Publications

Abstract

Eye movements made by listeners during language-mediated visual search reveal a strong link between
visual processing and conceptual processing. For example, upon hearing the word for a missing referent
with a characteristic colour (e.g., “strawberry”), listeners tend to fixate a colour-matched distractor (e.g.,
a red plane) more than a colour-mismatched distractor (e.g., a yellow plane). We ask whether these
shifts in visual attention are mediated by the retrieval of lexically stored colour labels. Do children
who do not yet possess verbal labels for the colour attribute that spoken and viewed objects have in
common exhibit language-mediated eye movements like those made by older children and adults?
That is, do toddlers look at a red plane when hearing “strawberry”? We observed that 24-montholds
lacking colour term knowledge nonetheless recognized the perceptual–conceptual commonality
between named and seen objects. This indicates that language-mediated visual search need not
depend on stored labels for concepts.

Abstract

An audio and video corpus of speech addressed to 28 11-month-olds is described. The corpus allows comparisons between adult speech directed towards infants, familiar adults and unfamiliar adult addressees, as well as of caregivers’ word teaching strategies across word classes. Summary data show that infant-directed speech differed more from speech to unfamiliar than familiar adults; that word teaching strategies for nominals versus verbs and adjectives differed; that mothers mostly addressed infants with multi-word utterances; and that infants’ vocabulary size was unrelated to speech rate, but correlated positively with predominance of continuous caregiver speech (not of isolated words) in the input.

Abstract

The nature of children’s early lexical processing was investigated by asking what information 36-month-olds access and use when instructed to find a known but absent referent. Children readily retrieved stored knowledge about characteristic color, i.e. when asked to find an object with a typical color (e.g. strawberry), children tended to fixate more upon an object that had the same (e.g. red plane) as opposed to a different (e.g. yellow plane) color. They did so regardless of the fact that they have had plenty of time to recognize the pictures for what they are, i.e. planes not strawberries. These data represent the first demonstration that language-mediated shifts of overt attention in young children can be driven by individual stored visual attributes of known words that mismatch on most other dimensions. The finding suggests that lexical processing and overt attention are strongly linked from an early age.

Abstract

The Possible Word Constraint limits the number of lexical candidates considered in speech recognition by stipulating that input should be parsed into a string of lexically viable chunks. For instance, an isolated single consonant is not a feasible word candidate. Any segmentation containing such a chunk is disfavored. Five experiments using the head-turn preference procedure investigated whether, like adults, 12-month-olds observe this constraint in word recognition. In Experiments 1 and 2, infants were familiarized with target words (e.g., rush), then tested on lists of nonsense items containing these words in “possible” (e.g., “niprush” [nip + rush]) or “impossible” positions (e.g., “prush” [p + rush]). The infants listened significantly longer to targets in “possible” versus “impossible” contexts when targets occurred at the end of nonsense items (rush in “prush”), but not when they occurred at the beginning (tan in “tance”). In Experiments 3 and 4, 12-month-olds were similarly familiarized with target words, but test items were real words in sentential contexts (win in “wind” versus “window”). The infants listened significantly longer to words in the “possible” condition regardless of target location. Experiment 5 with targets at the beginning of isolated real words (e.g., win in “wind”) replicated Experiment 2 in showing no evidence of viability effects in beginning position. Taken together, the findings suggest that, in situations in which 12-month-olds are required to rely on their word segmentation abilities, they give evidence of observing lexical viability constraints in the way that they parse fluent speech.

Abstract

Studies exploring the role of neural oscillations in cognition have revealed sustained increases in alpha-band (∼8–14 Hz) power during the delay period of delayed-recognition short-term memory tasks. These increases have been proposed to reflect the inhibition, for example, of cortical areas representing task-irrelevant information, or of potentially interfering representations from previous trials. Another possibility, however, is that elevated delay-period alpha-band power (DPABP) reflects the selection and maintenance of information, rather than, or in addition to, the inhibition of task-irrelevant information. In the present study, we explored these possibilities using a delayed-recognition paradigm in which the presence and task relevance of shape information was systematically manipulated across trial blocks and electroencephalographic was used to measure alpha-band power. In the first trial block, participants remembered locations marked by identical black circles. The second block featured the same instructions, but locations were marked by unique shapes. The third block featured the same stimulus presentation as the second, but with pretrial instructions indicating, on a trial-by-trial basis, whether memory for shape or location was required, the other dimension being irrelevant. In the final block, participants remembered the unique pairing of shape and location for each stimulus. Results revealed minimal DPABP in each of the location-memory conditions, whether locations were marked with identical circles or with unique task-irrelevant shapes. In contrast, alpha-band power increases were observed in both the shape-memory condition, in which location was task irrelevant, and in the critical final condition, in which both shape and location were task relevant. These results provide support for the proposal that alpha-band oscillations reflect the retention of shape information and/or shape–location associations in short-term memory.

Abstract

A visual fixation study tested whether seven-month-olds can discriminate between different talkers. The infants were first habituated to talkers producing sentences in either a familiar or unfamiliar language, then heard test sentences from previously unheard speakers, either in the language used for habituation, or in another language. When the language at test mismatched that in habituation, infants always noticed the change. When language remained constant and only talker altered, however, infants detected the change only if the language was the native tongue. Adult listeners with a different native tongue than the infants did not reproduce the discriminability patterns shown by the infants, and infants detected neither voice nor language changes in reversed speech; both these results argue against explanation of the native-language voice discrimination in terms of acoustic properties of the stimuli. The ability to identify talkers is, like many other perceptual abilities, strongly influenced by early life experience.

Abstract

Background: Autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are characterised by social and communication difficulties in day-to-day life, including problems in recognising emotions. However, experimental investigations of emotion recognition ability in ASD have been equivocal; hampered by small sample sizes, narrow IQ range and over-focus on the visual modality. Methods: We tested 99 adolescents (mean age 15;6 years, mean IQ 85) with an ASD and 57 adolescents without an ASD (mean age 15;6 years, mean IQ 88) on a facial emotion recognition task and two vocal emotion recognition tasks (one verbal; one non-verbal). Recognition of happiness, sadness, fear, anger, surprise and disgust were tested. Using structural equation modelling, we conceptualised emotion recognition ability as a multimodal construct, measured by the three tasks. We examined how the mean levels of recognition of the six emotions differed by group (ASD vs. non-ASD) and IQ (>= 80 vs. < 80). Results: There was no significant difference between groups for the majority of emotions and analysis of error patterns suggested that the ASD group were vulnerable to the same pattern of confusions between emotions as the non-ASD group. However, recognition ability was significantly impaired in the ASD group for surprise. IQ had a strong and significant effect on performance for the recognition of all six emotions, with higher IQ adolescents outperforming lower IQ adolescents. Conclusions: The findings do not suggest a fundamental difficulty with the recognition of basic emotions in adolescents with ASD.

Abstract

Social structure in human societies is underpinned by the variable expression of ideas about relatedness between different types of kin. We express these ideas through language in our kin terminology: to delineate who is kin and who is not, and to attach meanings to the types of kin labels associated with different individuals. Cross-culturally, there is a regular and restricted range of patterned variation in kin terminologies, and to date, our understanding of this diversity has been hampered by inadequate techniques for dealing with the hierarchical relatedness of languages (Galton’s Problem). Here I use maximum-likelihood and Bayesian phylogenetic comparative methods to begin to tease apart the processes underlying the evolution of kin terminologies in the Austronesian language family, focusing on terms for siblings. I infer (1) the probable ancestral states and (2) evolutionary models of change for the semantic distinctions of relative age (older/younger sibling) and relative sex (same sex/opposite-sex). Analyses show that early Austronesian languages contained the relative-age, but not the relative-sex distinction; the latter was reconstructed firmly only for the ancestor of Eastern Malayo-Polynesian languages. Both distinctions were best characterized by evolutionary models where the gains and losses of the semantic distinctions were equally likely. A multi-state model of change examined how the relative-sex distinction could be elaborated and found that some transitions in kin terms were not possible: jumps from absence to heavily elaborated were very unlikely, as was piece-wise dismantling of elaborate distinctions. Cultural ideas about what types of kin distinctions are important can be embedded in the semantics of language; using a phylogenetic evolutionary framework we can understand how those distinctions in meaning change through time.

