Publications

Abstract

The current study investigated the role of cross-linguistic influence in Cantonese–English bilingual children's comprehension of subject- and object-extracted relative clauses (RCs). Twenty simultaneous Cantonese–English bilingual children (Mage = 8;11, SD = 2;6) and 20 vocabulary-matched Cantonese monolingual children (Mage = 6;4, SD = 1;3) completed a test of Cantonese RC comprehension. The bilingual children also completed a test of English RC comprehension. The results showed that, whereas the monolingual children were equally competent on subject and object RCs, the bilingual children performed significantly better on subject RCs. Error analyses suggested that the bilingual children were most often correctly assigning thematic roles in object RCs, but were incorrectly choosing the RC subject as the head referent. This pervasive error was interpreted to be due to the fact that both Cantonese and English have canonical SVO word order, which creates competition with structures that compete with an object RC analysis.

Abstract

Although there is strong evidence for shared abstract grammatical structure in bilingual speakers from studies of sentence production, comparable evidence from studies of comprehension is lacking. Twenty-seven (N = 27) English-German bilingual adults participated in a structural priming study where unambiguous English subject and object relative clause (RC) structures were used to prime corresponding subject and object RC interpretations of structurally ambiguous German RCs. The results showed that English object RCs primed significantly greater object RC interpretations in German in comparison to baseline and subject RC prime conditions, but that English subject RC primes did not change the participants’ baseline preferences. This is the first study to report abstract crosslinguistic priming in comprehension. The results specifically suggest that word order overlap supports the integration of syntactic structures from different languages in bilingual speakers, and that these shared representations are used in comprehension as well as production

Abstract

This task investigates the expression of “enter” and “exit” events, and is a supplement to the Motion Elicitation task (https://doi.org/10.17617/2.3003391). Consultants are asked to describe a series of animated clips where a man moves into or out of a house. The clips focus on contrasts to do with perspective (e.g., whether the man appears to move away or towards the viewer) and transitional movement (e.g., whether the man walks or “teleports” into his new location).

Abstract

Do our hands 'speak the same language' across cultures? Gesture is the silent partner of spoken languages in face-to-face interaction, but we still have a lot to learn about gesture practices in different speech communities. The primary purpose of this task is to collect data in naturalistic settings that can be used to investigate the linguistic and cultural relativity of gesture performance, especially spatially indicative gestures. It involves video-recording pairs of speakers in both free conversation and more structured communication tasks (e.g., describing film plots).

Please note: the stimuli mentioned in this entry are available elsewhere: 'The Pear Story', a short film made at the University of California at Berkeley; "Frog, where are you?" from the original Mayer (1969) book, as published in the Appendix of Berman & Slobin (1994).

Abstract

Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is a common neuropsychiatric disorder with a complex genetic background. The G protein-coupled receptor kinase interacting ArfGAP 1 (GIT1) gene was previously associated with ADHD. We aimed at replicating the association of GIT1 with ADHD and investigated its role in cognitive and brain phenotypes. Gene-wide and single variant association analyses for GIT1 were performed for three cohorts: (1) the ADHD meta-analysis data set of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium (PGC, N=19,210), (2) the Dutch cohort of the International Multicentre persistent ADHD CollaboraTion (IMpACT-NL, N=225), and (3) the Brain Imaging Genetics cohort (BIG, N=1,300). Furthermore, functionality of the rs550818 variant as an expression quantitative trait locus (eQTL) for GIT1 was assessed in human blood samples. By using Drosophila melanogaster as a biological model system, we manipulated Git expression according to the outcome of the expression result and studied the effect of Git knockdown on neuronal morphology and locomotor activity. Association of rs550818 with ADHD was not confirmed, nor did a combination of variants in GIT1 show association with ADHD or any related measures in either of the investigated cohorts. However, the rs550818 risk-genotype did reduce GIT1 expression level. Git knockdown in Drosophila caused abnormal synapse and dendrite morphology, but did not affect locomotor activity. In summary, we could not confirm GIT1 as an ADHD candidate gene, while rs550818 was found to be an eQTL for GIT1. Despite GIT1's regulation of neuronal morphology, alterations in gene expression do not appear to have ADHD-related behavioral consequences

