the building blocks for homesign, it does not provide the blueprint for these resilient properties of language. -
Goncharova, M. V., Klenova, A. V., & Bragina, E. V. (2015). Development of cues to individuality and sex in calls of three crane species: when is it good to be recognizable? Journal of Ethology, 33, 165-175. doi:10.1007/s10164-015-0428-6.
Abstract
Vocal individuality provides a method of personalization for multiple avian species. However, expression of individual vocal features depends on necessity of recognition. Here we focused on chick vocalizations of demoiselle, Siberian and red-crowned cranes that differ by their body size, developmental rates and some ecological traits. Cranes are territorial during summer, but gather in
large flocks during autumn and winter. Nevertheless, parents keep feeding their chicks, even on winter grounds, despite the potential of confusing their own and alien
chicks. Here we aimed to compare expression of individuality and sex in calls of three crane species between solitary and gregarious periods of a chick’s life, and between species. We found significant individual patterns of
acoustic variables in the calls of all three species both before and after fledging. However, only red-crowned crane chicks increased expression of individuality significantly after the fledging. Also, we found that chicks of all three species significantly increased occurrence of nonlinear phenomena, i.e., irregular oscillations of soundproducing membranes (biphonations, sidebands, and deterministic chaos), in their calls after fledging. Non-linear phenomena can be a way of increasing the potential for
individual recognition as well as avoiding habituation of parents to their chicks’ calls. The older chicks are, the less
their parents feed them, and chicks benefit from keeping the permanent attention.Files private
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Goudbeek, M., Swingley, D., & Smits, R. (2009). Supervised and unsupervised learning of multidimensional acoustic categories. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 35, 1913-1933. doi:10.1037/a0015781.
Abstract
Learning to recognize the contrasts of a language-specific phonemic repertoire can be viewed as forming categories in a multidimensional psychophysical space. Research on the learning of distributionally defined visual categories has shown that categories defined over I dimension are easy to learn and that learning multidimensional categories is more difficult but tractable under specific task conditions. In 2 experiments, adult participants learned either a unidimensional ora multidimensional category distinction with or without supervision (feedback) during learning. The unidimensional distinctions were readily learned and supervision proved beneficial, especially in maintaining category learning beyond the learning phase. Learning the multidimensional category distinction proved to be much more difficult and supervision was not nearly as beneficial as with unidimensionally defined categories. Maintaining a learned multidimensional category distinction was only possible when the distributional information (hat identified the categories remained present throughout the testing phase. We conclude that listeners are sensitive to both trial-by-trial feedback and the distributional information in the stimuli. Even given limited exposure, listeners learned to use 2 relevant dimensions. albeit with considerable difficulty. -
Graham, S. A., Deriziotis, P., & Fisher, S. E. (2015). Insights into the genetic foundations of human communication. Neuropsychology Review, 25(1), 3-26. doi:10.1007/s11065-014-9277-2.
Abstract
The human capacity to acquire sophisticated language is unmatched in the animal kingdom. Despite the discontinuity in communicative abilities between humans and other primates, language is built on ancient genetic foundations, which are being illuminated by comparative genomics. The genetic architecture of the language faculty is also being uncovered by research into neurodevelopmental disorders that disrupt the normally effortless process of language acquisition. In this article, we discuss the strategies that researchers are using to reveal genetic factors contributing to communicative abilities, and review progress in identifying the relevant genes and genetic variants. The first gene directly implicated in a speech and language disorder was FOXP2. Using this gene as a case study, we illustrate how evidence from genetics, molecular cell biology, animal models and human neuroimaging has converged to build a picture of the role of FOXP2 in neurodevelopment, providing a framework for future endeavors to bridge the gaps between genes, brains and behavior -
Graham, S. A., Jégouzo, S. A. F., Yan, S., Powlesland, A. S., Brady, J. P., Taylor, M. E., & Drickamer, K. (2009). Prolectin, a glycan-binding receptor on dividing B cells in germinal centers. The Journal of Biological Chemistry, 284, 18537-18544. doi:10.1074/jbc.M109.012807.
Abstract
Prolectin, a previously undescribed glycan-binding receptor, has been identified by re-screening of the human genome for genes encoding proteins containing potential C-type carbohydrate-recognition domains. Glycan array analysis revealed that the carbohydrate-recognition domain in the extracellular domain of the receptor binds glycans with terminal α-linked mannose or fucose residues. Prolectin expressed in fibroblasts is found at the cell surface, but unlike many glycan-binding receptors it does not mediate endocytosis of a neoglycoprotein ligand. However, compared with other known glycan-binding receptors, the receptor contains an unusually large intracellular domain that consists of multiple sequence motifs, including phosphorylated tyrosine residues, that allow it to interact with signaling molecules such as Grb2. Immunohistochemistry has been used to demonstrate that prolectin is expressed on a specialized population of proliferating B cells in germinal centers. Thus, this novel receptor has the potential to function in carbohydrate-mediated communication between cells in the germinal center.Additional information
http://www.jbc.org/content/suppl/2009/05/06/M109.012807.DC1.html -
Graham, S. A., & Fisher, S. E. (2015). Understanding language from a genomic perspective. Annual Review of Genetics, 49, 131-160. doi:10.1146/annurev-genet-120213-092236.