Abstract

This special issue “Evolutionary Approaches to Cross-Cultural Anthropology” brings together scholars from the fields of behavioral ecology, evolutionary psychology, and cultural evolution whose cross-cultural work draws on evolutionary theory and methods. The papers here are a subset of those presented at a symposium we organized for the 2011 meeting of the Society for Cross-Cultural Research held in Charleston, South Carolina. Collectively, our authors show how an engagement with cultural variation has enriched evolutionary anthropology, and these papers showcase how cross-cultural research can benefit from the theoretical and methodological contributions of an evolutionary approach.

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Cognitive consequences at school age associated with prenatal methylmercury (MeHg) exposure may need to take into account nutritional and sociodemographic cofactors as well as relevant genetic polymorphisms. METHODS: A subsample (n = 1,311) of the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (Bristol, UK) was selected, and mercury (Hg) concentrations were measured in freeze-dried umbilical cord tissue as a measure of MeHg exposure. A total of 1135 children had available data on 247 single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) within relevant genes, as well as the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children Intelligence Quotient (IQ) scores at age 8 years. Multivariate regression models were used to assess the associations between MeHg exposure and IQ and to determine possible gene-environment interactions. RESULTS: Hg concentrations indicated low background exposures (mean = 26 ng/g, standard deviation = 13). Log10-transformed Hg was positively associated with IQ, which attenuated after adjustment for nutritional and sociodemographic cofactors. In stratified analyses, a reverse association was found in higher social class families (for performance IQ, P value for interaction = 0.0013) among whom there was a wider range of MeHg exposure. Among 40 SNPs showing nominally significant main effects, MeHg interactions were detected for rs662 (paraoxonase 1) and rs1042838 (progesterone receptor) (P <} 0.05) and for rs3811647 (transferrin) and rs2049046 (brain-derived neurotrophic factor) (P {< 0.10). CONCLUSIONS: In this population with a low level of MeHg exposure, there were only equivocal associations between MeHg exposure and adverse neuropsychological outcomes. Heterogeneities in several relevant genes suggest possible genetic predisposition to MeHg neurotoxicity in a substantial proportion of the population. Future studies need to address this possibility.

Abstract

The current study investigates auditory-motor coupling in musically trained participants using a Stroop-type task that required the execution of simple finger sequences according to aurally presented number sequences (e.g., "2," " 4," "5," "3," "1"). Digital remastering was used to manipulate the pitch contour of the number sequences such that they were either congruent or incongruent with respect to the resulting action sequence. Conservatoire-level violinists showed a strong effect of congruency manipulation (increased response time for incongruent vs. congruent trials), in comparison to a control group of non-musicians. In Experiment 2, this paradigm was used to determine whether pedagogical background would influence this effect in a group of young violinists. Suzuki-trained violinists differed significantly from those with no musical background, while traditionally-trained violinists did not. The findings extend previous research in this area by demonstrating that obligatory audio-motor coupling is directly related to a musicians' expertise on their instrument of study and is influenced by pedagogy.

Abstract

Both emotion and reward are primary modulators of cognition: Emotional word content enhances word processing, and reward expectancy similarly amplifies cognitive processing from the perceptual up to the executive control level. Here, we investigate how these primary regulators of cognition interact. We studied how the anticipation of gain or loss modulates the neural time course (event-related potentials, ERPs) related to processing of emotional words. Participants performed a semantic categorization task on emotional and neutral words, which were preceded by a cue indicating that performance could lead to monetary gain or loss. Emotion-related and reward-related effects occurred in different time windows, did not interact statistically, and showed different topographies. This speaks for an independence of reward expectancy and the processing of emotional word content. Therefore, privileged processing given to emotionally valenced words seems immune to short-term modulation of reward. Models of language comprehension should be able to incorporate effects of reward and emotion on language processing, and the current study argues for an architecture in which reward and emotion do not share a common neurobiological mechanism

Abstract

Theorists of language have argued that co-­speech hand gestures are an
intentional part of social communication. The present study provides evidence for these
claims by showing that speakers adjust their gesture use according to their perceived relevance to the audience. Participants were asked to read about items that were and were not useful in a wilderness survival scenario, under the pretense that they would then
explain (on camera) what they learned to one of two different audiences. For one audience (a group of college students in a dormitory orientation activity), the stakes of successful
communication were low;; for the other audience (a group of students preparing for a
rugged camping trip in the mountains), the stakes were high. In their explanations to the camera, participants in the high stakes condition produced three times as many
representational gestures, and spent three times as much time gesturing, than participants in the low stakes condition. This study extends previous research by showing that the anticipated consequences of one’s communication—namely, the degree to which information may be useful to an intended recipient—influences speakers’ use of gesture.

Abstract

In a recent Cognition paper (Cognition 85 (2002) B21), Bornkessel, Schlesewsky, and Friederici report ERP data that they claim “show that online processing difficulties induced by word order variations in German cannot be attributed to the relative infrequency of the constructions in question, but rather appear to reflect the application of grammatical principles during parsing” (p. B21). In this commentary we demonstrate that the posited contrast between grammatical principles and construction (in)frequency as sources of parsing problems is artificial because it is based on factually incorrect assumptions about the grammar of German and on inaccurate corpus frequency data concerning the German constructions involved.

Abstract

Science is currently under-utilized as a tool for effective policy and program design. A key part of this research-to-practice gap lies in the ineffectiveness of current models of science translation. Drawing on theory and methods from anthropology and cognitive linguistics, this study explores the role of cultural models and metaphor in the practice of science communication and translation. Qualitative interviews and group sessions, along with quantitative framing experiments, were used to design and test the effectiveness of a set of explanatory metaphors in translating the science of executive function. Developmental and cognitive scientists typically define executive function as a multi-dimensional set of related abilities that include working memory, inhibitory control, and cognitive flexibility. The study finds one metaphor in particular—the brain's air traffic control system—to be effective in bridging gaps between expert and public understandings on this issue and in so doing improving the accessibility of scientific information to members of the public as they reason about public policy issues. Findings suggest both a specific tool that can be used in efforts to translate the science of executive function and a theory and methodology that can be employed to design and test metaphors as communication devices on other science and social issues.

Abstract

In this paper we report on a visual world eye-tracking experiment that investigated the differing abilities of adults and children to use referential scene information during reanalysis to overcome lexical biases during sentence processing. The results showed that adults incorporated aspects of the referential scene into their parse as soon as it became apparent that a test sentence was syntactically ambiguous, suggesting they considered the two alternative analyses in parallel. In contrast, the children appeared not to reanalyze their initial analysis, even over shorter distances than have been investigated in prior research. We argue that this reflects the children's over-reliance on bottom-up, lexical cues to interpretation. The implications for the development of parsing routines are discussed

Abstract

This paper considers the use and representation of Australian hypocoristics (e.g., choccie → chocolate, arvo → afternoon). One-hundred-and-fifteen adult speakers of Australian English aged 17–84 years generated as many tokens of hypocoristics as they could in 10 min. The resulting corpus was analysed along a number of dimensions in an attempt to identify (i) general age- and gender-related trends in hypocoristic knowledge and use, and (ii) linguistic properties of each hypocoristic class. Following Bybee’s (1985, 1995) lexical network approach, we conclude that Australian hypocoristics are the product of the same linguistic processes that capture other inflectional morphological processes.