Abstract

Unter allen Disziplinen, die sich mit der Erforschung der Sprache befassen, ist die Lexikografie die älteste und die für die Allgemeinheit wichtigste. Die ältesten, noch sehr einfachen Wörterbücher finden sich auf 4000 Jahre alten Tontafeln, und wenn sich heute in einem Haushalt überhaupt ein Buch findet, dann ist es wahrscheinlich ein Wörterbuch. In den letzten zwanzig Jahren ist die kommerzielle wie die von öffentlich finanzierten Forschungsstätten betriebene Lexikografie jedoch in einer ernsthafte Krise geraten. Die großen Wörterbuchverlage haben die Arbeit an umfassenden Wörterbüchern weitestgehend eingestellt, weil sie kaum noch gekauft werden; die Akademien geraten mit ihren Langzeitvorhaben in massive Zeit- und Finanzprobleme. Wenn wir nicht auf die umfassende Beschreibung des deutschen Wortschatzes in all einer Vielfalt und seiner geschichtlichen Entwicklung verzichten wollen, müssen ganz neue Wege gegangen werden: Wörterbücher im traditionellen Sinne müssen durch digitale lexikalische Systeme ersetzt werden, die das vorhandene lexikalische Wissen integrieren, es schrittweise systematisch ausbauen, eigene Recherchen in verlässlichen Corpora ermöglichen und von jedermann frei über das Internet nutzbar sind.

Abstract

The German Perfekt has two quite different temporal readings, as illustrated by the two possible continuations of the sentence Peter hat gearbeitet in i, ii, respectively: (i) Peter hat gearbeitet und ist müde. Peter has worked and is tired. (ii) Peter hat gearbeitet und wollte nicht gestört werden. Peter has worked and wanted not to be disturbed. The first reading essentially corresponds to the English present perfect; the second can take a temporal adverbial with past time reference ('yesterday at five', 'when the phone rang', and so on), and an English translation would require a past tense ('Peter worked/was working'). This article shows that the Perfekt has a uniform temporal meaning that results systematically from the interaction of its three components-finiteness marking, auxiliary and past participle-and that the two readings are the consequence of a structural ambiguity. This analysis also predicts the properties of other participle constructions, in particular the passive in German.

Abstract

Chinese has a number of particles such as le, guo, zai and zhe that add a particular aspectual value to the verb to which they are attached. There have been many characterisations of this value in the literature. In this paper, we review several existing influential accounts of these particles, including those in Li and Thompson (1981), Smith (1991), and Mangione and Li (1993). We argue that all these characterisations are intuitively plausible, but none of them is precise.We propose that these particles serve to mark which part of the sentence''s descriptive content is asserted, and that their aspectual value is a consequence of this function. We provide a simple and precise definition of the meanings of le, guo, zai and zhe in terms of the relationship between topic time and time of situation, and show the consequences of their interaction with different verb expressions within thisnew framework of interpretation.

Abstract

During the last 25 years, second language acquisition (SLA) research hasmade considerable progress, but is still far from proving a solid basis for foreign language teaching, or from a general theory of SLA. In addition, its status within the linguistic disciplines is still very low. I argue this has not much to do with low empirical or theoretical standards in the field—in this regard, SLA research is fully competitive—but with a particular perspective on the acquisition process: SLA researches learners' utterances as deviations from a certain target, instead of genuine manifestations of underlying language capacity; it analyses them in terms of what they are not rather than what they are. For some purposes such a "target deviation perspective" makes sense, but it will not help SLA researchers to substantially and independently contribute to a deeper understanding of the structure and function of the human language faculty. Therefore, these findings will remain of limited interest to other scientists until SLA researchers consider learner varieties a normal, in fact typical, manifestation of this unique human capacity.