Abstract
Language is a defining characteristic of the human species, but its foundations remain mysterious. Heritable disorders offer a gateway into biological underpinnings, as illustrated by the discovery that FOXP2 disruptions cause a rare form of speech and language impairment. The genetic architecture underlying language-related disorders is complex, and although some progress has been made, it has proved challenging to pinpoint additional relevant genes with confidence. Next-generation sequencing and genome-wide association studies are revolutionizing understanding of the genetic bases of other neurodevelopmental disorders, like autism and schizophrenia, and providing fundamental insights into the molecular networks crucial for typical brain development. We discuss how a similar genomic perspective, brought to the investigation of language-related phenotypes, promises to yield equally informative discoveries. Moreover, we outline how follow-up studies of genetic findings using cellular systems and animal models can help to elucidate the biological mechanisms involved in the development of brain circuits supporting language.Files private
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Gretsch, P. (2003). Omission impossible?: Topic and Focus in Focal Ellipsis. In K. Schwabe, & S. Winkler (
Eds. ), The Interfaces: Deriving and interpreting omitted structures (pp. 341-365). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Files private
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Grünloh, T., & Liszkowski, U. (2015). Prelinguistic vocalizations distinguish pointing acts. Journal of Child Language, 42(6), 1312-1336. doi:10.1017/S0305000914000816.
Abstract
The current study investigated whether point-accompanying characteristics, like vocalizations and hand shape, differentiate infants' underlying motives of prelinguistic pointing. We elicited imperative (requestive) and declarative (expressive and informative) pointing acts in experimentally controlled situations, and analyzed accompanying characteristics. Experiment 1 revealed that prosodic characteristics of point-accompanying vocalizations distinguished requestive from both expressive and informative pointing acts, with little differences between the latter two. In addition, requestive points were more often realized with the whole hand than the index finger, while this was the opposite for expressive and informative acts. Experiment 2 replicated Experiment 1, revealing distinct prosodic characteristics for requestive pointing also when the referent was distal and when it had an index-finger shape. Findings reveal that beyond the social context, point-accompanying vocalizations give clues to infants' underlying intentions when pointing. -
Guadalupe, T., Zwiers, M. P., Wittfeld, K., Teumer, A., Vasquez, A. A., Hoogman, M., Hagoort, P., Fernandez, G., Buitelaar, J., van Bokhoven, H., Hegenscheid, K., Völzke, H., Franke, B., Fisher, S. E., Grabe, H. J., & Francks, C. (2015). Asymmetry within and around the human planum temporale is sexually dimorphic and influenced by genes involved in steroid hormone receptor activity. Cortex, 62, 41-55. doi:10.1016/j.cortex.2014.07.015.
Abstract
The genetic determinants of cerebral asymmetries are unknown. Sex differences in asymmetry of the planum temporale, that overlaps Wernicke’s classical language area, have been inconsistently reported. Meta-analysis of previous studies has suggested that publication bias established this sex difference in the literature. Using probabilistic definitions of cortical regions we screened over the cerebral cortex for sexual dimorphisms of asymmetry in 2337 healthy subjects, and found the planum temporale to show the strongest sex-linked asymmetry of all regions, which was supported by two further datasets, and also by analysis with the Freesurfer package that performs automated parcellation of cerebral cortical regions. We performed a genome-wide association scan meta-analysis of planum temporale asymmetry in a pooled sample of 3095 subjects, followed by a candidate-driven approach which measured a significant enrichment of association in genes of the ´steroid hormone receptor activity´ and 'steroid metabolic process' pathways. Variants in the genes and pathways identified may affect the role of the planum temporale in language cognition.Additional information
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0010945214002469#appd001 -
Gubian, M., Torreira, F., Strik, H., & Boves, L. (2009). Functional data analysis as a tool for analyzing speech dynamics a case study on the French word c'était. In Proceedings of the 10th Annual Conference of the International Speech Communication Association (Interspeech 2009) (pp. 2199-2202).
Abstract
In this paper we introduce Functional Data Analysis (FDA) as a tool for analyzing dynamic transitions in speech signals. FDA makes it possible to perform statistical analyses of sets of mathematical functions in the same way as classical multivariate analysis treats scalar measurement data. We illustrate the use of FDA with a reduction phenomenon affecting the French word c'était /setε/ 'it was', which can be reduced to [stε] in conversational speech. FDA reveals that the dynamics of the transition from [s] to [t] in fully reduced cases may still be different from the dynamics of [s] - [t] transitions in underlying /st/ clusters such as in the word stage. -
Gubian, M., Torreira, F., & Boves, L. (2015). Using functional data analysis for investigating multidimensional dynamic phonetic contrasts. Journal of Phonetics, 49, 16-40. doi:10.1016/j.wocn.2014.10.001.
