Publications

Abstract

The experimental record of the last three decades shows that children under 4 years old fail all sorts of variations on the standard false-belief task, whereas more recent studies have revealed that infants are able to pass nonverbal versions of the task. We argue that these paradoxical results are an artifact of the type of false-belief tasks that have been used to test infants and children: Nonverbal designs allow infants to keep track of a protagonist’s perspective over a course of events, whereas verbal designs tend to disrupt the perspective-tracking process in various ways, which makes it too hard for younger children to demonstrate their capacity for perspective tracking. We report three experiments that confirm this hypothesis by showing that 3-year-olds can pass a suitably streamlined version of the verbal false-belief task. We conclude that young children can pass the verbal false-belief task provided that they are allowed to keep track of the protagonist’s perspective without too much disruption.

Abstract

In a data set of 291 spontaneous utterances from German 5-year-olds, 7-year-olds and adults, nuclear pitch contours were labeled manually using the GToBI annotation system. Ten different contour types were identified. The fundamental frequency (F0) of these contours was modeled using third-order orthogonal polynomials, following an approach similar to the one Grabe, Kochanski, and Coleman (2007) used for English. Statistical analyses showed that all but one contour pair differed significantly from each other in at least one of the four coefficients. This demonstrates that polynomial modeling can provide quantitative empirical support for phonological labels in unscripted speech, and for languages other than English. Furthermore, polynomial expressions can be used to derive the alignment of tonal targets relative to the syllable structure, making polynomial modeling more accessible to the phonological research community. Finally, within-contour comparisons of the three age groups showed that for children, the magnitude of the higher coefficients is lower, suggesting that they are not yet able to modulate their pitch as fast as adults.

Abstract

Background: A well-known test for measuring verbal adequacy (i.e., verbal effectiveness) in mildly impaired aphasic speakers is the Amsterdam-Nijmegen Everyday Language Test (ANELT; Blomert, Koster, & Kean, 1995). Aphasia therapy practitioners score verbal adequacy qualitatively when they administer the ANELT to their aphasic clients in clinical practice. Aims: The current study investigated whether the construct validity of the ANELT could be further improved by substituting the qualitative score by a quantitative one, which takes the number of essential information units into account. The new quantitative measure could have the following advantages: the ability to derive a quantitative score of verbal efficiency, as well as improved sensitivity to detect changes in functional communication over time. Methods & Procedures: The current study systematically compared a new quantitative measure of verbal effectiveness with the current ANELT Comprehensibility scale, which is based on qualitative judgements. A total of 30 speakers of Dutch participated: 20 non-aphasic speakers and 10 aphasic patients with predominantly expressive disturbances. Outcomes & Results: Although our findings need to be replicated in a larger group of aphasic speakers, the main results suggest that the new quantitative measure of verbal effectiveness is more sensitive to detect change in verbal effectiveness over time. What is more, it can be used to derive a measure of verbal efficiency. Conclusions: The fact that both verbal effectiveness and verbal efficiency can be reliably as well as validly measured in the ANELT is of relevance to clinicians. It allows them to obtain a more complete picture of aphasic speakers' functional communication skills.

Abstract

Psycholinguistic theories propose different models of inflectional processing of regular and irregular verbs: dual mechanism models assume separate modules with lexical frequency sensitivity for irregular verbs. In contradistinction, connectionist models propose a unified process in a single module.We conducted a PET study using a 2 x 2 design with verb regularity and frequency.We found significantly shorter voice onset times for regular verbs and high frequency verbs irrespective of regularity. The PET data showed activations in inferior frontal gyrus (BA 45), nucleus lentiformis, thalamus, and superior medial cerebellum for both regular and irregular verbs but no dissociation for verb regularity.Our results support common processing components for regular and irregular verb inflection.

Abstract

Two cross-linguistic experiments comparing musicians and non-musicians were performed in order to examine whether musicians have enhanced perception of specific acoustical features of speech in a second language (L2). These discrimination and identification experiments examined the perception of various speech features; namely, the timing and quality of Japanese consonants, and the quality of Dutch vowels. We found that musical experience was more strongly associated with discrimination performance rather than identification performance. The enhanced perception was observed not only with respect to L2, but also L1. It was most pronounced when tested with Japanese consonant timing. These findings suggest the following: 1) musicians exhibit enhanced early acoustical analysis of speech, 2) musical training does not equally enhance the perception of all acoustic features automatically, and 3) musicians may enjoy an advantage in the perception of acoustical features that are important in both language and music, such as pitch and timing. Research Highlights We compared the perception of L1 and L2 speech by musicians and non-musicians. Discrimination and identification experiments examined perception of consonant timing, quality of Japanese consonants and of Dutch vowels. We compared results for Japanese native musicians and non-musicians as well as, Dutch native musicians and non-musicians. Musicians demonstrated enhanced perception for both L1 and L2. Most pronounced effect was found for Japanese consonant timing.

Abstract

Although the high-variability training method can enhance learning of non-native speech categories, this can depend on individuals’ aptitude. The current study asked how general the effects of perceptual aptitude are by testing whether they occur with training materials spoken by native speakers and whether they depend on the nature of the to-be-learned material. Forty-five native Dutch listeners took part in a five-day training procedure in which they identified bisyllabic Mandarin pseudowords (e.g., asa) pronounced with different lexical tone combinations. The training materials were presented to different groups of listeners at three levels of variability: low (many repetitions of a limited set of words recorded by a single speaker), medium (fewer repetitions of a more variable set of words recorded by 3 speakers) and high (similar to medium but with 5 speakers). Overall, variability did not influence learning performance, but this was due to an interaction with individuals’ perceptual aptitude: increasing variability hindered improvements in performance for low-aptitude perceivers while it helped improvements in performance for high-aptitude perceivers. These results show that the previously observed interaction between individuals’ aptitude and effects of degree of variability extends to natural tokens of Mandarin speech. This interaction was not found, however, in a closely-matched study in which native Dutch listeners were trained on the Japanese geminate/singleton consonant contrast. This may indicate that the effectiveness of high-variability training depends not only on individuals’ aptitude in speech perception but also on the nature of the categories being acquired.

Abstract

This study reports effects of a high-variability training procedure on nonnative learning of a Japanese geminate-singleton fricative contrast. Thirty native speakers of Dutch took part in a 5-day training procedure in which they identified geminate and singleton variants of the Japanese fricative /s/. Participants were trained with either many repetitions of a limited set of words recorded by a single speaker (low-variability training) or with fewer repetitions of a more variable set of words recorded by multiple speakers (high-variability training). Both types of training enhanced identification of speech but not of nonspeech materials, indicating that learning was domain specific. High-variability training led to superior performance in identification but not in discrimination tests, and supported better generalization of learning as shown by transfer from the trained fricatives to the identification of untrained stops and affricates. Variability thus helps nonnative listeners to form abstract categories rather than to enhance early acoustic analysis.