Abstract

Recent studies indicate that Arabic digit knowledge rather than non-symbolic number knowledge is a key foundation for arithmetic proficiency at the start of a child’s mathematical career. We document the developmental trajectory of 4- to 7-year-olds’ proficiency in accessing magnitude information from Arabic digits in five tasks differing in magnitude manipulation requirements. Results showed that children from 5 years onwards accessed magnitude information implicitly and explicitly, but that 5-year-olds failed to access magnitude information explicitly when numerical magnitude was contrasted with physical magnitude. Performance across tasks revealed a clear developmental trajectory: children traverse from first knowing the cardinal values of number words to recognizing Arabic digits to knowing their cardinal values and, concurrently, their ordinal position. Correlational analyses showed a strong within-child consistency, demonstrating that this pattern is not only reflected in group differences but also in individual performance.

Abstract

Representing brain morphology as a network has the advantage that the regional morphology of ‘isolated’ structures can be described statistically based on graph theory. However, very few studies have investigated brain morphology from the holistic perspective of complex networks, particularly in individual brains. We proposed a new network framework for individual brain morphology. Technically, in the new network, nodes are defined as regions based on a brain atlas, and edges are estimated using our newly-developed inter-regional relation measure based on regional morphological distributions. This implementation allows nodes in the brain network to be functionally/anatomically homogeneous but different with respect to shape and size. We first demonstrated the new network framework in a healthy sample. Thereafter, we studied the graph-theoretical properties of the networks obtained and compared the results with previous morphological, anatomical, and functional networks. The robustness of the method was assessed via measurement of the reliability of the network metrics using a test-retest dataset. Finally, to illustrate potential applications, the networks were used to measure age-related changes in commonly used network metrics. Results suggest that the proposed method could provide a concise description of brain organization at a network level and be used to investigate interindividual variability in brain morphology from the perspective of complex networks. Furthermore, the method could open a new window into modeling the complexly distributed brain and facilitate the emerging field of human connectomics.

Abstract

In various applications of forensic phonetics the question arises as to how far aural-perceptual speaker recognition performance is reliable. Therefore, it is necessary to examine the relationship between speaker recognition results and human perception/production abilities like musicality or speech sensitivity. In this study, performance in a speaker recognition experiment and a speech sensitivity test are correlated. The results show a moderately significant positive correlation between the two tasks. Generally, performance in the speaker recognition task was better than in the speech sensitivity test. Professionals in speech and singing yielded a more homogeneous correlation than non-experts. Training in speech as well as choir-singing seems to have a positive effect on performance in speaker recognition. It may be concluded, firstly, that in cases where the reliability of voice line-up results or the credibility of a testimony have to be considered, the speech sensitivity test could be a useful indicator. Secondly, the speech sensitivity test might be integrated into the canon of possible procedures for the accreditation of forensic phoneticians. Both tests may also be used in combination.

Abstract

Instrumental music and language are both syntactic systems, employing complex, hierarchically-structured sequences built using implicit structural norms. This organization allows listeners to understand the role of individual words or tones in the context of an unfolding sentence or melody. Previous studies suggest that the brain mechanisms of syntactic processing may be partly shared between music and language. However, functional neuroimaging evidence for anatomical overlap of brain activity involved in linguistic and musical syntactic processing has been lacking. In the present study we used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in conjunction with an interference paradigm based on sung sentences. We show that the processing demands of musical syntax (harmony) and language syntax interact in Broca’s area in the left inferior frontal gyrus (without leading to music and language main effects). A language main effect in Broca’s area only emerged in the complex music harmony condition, suggesting that (with our stimuli and tasks) a language effect only becomes visible under conditions of increased demands on shared neural resources. In contrast to previous studies, our design allows us to rule out that the observed neural interaction is due to: (1) general attention mechanisms, as a psychoacoustic auditory anomaly behaved unlike the harmonic manipulation, (2) error processing, as the language and the music stimuli contained no structural errors. The current results thus suggest that two different cognitive domains—music and language—might draw on the same high level syntactic integration resources in Broca’s area.