Abstract
The study of phonetic contrasts and related phenomena, e.g. inter- and intra-speaker variability, often requires to analyse data in the form of measured time series, like f0 contours and formant trajectories. As a consequence, the investigator has to find suitable ways to reduce the raw and abundant numerical information contained in a bundle of time series into a small but sufficient set of numerical descriptors of their shape. This approach requires one to decide in advance which dynamic traits to include in the analysis and which not. For example, a rising pitch gesture may be represented by its duration and slope, hence reducing it to a straight segment, or by a richer coding specifying also whether (and how much) the rising contour is concave or convex, the latter being irrelevant in some context but crucial in others. Decisions become even more complex when a phenomenon is described by a multidimensional time series, e.g. by the first two formants. In this paper we introduce a methodology based on Functional Data Analysis (FDA) that allows the investigator to delegate most of the decisions involved in the quantitative description of multidimensional time series to the data themselves. FDA produces a data-driven parametrisation of the main shape traits present in the data that is visually interpretable, in the same way as slopes or peak heights are. These output parameters are numbers that are amenable to ordinary statistical analysis, e.g. linear (mixed effects) models. FDA is also able to capture correlations among different dimensions of a time series, e.g. between formants F1 and F2. We present FDA by means of an extended case study on diphthong – hiatus distinction in Spanish, a contrast that involves duration, formant trajectories and pitch contours. -
Le Guen, O. (2009). Geocentric gestural deixis among Yucatecan Maya (Quintana Roo, México). In 18th IACCP Book of Selected Congress Papers (pp. 123-136). Athens, Greece: Pedio Books Publishing.
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Le Guen, O., Samland, J., Friedrich, T., Hanus, D., & Brown, P. (2015). Making sense of (exceptional) causal relations. A cross-cultural and cross-linguistic study. Frontiers in Psychology, 6: 1645. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01645.
Abstract
In order to make sense of the world, humans tend to see causation almost everywhere. Although most causal relations may seem straightforward, they are not always construed in the same way cross-culturally. In this study, we investigate concepts of ‘chance’, ‘coincidence’ or ‘randomness’ that refer to assumed relations between intention, action, and outcome in situations, and we ask how people from different cultures make sense of such non-law-like connections. Based on a framework proposed by Alicke (2000), we administered a task that aims to be a neutral tool for investigating causal construals cross-culturally and cross-linguistically. Members of four different cultural groups, rural Mayan Yucatec and Tseltal speakers from Mexico and urban students from Mexico and Germany, were presented with a set of scenarios involving various types of causal and non-causal relations and were asked to explain the described events. Three links varied as to whether they were present or not in the scenarios: Intention to Action, Action to Outcome, and Intention to Outcome. Our results show that causality is recognized in all four cultural groups. However, how causality and especially non-law-like causality are interpreted depends on the type of links, the cultural background and the language used. In all three groups, Action to Outcome is the decisive link for recognizing causality. Despite the fact that the two Mayan groups share similar cultural backgrounds, they display different ideologies regarding concepts of non-law causality. The data suggests that the concept of ‘chance’ is not universal, but seems to be an explanation that only some cultural groups draw on to make sense of specific situations. Of particular importance is the existence of linguistic concepts in each language that trigger ideas of causality in the responses from each cultural groupAdditional information
LeGuen_etal_2015sup.docx -
Le Guen, O. (2003). Quand les morts reviennent, réflexion sur l'ancestralité chez les Mayas des Basses Terres. Journal de la Société des Américanistes, 89(2), 171-205.
Abstract
When the dead come home… Remarks on ancestor worship among the Lowland Mayas. In Amerindian ethnographical literature, ancestor worship is often mentioned but evidence of its existence is lacking. This article will try to demonstrate that some Lowland Maya do worship ancestors ; it will use precise criteria taken from ethnological studies of societies where ancestor worship is common, compared to maya beliefs and practices. The All Souls’ Day, or hanal pixan, seems to be the most significant manifestation of this cult. Our approach will be comparative, through time – using colonial and ethnographical data of the twentieth century, and space – contemplating uses and beliefs of two maya groups, the Yucatec and the Lacandon Maya. -
Le Guen, O. (2009). The ethnography of emotions: A field worker's guide. In A. Majid (
Ed. ), Field manual volume 12 (pp. 31-34). Nijmegen: Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics. doi:10.17617/2.446076.Abstract
The goal of this task is to investigate cross-cultural emotion categories in language and thought. This entry is designed to provide researchers with some guidelines to describe the emotional repertoire of a community from an emic perspective. The first objective is to offer ethnographic tools and a questionnaire in order to understand the semantics of emotional terms and the local conception of emotions. The second objective is to identify the local display rules of emotions in communicative interactions. -
Guggenheim, J. A., St Pourcain, B., McMahon, G., Timpson, N. J., Evans, D. M., & Williams, C. (2015). Assumption-free estimation of the genetic contribution to refractive error across childhood. Molecular Vision, 21, 621-632. Retrieved from http://www.molvis.org/molvis/v21/621.