Abstract

The present paper reports on a study that investigated the role of procedural and declarative memory in the acquisition of Finnish past tense morphology. Two competing models were tested. Ullman's (2004) declarative/procedural model predicts that procedural memory supports the acquisition of regular morphology, whereas declarative memory supports the acquisition of irregular morphology. In contrast, single-route approaches predict that declarative memory should support lexical learning, which in turn should predict morphological acquisition. One-hundred and twenty-four (N=124) monolingual Finnish-speaking children aged 4;0–6;7 completed tests of procedural and declarative memory, tests of vocabulary knowledge and nonverbal ability, and a test of past test knowledge. The results best supported the single-route approach, suggesting that this account best extends to languages that possess greater morphological complexity than English.

Abstract

Eisenberg (2002) presents data from an experiment investigating three- and four-year-old children's comprehension of restrictive relative clauses (RC). From the results she argues, contrary to Hamburger & Crain (1982), that children do not have discourse knowledge of the felicity conditions of RCs before acquiring the syntax of relativization. This note evaluates this conclusion on the basis of the methodology used, and proposes that an account of syntactic development needs to be sensitive to the real-time processing requirements acquisition places on the learner.

Abstract

This article reviews research that has investigated the role of verbal working memory (VWM) in sentence comprehension in both typical and atypical developmental populations. Two theoretical approaches that specify different roles for VWM in sentence comprehension are considered: (i) capacity-limit approaches, which treat VWM as a theoretical primitive that causally constrains language processing and acquisition, and (ii) the experience-based approach, which argues that VWM is an emergent property of long-term linguistic knowledge. The empirical literature relevant to these different approaches is then reviewed. Although there has been considerable recent research on the topic, it is concluded that the current role of working memory in sentence comprehension in development is unclear, calling for a greater number of controlled systematic developmental studies on the topic.

Abstract

This research investigated the developing inter-relationships between language, graphic symbolism and symbolic play both concurrently and longitudinally from the fourth to the fifth year of childhood. Sixty children (n = 60) aged between 3 and 4 years completed multiple assessments of language and assessments of graphic symbolism, symbolic play and non-verbal intelligence. A year later, 31 children (n = 31) were re-tested using the same assessments. The findings revealed that skills within each symbolic domain were inter-related during the fourth year, appearing to develop in a domain-general type fashion based upon a common underlying symbolic mechanism. However, between the fourth and the fifth years, only language had predictive validity, suggesting a shift towards the verbal mediation of symbolic play and graphic symbolism as language becomes progressively internalized (Vygotsky, 1962, 1978).

Abstract

Gestures that spontaneously accompany speech convey information coordinated with the concurrent speech. There has been considerable theoretical disagreement about the process by which this informational coordination is achieved. Some theories predict that the information encoded in gesture is not influenced by how information is verbally expressed. However, others predict that gestures encode only what is encoded in speech. This paper investigates this issue by comparing informational coordination between speech and gesture across different languages. Narratives in Turkish, Japanese, and English were elicited using an animated cartoon as the stimulus. It was found that gestures used to express the same motion events were influenced simultaneously by (1) how features of motion events were expressed in each language, and (2) spatial information in the stimulus that was never verbalized. From this, it is concluded that gestures are generated from spatio-motoric processes that interact on-line with the speech production process. Through the interaction, spatio-motoric information to be expressed is packaged into chunks that are verbalizable within a processing unit for speech formulation. In addition, we propose a model of speech and gesture production as one of a class of frameworks that are compatible with the data.

Abstract

In the first, critical part of this study, a small sample of simple German sentences with their empirically determined pitch contours is used to demonstrate the incorrectness of numerous currently hold views of German sentence intonation. In the second, more constructive part, several interrogative sentence types are analysed and an attempt is made to show that intonation, besides other functions, indicates the permantently changing 'thematic score' in on-going discourse as well as certain validity claims.