Abstract

We review a number of recent studies that have identified either correlations between different linguistic features (e.g., implicational universals) or correlations between linguistic features and nonlinguistic properties of speakers or their environment (e.g., effects of geography on vocabulary). We compare large-scale quantitative studies with more traditional theoretical and historical linguistic research and identify divergent assumptions and methods that have led linguists to be skeptical of correlational work. We also attempt to demystify statistical techniques and point out the importance of informed critiques of the validity of statistical approaches. Finally, we describe various methods used in recent correlational studies to deal with the fact that, because of contact and historical relatedness, individual languages in a sample rarely represent independent data points, and we show how these methods may allow us to explore linguistic prehistory to a greater time depth than is possible with orthodox comparative reconstruction.

Abstract

The role of the two hemispheres in processing metaphoric language is controversial. While some studies have reported a special role of the right hemisphere (RH) in processing metaphors, others indicate no difference in laterality relative to literal language. Some studies have found a role of the RH for novel/unfamiliar metaphors, but not
conventional/familiar metaphors. It is not clear, however, whether the role of the RH
is specific to metaphor novelty, or whether it reflects processing, reinterpretation or
reanalysis of novel/unfamiliar language in general. Here we used functional magnetic
resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine the effects of familiarity in both metaphoric and
non-metaphoric sentences. A left lateralized network containing the middle and inferior
frontal gyri, posterior temporal regions in the left hemisphere (LH), and inferior frontal
regions in the RH, was engaged across both metaphoric and non-metaphoric sentences;
engagement of this network decreased as familiarity decreased. No region was engaged
selectively for greater metaphoric unfamiliarity. An analysis of laterality, however, showed that the contribution of the RH relative to that of LH does increase in a metaphorspecific manner as familiarity decreases. These results show that RH regions, taken by themselves, including commonly reported regions such as the right inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), are responsive to increased cognitive demands of processing unfamiliar stimuli, rather than being metaphor-selective. The division of labor between the two hemispheres, however, does shift towards the right for metaphoric processing. The shift results not because the RH contributes more to metaphoric processing. Rather, relative to
its contribution for processing literals, the LH contributes less.

Abstract

This study investigated the brain regions for the comprehension of implied emotion in sentences. Participants read negative sentences without negative words, for example, “The boy fell asleep and never woke up again,” and their neutral counterparts “The boy stood up and grabbed his bag.” This kind of negative sentence allows us to examine implied emotion derived at the sentence level, without associative emotion coming from word retrieval. We found that implied emotion in sentences, relative to neutral sentences, led to activation in some emotion-related areas, including the medial prefrontal cortex, the amygdala, and the insula, as well as certain language-related areas, including the inferior frontal gyrus, which has been implicated in combinatorial processing. These results suggest that the emotional network involved in implied emotion is intricately related to the network for combinatorial processing in language, supporting the view that sentence meaning is more than simply concatenating the meanings of its lexical building blocks.

Abstract

The KE family is a large three-generation pedigree in which half the members are affected with a severe speech and language disorder that is transmitted as an autosomal dominant monogenic trait. In previously published work, we localized the gene responsible (SPCH1) to a 5.6-cM region of 7q31 between D7S2459 and D7S643. In the present study, we have employed bioinformatic analyses to assemble a detailed BAC-/PAC-based sequence map of this interval, containing 152 sequence tagged sites (STSs), 20 known genes, and >7.75 Mb of completed genomic sequence. We screened the affected chromosome 7 from the KE family with 120 of these STSs (average spacing <100 kb), but we did not detect any evidence of a microdeletion. Novel polymorphic markers were generated from the sequence and were used to further localize critical recombination breakpoints in the KE family. This allowed refinement of the SPCH1 interval to a region between new markers 013A and 330B, containing ∼6.1 Mb of completed sequence. In addition, we have studied two unrelated patients with a similar speech and language disorder, who have de novo translocations involving 7q31. Fluorescence in situ hybridization analyses with BACs/PACs from the sequence map localized the t(5;7)(q22;q31.2) breakpoint in the first patient (CS) to a single clone within the newly refined SPCH1 interval. This clone contains the CAGH44 gene, which encodes a brain-expressed protein containing a large polyglutamine stretch. However, we found that the t(2;7)(p23;q31.3) breakpoint in the second patient (BRD) resides within a BAC clone mapping >3.7 Mb distal to this, outside the current SPCH1 critical interval. Finally, we investigated the CAGH44 gene in affected individuals of the KE family, but we found no mutations in the currently known coding sequence. These studies represent further steps toward the isolation of the first gene to be implicated in the development of speech and language.