Abstract

Previous studies have reported that infants selectively reproduce observed actions and have argued that this selectivity reflects understanding of intentions and goals, or goal-directed imitation. We reasoned that if selective imitation of goal-directed actions reflects understanding of intentions, infants should demonstrate stability across perceptually and causally dissimilar imitation tasks. To this end, we employed a longitudinal within-participants design to compare the performance of 37 infants on two imitation tasks, with one administered at 13 months and one administered at 14 months. Infants who selectively imitated goal-directed actions in an object-cued task at 13 months also selectively imitated goal-directed actions in a vocal-cued task at 14 months. We conclude that goal-directed imitation reflects a general ability to interpret behavior in terms of mental states.

Abstract

Daily activities of forty-eight 8- to 15-month-olds and their interlocutors were observed to test for the presence and frequency of triadic joint actions and deictic gestures across three different cultures: Yucatec-Mayans (Mexico), Dutch (Netherlands), and Shanghai-Chinese (China). The amount of joint action and deictic gestures to which infants were exposed differed systematically across settings, allowing testing for the role of social–interactional input in the ontogeny of prelinguistic gestures. Infants gestured more and at an earlier age depending on the amount of joint action and gestures infants were exposed to, revealing early prelinguistic sociocultural differences. The study shows that the emergence of basic prelinguistic gestures is socially mediated, suggesting that others' actions structure the ontogeny of human communication from early on.

Abstract

Three- and four-year-old children were asked predicate-focus questions ('What's X doing?') about a scene in which an agent performed an action on a patient. We varied: (i) whether (or not) the preceding discourse context, which established the patient as given information, was available for the questioner; and (ii) whether (or not) the patient was perceptually available to the questioner when she asked the question. The main finding in our study differs from those of previous studies since it suggests that children are sensitive to the perceptual context at an earlier age than they are to previous discourse context if they need to take the questioner's perspective into account. Our finding indicates that, while children are in principle sensitive to both factors, young children rely on perceptual availability when a conflict arises.

Abstract

Research on memory for native language (L1) has consistently shown that retention of surface form is inferior to that of gist (e.g., Sachs, 1967). This paper investigates whether the same pattern is found in memory for non-native language (L2). We apply a model of bilingual word processing to more complex linguistic structures and predict that memory for L2 sentences ought to contain more surface information than L1 sentences. Native and non-native speakers of English were tested on a set of sentence pairs with different surface forms but the same meaning (e.g., “The bullet hit/struck the bull's eye”). Memory for these sentences was assessed with a cued recall procedure. Responses showed that native and non-native speakers did not differ in the accuracy of gist-based recall but that non-native speakers outperformed native speakers in the retention of surface form. The results suggest that L2 processing involves more intensive encoding of lexical level information than L1 processing.

Abstract

Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a common behavioral disorder affecting about 4–8% of children. ADHD persists into adulthood in around 65% of cases, either as the full condition or in partial remission with persistence of symptoms. Pharmacological, animal and molecular genetic studies support a role for genes of the dopaminergic system in ADHD due to its essential role in motor control, cognition, emotion, and reward. Based on these data, we analyzed two functional polymorphisms within the DRD4 gene (120 bp duplication in the promoter and 48 bp VNTR in exon 3) in a clinical sample of 1,608 adult ADHD patients and 2,352 controls of Caucasian origin from four European countries that had been recruited in the context of the International Multicentre persistent ADHD CollaboraTion (IMpACT). Single-marker analysis of the two polymorphisms did not reveal association with ADHD. In contrast, multiple-marker meta-analysis showed a nominal association (P  = 0.02) of the L-4R haplotype (dup120bp-48bpVNTR) with adulthood ADHD, especially with the combined clinical subtype. Since we previously described association between adulthood ADHD and the dopamine transporter SLC6A3 9R-6R haplotype (3′UTR VNTR-intron 8 VNTR) in the same dataset, we further tested for gene × gene interaction between DRD4 and SLC6A3. However, we detected no epistatic effects but our results rather suggest additive effects of the DRD4 risk haplotype and the SLC6A3 gene.

Abstract

We conducted a field trial in computer-assisted professional translation to compare interactive translation prediction (ITP) against conventional post-editing (PE) of machine translation (MT) output. In contrast to the conventional PE set-up, where an MT system first produces a static translation hypothesis that is then edited by a professional (hence “post-editing”), ITP constantly updates the translation hypothesis in real time in response to user edits. Our study involved nine professional translators and four reviewers working with the web-based CasMaCat workbench. Various new interactive features aiming to assist the post-editor/translator were also tested in this trial. Our results show that even with little training, ITP can be as productive as conventional PE in terms of the total time required to produce the final translation. Moreover, translation editors working with ITP require fewer key strokes to arrive at the final version of their translation.

Abstract

Does our perception of others’ emotional signals depend on the language we speak or is our perception the same regardless of language and culture? It is well established that human emotional facial expressions are perceived categorically by viewers, but whether this is driven by perceptual or linguistic mechanisms is debated. We report an investigation into the perception of emotional facial expressions, comparing German speakers to native speakers of Yucatec Maya, a language with no lexical labels that distinguish disgust from anger. In a free naming task, speakers of German, but not Yucatec Maya, made lexical distinctions between disgust and anger. However, in a delayed match-to-sample task, both groups perceived emotional facial expressions of these and other emotions categorically. The magnitude of this effect was equivalent across the language groups, as well as across emotion continua with and without lexical distinctions. Our results show that the perception of affective signals is not driven by lexical labels, instead lending support to accounts of emotions as a set of biologically evolved mechanisms.

Abstract

In the current study we use electroencephalography (EEG) to detect heard music from the brain signal, hypothesizing that the time structure in music makes it especially suitable for decoding perception from EEG signals. While excluding music with vocals, we classified the perception of seven different musical fragments of about three seconds, both individually and cross-participants, using only time domain information (the event-related potential, ERP). The best individual results are 70% correct in a seven-class problem while using single trials, and when using multiple trials we achieve 100% correct after six presentations of the stimulus. When classifying across participants, a maximum rate of 53% was reached, supporting a general representation of each musical fragment over participants. While for some music stimuli the amplitude envelope correlated well with the ERP, this was not true for all stimuli. Aspects of the stimulus that may contribute to the differences between the EEG responses to the pieces of music are discussed.