Abstract

Nannten die Erwachsenen irgend einen Gegenstand und wandten sie sich dabei ihm zu, so nahm ich das wahr und ich begriff, daß der Gegenstand durch die Laute, die sie aussprachen, bezeichnet wurde, da sie auf ihn hinweisen wollten. Dies aber entnahm ich aus ihren Gebärden, der natürlichen Sprache aller Völker, der Sprache, die durch Mienen- und Augenspiel, durch die Bewegungen der Glieder und den Klang der Stimme die Empfindungen der Seele anzeigt, wenn diese irgend etwas begehrt, oder festhält, oder zurückweist, oder flieht. So lernte ich nach und nach verstehen, welche Dinge die Wörter bezeichneten, die ich wieder und wieder, an ihren bestimmten Stellen in verschiedenen Sätzen, aussprechen hörte. Und ich brachte, als nun mein Mund sich an diese Zeichen gewöhnt hatte, durch sie meine Wünsche zum Ausdruck. (Augustinus, Confessiones I, 8) Dies ist das Zitat eines Zitats: Zu Beginn der Philosophischen Untersuchungen führt Ludwig Wittgenstein diese Stelle aus Augustinus’ Bekenntnissen an, in denen dieser beschreibt, wie er seiner Erinnerung nach seine Muttersprache gelernt hat (Wittgenstein führt den lateinischen Text an und gibt dann seine Übersetzung, hier ist nur letztere zitiert). Sie bilden den Ausgangspunkt für Wittgensteins berühmte Überlegungen über die Funktionsweise der menschlichen Sprache und für seine Idee des Sprachspiels. Nun weiß man nicht, wie genau sich Augustinus wirklich erinnert und ob er sich all dies, wie so viel, was seither über den Spracherwerb gesagt und geschrieben wurde, bloß zurechtgelegt hat, in der Meinung, so müsse es sein. Aber anders als so vieles, was seither über den Spracherwerb gesagt und geschrieben wurde, ist es wunderbar formuliert und enthält zwei Momente, die in der wissenschaftlichen Forschung bis heute, wenn denn nicht bestritten, so doch oft nicht gesehen und dort, wo sie denn gesehen, nicht wirklich ernstgenommen wurden: A. Wir lernen die Sprache in der alltäglichen Kommunikation mit der sozialen Umgebung. B. Um eine Sprache zu lernen, genügt es nicht, diese Sprache zu hören; vielmehr benötigen wir eine Fülle an begleitender Information, wie hier Gestik und Mimik der Erwachsenen. Beides möchte man eigentlich für selbstverständlich halten. Herodot erzählt die berühmte Geschichte des Pharaos Psammetich, der wissen wollte, was die erste und eigentliche Sprache der Menschen sei, und befahl, zwei Neugeborene aufwachsen zu lassen, ohne dass jemand zu ihnen spricht; das erste Wort, das sie äußern, klang, so erzählt Herodot, wie das phrygische Wort für Brot, und so nahm man denn an, die Ursprache des Menschen sei das Phrygische. In dieser Vorstellung vom Spracherwerb spielt der Input aus der sozialen Umgebung nur insofern eine Rolle, als die eigentliche, von Geburt an vorhandene Sprache durch eine andere verdrängt werden kann: Kinder, die in einer englischsprachigen Umgebung aufwachsen, sprechen nicht die Ursprache. Diese Theorie gilt heute als obsolet. Sie ist aber in ihrer Einschätzung vom relativen Gewicht dessen, was an sprachlichem Wissen von Anfang an vorhanden ist, und dem, was der sozialen Umgebung entnommen werden muss, manchen neueren Theorien des Spracherwerbs nicht ganz fern: In der Chomsky’schen Idee der Universalgrammatik, theoretische Grundlage eines wesentlichen Teils der modernen Spracherwerbsforschung, ist „die Sprache” hauptsächlich etwas Angeborenes, insoweit gleich für alle Menschen und vom jeweiligen Input unabhängig. Das, was das Kind oder, beim Zweitspracherwerb, der erwachsene Lerner an Sprachlichem aus seiner Umgebung erfährt, wird nicht genutzt, um daraus bestimmte Regelhaftigkeiten abzuleiten und sich diese anzueignen; der Input fungiert eher als eine Art externer Auslöser für latent bereits vorhandenes Wissen. Für das Erlernen des Wortschatzes gilt dies sicher nicht. Es kann nicht angeboren sein, dass der Mond luna heißt. Für andere Bereiche der Sprache ist das Ausmaß des Angeborenen aber durchaus umstritten. Bei dieser Denkweise gilt das unter A Gesagte nicht. Die meisten modernen Spracherwerbsforscher schreiben dem Input ein wesentlich höheres Gewicht zu: Wir kopieren die charakteristischen Eigenschaften eines bestimmten sprachlichen Systems, indem wir den Input analysieren, um so die ihm zugrundeliegenden Regularitäten abzuleiten. Der Input tritt uns in Form von Schallfolgen (oder Gesten und später geschriebenen Zeichen) entgegen, die von anderen, die das System beherrschen, zu kommunikativen Zwecken verwendet werden. Diese Schallfolgen müssen die Lernenden in kleinere Einheiten zerlegen, diese mit Bedeutungen versehen und nach den Regularitäten abklopfen, denen gemäß sie sich zu komplexeren Ausdrücken verbinden lassen. Dies – und vieles andere – ist es, was das dem Menschen angeborene Sprachvermögen leistet, keine andere Spezies kann es (einem Pferd kann man so viel Chinesisch vorspielen, wie man will, es wird es nicht lernen). Aber auch wir könnten es nicht, wenn wir nur den Schall hätten. Wenn man, in einer Abwandlung des Psammetich’schen Versuchs, jemanden in ein Zimmer einsperren und tagaus tagein mit Chinesisch beschallen und im Übrigen gut versorgen würde, so würde er es, gleich ob als Kind oder als Erwachsener, nicht lernen. Vielleicht würde er einige strukturelle Eigenschaften des Schallstroms ausfindig machen; aber er würde auch nach Jahren kein Chinesisch können. Man benötigt den Schallstrom als sinnlich fassbaren Ausdruck der zugrundeliegenden Sprache, und man benötigt all die Informationen, die man der jeweiligen Redesituation oder aber seinem bereits vorhandenen anderweitigen Wissen entnehmen kann. Augustinus hat beides radikal vereinfacht; aber im Prinzip hat er Recht, und man sollte daher von der Spracherwerbsforschung erwarten, dass sie dies in Rechnung stellt. Das tut sie aber selten. Soweit sie überhaupt aus dem Gehäuse der Theorie tritt und sich den tatsächlichen Verlauf des Spracherwerbs anschaut, konzentriert sie sich weithin auf das, was die Kinder selbst sagen – dazu dienen ausgedehnte Corpora –, oder aber sie untersucht in experimentellen Settings, wie Kinder bestimmte Wörter oder Strukturen verstehen oder auch nicht verstehen. Das hat auch, wenn denn gut gemacht, einen hohen Aufschlusswert. Aber die eigentliche Verarbeitung des Inputs im doppelten Sinne – Schallwellen und Parallelinformation – wird selten in den Mittelpunkt des Interesses gerückt. Dies führt zu eigentümlichen Verzerrungen. So betrachtet man in der Spracherwerbsforschung vor allem deklarative Hauptsätze. Ein nicht unwesentlicher Teil dessen, was Kinder hören, besteht aber aus Imperativen („Tu das!“, „Tu das nicht!“). In solchen Imperativen gibt es normalerweise kein Subjekt. Ein intelligentes Kind muss daher zu dem Schluss kommen, dass das Deutsche in einem nicht unwesentlichen Teil seiner grammatischen Strukturen eine „pro drop-Sprache” ist, d.h. eine Sprache, in dem man das Subjekt weglassen kann. Kein Linguist käme auf diese Idee; sie entspricht aber den tatsächlichen Verhältnissen, und dies schlägt sich in dem Input, den das Kind verarbeiten muss, nieder. Dieses Heft befasst sich mit einer Spracherwerbssituation, in der – anders als beispielsweise bei einem Gespräch am Frühstückstisch – der Input in seiner doppelten Form gut zu überschauen ist, ohne dass die Situation, wie etwa bei einem kontrollierten Experiment, unnatürlich und der normalen Lernumgebung ferne wäre: mit dem Anschauen, Vorlesen und Lesen von Kinderbüchern. Man kann sich eine solche Situation als eine natürliche Ausweitung dessen vorstellen, was Augustinus beschreibt: Die Kinder hören, was die Erwachsenen sagen, und ihre Aufmerksamkeit wird auf bestimmte Dinge gerichtet, während sie hören und schauen – nur geht es hier nicht um einzelne Wörter, sondern um komplexe Ausdrücke und um komplexe, aber dennoch überschaubare begleitende Informationen. Nun haben Kinderbücher in der Spracherwerbsforschung durchaus eine Rolle gespielt. Dabei dienen sie – sei es als reine Folge von Bildern, sei es mit Text oder gar nur als Text – aber meistens nur als eine Art Vorlage für die Sprachproduktion der Kinder: Sie sollen aus der Vorlage eine Geschichte ableiten und in ihren eigenen Worten erzählen. Das bekannteste, aber keineswegs das einzige Beispiel sind die von Michael Bamberg, Ruth Berman und Dan Slobin in den 1980er Jahren initiierten „frog stories” – Nacherzählungen einer einfachen Bildgeschichte, die inzwischen in zahlreichen Sprachen vorliegen und viele Aufschlüsse über die unterschiedlichsten Aspekte der sich entwickelnden Sprachbeherrschung, von der Flexionsmorphologie bis zur Textstruktur, gebracht haben. Das ist gut und sinnvoll; aber im Grunde müsste man einen Schritt weiter gehen, nämlich gleichsam wir durch ein Mikroskop zu schauen, wie sich die Kinder ihre Regularitäten aus der Interaktion ableiten. Dies würde unsere Vorstellungen über den Verlauf des Spracherwerbs und die Gesetzlichkeiten, nach denen er erfolgt, wesentlich bereichern, vielleicht auf eine ganz neue Basis stellen. Die Beiträge dieses Heftes geben dafür eine Reihe von Beispielen, von denen nur ein kleines, aber besonders schlagendes erwähnt werden soll. Es gibt zahlreiche, auf Bildgeschichten beruhende Analysen, in denen untersucht wird, wie Kinder eine bestimmte Person oder eine Sache im fortlaufenden Diskurs benennen – ob sie etwa definite und indefinite Nominalausdrücke (ein Junge – der Junge), lexikalische oder pronominale Nominalphrasen (der Junge – er) oder gar leere Elemente (der Junge wacht auf und 0 schaut nach seinem Hund) richtig verwenden können. Das Bild, das die Forschung in diesem wesentlichen Teil der Sprachbeherrschung heute bietet, ist alles andere als einheitlich. So umfassen die Ansichten darüber, wann die Definit-Indefinit-Unterscheidung gemeistert wird, den größten Teil der Kindheit, je nachdem, welche Untersuchungen man zu Rate zieht. In dem Aufsatz von Katrin Dammann-Thedens wird deutlich, dass Kindern in einem bestimmen Alter oft überhaupt nicht klar ist, dass eine bestimmte Person, eine bestimmte Sache auf fortlaufenden Bildern dieselbe ist – auch wenn sie ähnlich aussieht –, und das ist bei Licht besehen ja auch keine triviale Frage. Diese Beobachtungen werfen ein ganz neues Licht auf die Idee der referentiellen Kontinuität im Diskurs und ihren Ausdruck durch nominale Ausdrücke wie die eben genannten. Vielleicht haben wir ganz falsche Vorstellungen darüber, wie Kinder die begleitende Information – hier durch die Bilder einer Geschichte geliefert – verstehen und damit für den Spracherwerb verarbeiten. Derlei Beobachtungen sind zunächst einmal etwas Punktuelles, keine Antworten, sondern Hinweise auf Dinge, die man bedenken muss. Aber ihre Analyse, und allgemeiner, ein genauerer Blick auf das, was sich tatsächlich abspielt, wenn Kinder sich Kinderbücher anschauen, mag uns vielleicht zu einem wesentlich tieferen Verständnis dessen führen, was beim Erwerb einer Sprache tatsächlich geschieht.