Abstract

Speakers of English habitually encode motion events using manner-of-motion verbs (e.g., spin, roll, slide) whereas Spanish speakers rely on path-of-motion verbs (e.g., enter, exit, approach). Here, we ask whether the language-specific verb representations used in encoding motion events induce different modes of “thinking-for-speaking” in Spanish–English bilinguals. That is, assuming that the verb encodes the most salient information in the clause, do bilinguals find the path of motion to be more salient than manner of motion if they had previously described the motion event using Spanish versus English? In our study, Spanish–English bilinguals described a set of target motion events in either English or Spanish and then participated in a nonlinguistic similarity judgment task in which they viewed the target motion events individually (e.g., a ball rolling into a cave) followed by two variants a “same-path” variant such as a ball sliding into a cave or a “same-manner” variant such as a ball rolling away from a cave). Participants had to select one of the two variants that they judged to be more similar to the target event: The event that shared the same path of motion as the target versus the one that shared the same manner of motion. Our findings show that bilingual speakers were more likely to classify two motion events as being similar if they shared the same path of motion and if they had previously described the target motion events in Spanish versus in English. Our study provides further evidence for the “thinking-for-speaking” hypothesis by demonstrating that bilingual speakers can flexibly shift between language-specific construals of the same event “on-the-fly.”

Abstract

Embodied theories of language postulate that language meaning is stored in modality-specific brain areas generally involved in perception and action in the real world. However, the temporal dynamics of the interaction between modality-specific information and lexical-semantic processing remain unclear. We investigated the relative timing at which two types of modality-specific information (action-based and visual-form information) contribute to lexical-semantic comprehension. To this end, we applied a behavioral priming paradigm in which prime and target words were related with respect to (1) action features, (2) visual features, or (3) semantically associative information. Using a Go/No-Go lexical decision task, priming effects were measured across four different inter-stimulus intervals (ISI = 100, 250, 400, and 1000 ms) to determine the relative time course of the different features. Notably, action priming effects were found in ISIs of 100, 250, and 1000 ms whereas a visual priming effect was seen only in the ISI of 1000 ms. Importantly, our data suggest that features follow different time courses of activation during word recognition. In this regard, feature activation is dynamic, measurable in specific time windows but not in others. Thus the current study (1) demonstrates how multiple ISIs can be used within an experiment to help chart the time course of feature activation and (2) provides new evidence for embodied theories of language.

Abstract

In his first description of Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD), Kanner emphasized emotional impairments by characterizing children with ASD as indifferent to other people, self-absorbed, emotionally cold, distanced, and retracted. Thereafter, emotional impairments became regarded as part of the social impairments of ASD, and research mostly focused on understanding how individuals with ASD recognize visual expressions of emotions from faces and body postures. However, it still remains unclear how emotions are processed outside of the visual domain. This systematic review aims to fill this gap by focusing on impairments of emotional language processing in ASD.
We systematically searched PubMed for papers published between 1990 and 2013 using standardized search terms. Studies show that people with ASD are able to correctly classify emotional language stimuli as emotionally positive or negative. However, processing of emotional language stimuli in ASD is associated with atypical patterns of attention and memory performance, as well as abnormal physiological and neural activity. Particularly, younger children with ASD have difficulties in acquiring and developing emotional concepts, and avoid using these in discourse. These emotional language impairments were not consistently associated with age, IQ, or level of development of language skills.
We discuss how emotional language impairments fit with existing cognitive theories of ASD, such as central coherence, executive dysfunction, and weak Theory of Mind. We conclude that emotional impairments in ASD may be broader than just a mere consequence of social impairments, and should receive more attention in future research