Abstract

This paper explores the use of demonstratives in non-embedded clausal nominalisations. We present data and analysis from three Papuan languages of the Timor-Alor-Pantar family in south-east Indonesia. In these languages, demonstratives can apply to the clausal as well as to the nominal domain, contributing contrastive semantic content in assertive stance-taking and attention-directing utterances. In the Timor-Alor-Pantar constructions, meanings that are to do with spatial and discourse locations at the participant level apply to spatial, temporal and mental locations at the state or event leve

Abstract

Numerous studies have shown that younger adults engage in lexically guided perceptual learning in speech perception. Here, we investigated whether older listeners are also able to retune their phonetic category boundaries. More specifically, in this research we tried to answer two questions. First, do older adults show perceptual-learning effects of similar size to those of younger adults? Second, do differences in lexical behavior predict the strength of the perceptual-learning effect? An age group comparison revealed that older listeners do engage in lexically guided perceptual learning, but there were two age-related differences: Younger listeners had a stronger learning effect right after exposure than did older listeners, but the effect was more stable for older than for younger listeners. Moreover, a clear link was shown to exist between individuals’ lexical-decision performance during exposure and the magnitude of their perceptual-learning effects. A subsequent analysis on the results of the older participants revealed that, even within the older participant group, with increasing age the perceptual retuning effect became smaller but also more stable, mirroring the age group comparison results. These results could not be explained by differences in hearing loss. The age effect may be accounted for by decreased flexibility in the adjustment of phoneme categories or by age-related changes in the dynamics of spoken-word recognition, with older adults being more affected by competition from similar-sounding lexical competitors, resulting in less lexical guidance for perceptual retuning. In conclusion, our results clearly show that the speech perception system remains flexible over the life span.

Abstract

Work on animals indicates that BOLD is preferentially sensitive to local field potentials, and that it correlates most strongly with gamma band neuronal synchronization. Here we investigate how the BOLD signal in humans performing a cognitive task is related to neuronal synchronization across different frequency bands. We simultaneously recorded EEG and BOLD while subjects engaged in a visual attention task known to induce sustained changes in neuronal synchronization across a wide range of frequencies. Trial-by-trial BOLD luctuations correlated positively with trial-by-trial fluctuations in high-EEG gamma power (60–80 Hz) and negatively with alpha and beta power. Gamma power on the one hand, and alpha and beta power on the other hand, independently contributed to explaining BOLD variance. These results indicate that the BOLD-gamma coupling observed in animals can be extrapolated to humans performing a task and that neuronal dynamics underlying high- and low-frequency synchronization contribute independently to the BOLD signal.

Abstract

The coinciding form and meaning similarity of cognates, e.g. ‘flamme’ (French), ‘Flamme’ (German), ‘vlam’ (Dutch), meaning ‘flame’ in English, facilitates learning of additional languages. The cross-language frequency and similarity distributions of cognates vary according to evolutionary change and language contact. We compare frequency and orthographic (O), phonetic (P), and semantic similarity of cognates, automatically identified in semi-complete lexicons of six widely spoken languages. Comparisons of P and O similarity reveal inconsistent mappings in language pairs with deep orthographies. The frequency distributions show that cognate frequency is reduced in less closely related language pairs as compared to more closely related languages (e.g., French-English vs. German-English). These frequency and similarity patterns may support a better understanding of cognate processing in natural and experimental settings. The automatically identified cognates are available in the supplementary materials, including the frequency and similarity measurements.

Abstract

This study examines how lexical frequency and planning problems can predict phonetic variability in the function word ‘the’ in conversational speech produced by non-native speakers of English. We examined 3180 tokens of ‘the’ drawn from English conversations between native speakers of Czech or Norwegian. Using regression models, we investigated the effect of following word frequency and disfluencies on three phonetic parameters: vowel duration, vowel quality, and consonant quality. Overall, the non-native speakers showed variation that is very similar to the variation displayed by native speakers of English. Like native speakers, Czech speakers showed an effect of frequency on vowel durations, which were shorter in more frequent word sequences. Both groups of speakers showed an effect of frequency on consonant quality: the substitution of another consonant for /ð/ occurred more often in the context of more frequent words. The speakers in this study also showed a native-like allophonic distinction in vowel quality, in which /ði/ occurs more often before vowels and /ðə/ before consonants. Vowel durations were longer in the presence of following disfluencies, again mirroring patterns in native speakers, and the consonant quality was more likely to be the target /ð/ before disfluencies, as opposed to a different consonant. The fact that non-native speakers show native-like sensitivity to lexical frequency and disfluencies suggests that these effects are consequences of a general, non-language-specific production mechanism governing language planning. On the other hand, the non-native speakers in this study did not show native-like patterns of vowel quality in the presence of disfluencies, suggesting that the pattern attested in native speakers of English may result from language-specific processes separate from the general production mechanisms

Abstract

The Flinder Sensitive Line (FSL) is a rat strain that displays distinct behavioral and neurochemical features of major depression. Chronic selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are able to reverse these symptoms in FSL rats. It is well known that several abnormalities in the serotonergic system have been found in FSL rats, including increased 5-HT brain tissue levels and reduced 5-HT synthesis. SSRIs are known to exert (part of) their effects by desensitization of the 5-HT1A receptor and FSL rats appear to have lower 5-HT1A receptor densities compared with Flinder Resistant Line (FRL) rats. We therefore studied the sensitivity of this receptor on the sexual behavior performance in both FRL and FSL rats. First, basal sexual performance was studied after saline treatment followed by treatment of two different doses of the 5-HT1A receptor agonist ±8-OH-DPAT. Finally we measured the effect of a 5-HT1A receptor antagonist to check for specificity of the 5-HT1A receptor activation. Our results show that FSL rats have higher ejaculation frequencies compared with FRL rats which do not fit with a more depressive-like phenotype. Moreover FRL rats are more sensitive to effects of ±8-OH-DPAT upon EL and IF than FSL rats. The blunted response of FSL rats to the effects of ±8-OH-DPAT may be due to lower densities of 5-HT1A receptors.

Abstract

This study investigates whether or not the representation of lexical stress information can be primed during speech production. In four experiments, we attempted to prime the stress position of bisyllabic target nouns (picture names) having initial and final stress with auditory prime words having either the same or different stress as the target (e.g., WORtel–MOtor vs. koSTUUM–MOtor; capital letters indicate stressed syllables in prime–target pairs). Furthermore, half of the prime words were semantically related, the other half unrelated. Overall, picture names were not produced faster when the prime word had the same stress as the target than when the prime had different stress, i.e., there was no stress-priming effect in any experiment. This result would not be expected if stress were stored in the lexicon. However, targets with initial stress were responded to faster than final-stress targets. The reason for this effect was neither the quality of the pictures nor frequency of occurrence or voice-key characteristics. We hypothesize here that this stress effect is a genuine encoding effect, i.e., words with stress on the second syllable take longer to be encoded because their stress pattern is irregular with respect to the lexical distribution of bisyllabic stress patterns, even though it can be regular with respect to metrical stress rules in Dutch. The results of the experiments are discussed in the framework of models of phonological encoding.