Abstract

Nobel's legacy, or the metamorphosis of what is idealistic Ever since the first Nobel prize in literature was awarded to Prudhomme in 1901, the decisions of the Swedish Academy have been subject to criticism. What is surprising in the changing decision policy as well as in its criticism is the fact that Alfred Nobel's original intentions are hardly ever taken into account: the Nobel prize is a philanthropic prize, it is not meant to select and honour the most eminent literary work but the work with maximal benefit to human beings. What is even more surprising is the fact that no one seems to care that the donator's Last Will is regularly broken.

Abstract

In this article, we discuss the implications of the fact that adult second language learners (outside the classroom) universally develop a well-structured, efficient and simple form of language–the Basic Variety (BV). Three questions are asked as to (1) the structural properties of the BV, (2) the status of these properties and (3) why some structural properties of ‘fully fledged’ languages are more complex. First, we characterize the BV in four respects: its lexical repertoire, the principles according to which utterances are structured, and temporality and spatiality expressed. The organizational principles proposed are small in number, and interact. We analyse this interaction, describing how the BV is put to use in various complex verbal tasks, in order to establish both what its communicative potentialities are, and also those discourse contexts where the constraints come into conflict and where the variety breaks down. This latter phenomenon provides a partial answer to the third question,concerning the relative complexity of ‘fully fledged’ languages–they have devices to deal with such cases. As for the second question, it is argued firstly that the empirically established continuity of the adult acquisition process precludes any assignment of the BV to a mode of linguistic expression (e.g., ‘protolanguage’) distinct from that of ‘fully fledged’ languages and, moreover, that the organizational constraints of the BV belong to the core attributes of the human language capacity, whereas a number of complexifications not attested in the BV are less central properties of this capacity. Finally, it is shown that the notion of feature strength, as used in recent versions of Generative Grammar, allows a straightforward characterization of the BV as a special case of an I-language, in the sense of this theory. Under this perspective, the acquisition of an Ilanguage beyond the BV can essentially be described as a change in feature strength.

Abstract

Warning others about unexpected negative action outcomes is a paradigm case of communicative helping and prospective action understanding. The current study addressed the ontogeny of warning in infants’ gestural communication. We found that 12- and 18-month-olds (n = 84) spontaneously warned an adult by pointing out to her an aversive object hidden in her way (Problem condition). In control conditions the object was either positive (No Problem condition) or the adult had witnessed its’ placing (Problem known condition), which resulted in significantly less pointing. Results show that infants intervene spontaneously and with foresight through communication, in order to help others avoid a problem before it has occurred. These acts of warning entail an understanding of others’ negatively defined goals (to avoid an outcome) and their incorrect representations of reality. Findings support theories of altruism and social-pragmatic competencies in infancy.

Abstract

A contentious issue in memory research is whether verbal short-term memory (STM) depends on a neural system specifically dedicated to the temporary maintenance of information, or instead relies on the same brain areas subserving the comprehension and production of language. In this study, we examined a large sample of adults with acquired brain lesions to identify the critical neural substrates underlying verbal STM and the relationship between verbal STM and language processing abilities. We found that patients with damage to selective regions of left perisylvian cortex – specifically the inferior frontal and posterior temporal sectors – were impaired on auditory–verbal STM performance (digit span), as well as on tests requiring the production and/or comprehension of language. These results support the conclusion that verbal STM and language processing are mediated by the same areas of left perisylvian cortex.

Abstract

Why does chanting, drumming or dancing together make people feel united? Here we investigate the neural mechanisms underlying interpersonal synchrony and its subsequent effects on prosocial behavior among synchronized individuals. We hypothesized that areas of the brain associated with the processing of reward would be active when individuals experience synchrony during drumming, and that these reward signals would increase prosocial behavior toward this synchronous drum partner. 18 female non-musicians were scanned with functional magnetic resonance imaging while they drummed a rhythm, in alternating blocks, with two different experimenters: one drumming in-synchrony and the other out-of-synchrony relative to the participant. In the last scanning part, which served as the experimental manipulation for the following prosocial behavioral test, one of the experimenters drummed with one half of the participants in-synchrony and with the other out-of-synchrony. After scanning, this experimenter "accidentally" dropped eight pencils, and the number of pencils collected by the participants was used as a measure of prosocial commitment. Results revealed that participants who mastered the novel rhythm easily before scanning showed increased activity in the caudate during synchronous drumming. The same area also responded to monetary reward in a localizer task with the same participants. The activity in the caudate during experiencing synchronous drumming also predicted the number of pencils the participants later collected to help the synchronous experimenter of the manipulation run. In addition, participants collected more pencils to help the experimenter when she had drummed in-synchrony than out-of-synchrony during the manipulation run. By showing an overlap in activated areas during synchronized drumming and monetary reward, our findings suggest that interpersonal synchrony is related to the brain's reward system.

Abstract

People tend to associate the abstract concepts of “good” and “bad” with their fluent and disfluent sides of space, as determined by their natural handedness or by experimental manipulation (Casasanto, 2011). Here we investigated influences of spatial perspective taking on the spatialization of “good” and “bad.” In the first experiment, participants indicated where a schematically drawn cartoon character would locate “good” and “bad” stimuli. Right-handers tended to assign “good” to the right and “bad” to the left side of egocentric space when the character shared their spatial perspective, but when the character was rotated 180° this spatial mapping was reversed: good was assigned to the character’s right side, not the participant’s. The tendency to spatialize valence from the character’s perspective was stronger in the second experiment, when participants were shown a full-featured photograph of the character. In a third experiment, most participants not only spatialized “good” and “bad” from the character’s perspective, they also based their judgments on a salient attribute of the character’s body (an injured hand) rather than their own body. Taking another’s spatial perspective encourages people to compute space-valence mappings using an allocentric frame of reference, based on the fluency with which the other person could perform motor actions with their right or left hand. When people reason from their own spatial perspective, their judgments depend, in part, on the specifics of their bodies; when people reason from someone else’s perspective, their judgments may depend on the specifics of the other person’s body, instead. - See more at: http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00266

Abstract

The ability to extract word forms from continuous speech is a prerequisite for constructing a vocabulary and emerges in the first year of life. Electrophysiological (ERP) studies of speech segmentation by 9- to 12-month-old listeners in several languages have found a left-localized negativity linked to word onset as a marker of word detection. We report an ERP study showing significant evidence of speech segmentation in Dutch-learning 7-month-olds. In contrast to the left-localized negative effect reported with older infants, the observed overall mean effect had a positive polarity. Inspection of individual results revealed two participant sub-groups: a majority showing a positive-going response, and a minority showing the left negativity observed in older age groups. We retested participants at age three, on vocabulary comprehension and word and sentence production. On every test, children who at 7 months had shown the negativity associated with segmentation of words from speech outperformed those who had produced positive-going brain responses to the same input. The earlier that infants show the left-localized brain responses typically indicating detection of words in speech, the better their early childhood language skills.