Abstract

The ability to map locations in the surrounding environment is crucial for any navigating animal. Decades of research on mammalian spatial representations suggest that environmental boundaries play a major role in both navigation behavior and hippocampal place coding. Although the capacity for spatial mapping is shared among vertebrates, including birds and fish, it is not yet clear whether such similarities in competence reflect common underlying mechanisms. The present study tests cue specificity in spatial mapping in zebrafish, by probing their use of various visual cues to encode the location of a nearby conspecific. The results suggest that untrained zebrafish, like other vertebrates tested so far, rely primarily on environmental boundaries to compute spatial relationships and, at the same time, use other visible features such as surface markings and freestanding objects as local cues to goal locations. We propose that the pattern of specificity in spontaneous spatial mapping behavior across vertebrates reveals cross-species commonalities in its underlying neural representations.

Abstract

Non-native speakers have lower linguistic competence than native speakers, which renders their language less reliable in conveying their intentions. We suggest that expectations of lower competence lead listeners to adapt their manner of processing when they listen to non-native speakers. We propose that listeners use cognitive resources to adjust by increasing their reliance on top-down processes and extracting less information from the language of the non-native speaker. An eye-tracking study supports our proposal by showing that when following instructions by a non-native speaker, listeners make more contextually-induced interpretations. Those with relatively high working memory also increase their reliance on context to anticipate the speaker’s upcoming reference, and are less likely to notice lexical errors in the non-native speech, indicating that they take less information from the speaker’s language. These results contribute to our understanding of the flexibility in language processing and have implications for interactions between native and non-native speakers

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to relate a psycholinguistic processing model of picture naming to the dynamics of cortical activation during picture naming. The activation was recorded from eight Dutch subjects with a whole-head neuromagnetometer. The processing model, based on extensive naming latency studies, is a stage model. In preparing a picture's name, the speaker performs a chain of specific operations. They are, in this order, computing the visual percept, activating an appropriate lexical concept, selecting the target word from the mental lexicon, phonological encoding, phonetic encoding, and initiation of articulation. The time windows for each of these operations are reasonably well known and could be related to the peak activity of dipole sources in the individual magnetic response patterns. The analyses showed a clear progression over these time windows from early occipital activation, via parietal and temporal to frontal activation. The major specific findings were that (1) a region in the left posterior temporal lobe, agreeing with the location of Wernicke's area, showed prominent activation starting about 200 msec after picture onset and peaking at about 350 msec, (i.e., within the stage of phonological encoding), and (2) a consistent activation was found in the right parietal cortex, peaking at about 230 msec after picture onset, thus preceding and partly overlapping with the left temporal response. An interpretation in terms of the management of visual attention is proposed.

Abstract

This commentary discusses whether abstract metrical frames are stored. For stress-assigning languages (e.g., Dutch and English), which have a dominant stress pattern, metrical frames are stored only for words that deviate from the default stress pattern. The majority of the words in these languages are produced without retrieving any independent syllabic or metrical frame.

Abstract

In recent decades, psychologists have become increasingly interested in our ability to speak. This paper sketches the present theoretical perspective on this most complex skill of homo sapiens. The generation of fluent speech is based on the interaction of various processing components. These mechanisms are highly specialized, dedicated to performing specific subroutines, such as retrieving appropriate words, generating morpho-syntactic structure, computing the phonological target shape of syllables, words, phrases and whole utterances, and creating and executing articulatory programmes. As in any complex skill, there is a self-monitoring mechanism that checks the output. These component processes are targets of increasingly sophisticated experimental research, of which this paper presents a few salient examples.

Abstract

In this article, we present an account of developmental data regarding the acquisition of syllable types. The data come from a longitudinal corpus of phonetically transcribed speech of 12 children acquiring Dutch as their first language. A developmental order of acquisition of syllable types was deduced by aligning the syllabified data on a Guttman scale. This order could be analyzed as following from an initial ranking and subsequent rerankings in the grammar of the structural constraints ONSET, NO-CODA, *COMPLEX-O, and *COMPLEX-C; some local conjunctions of these constraints; and a faithfulness constraint FAITH. The syllable type frequencies in the speech surrounding the language learner are also considered. An interesting correlation is found between the frequencies and the order of development of the different syllable types.