Abstract
Studies in relatives have generally yielded high heritability estimates for refractive error: twins 75–90%, families 15–70%. However, because related individuals often share a common environment, these estimates are inflated (via misallocation of unique/common environment variance). We calculated a lower-bound heritability estimate for refractive error free from such bias.
Between the ages 7 and 15 years, participants in the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) underwent non-cycloplegic autorefraction at regular research clinics. At each age, an estimate of the variance in refractive error explained by single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) genetic variants was calculated using genome-wide complex trait analysis (GCTA) using high-density genome-wide SNP genotype information (minimum N at each age=3,404).
The variance in refractive error explained by the SNPs (“SNP heritability”) was stable over childhood: Across age 7–15 years, SNP heritability averaged 0.28 (SE=0.08, p<0.001). The genetic correlation for refractive error between visits varied from 0.77 to 1.00 (all p<0.001) demonstrating that a common set of SNPs was responsible for the genetic contribution to refractive error across this period of childhood. Simulations suggested lack of cycloplegia during autorefraction led to a small underestimation of SNP heritability (adjusted SNP heritability=0.35; SE=0.09). To put these results in context, the variance in refractive error explained (or predicted) by the time participants spent outdoors was <0.005 and by the time spent reading was <0.01, based on a parental questionnaire completed when the child was aged 8–9 years old.
Genetic variation captured by common SNPs explained approximately 35% of the variation in refractive error between unrelated subjects. This value sets an upper limit for predicting refractive error using existing SNP genotyping arrays, although higher-density genotyping in larger samples and inclusion of interaction effects is expected to raise this figure toward twin- and family-based heritability estimates. The same SNPs influenced refractive error across much of childhood. Notwithstanding the strong evidence of association between time outdoors and myopia, and time reading and myopia, less than 1% of the variance in myopia at age 15 was explained by crude measures of these two risk factors, indicating that their effects may be limited, at least when averaged over the whole population. -
Gullberg, M., & Kita, S. (2009). Attention to speech-accompanying gestures: Eye movements and information uptake. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 33(4), 251-277. doi:10.1007/s10919-009-0073-2.
Abstract
There is growing evidence that addressees in interaction integrate the semantic information conveyed by speakers’ gestures. Little is known, however, about whether and how addressees’ attention to gestures and the integration of gestural information can be modulated. This study examines the influence of a social factor (speakers’ gaze to their own gestures), and two physical factors (the gesture’s location in gesture space and gestural holds) on addressees’ overt visual attention to gestures (direct fixations of gestures) and their uptake of gestural information. It also examines the relationship between gaze and uptake. The results indicate that addressees’ overt visual attention to gestures is affected both by speakers’ gaze and holds but for different reasons, whereas location in space plays no role. Addressees’ uptake of gesture information is only influenced by speakers’ gaze. There is little evidence of a direct relationship between addressees’ direct fixations of gestures and their uptake. -
Gullberg, M. (2003). Eye movements and gestures in human face-to-face interaction. In J. Hyönä, R. Radach, & H. Deubel (
Eds. ), The mind's eyes: Cognitive and applied aspects of eye movements (pp. 685-703). Oxford: Elsevier.Abstract
Gestures are visuospatial events, meaning carriers, and social interactional phenomena. As such they constitute a particularly favourable area for investigating visual attention in a complex everyday situation under conditions of competitive processing. This chapter discusses visual attention to spontaneous gestures in human face-to-face interaction as explored with eye-tracking. Some basic fixation patterns are described, live and video-based settings are compared, and preliminary results on the relationship between fixations and information processing are outlined. -
Gullberg, M., & Kita, S. (2003). Das Beachten von Gesten: Eine Studie zu Blickverhalten und Integration gestisch ausgedrückter Informationen. In Max-Planck-Gesellschaft (
Ed. ), Jahrbuch der Max Planck Gesellschaft 2003 (pp. 949-953). Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. -
Gullberg, M. (2003). Gestures, referents, and anaphoric linkage in learner varieties. In C. Dimroth, & M. Starren (
Eds. ), Information structure, linguistic structure and the dynamics of language acquisition. (pp. 311-328). Amsterdam: Benjamins.Abstract
This paper discusses how the gestural modality can contribute to our understanding of anaphoric linkage in learner varieties, focusing on gestural anaphoric linkage marking the introduction, maintenance, and shift of reference in story retellings by learners of French and Swedish. The comparison of gestural anaphoric linkage in native and non-native varieties reveals what appears to be a particular learner variety of gestural cohesion, which closely reflects the characteristics of anaphoric linkage in learners' speech. Specifically, particular forms co-occur with anaphoric gestures depending on the information organisation in discourse. The typical nominal over-marking of maintained referents or topic elements in speech is mirrored by gestural (over-)marking of the same items. The paper discusses two ways in which this finding may further the understanding of anaphoric over-explicitness of learner varieties. An addressee-based communicative perspective on anaphoric linkage highlights how over-marking in gesture and speech may be related to issues of hyper-clarity and ambiguity. An alternative speaker-based perspective is also explored in which anaphoric over-marking is seen as related to L2 speech planning. -
Gullberg, M. (2009). Gestures and the development of semantic representations in first and second language acquisition. Acquisition et Interaction en Langue Etrangère..Languages, Interaction, and Acquisition (former AILE), 1, 117-139.