Abstract

In spoken language, pitch accent can mark certain information as focus, whereby more attentional resources are allocated to the focused information. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, this study examined whether pitch accent, used for marking focus, recruited general attention networks during sentence comprehension. In a language task, we independently manipulated the prosody and semantic/pragmatic congruence of sentences. We found that semantic/pragmatic processing affected bilateral inferior and middle frontal gyrus. The prosody manipulation showed bilateral involvement of the superior/inferior parietal cortex, superior and middle temporal cortex, as well as inferior, middle, and posterior parts of the frontal cortex. We compared these regions with attention networks localized in an auditory spatial attention task. Both tasks activated bilateral superior/inferior parietal cortex, superior temporal cortex, and left precentral cortex. Furthermore, an interaction between prosody and congruence was observed in bilateral inferior parietal regions: for incongruent sentences, but not for congruent ones, there was a larger activation if the incongruent word carried a pitch accent, than if it did not. The common activations between the language task and the spatial attention task demonstrate that pitch accent activates a domain general attention network, which is sensitive to semantic/pragmatic aspects of language. Therefore, attention and language comprehension are highly interactive.

Abstract

While the distribution of RNA polymerase II (PolII) in a variety of complex genomes is correlated with gene expression, the presence of PolII at a gene does not necessarily indicate active expression. Various patterns of PolII binding have been described genome wide; however, whether or not PolII binds at transcriptionally inactive sites remains uncertain. The two X chromosomes in female cells in mammals present an opportunity to examine each of the two alleles of a given locus in both active and inactive states, depending on which X chromosome is silenced by X chromosome inactivation. Here, we investigated PolII occupancy and expression of the associated genes across the active (Xa) and inactive (Xi) X chromosomes in human female cells to elucidate the relationship of gene expression and PolII binding. We find that, while PolII in the pseudoautosomal region occupies both chromosomes at similar levels, it is significantly biased toward the Xa throughout the rest of the chromosome. The general paucity of PolII on the Xi notwithstanding, detectable (albeit significantly reduced) binding can be observed, especially on the evolutionarily younger short arm of the X. PolII levels at genes that escape inactivation correlate with the levels of their expression; however, additional PolII sites can be found at apparently silenced regions, suggesting the possibility of a subset of genes on the Xi that are poised for expression. Consistent with this hypothesis, we show that a high proportion of genes associated with PolII-accessible sites, while silenced in GM12878, are expressed in other female cell lines.

Abstract

This study investigates the prosodic conditioning of phonetic details which are candidate cues to phonological contrasts. German /b, d, g, p, t, k/ were examined in three prosodic positions. Lenis plosives /b, d, g/ were produced with less glottal vibration at larger prosodic boundaries, whereas their VOT showed no effect of prosody. VOT of fortis plosives /p, t, k/ decreased at larger boundaries, as did their burst intensity maximum. Vowels (when measured from consonantal release) following fortis plosives and lenis velars were shorter after larger boundaries. Closure duration, which did not contribute to the fortis/lenis contrast, was heavily affected by prosody. These results support neither of the hitherto proposed accounts of prosodic strengthening (Uniform Strengthening and Feature Enhancement). We propose a different account, stating that the phonological identity of speech sounds remains stable not only within, but also across prosodic positions (contrast-over-prosody hypothesis). Domain-initial strengthening hardly diminishes the contrast between prosodically weak fortis and strong lenis plosives.

Abstract

Phase-locked evoked responses and event-related modulations of spontaneous rhythmic activity are the two main approaches used to quantify stimulus- or task-related changes in electrophysiological measures. The relationship between the two has beenwidely theorized upon but empirical research has been limited to the primary visual and sensorimotor cortex. However, both evoked responses and rhythms have been used as markers of neural activity in paradigms ranging from simple sensory to complex cognitive tasks.While some spatial agreement between the two phenomena has been observed, typically only one of the measures has been used in any given study, thus disallowing a direct evaluation of their exact spatiotemporal relationship. In this study, we sought to systematically clarify the connection between evoked responses and rhythmic activity. Using both measures, we identified the spatiotemporal patterns of task effects in three magnetoencephalography (MEG) data sets, all variants of a picture naming task. Evoked responses and rhythmic modulation yielded largely separate networks, with spatial overlap mainly in the sensorimotor and primary visual areas.Moreover, in the cortical regions thatwere identified with both measures the experimental effects they conveyed differed in terms of timing and function. Our results suggest that the two phenomena are largely detached and that both measures are needed for an accurate portrayal of brain activity.

Abstract

The Neolithic is a key period in the history of the European settlement. Although archaeological and present-day genetic data suggest several hypotheses regarding the human migration patterns at this period, validation of these hypotheses with the use of ancient genetic data has been limited. In this context, we studied DNA extracted from 53 individuals buried in a necropolis used by a French local community 5,000 y ago. The relatively good DNA preservation of the samples allowed us to obtain autosomal, Y-chromosomal, and/or mtDNA data for 29 of the 53 samples studied. From these datasets, we established close parental relationships within the necropolis and determined maternal and paternal lineages as well as the absence of an allele associated with lactase persistence, probably carried by Neolithic cultures of central Europe. Our study provides an integrative view of the genetic past in southern France at the end of the Neolithic period. Furthermore, the Y-haplotype lineages characterized and the study of their current repartition in European populations confirm a greater influence of the Mediterranean than the Central European route in the peopling of southern Europe during the Neolithic transition.

Abstract

The impact of the Neolithic dispersal on the western European populations is subject to continuing debate. To trace and date genetic lineages potentially brought during this transition and so understand the origin of the gene pool of current populations, we studied DNA extracted from human remains excavated in a Spanish funeral cave dating from the beginning of the fifth millennium B.C. Thanks to a “multimarkers” approach based on the analysis of mitochondrial and nuclear DNA (autosomes and Y-chromosome), we obtained information on the early Neolithic funeral practices and on the biogeographical origin of the inhumed individuals. No close kinship was detected. Maternal haplogroups found are consistent with pre-Neolithic settlement, whereas the Y-chromosomal analyses permitted confirmation of the existence in Spain approximately 7,000 y ago of two haplogroups previously associated with the Neolithic transition: G2a and E1b1b1a1b. These results are highly consistent with those previously found in Neolithic individuals from French Late Neolithic individuals, indicating a surprising temporal genetic homogeneity in these groups. The high frequency of G2a in Neolithic samples in western Europe could suggest, furthermore, that the role of men during Neolithic dispersal could be greater than currently estimated.