Abstract

Any complete theory of speaking must take the dialogical function of language use into account. Pickering & Garrod (P&G) make some progress on this point. However, we question whether their interactive alignment model is the optimal approach. In this commentary, we specifically criticize (1) their notion of alignment being implemented through priming, and (2) their claim that self-monitoring can occur at all levels of linguistic representation.

Abstract

This study investigates whether or not masked form priming effects in the naming task depend on the number of shared segments between prime and target. Dutch participants named bisyllabic words, which were preceded by visual masked primes. When primes shared the initial segment(s) with the target, naming latencies were shorter than in a control condition (string of percent signs). Onset complexity (singleton vs. complex word onset) did not modulate this priming effect in Dutch. Furthermore, significant priming due to shared final segments was only found when the prime did not contain a mismatching onset, suggesting an interfering role of initial non-target segments. It is concluded that (a) degree of overlap (segmental match vs. mismatch), and (b) position of overlap (initial vs. final) influence the magnitude of the form priming effect in the naming task. A modification of the segmental overlap hypothesis (Schiller, 1998) is proposed to account for the data.

Abstract

To investigate the role of the syllable in Dutch speech production, five experiments were carried out to examine the effect of visually masked syllable primes on the naming latencies for written words and pictures. Targets had clear syllable boundaries and began with a CV syllable (e.g., ka.no) or a CVC syllable (e.g., kak.tus), or had ambiguous syllable boundaries and began with a CV[C] syllable (e.g., ka[pp]er). In the syllable match condition, bisyllabic Dutch nouns or verbs were preceded by primes that were identical to the target’s first syllable. In the syllable mismatch condition, the prime was either shorter or longer than the target’s first syllable. A neutral condition was also included. None of the experiments showed a syllable priming effect. Instead, all related primes facilitated the naming of the targets. It is concluded that the syllable does not play a role in the process of phonological encoding in Dutch. Because the amount of facilitation increased with increasing overlap between prime and target, the priming effect is accounted for by a segmental overlap hypothesis.

Abstract

This study examines the placement of finite and nonfinite lexical verbs and finite light verbs (LVs) in semispontaneous production and elicited imitation of adult beginning learners of German and French. Theories assuming nonnativelike syntactic representations at early stages of development predict variable placement of lexical verbs and consistent placement of LVs, whereas theories assuming nativelike syntax predict variability for nonfinite verbs and consistent placement of all finite verbs. The results show that beginning learners of German have consistent preferences only for LVs. More advanced learners of German and learners of French produce and imitate finite verbs in more variable positions than nonfinite verbs. This is argued to support a structure-building view of second-language development.

Abstract

Studying the interaction between brain regions is important to increase our understanding of brain function. Magnetoencephalography (MEG) is well suited to investigate brain connectivity, because it provides measurements of activity of the whole brain at very high temporal resolution. Typically, brain activity is reconstructed from the sensor recordings with an inverse method such as a beamformer, and subsequently a connectivity metric is estimated between predefined reference regions-of-interest (ROIs) and the rest of the source space. Unfortunately, this approach relies on a robust estimate of the relevant reference regions and on a robust estimate of the activity in those reference regions, and is not generally applicable to a wide variety of cognitive paradigms. Here, we investigate the possibility to perform all-to-all pairwise connectivity analysis, thus removing the need to define ROIs. Particularly, we evaluate the effect of nonhomogeneous spatial smoothing of differential connectivity maps. This approach is inspired by the fact that the spatial resolution of source reconstructions is typically spatially nonhomogeneous. We use this property to reduce the spatial noise in the cerebro-cerebral connectivity map, thus improving interpretability. Using extensive data simulations we show a superior detection rate and a substantial reduction in the number of spurious connections. We conclude that nonhomogeneous spatial smoothing of cerebro-cerebral connectivity maps could be an important improvement of the existing analysis tools to study neuronal interactions noninvasively.

Abstract

Local groups of neurons engaged in a cognitive task often exhibit rhythmically synchronized activity in the gamma band, a phenomenon that likely enhances their impact on downstream areas. The efficacy of neuronal interactions may be enhanced further by interareal synchronization of these local rhythms, establishing mutually well timed fluctuations in neuronal excitability. This notion suggests that long-range synchronization is enhanced selectively for connections that are behaviorally relevant. We tested this prediction in the human motor system, assessing activity from bilateral motor cortices with magnetoencephalography and corresponding spinal activity through electromyography of bilateral hand muscles. A bimanual isometric wrist extension task engaged the two motor cortices simultaneously into interactions and coherence with their respective corresponding contralateral hand muscles. One of the hands was cued before each trial as the response hand and had to be extended further to report an unpredictable visual go cue. We found that, during the isometric hold phase, corticomuscular coherence was enhanced, spatially selective for the corticospinal connection that was effectuating the subsequent motor response. This effect was spectrally selective in the low gamma-frequency band (40–47 Hz) and was observed in the absence of changes in motor output or changes in local cortical gamma-band synchronization. These findings indicate that, in the anatomical connections between the cortex and the spinal cord, gamma-band synchronization is a mechanism that may facilitate behaviorally relevant interactions between these distant neuronal groups.

Abstract

We report on an fMRI syntactic priming experiment in which we measure brain activity for participants who communicate with another participant outside the scanner. We investigated whether syntactic processing during overt language production and comprehension is influenced by having a (shared) goal to communicate. Although theory suggests this is true, the nature of this influence remains unclear. Two hypotheses are tested: i. syntactic priming effects (fMRI and RT) are stronger for participants in the communicative context than for participants doing the same experiment in a non-communicative context, and ii. syntactic priming magnitude (RT) is correlated with the syntactic priming magnitude of the speaker’s communicative partner. Results showed that across conditions, participants were faster to produce sentences with repeated syntax, relative to novel syntax. This behavioral result converged with the fMRI data: we found repetition suppression effects in the left insula extending into left inferior frontal gyrus (BA 47/45), left middle temporal gyrus (BA 21), left inferior parietal cortex (BA 40), left precentral gyrus (BA 6), bilateral precuneus (BA 7), bilateral supplementary motor cortex (BA 32/8) and right insula (BA 47). We did not find support for the first hypothesis: having a communicative intention does not increase the magnitude of syntactic priming effects (either in the brain or in behavior) per se. We did find support for the second hypothesis: if speaker A is strongly/weakly primed by speaker B, then speaker B is primed by speaker A to a similar extent. We conclude that syntactic processing is influenced by being in a communicative context, and that the nature of this influence is bi-directional: speakers are influenced by each other.