Abstract
This paper argues that speech-associated gestures can usefully inform studies exploring development of meaning in first and second language acquisition. The example domain is caused motion or placement meaning (putting a cup on a table) where acquisition problems have been observed and where adult native gesture use reflects crosslinguistically different placement verb semantics. Against this background, the paper summarises three studies examining the development of semantic representations in Dutch children acquiring Dutch, and adult learners’ acquiring Dutch and French placement verbs. Overall, gestures change systematically with semantic development both in children and adults and (1) reveal what semantic elements are included in current semantic representations, whether target-like or not, and (2) highlight developmental shifts in those representations. There is little evidence that gestures chiefly act as a support channel. Instead, the data support the theoretical notion that speech and gesture form an integrated system, opening new possibilities for studying the processes of acquisition. -
Gullberg, M. (2009). Reconstructing verb meaning in a second language: How English speakers of L2 Dutch talk and gesture about placement. Annual Review of Cognitive Linguistics, 7, 221-245. doi:10.1075/arcl.7.09gul.
Abstract
This study examines to what extent English speakers of L2 Dutch reconstruct the meanings of placement verbs when moving from a general L1 verb of caused motion (put) to two specific caused posture verbs (zetten/leggen ‘set/lay’) in the L2 and whether the existence of low-frequency cognate forms in the L1 (set/lay) alleviates the reconstruction problem. Evidence from speech and gesture indicates that English speakers have difficulties with the specific verbs in L2 Dutch, initially looking for means to express general caused motion in L1-like fashion through over-generalisation. The gesture data further show that targetlike forms are often used to convey L1-like meaning. However, the differentiated use of zetten for vertical placement and dummy verbs (gaan ‘go’ and doen ‘do’) and intransitive posture verbs (zitten/staan/liggen ‘sit, stand, lie’) for horizontal placement, and a positive correlation between appropriate verb use and target-like gesturing suggest a beginning sensitivity to the semantic parameters of the L2 verbs and possible reconstruction. -
Gullberg, M., Indefrey, P., & Muysken, P. (2009). Research techniques for the study of code-switching. In B. E. Bullock, & J. A. Toribio (
Eds. ), The Cambridge handbook on linguistic code-switching (pp. 21-39). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Abstract
The aim of this chapter is to provide researchers with a tool kit of semi-experimental and experimental techniques for studying code-switching. It presents an overview of the current off-line and on-line research techniques, ranging from analyses of published bilingual texts of spontaneous conversations, to tightly controlled experiments. A multi-task approach used for studying code-switched sentence production in Papiamento-Dutch bilinguals is also exemplified. -
Gullberg, M. (2009). Why gestures are relevant to the bilingual mental lexicon. In A. Pavlenko (
Ed. ), The bilingual mental lexicon: Interdisciplinary approaches (pp. 161-184). Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.Abstract
Gestures, the symbolic movements speakers perform while they speak, are systematically related to speech and language in non-trivial ways. This chapter presents an overview of what gestures can and cannot tell us about the monolingual and the bilingual mental lexicon. Gesture analysis opens for a broader view of the mental lexicon, targeting the interface between conceptual, semantic and syntactic aspects of event construal, and offers new possibilities for examining how languages co-exist and interact in bilinguals beyond the level of surface forms. The first section of this chapter gives a brief introduction to gesture studies and outlines the current views on the relationship between gesture, speech, and language. The second section targets the key questions for the study of the monolingual and bilingual lexicon, and illustrates the methods employed for addressing these questions. It further exemplifies systematic cross-linguistic patterns in gestural behaviour in monolingual and bilingual contexts. The final section discusses some implications of an expanded view of the multilingual lexicon that includes gesture, and outlines directions for future inquiry.Files private
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Gupta, C. N., Calhoun, V. D., Rachkonda, S., Chen, J., Patel, V., Liu, J., Segall, J., Franke, B., Zwiers, M. P., Arias-Vasquez, A., Buitelaar, J., Fisher, S. E., Fernández, G., van Erp, T. G. M., Potkin, S., Ford, J., Matalon, D., McEwen, S., Lee, H. J., Mueller, B. A. and 16 moreGupta, C. N., Calhoun, V. D., Rachkonda, S., Chen, J., Patel, V., Liu, J., Segall, J., Franke, B., Zwiers, M. P., Arias-Vasquez, A., Buitelaar, J., Fisher, S. E., Fernández, G., van Erp, T. G. M., Potkin, S., Ford, J., Matalon, D., McEwen, S., Lee, H. J., Mueller, B. A., Greve, D. N., Andreassen, O., Agartz, I., Gollub, R. L., Sponheim, S. R., Ehrlich, S., Wang, L., Pearlson, G., Glahn, D. S., Sprooten, E., Mayer, A. R., Stephen, J., Jung, R. E., Canive, J., Bustillo, J., & Turner, J. A. (2015). Patterns of gray matter abnormalities in schizophrenia based on an international mega-analysis. Schizophrenia Bulletin, 41(5), 1133-1142. doi:10.1093/schbul/sbu177.