Abstract

Recent experimental findings suggest stable individual differences in the perception of auditory stimuli lacking energy at the fundamental frequency (F0), here called missing fundamental (MF) tones. Specifically, some individuals readily identify the pitch of such tones with the missing F0 ("F0 listeners"), and some base their judgment on the frequency of the partials that make up the tones ("spectral listeners"). However, the diversity of goals and methods in recent research makes it difficult to draw clear conclusions about individual differences. The first purpose of this article is to discuss the influence of methodological choices on listeners' responses. The second goal is to report findings on individual differences in our own studies of the MF phenomenon. In several experiments, participants judged the direction of pitch change in stimuli composed of two MF tones, constructed so as to reveal whether the pitch percept was based on the MF or the partials. The reported difference between F0 listeners and spectral listeners was replicated, but other stable patterns of responses were also observed. Test-retest reliability is high. We conclude that there are genuine, stable individual differences underlying the diverse findings, but also that there are more than two general types of listeners, and that stimulus variables strongly affect some listeners' responses. This suggests that it is generally misleading to classify individuals as "F0 listeners" or "spectral listeners." It may be more accurate to speak of two modes of perception ("F0 listening" and "spectral listening"), both of which are available to many listeners. The individual differences lie in what conditions the choice between the two modes.

Abstract

Cognitive linguists suggest that understanding metaphors requires activation of conceptual mappings between the involved concepts. We tested whether mappings are indeed in use during metaphor comprehension, and what mapping means as a cognitive process with Event-Related Potentials. Participants read literal, conventional metaphorical, novel metaphorical, and anomalous target sentences preceded by primes with related or unrelated mappings. Experiment 1 used sentence-primes to activate related mappings, and Experiment 2 used simile-primes to induce comparison thinking. In the unprimed conditions of both experiments, metaphors elicited N400s more negative than the literals. In Experiment 1, related sentence-primes reduced the metaphor-literal N400 difference in conventional, but not in novel metaphors. In Experiment 2, related simile-primes reduced the metaphor-literal N400 difference in novel, but not clearly in conventional metaphors. We suggest that mapping as a process occurs in metaphors, and the ways in which it can be facilitated by comparison differ between conventional and novel metaphors.

Abstract

Disruption of FOXP2, a gene encoding a forkhead-domain transcription factor, causes a severe developmental disorder of verbal communication, involving profound articulation deficits, accompanied by linguistic and grammatical impairments. Investigation of the neural basis of this disorder has been limited previously to neuroimaging of affected children and adults. The discovery of the gene responsible, FOXP2, offers a unique opportunity to explore the relevant neural mechanisms from a molecular perspective. In the present study, we have determined the detailed spatial and temporal expression pattern of FOXP2 mRNA in the developing brain of mouse and human. We find expression in several structures including the cortical plate, basal ganglia, thalamus, inferior olives and cerebellum. These data support a role for FOXP2 in the development of corticostriatal and olivocerebellar circuits involved in motor control. We find intriguing concordance between regions of early expression and later sites of pathology suggested by neuroimaging. Moreover, the homologous pattern of FOXP2/Foxp2 expression in human and mouse argues for a role for this gene in development of motor-related circuits throughout mammalian species. Overall, this study provides support for the hypothesis that impairments in sequencing of movement and procedural learning might be central to the FOXP2-related speech and language disorder.

Abstract

Hierarchical centre-embedded structures pose a large difficulty for language learners due to their complexity. A recent artificial grammar learning study (Lai & Poletiek, 2011) demonstrated a starting-small (SS) effect, i.e., staged-input and sufficient exposure to 0-level-of-embedding exemplars were the critical conditions in learning AnBn structures. The current study aims to test: (1) a more sophisticated type of SS (a gradually rather than discretely growing input), and (2) the frequency distribution of the input. The results indicate that SS optimally works under other conditional cues, such as a skewed frequency distribution with simple stimuli being more numerous than complex ones.

Abstract

In this paper we examine whether experience with spatial metaphors for time has an influence on people’s representation of time. In particular we ask whether spatiotemporal metaphors can have both chronic and immediate effects on temporal thinking. In Study 1, we examine the prevalence of ego-moving representations for time in Mandarin speakers, English speakers, and Mandarin-English (ME) bilinguals. As predicted by observations in linguistic analyses, we find that Mandarin speakers are less likely to take an ego-moving perspective than are English speakers. Further, we find that ME bilinguals tested in English are less likely to take an ego-moving perspective than are English monolinguals (an effect of L1 on meaning-making in L2), and also that ME bilinguals tested in Mandarin are more likely to take an ego-moving perspective than are Mandarin monolinguals (an effect of L2 on meaning-making in L1). These findings demonstrate that habits of metaphor use in one language can influence temporal reasoning in another language, suggesting the metaphors can have a chronic effect on patterns in thought. In Study 2 we test Mandarin speakers using either horizontal or vertical metaphors in the immediate context of the task. We find that Mandarin speakers are more likely to construct front-back representations of time when understanding front-back metaphors, and more likely to construct up-down representations of time when understanding up-down metaphors. These findings demonstrate that spatiotemporal metaphors can also have an immediate influence on temporal reasoning. Taken together, these findings demonstrate that the metaphors we use to talk about time have both immediate and long-term consequences for how we conceptualize and reason about this fundamental domain of experience.

Abstract

A theoretical debate in artificial grammar learning (AGL) regards the learnability of hierarchical structures. Recent studies using an AnBn grammar draw conflicting conclusions (Bahlmann and Friederici, 2006, De Vries et al., 2008). We argue that 2 conditions crucially affect learning AnBn structures: sufficient exposure to zero-level-of-embedding (0-LoE) exemplars and a staged-input. In 2 AGL experiments, learning was observed only when the training set was staged and contained 0-LoE exemplars. Our results might help understanding how natural complex structures are learned from exemplars.

Abstract

The Human Connectome Project (HCP) seeks to map the structural and functional connections between network elements in the human brain. Magnetoencephalography (MEG) provides a temporally rich source of information on brain network dynamics and represents one source of functional connectivity data to be provided by the HCP. High quality MEG data will be collected from 50 twin pairs both in the resting state and during performance of motor, working memory and language tasks. These data will be available to the general community. Additionally, using the cortical parcellation scheme common to all imaging modalities, the HCP will provide processing pipelines for calculating connection matrices as a function of time and frequency. Together with structural and functional data generated using magnetic resonance imaging methods, these data represent a unique opportunity to investigate brain network connectivity in a large cohort of normal adult human subjects. The analysis pipeline software and the dynamic connectivity matrices that it generates will all be made freely available to the research community.

Abstract

Investigations of left hand praxis in imitation and object use in patients with callosal disconnection have yielded divergent results, inducing a debate between two theoretical positions. Whereas Liepmann suggested that the left hemisphere is motor dominant, others maintain that both hemispheres have equal motor competences and propose that left hand apraxia in patients with callosal disconnection is secondary to left hemispheric specialization for language or other task modalities. The present study aims to gain further insight into the motor competence of the right hemisphere by investigating pantomime of object use in split-brain patients. Three patients with complete callosotomy and, as control groups, five patients with partial callosotomy and nine healthy subjects were examined for their ability to pantomime object use to visual object presentation and demonstrate object manipulation. In each condition, 11 objects were presented to the subjects who pantomimed or demonstrated the object use with either hand. In addition, six object pairs were presented to test bimanual coordination. Two independent raters evaluated the videotaped movement demonstrations. While object use demonstrations were perfect in all three groups, the split-brain patients displayed apraxic errors only with their left hands in the pantomime condition. The movement analysis of concept and execution errors included the examination of ipsilateral versus contralateral motor control. As the right hand/left hemisphere performances demonstrated retrieval of the correct movement concepts, concept errors by the left hand were taken as evidence for right hemisphere control. Several types of execution errors reflected a lack of distal motor control indicating the use of ipsilateral pathways. While one split-brain patient controlled his left hand predominantly by ipsilateral pathways in the pantomime condition, the error profile in the other two split-brain patients suggested that the right hemisphere controlled their left hands. In the object use condition, in all three split-brain patients fine-graded distal movements in the left hand indicated right hemispheric control. Our data show left hand apraxia in split-brain patients is not limited to verbal commands, but also occurs in pantomime to visual presentation of objects. As the demonstration with object in hand was unimpaired in either hand, both hemispheres must contain movement concepts for object use. However, the disconnected right hemisphere is impaired in retrieving the movement concept in response to visual object presentation, presumably because of a deficit in associating perceptual object representation with the movement concepts.