Abstract

The acquisition of language and speech is uniquely human, but how genetic changes might have adapted the nervous system to this capacity is not well understood. Two human-specific amino acid substitutions in the transcription factor forkhead box P2 (FOXP2) are outstanding mechanistic candidates, as they could have been positively selected during human evolution and as FOXP2 is the sole gene to date firmly linked to speech and language development. When these two substitutions are introduced into the endogenous Foxp2 gene of mice (Foxp2hum), cortico-basal ganglia circuits are specifically affected. Here we demonstrate marked effects of this humanization of Foxp2 on learning and striatal neuroplasticity. Foxp2hum/hum mice learn stimulus–response associations faster than their WT littermates in situations in which declarative (i.e., place-based) and procedural (i.e., response-based) forms of learning could compete during transitions toward proceduralization of action sequences. Striatal districts known to be differently related to these two modes of learning are affected differently in the Foxp2hum/hum mice, as judged by measures of dopamine levels, gene expression patterns, and synaptic plasticity, including an NMDA receptor-dependent form of long-term depression. These findings raise the possibility that the humanized Foxp2 phenotype reflects a different tuning of corticostriatal systems involved in declarative and procedural learning, a capacity potentially contributing to adapting the human brain for speech and language acquisition.

Abstract

Hoewel de spelling van Nederlandse verledentijdsvormen van zwakke werkwoorden algemeen als eenvoudig wordt beschouwd (ze zijn immers klankzuiver) maken zelfs universiteitsstudenten opvallend veel fouten bij de keuze tussen de uitgangen -te en -de. Voor een deel zijn die fouten ‘natuurlijk’ in die zin dat ze het gevolg zijn van de werking van frequentie en analogie. Anderzijds stellen we vast dat Nederlanders veel meer fouten maken dan Vlamingen, althans als de stam op een coronale fricatief eindigt (s, z, f, v). Aangezien de Nederlandse proefpersonen de ‘regel’ (het ezelsbruggetje ’t kofschip) beter lijken te beheersen dan de Vlamingen, moet de verklaring voor het verschil gezocht worden in een klankverandering die zich wel in Nederland maar niet of nauwelijks in Vlaanderen voordoet, de verstemlozing van de fricatieven. Het spellingprobleem vraagt om didactische maatregelen en/of politieke: het kan wellicht grotendeels worden opgelost door de spellingregels een weinig aan te passen.

Abstract

In spontaneous, conversational speech, words are often reduced compared to their citation forms, such that a word like yesterday may sound like [’jεsmall eshei]. The present chapter investigates such acoustic reduction. The study of reduction needs large corpora that are transcribed phonetically. The first part of this chapter describes an automatic transcription procedure used to obtain such a large phonetically transcribed corpus of Dutch spontaneous dialogues, which is subsequently used for the investigation of acoustic reduction. First, the orthographic transcriptions were adapted for automatic processing. Next, the phonetic transcription of the corpus was created by means of a forced alignment using a lexicon with multiple pronunciation variants per word. These variants were generated by applying phonological and reduction rules to the canonical phonetic transcriptions of the words. The second part of this chapter reports the results of a quantitative analysis of reduction in the corpus on the basis of the generated transcriptions and gives an inventory of segmental reductions in standard Dutch. Overall, we found that reduction is more pervasive in spontaneous Dutch than previously documented.

Abstract

Gender assignment relates to a native speaker's knowledge of the structure of the gender system of his/her language, allowing the speaker to select the appropriate gender for each noun. Whereas categorical assignment rules and exceptional gender assignment are well investigated, assignment regularities, i.e., tendencies in the gender distribution identified within the vocabulary of a language, are still controversial. The present study is an empirical contribution trying to shed light on the gender assignment system native German speakers have at their disposal. Participants presented with a category (e.g., predator) and a pair of gender-marked pseudowords (e.g., der Trelle vs. die Stisse) preferentially selected the pseudo-word preceded by the gender-marked determiner ‘‘associated’’ with the category (e.g., masculine). This finding suggests that semantic regularities might be part of the gender assignment system of native speakers.

Abstract

Speakers tend to repeat syntactic structures across sentences, a phenomenon called syntactic priming. Although it has been suggested that repeating syntactic structures should result in speeded responses, previous research has focused on effects in response tendencies. We investigated syntactic priming effects simultaneously in response tendencies and response latencies for active and passive transitive sentences in a picture description task. In Experiment 1, there were priming effects in response tendencies for passives and in response latencies for actives. However, when participants' pre-existing preference for actives was altered in Experiment 2, syntactic priming occurred for both actives and passives in response tendencies as well as in response latencies. This is the first investigation of the effects of structure frequency on both response tendencies and latencies in syntactic priming. We discuss the implications of these data for current theories of syntactic processing.

Abstract

Behavioral syntactic priming effects during sentence comprehension are typically observed only if both the syntactic structure and lexical head are repeated. In contrast, during production syntactic priming occurs with structure repetition alone, but the effect is boosted by repetition of the lexical head. We used fMRI to investigate the neuronal correlates of syntactic priming and lexical boost effects during sentence production and comprehension. The critical measure was the magnitude of fMRI adaptation to repetition of sentences in active or passive voice, with or without verb repetition. In conditions with repeated verbs, we observed adaptation to structure repetition in the left IFG and MTG, for active and passive voice. However, in the absence of repeated verbs, adaptation occurred only for passive sentences. None of the fMRI adaptation effects yielded differential effects for production versus comprehension, suggesting that sentence comprehension and production are subserved by the same neuronal infrastructure for syntactic processing.

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Repetition suppression in fMRI studies is generally thought to underlie behavioural facilitation effects (i.e., priming) and it is often used to identify the neuronal representations associated with a stimulus. However, this pays little heed to the large number of repetition enhancement effects observed under similar conditions. In this review, we identify several cognitive variables biasing repetition effects in the BOLD response towards enhancement instead of suppression. These variables are stimulus recognition, learning, attention, expectation and explicit memory. We also evaluate which models can account for these repetition effects and come to the conclusion that there is no one single model that is able to embrace all repetition enhancement effects. Accumulation, novel network formation as well as predictive coding models can all explain subsets of repetition enhancement effects.

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Speakers sometimes repeat syntactic structures across sentences, a phenomenon called syntactic priming. We investigated the influence of verb-bound syntactic preferences on syntactic priming effects in response choices and response latencies for German ditransitive sentences. In the response choices we found inverse preference effects: There were stronger syntactic priming effects for primes in the less preferred structure, given the syntactic preference of the prime verb. In the response latencies we found positive preference effects: There were stronger syntactic priming effects for primes in the more preferred structure, given the syntactic preference of the prime verb. These findings provide further support for the idea that syntactic processing is lexically guided.