Abstract
Analyses of gray matter concentration (GMC) deficits in patients with schizophrenia (Sz) have identified robust changes throughout the cortex. We assessed the relationships between diagnosis, overall symptom severity, and patterns of gray matter in the largest aggregated structural imaging dataset to date. We performed both source-based morphometry (SBM) and voxel-based morphometry (VBM) analyses on GMC images from 784 Sz and 936 controls (Ct) across 23 scanning sites in Europe and the United States. After correcting for age, gender, site, and diagnosis by site interactions, SBM analyses showed 9 patterns of diagnostic differences. They comprised separate cortical, subcortical, and cerebellar regions. Seven patterns showed greater GMC in Ct than Sz, while 2 (brainstem and cerebellum) showed greater GMC for Sz. The greatest GMC deficit was in a single pattern comprising regions in the superior temporal gyrus, inferior frontal gyrus, and medial frontal cortex, which replicated over analyses of data subsets. VBM analyses identified overall cortical GMC loss and one small cluster of increased GMC in Sz, which overlapped with the SBM brainstem component. We found no significant association between the component loadings and symptom severity in either analysis. This mega-analysis confirms that the commonly found GMC loss in Sz in the anterior temporal lobe, insula, and medial frontal lobe form a single, consistent spatial pattern even in such a diverse dataset. The separation of GMC loss into robust, repeatable spatial patterns across multiple datasets paves the way for the application of these methods to identify subtle genetic and clinical cohort effects.Additional information
http://schizophreniabulletin.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2014/12/21/schbul… -
Hagoort, P., Wassenaar, M., & Brown, C. M. (2003). Syntax-related ERP-effects in Dutch. Cognitive Brain Research, 16(1), 38-50. doi:10.1016/S0926-6410(02)00208-2.
Abstract
In two studies subjects were required to read Dutch sentences that in some cases contained a syntactic violation, in other cases a semantic violation. All syntactic violations were word category violations. The design excluded differential contributions of expectancy to influence the syntactic violation effects. The syntactic violations elicited an Anterior Negativity between 300 and 500 ms. This negativity was bilateral and had a frontal distribution. Over posterior sites the same violations elicited a P600/SPS starting at about 600 ms. The semantic violations elicited an N400 effect. The topographic distribution of the AN was more frontal than the distribution of the classical N400 effect, indicating that the underlying generators of the AN and the N400 are, at least to a certain extent, non-overlapping. Experiment 2 partly replicated the design of Experiment 1, but with differences in rate of presentation and in the distribution of items over subjects, and without semantic violations. The word category violations resulted in the same effects as were observed in Experiment 1, showing that they were independent of some of the specific parameters of Experiment 1. The discussion presents a tentative account of the functional differences in the triggering conditions of the AN and the P600/SPS. -
Hagoort, P., Wassenaar, M., & Brown, C. M. (2003). Real-time semantic compensation in patients with agrammatic comprehension: Electrophysiological evidence for multiple-route plasticity. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 100(7), 4340-4345. doi:10.1073/pnas.0230613100.