Abstract

Since some patients with right hemisphere damage or with spontaneous callosal disconnection neglect the left half of space, it has been suggested that the left cerebral hemisphere predominantly attends to the right half of space. However, clinical investigations of patients having undergone surgical callosal section have not shown neglect when the hemispheres are tested separately. These observations question the validity of theoretical models that propose a left hemispheric specialisation for attending to the right half of space. The present study aims to investigate neglect and the use of space by either hand in gestural demonstrations in three split-brain patients as compared to five patients with partial callosotomy and 11 healthy subjects. Subjects were asked to demonstrate with precise gestures and without speaking the content of animated scenes with two moving objects. The results show that in the absence of primary perceptual or representational neglect, split-brain patients neglect left personal space in right-handed gestural demonstrations. Since this neglect of left personal space cannot be explained by directional or spatial akinesia, it is suggested that it originates at the conceptual level, where the spatial coordinates for right-hand gestures are planned. The present findings are at odds with the position that the separate left hemisphere possesses adequate mechanisms for acting in both halves of space and neglect results from right hemisphere suppression of this potential. Rather, the results provide support for theoretical models that consider the left hemisphere as specialised for processing the right half of space during the execution of descriptive gestures.

Abstract

The present study investigates the hand choice in iconic gestures that accompany speech. In 10 right-handed subjects gestures were elicited by verbal narration and by silent gestural demonstrations of animations with two moving objects. In both conditions, the left-hand was used as often as the right-hand to display iconic gestures. The choice of the right- or left-hands was determined by semantic aspects of the message. The influence of hemispheric language lateralization on the hand choice in co-speech gestures appeared to be minor. Instead, speaking seemed to induce a sequential organization of the iconic gestures.

Abstract

Force-distance measurements have been used to examine differences in the interaction of the dendritic cell glycan-binding receptor DC-SIGN and the closely related endothelial cell receptor DC-SIGNR (L-SIGN) with membranes bearing glycan ligands. The results demonstrate that upon binding to membrane-anchored ligand, DC-SIGNR undergoes a conformational change similar to that previously observed for DC-SIGN. The results also validate a model for the extracellular domain of DC-SIGNR derived from crystallographic studies. Force measurements were performed with DC-SIGNR variants that differ in the length of the neck that result from genetic polymorphisms, which encode different numbers of the 23-amino acid repeat sequences that constitute the neck. The findings are consistent with an elongated, relatively rigid structure of the neck repeat observed in crystals. In addition, differences in the lengths of DC-SIGN and DC-SIGNR extracellular domains with equivalent numbers of neck repeats support a model in which the different dispositions of the carbohydrate-recognition domains in DC-SIGN and DC-SIGNR result from variations in the sequences of the necks.

Abstract

Objective Wnt signalling is critical for normal intestinal development and homeostasis. Wnt dysregulation occurs in almost all human and murine intestinal tumours and an optimal but not excessive level of Wnt activation is considered favourable for tumourigenesis. The authors assessed effects of pan-intestinal Wnt activation on tissue homeostasis, taking into account underlying physiological Wnt activity and stem-cell number in each region of the bowel. Design The authors generated mice that expressed temporally controlled, stabilised β-catenin along the crypt–villus axis throughout the intestines. Physiological Wnt target gene activity was assessed in different regions of normal mouse and human tissue. Human intestinal tumour mutation spectra were analysed. Results In the mouse, β-catenin stabilisation resulted in a graduated neoplastic response, ranging from dysplastic transformation of the entire epithelium in the proximal small bowel to slightly enlarged crypts of non-dysplastic morphology in the colorectum. In contrast, stem and proliferating cell numbers were increased in all intestinal regions. In the normal mouse and human intestines, stem-cell and Wnt gradients were non-identical, but higher in the small bowel than large bowel in both species. There was also variation in the expression of some Wnt modulators. Human tumour analysis confirmed that different APC mutation spectra are selected in different regions of the bowel. Conclusions There are variable gradients in stem-cell number, physiological Wnt activity and response to pathologically increased Wnt signalling along the crypt-villus axis and throughout the length of the intestinal tract. The authors propose that this variation influences regional mutation spectra, tumour susceptibility and lesion distribution in mice and humans.

Abstract

In this article, we propose a novel image segmentation method called the whole mesh deformation (WMD) model, which aims at addressing the problems of modern medical imaging. Such problems have raised from the combination of several factors: (1) significant growth of medical image volumes sizes due to increasing capabilities of medical acquisition devices; (2) the will to increase the complexity of image processing algorithms in order to explore new functionality; (3) change in processor development and turn towards multi processing units instead of growing bus speeds and the number of operations per second of a single processing unit. Our solution is based on the concept of deformable models and is characterized by a very effective and precise segmentation capability. The proposed WMD model uses a volumetric mesh instead of a contour or a surface to represent the segmented shapes of interest, which allows exploiting more information in the image and obtaining results in shorter times, independently of image contents. The model also offers a good ability for topology changes and allows effective parallelization of workflow, which makes it a very good choice for large datasets. We present a precise model description, followed by experiments on artificial images and real medical data.

Abstract

Learning a second language influences speakers’ first language, but there is great variability in the degree of influence that speakers exhibit. We show that some of this variability is due to individual differences in inhibitory skill. Particularly, we propose that poorer inhibitory skill leads to greater activation of competing items from the language not in use, and that this greater co-activation ultimately leads to greater influence of the co-activated items on one another. Specifically, we show that bilinguals with lower inhibitory skill exhibit greater influence of the second language on the first. Late English–French bilinguals residing in France produced and perceived Voice Onset Time of voiceless stops in English in a more French-like manner, the lower their inhibitory skill was. We discuss the implications of these results for the role of inhibitory skill in shaping representation in bilingual as well as monolingual language processing.

Abstract

In their comment, Dell and O'Seaghdha (1991) adduced any effect on phonological probes for semantic alternatives to the activation of these probes in the lexical network. We argue that that interpretation is false and, in addition, that the model still cannot account for our data. Furthermore, and different from Dell and O'seaghda, we adduce semantic rebound to the lemma level, where it is so substantial that it should have shown up in our data. Finally, we question the function of feedback in a lexical network (other than eliciting speech errors) and discuss Dell's (1988) notion of a unified production-comprehension system.

Abstract

Speakers tend to repeat materials from previous talk. This tendency is experimentally established and manipulated in various question-answering situations. It is shown that a question's surface form can affect the format of the answer given, even if this form has little semantic or conversational consequence, as in the pair Q: (At) what time do you close. A: “(At)five o'clock.” Answerers tend to match the utterance to the prepositional (nonprepositional) form of the question. This “correspondence effect” may diminish or disappear when, following the question, additional verbal material is presented to the answerer. The experiments show that neither the articulatory buffer nor long-term memory is normally involved in this retention of recent speech. Retaining recent speech in working memory may fulfill a variety of functions for speaker and listener, among them the correct production and interpretation of surface anaphora. Reusing recent materials may, moreover, be more economical than regenerating speech anew from a semantic base, and thus contribute to fluency. But the realization of this strategy requires a production system in which linguistic formulation can take place relatively independent of, and parallel to, conceptual planning.