Abstract

Background: Gesture frequently accompanies speech in healthy speakers. For many individuals with aphasia, gestures are a target of speech-language pathology intervention, either as an alternative form of communication or as a facilitative device for language restoration. The patterns of gesture production for people with aphasia and the participant variables that predict these patterns remain unclear. Aims: We aimed to examine gesture production during conversational discourse in a large sample of individuals with aphasia. We used a detailed gesture coding system to determine patterns of gesture production associated with specific aphasia types and severities. Methods & Procedures: We analysed conversation samples from AphasiaBank, gathered from 46 people with post-stroke aphasia and 10 healthy matched controls all of whom had gestured at least once during a story re-tell task. Twelve gesture types were coded. Descriptive statistics were used to describe the patterns of gesture production. Possible significant differences in production patterns according to aphasia type and severity were examined with a series of analyses of variance (ANOVA) statistics, and multiple regression analysis was used to examine these potential predictors of gesture production patterns. Outcomes & Results: Individuals with aphasia gestured significantly more frequently than healthy controls. Aphasia type and severity impacted significantly on gesture type in specific identified patterns detailed here, especially on the production of meaning-laden gestures. Conclusions: These patterns suggest the opportunity for gestures as targets of aphasia therapy. Aphasia fluency accounted for a greater degree of data variability than aphasia severity or naming skills. More work is required to delineate predictive factors.

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Purpose For many individuals with aphasia, gestures form a vital component of message transfer and are the target of speech-language pathology intervention. What remains unclear are the participant variables that predict successful outcomes from gesture treatments. The authors examined the gesture production of a large number of individuals with aphasia—in a consistent discourse sampling condition and with a detailed gesture coding system—to determine patterns of gesture production associated with specific types of aphasia. Method The authors analyzed story retell samples from AphasiaBank (TalkBank, n.d.), gathered from 98 individuals with aphasia resulting from stroke and 64 typical controls. Twelve gesture types were coded. Descriptive statistics were used to describe the patterns of gesture production. Possible significant differences in production patterns according to aphasia type were examined using a series of chi-square, Fisher exact, and logistic regression statistics. Results A significantly higher proportion of individuals with aphasia gestured as compared to typical controls, and for many individuals with aphasia, this gesture was iconic and was capable of communicative load. Aphasia type impacted significantly on gesture type in specific identified patterns, detailed here. Conclusion These type-specific patterns suggest the opportunity for gestures as targets of aphasia therapy.

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The present study investigates the functions of gestures in preschoolers’ descriptions of activities. Specifically, utilizing McNeill’s growth point theory (1992), I examine how gestures contribute to the creation of contrast from the immediate context in the spoken discourse of children. When preschool children describe an activity consisting of multiple actions, like playing on a slide, they often begin with the central action (e.g., sliding-down) instead of with the beginning of the activity sequence (e.g., climbing-up). This study indicates that, in descriptions of activities, gestures may be among the cues the speaker uses for forming a next idea or for repairing the temporal order of the activities described. Gestures may function for the speaker as visual feedback and contribute to the process of utterance formation and provide an index for assessing language development.

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This article discusses how the Trobriand Islanders speak about body and mind. It addresses the following questions: do the linguistic datafit into theories about lexical universals of body-part terminology? Can we make inferences about the Trobrianders' conceptualization of psychological and physical states on the basis of these data? If a Trobriand Islander sees these idioms as external manifestations of inner states, then can we interpret them as a kind of ethnopsychological theory about the body and its role for emotions, knowledge, thought, memory, and so on? Can these idioms be understood as representation of Trobriand ethnopsychological theory?

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How stable is the lexicon for perceptual experiences? This article presents results on how the Trobriand Islanders of Papua New Guinea talk about color and taste and whether this has changed over the years. Comparing the results of research on color terms conducted in 1983 with data collected in 2008 revealed that many English color terms have been integrated into the Kilivila lexicon. Members of the younger generation with school education have been the agents of this language change. However, today not all English color terms are produced correctly according to English lexical semantics. The traditional Kilivila color terms bwabwau ‘black’, pupwakau ‘white’, and bweyani ‘red’ are not affected by this change, probably because of the cultural importance of the art of coloring canoes, big yams houses, and bodies. Comparing the 1983 data on taste vocabulary with the results of my 2008 research revealed no substantial change. The conservatism of the Trobriand Islanders' taste vocabulary may be related to the conservatism of their palate. Moreover, they are more interested in displaying and exchanging food than in savoring it. Although English color terms are integrated into the lexicon, Kilivila provides evidence that traditional terms used for talking about color and terms used to refer to tastes have remained stable over time.

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A new sign language has been created by deaf Nicaraguans over the past 25 years, providing an opportunity to observe the inception of universal hallmarks of language. We found that in their initial creation of the language, children analyzed complex events into basic elements and sequenced these elements into hierarchically structured expressions according to principles not observed in gestures accompanying speech in the surrounding language. Successive cohorts of learners extended this procedure, transforming Nicaraguan signing from its early gestural form into a linguistic system. We propose that this early segmentation and recombination reflect mechanisms with which children learn, and thereby perpetuate, language. Thus, children naturally possess learning abilities capable of giving language its fundamental structure.

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This study is a prolegomenon to a formal theory of the natural growth of conceptual and lexical fields. Negation, in the various forms in which it occurs in language, is found to be a powerful indicator. Other than in standard logic, natural language negation selects its complement within universes of discourse that are, for practical and functional reasons, restricted in various ways and to different degrees. It is hypothesized that a system of cognitive principles drives recursive processes of universe restriction, which in turn affects logical relations within the restricted universes. This approach provides a new perspective in which to view the well-known clashes between standard logic and natural logical intuitions. Lexicalization in language, especially the morphological incorporation of negation, is limited to highly restricted universes, which explains, for example, why a dog can be said not to be a Catholic, but also not to be a non-Catholic. Cognition is taken to restrict the universe of discourse to contrary pairs, splitting up one or both of the contraries into further subuniverses as a result of further cognitive activity. It is shown how a logically sound square of opposition , expanded to a hexagon (Jacoby 1950, 1960, Sesmat 1951, Blanché 1952, 1953, 1966), is generated by a hierarchy of universe restrictions, defining the notion ‘natural’ for logical systems. The logical hexagon contains two additional vertices, one for ‘some but not all’ (the Y-type) and one for ‘either all or none’ (the U-type), and incorporates both the classic square and the Hamiltonian triangle of contraries . Some is thus considered semantically ambiguous, representing two distinct quantifiers. The pragmaticist claim that the language system contains only the standard logical ‘some perhaps all’ and that the ‘some but not all’ meaning is pragmatically derived from the use of the system is rejected. Four principles are proposed according to which negation selects a complement from the subuniverses at hand. On the basis of these principles and of the logico-cognitive system proposed, the well-known nonlexicalization not only of *nall and *nand but also of many other nonlogical cases found throughout the lexicons of languages is analyzed and explained