Abstract
To understand spoken language requires that the brain provides rapid access to different kinds of knowledge, including the sounds and meanings of words, and syntax. Syntax specifies constraints on combining words in a grammatically well formed manner. Agrammatic patients are deficient in their ability to use these constraints, due to a lesion in the perisylvian area of the languagedominant hemisphere. We report a study on real-time auditory sentence processing in agrammatic comprehenders, examining
their ability to accommodate damage to the language system. We recorded event-related brain potentials (ERPs) in agrammatic comprehenders, nonagrammatic aphasics, and age-matched controls. When listening to sentences with grammatical violations, the agrammatic aphasics did not show the same syntax-related ERP effect as the two other subject groups. Instead, the waveforms of the agrammatic aphasics were dominated by a meaning-related ERP effect, presumably reflecting their attempts to achieve understanding by the use of semantic constraints. These data demonstrate that although agrammatic aphasics are impaired in their ability to exploit syntactic information in real time, they can reduce the consequences of a syntactic deficit by exploiting a semantic route. They thus provide evidence for the compensation of a syntactic deficit by a stronger reliance on another route in mapping
sound onto meaning. This is a form of plasticity that we refer to as multiple-route plasticity. -
Hagoort, P. (2009). The fractionation of spoken language understanding by measuring electrical and magnetic brain signals. In B. C. J. Moore, L. K. Tyler, & W. Marslen-Wilson (
Eds. ), The perception of speech: From sound to meaning (pp. 223-248). New York: Oxford University Press. -
Hagoort, P. (2003). De verloving tussen neurowetenschap en psychologie. In K. Hilberdink (
Ed. ), Interdisciplinariteit in de geesteswetenschappen (pp. 73-81). Amsterdam: KNAW. -
Hagoort, P. (2003). Die einzigartige, grösstenteils aber unbewusste Fähigkeit der Menschen zu sprachlicher Kommunikation. In G. Kaiser (
Ed. ), Jahrbuch 2002-2003 / Wissenschaftszentrum Nordrhein-Westfalen (pp. 33-46). Düsseldorf: Wissenschaftszentrum Nordrhein-Westfalen. -
Hagoort, P. (2003). Functional brain imaging. In W. J. Frawley (
Ed. ), International encyclopedia of linguistics (pp. 142-145). New York: Oxford University Press. -
Hagoort, P. (2003). How the brain solves the binding problem for language: A neurocomputational model of syntactic processing. NeuroImage, 20(suppl. 1), S18-S29. doi:10.1016/j.neuroimage.2003.09.013.
Abstract
Syntax is one of the components in the architecture of language processing that allows the listener/reader to bind single-word information into a unified interpretation of multiword utterances. This paper discusses ERP effects that have been observed in relation to syntactic processing. The fact that these effects differ from the semantic N400 indicates that the brain honors the distinction between semantic and syntactic binding operations. Two models of syntactic processing attempt to account for syntax-related ERP effects. One type of model is serial, with a first phase that is purely syntactic in nature (syntax-first model). The other type of model is parallel and assumes that information immediately guides the interpretation process once it becomes available. This is referred to as the immediacy model. ERP evidence is presented in support of the latter model. Next, an explicit computational model is proposed to explain the ERP data. This Unification Model assumes that syntactic frames are stored in memory and retrieved on the basis of the spoken or written word form input. The syntactic frames associated with the individual lexical items are unified by a dynamic binding process into a structural representation that spans the whole utterance. On the basis of a meta-analysis of imaging studies on syntax, it is argued that the left posterior inferior frontal cortex is involved in binding syntactic frames together, whereas the left superior temporal cortex is involved in retrieval of the syntactic frames stored in memory. Lesion data that support the involvement of this left frontotemporal network in syntactic processing are discussed. -
Hagoort, P. (2003). Interplay between syntax and semantics during sentence comprehension: ERP effects of combining syntactic and semantic violations. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 15(6), 883-899. doi:10.1162/089892903322370807.
Abstract
This study investigated the effects of combined semantic and syntactic violations in relation to the effects of single semantic and single syntactic violations on language-related event-related brain potential (ERP) effects (N400 and P600/ SPS). Syntactic violations consisted of a mismatch in grammatical gender or number features of the definite article and the noun in sentence-internal or sentence-final noun phrases (NPs). Semantic violations consisted of semantically implausible adjective–noun combinations in the same NPs. Combined syntactic and semantic violations were a summation of these two respective violation types. ERPs were recorded while subjects read the sentences with the different types of violations and the correct control sentences. ERP effects were computed relative to ERPs elicited by the sentence-internal or sentence-final nouns. The size of the N400 effect to the semantic violation was increased by an additional syntactic violation (the syntactic boost). In contrast, the size of the P600/ SPS to the syntactic violation was not affected by an additional semantic violation. This suggests that in the absence of syntactic ambiguity, the assignment of syntactic structure is independent of semantic context. However, semantic integration is influenced by syntactic processing. In the sentence-final position, additional global processing consequences were obtained as a result of earlier violations in the sentence. The resulting increase in the N400 amplitude to sentence-final words was independent of the nature of the violation. A speeded anomaly detection task revealed that it takes substantially longer to detect semantic than syntactic anomalies. These results are discussed in relation to the latency and processing characteristics of the N400 and P600/SPS effects. Overall, the results reveal an asymmetry in the interplay between syntax and semantics during on-line sentence comprehension. -
Hagoort, P. (2015). Het talige brein. In A. Aleman, & H. E. Hulshoff Pol (
Eds. ), Beeldvorming van het brein: Imaging voor psychiaters en psychologen (pp. 169-176). Utrecht: De Tijdstroom. -
Hagoort, P. (1989). Processing of lexical ambiguities: a comment on Milberg, Blumstein, and Dworetzky (1987). Brain and Language, 36, 335-348. doi:10.1016/0093-934X(89)90070-9.