Abstract

The present paper studies how, in deictic expressions, the temporal interdependency of speech and gesture is realized in the course of motor planning and execution. Two theoretical positions were compared. On the “interactive” view the temporal parameters of speech and gesture are claimed to be the result of feedback between the two systems throughout the phases of motor planning and execution. The alternative “ballistic” view, however, predicts that the two systems are independent during the phase of motor execution, the temporal parameters having been preestablished in the planning phase. In four experiments subjects were requested to indicate which of an array of referent lights was momentarily illuminated. This was done by pointing to the light and/or by using a deictic expression (this/that light). The temporal and spatial course of the pointing movement was automatically registered by means of a Selspot opto-electronic system. By analyzing the moments of gesture initiation and apex, and relating them to the moments of speech onset, it was possible to show that, for deictic expressions, the ballistic view is very nearly correct.

Abstract

The process of speaking is traditionally regarded as a mapping of thoughts (intentions, feelings, etc.) onto language. One requirement that this mapping has to meet is that the units of information to be expressed be strictly ordered. The channel of speech largely prohibits the simultaneous expression of multiple propositions: the speaker has a linearization problem - that is, a linear order has to be determined over any knowledge structure to be formulated. This may be relatively simple if the informational structure has itself an intrinsic linear arrangement, as often occurs with event structures, but it requires special procedures if the structure is more complex, as is often the case in two- or three-dimensional spatial patterns. How, for instance, does a speaker proceed in describing his home, or the layout of his town? Two powerful constraints on linearization derive, on the one hand, from 'mutual knowledge' and, on the other, from working memory limitations. Mutual knowledge may play a role in that the listener can be expected to derive different implicatures from different orderings (compare 'she married and became pregnant' with 'she became pregnant and married'). Mutual knowledge determinants of linearization are essentially pragmatic and cultural, and dependent on the content of discourse. Working memory limitations affect linearization in that a speaker's linearization strategy will minimize memory load during the process of formulating. A multidimensional structure is broken up in such a way that the number of 'return addresses' to be kept in memory will be minimized. This is attained by maximizing the connectivity of the discourse, and by backtracking to stored addresses in a first-in-last-out fashion. These memory determinants of linearization are presumably biological, and independent of the domain of discourse. An important question is whether the linearization requirement is enforced by the oral modality of speech or whether it is a deeper modality-independent property of language use.

Abstract

The core issue in the 19-century sources of psycholinguistics was the question, "Where does language come from?'' This genetic perspective unified the study of the ontogenesis, the phylogenesis, the microgenesis, and to some extent the neurogenesis of language. This paper makes the point that this original perspective is still a valid and attractive one. It is exemplified by a discussion of the genesis of spoken words.

Abstract

It is quite normal for us to produce one or two million word tokens every year. Speaking is a dear occupation and producing words is at the core of it. Still, producing even a single word is a highly complex affair. Recently, Levelt, Roelofs, and Meyer (1999) reviewed their theory of lexical access in speech production, which dissects the word-producing mechanism as a staged application of various dedicated operations. The present paper begins by presenting a bird eye's view of this mechanism. We then square the complexity by asking how speakers control multiple access in generating simple utterances such as a table and a chair. In particular, we address two issues. The first one concerns dependency: Do temporally contiguous access procedures interact in any way, or do they run in modular fashion? The second issue concerns temporal alignment: How much temporal overlap of processing does the system tolerate in accessing multiple content words, such as table and chair? Results from picture-word interference and eye tracking experiments provide evidence for restricted cases of dependency as well as for constraints on the temporal alignment of access procedures.

Abstract

It has been hypothesised that human reasoning has a non-linguistic foundation, but is nevertheless influenced by the formal means available in a language. For example, Western logic is transparently related to European sentential connectives (e.g., and, if … then, or, not), some of which cannot be unambiguously expressed in other languages. The questionnaire explores reasoning tools and practices through investigating translation equivalents of English sentential connectives and collecting examples of “reasoned arguments”.