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This paper is an attempt to show that given the available observations on the behaviour of negation and presuppositions there is no simpler explanation than to assume that natural language has two distinct negation operators, the minimal negation which preserves presuppositions and the radical negation which does not. The three-valued logic emerging from this distinction, and especially its model-theory, are discussed in detail. It is, however, stressed that the logic itself is only epiphenomenal on the structures and processes involved in the interpretation of sentences. Horn (1985) brings new observations to bear, related with metalinguistic uses of negation, and proposes a “pragmatic” ambiguity in negation to the effect that in descriptive (or “straight”) use negation is the classical bivalent operator, whereas in metalinguistic use it is non-truthfunctional but only pragmatic. Van der Sandt (to appear) accepts Horn's observations but proposes a different solution: he proposes an ambiguity in the argument clause of the negation operator (which, for him, too, is classical and bivalent), according to whether the negation takes only the strictly asserted proposition or covers also the presuppositions, the (scalar) implicatures and other implications (in particular of style and register) of the sentence expressing that proposition. These theories are discussed at some length. The three-valued analysis is defended on the basis of partly new observations, which do not seem to fit either Horn's or Van der Sandt's solution. It is then placed in the context of incremental discourse semantics, where both negations are seen to do the job of keeping increments out of the discourse domain, though each does so in its own specific way. The metalinguistic character of the radical negation is accounted for in terms of the incremental apparatus. The metalinguistic use of negation in denials of implicatures or implications of style and register is regarded as a particular form of minimal negation, where the negation denies not the proposition itself but the appropriateness of the use of an expression in it. This appropriateness negation is truth-functional and not pragmatic, but it applies to a particular, independently motivated, analysis of the argument clause. The ambiguity of negation in natural language is different from the ordinary type of ambiguity found in the lexicon. Normally, lexical ambiguities are idiosyncratic, highly contingent, and unpredictable from language to language. In the case of negation, however, the two meanings are closely related, both truth-conditionally and incrementally. Moreover, the mechanism of discourse incrementation automatically selects the right meaning. These properties are taken to provide a sufficient basis for discarding the, otherwise valid, objection that negation is unlikely to be ambiguous because no known language makes a lexical distinction between the two readings.

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Since Aristotle and the Stoa, there has been a clash, worsened by modern predicate logic, between logically defined operator meanings and natural intuitions. Pragmatics has tried to neutralize the clash by an appeal to the Gricean conversational maxims. The present study argues that the pragmatic attempt has been unsuccessful. The “softness” of the Gricean explanation fails to do justice to the robustness of the intuitions concerned, leaving the relation between the principles evoked and the observed facts opaque. Moreover, there are cases where the Gricean maxims fail to apply. A more adequate solution consists in the devising of a sound natural logic, part of the innate cognitive equipment of mankind. This account has proved successful in conjunction with a postulated cognitive mechanism in virtue of which the universe of discourse (Un) is stepwise and recursively restricted, so that the negation selects different complements according to the degree of restrictedness of Un. This mechanism explains not only the discrepancies between natural logical intuitions and known logical systems; it also accounts for certain systematic lexicalization gaps in the languages of the world. Finally, it is shown how stepwise restriction of Un produces the ontogenesis of natural predicate logic, while at the same time resolving the intuitive clashes with established logical systems that the Gricean maxims sought to explain

Abstract

Notch signaling in the nervous system is often regarded as a developmental pathway. However, recent studies have suggested that Notch is associated with neuronal discharges. Here, focusing on temporal lobe epilepsy, we found that Notch signaling was activated in the kainic acid (KA)-induced epilepsy model and in human epileptogenic tissues. Using an acute model of seizures, we showed that DAPT, an inhibitor of Notch, inhibited ictal activity. In contrast, pretreatment with exogenous Jagged1 to elevate Notch signaling before KA application had proconvulsant effects. In vivo, we demonstrated that the impacts of activated Notch signaling on seizures can in part be attributed to the regulatory role of Notch signaling on excitatory synaptic activity in CA1 pyramidal neurons. In vitro, we found that DAPT treatment impaired synaptic vesicle endocytosis in cultured hippocampal neurons. Taken together, our findings suggest a correlation between aberrant Notch signaling and epileptic seizures. Notch signaling is up-regulated in response to seizure activity, and its activation further promotes neuronal excitation of CA1 pyramidal neurons in acute seizures.

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We investigated the neural basis of inhibitory control during lexical selection. Participants overtly named pictures while response times (RTs) and event-related brain potentials (ERPs) were recorded. The difficulty of lexical selection was manipulated by using object and action pictures with high name agreement (few response candidates) versus low name agreement (many response candidates). To assess the involvement of inhibition, we conducted delta plot analyses of naming RTs and examined the N2 component of the ERP. We found longer mean naming RTs and a larger N2 amplitude in the low relative to the high name agreement condition. For action naming we found a negative correlation between the slopes of the slowest delta segment and the difference in N2 amplitude between the low and high name agreement conditions. The converging behavioral and electrophysiological evidence suggests that selective inhibition is engaged to reduce competition during lexical selection in picture naming.

Abstract

The present study examined the relation between nonselective inhibition and selective inhibition in picture naming performance. Nonselective inhibition refers to the ability to suppress any unwanted response, whereas selective inhibition refers to the ability to suppress specific competing responses. The degree of competition in picture naming was manipulated by presenting targets along with distractor words that could be semantically related (e.g., a picture of a dog combined with the word cat) or unrelated (tree) to the picture name. The mean naming response time (RT) was longer in the related than in the unrelated condition, reflecting semantic interference. Delta plot analyses showed that participants with small mean semantic interference effects employed selective inhibition more effectively than did participants with larger semantic interference effects. The participants were also tested on the stop-signal task, which taps nonselective inhibition. Their performance on this task was correlated with their mean naming RT but, importantly, not with the selective inhibition indexed by the delta plot analyses and the magnitude of the semantic interference effect. These results indicate that nonselective inhibition ability and selective inhibition of competitors in picture naming are separable to some extent.

Abstract

The present study provides Dutch norms for age of acquisition, familiarity, imageability, image agreement, visual complexity, word frequency, and word length (in syllables) for 124 line drawings of actions. Ratings were obtained from 117 Dutch participants. Word frequency was determined on the basis of the SUBTLEX-NL corpus (Keuleers, Brysbaert, & New, Behavior Research Methods, 42, 643–650, 2010). For 104 of the pictures, naming latencies and name agreement were determined in a separate naming experiment with 74 native speakers of Dutch. The Dutch norms closely corresponded to the norms for British English. Multiple regression analysis showed that age of acquisition, imageability, image agreement, visual complexity, and name agreement were significant predictors of naming latencies, whereas word frequency and word length were not. Combined with the results of a principal-component analysis, these findings suggest that variables influencing the processes of conceptual preparation and lexical selection affect latencies more strongly than do variables influencing word-form encoding.