Abstract
In a study by Milberg, Blumstein, and Dworetzky (1987), normal control subjects and Wernicke's and Broca's aphasics performed a lexical decision task on the third element of auditorily presented triplets of words with either a word or a nonword as target. In three of the four types of word triplets, the first and the third words were related to one or both meanings of the second word, which was semantically ambiguous. The fourth type of word triplet consisted of three unrelated, unambiguous words, functioning as baseline. Milberg et al. (1987) claim that the results for their control subjects are similar to those reported by Schvaneveldt, Meyer, and Becker's original study (1976) with the same prime types, and so interpret these as evidence for a selective lexical access of the different meanings of ambiguous words. It is argued here that Milberg et al. only partially replicate the Schvaneveldt et al. results. Moreover, the results of Milberg et al. are not fully in line with the selective access hypothesis adopted. Replication of the Milberg et al. (1987) study with Dutch materials, using both a design without and a design with repetition of the same target words for the same subjects led to the original pattern as reported by Schvaneveldt et al. (1976). In the design with four separate presentations of the same target word, a strong repetition effect was found. It is therefore argued that the discrepancy between the Milberg et al. results on the one hand, and the Schvaneveldt et al. results on the other, might be due to the absence of a control for repetition effects in the within-subject design used by Milberg et al. It is concluded that this makes the results for both normal and aphasic subjects in the latter study difficult to interpret in terms of a selective access model for normal processing. -
Hagoort, P. (2009). Reflections on the neurobiology of syntax. In D. Bickerton, & E. Szathmáry (
Eds. ), Biological foundations and origin of syntax (pp. 279-296). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Abstract
This contribution focuses on the neural infrastructure for parsing and syntactic encoding. From an anatomical point of view, it is argued that Broca's area is an ill-conceived notion. Functionally, Broca's area and adjacent cortex (together Broca's complex) are relevant for language, but not exclusively for this domain of cognition. Its role can be characterized as providing the necessary infrastructure for unification (syntactic and semantic). A general proposal, but with required level of computational detail, is discussed to account for the distribution of labor between different components of the language network in the brain.Arguments are provided for the immediacy principle, which denies a privileged status for syntax in sentence processing. The temporal profile of event-related brain potential (ERP) is suggested to require predictive processing. Finally, since, next to speed, diversity is a hallmark of human languages, the language readiness of the brain might not depend on a universal, dedicated neural machinery for syntax, but rather on a shaping of the neural infrastructure of more general cognitive systems (e.g., memory, unification) in a direction that made it optimally suited for the purpose of communication through language. -
Hagoort, P., Baggio, G., & Willems, R. M. (2009). Semantic unification. In M. S. Gazzaniga (
Ed. ), The cognitive neurosciences, 4th ed. (pp. 819-836). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Abstract
Language and communication are about the exchange of meaning. A key feature of understanding and producing language is the construction of complex meaning from more elementary semantic building blocks. The functional characteristics of this semantic unification process are revealed by studies using event related brain potentials. These studies have found that word meaning is assembled into compound meaning in not more than 500 ms. World knowledge, information about the speaker, co-occurring visual input and discourse all have an immediate impact on semantic unification, and trigger similar electrophysiological responses as sentence-internal semantic information. Neuroimaging studies show that a network of brain areas, including the left inferior frontal gyrus, the left superior/middle temporal cortex, the left inferior parietal cortex and, to a lesser extent their right hemisphere homologues are recruited to perform semantic unification. -
Hagoort, P. (2015). Spiegelneuronen. In J. Brockmann (
Ed. ), Wetenschappelijk onkruid: 179 hardnekkige ideeën die vooruitgang blokkeren (pp. 455-457). Amsterdam: Maven Publishing. -
Hagoort, P. (2009). Taalontwikkeling: Meer dan woorden alleen. In M. Evenblij (
Ed. ), Brein in beeld: Beeldvorming bij heersenonderzoek (pp. 53-57). Den Haag: Stichting Bio-Wetenschappen en Maatschappij. -
Hagoort, P., & Levelt, W. J. M. (2009). The speaking brain. Science, 326(5951), 372-373. doi:10.1126/science.1181675.
Abstract
How does intention to speak become the action of speaking? It involves the generation of a preverbal message that is tailored to the requirements of a particular language, and through a series of steps, the message is transformed into a linear sequence of speech sounds (1, 2). These steps include retrieving different kinds of information from memory (semantic, syntactic, and phonological), and combining them into larger structures, a process called unification. Despite general agreement about the steps that connect intention to articulation, there is no consensus about their temporal profile or the role of feedback from later steps (3, 4). In addition, since the discovery by the French physician Pierre Paul Broca (in 1865) of the role of the left inferior frontal cortex in speaking, relatively little progress has been made in understanding the neural infrastructure that supports speech production (5). One reason is that the characteristics of natural language are uniquely human, and thus the neurobiology of language lacks an adequate animal model. But on page 445 of this issue, Sahin et al. (6) demonstrate, by recording neuronal activity in the human brain, that different kinds of linguistic information are indeed sequentially processed within Broca's area.
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