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This study examined the contributions of verbal ability and executive control to verbal fluency performance in older adults (n=82). Verbal fluency was assessed in letter and category fluency tasks, and performance on these tasks was related to indicators of vocabulary size, lexical access speed, updating, and inhibition ability. In regression analyses the number of words produced in both fluency tasks was predicted by updating ability, and the speed of the first response was predicted by vocabulary size and, for category fluency only, lexical access speed. These results highlight the hybrid character of both fluency tasks, which may limit their usefulness for research and clinical purposes.

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Models of speech production disagree on whether or not homonyms have a shared word-form representation. To investigate this issue, a picture-naming experiment was carried out using Dutch homonyms of which both meanings could be presented as a picture. Naming latencies for the low-frequency meanings of homonyms were slower than for those of the high-frequency meanings. However, no frequency effect was found for control words, which matched the frequency of the homonyms meanings. Subsequent control experiments indicated that the difference in naming latencies for the homonyms could be attributed to processes earlier than wordform retrieval. Specifically, it appears that low name agreement slowed down the naming of the low-frequency homonym pictures.

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Pitch is often described metaphorically: for example, Farsi and Turkish speakers use a ‘thickness’ metaphor (low sounds are ‘thick’ and high sounds are ‘thin’), while German and English speakers use a height metaphor (‘low’, ‘high’). This study examines how child and adult speakers of Farsi, Turkish, and German map pitch and thickness using a cross-modal association task. All groups, except for German children, performed significantly better than chance. German-speaking adults’ success suggests the pitch-to-thickness association can be learned by experience. But the fact that German children were at chance indicates that this learning takes time. Intriguingly, Farsi and Turkish children's performance suggests that learning cross-modal associations can be boosted through experience with consistent metaphorical mappings in the input language

Abstract

Speakers use vocabulary for spatial verticality and size to describe pitch. A high–low contrast is common to many languages, but others show contrasts like thick–thin and big–small. We consider uses of thick for low pitch and thin for high pitch in three languages: Farsi, Turkish, and Zapotec. We ask how metaphors for pitch structure the sound space. In a language like English, high applies to both high-pitched as well as high-amplitude (loud) sounds; low applies to low-pitched as well as low-amplitude (quiet) sounds. Farsi, Turkish, and Zapotec organize sound in a different way. Thin applies to high pitch and low amplitude and thick to low pitch and high amplitude. We claim that these metaphors have their sources in life experiences. Musical instruments show co-occurrences of higher pitch with thinner, smaller objects and lower pitch with thicker, larger objects. On the other hand bodily experience can ground the high–low metaphor. A raised larynx produces higher pitch and lowered larynx lower pitch. Low-pitched sounds resonate the chest, a lower place than highpitched sounds. While both patterns are available from life experience, linguistic experience privileges one over the other, which results in differential structuring of the multiple dimensions of sound.

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Contrary to linear difference equations, there is no general theory of difference equations of the form G(P(x−τ1),…,P(x−τs))+G0(x)=0, with τi∈K, G(x1,…,xs)∈K[x1,…,xs] of total degree D⩾2 and G0(x)∈K[x], where K is a field of characteristic zero. This article is concerned with the following problem: given τi, G and G0, find an upper bound on the degree d of a polynomial solution P(x), if it exists. In the presented approach the problem is reduced to constructing a univariate polynomial for which d is a root. The authors formulate a sufficient condition under which such a polynomial exists. Using this condition, they give an effective bound on d, for instance, for all difference equations of the form G(P(x−a),P(x−a−1),P(x−a−2))+G0(x)=0 with quadratic G, and all difference equations of the form G(P(x),P(x−τ))+G0(x)=0 with G having an arbitrary degree.

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We investigated global integration (wrap-up) processes at the boundaries of musical phrases by comparing the effects of well and non-well formed phrases on event-related potentials time-locked to two boundary points: the onset and the offset of the boundary pause. The Closure Positive Shift, which is elicited at the boundary offset, was not modulated by the quality of phrase structure (well vs. non-well formed). In contrast, the boundary onset potentials showed different patterns for well and non-well formed phrases. Our results contribute to specify the functional meaning of the Closure Positive Shift in music, shed light on the large-scale structural integration of musical input, and raise new hypotheses concerning shared resources between music and language.

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Neuroscientific and musicological approaches to music cognition indicate that listeners familiarized in the Western tonal tradition expect a musical phrase boundary at predictable time intervals. However, phrase boundary prediction processes in music remain untested. We analyzed event-related potentials (ERPs) and event-related induced power changes at the onset and offset of a boundary pause. We made comparisons with modified melodies, where the pause was omitted and filled by tones. The offset of the pause elicited a closure positive shift (CPS), indexing phrase boundary detection. The onset of the filling tones elicited significant increases in theta and beta powers. In addition, the P2 component was larger when the filling tones started than when they ended. The responses to boundary omission suggest that listeners expected to hear a boundary pause. Therefore, boundary prediction seems to coexist with boundary detection in music segmentation.

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An ability to decode semantic information from fMRI spatial patterns has been demonstrated in previous studies mostly for 1 specific input modality. In this study, we aimed to decode semantic category independent of the modality in which an object was presented. Using a searchlight method, we were able to predict the stimulus category from the data while participants performed a semantic categorization task with 4 stimulus modalities (spoken and written names, photographs, and natural sounds). Significant classification performance was achieved in all 4 modalities. Modality-independent decoding was implemented by training and testing the searchlight method across modalities. This allowed the localization of those brain regions, which correctly discriminated between the categories, independent of stimulus modality. The analysis revealed large clusters of voxels in the left inferior temporal cortex and in frontal regions. These voxels also allowed category discrimination in a free recall session where subjects recalled the objects in the absence of external stimuli. The results show that semantic information can be decoded from the fMRI signal independently of the input modality and have clear implications for understanding the functional mechanisms of semantic memory.

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This study examines what stage 9‐12‐year‐old Dutch‐speaking children have reached in the development of their L2 lexicon, focusing on its phonological specificity. Two experiments were carried out with a group of Dutch‐speaking children and adults learning English. In a first task, listeners were asked to judge Dutch words which were presented with either the target Dutch vowel or with an English vowel synthetically inserted. The second experiment was a mirror of the first, i.e. with English words and English or Dutch vowels inserted. It was examined to what extent the listeners accepted substitutions of Dutch vowels by English ones, and vice versa. The results of the experiments suggest that the children have not reached the same degree of phonological specificity of L2 words as the adults. Children not only experience a strong influence of their native vowel categories when listening to L2 words, they also apply less strict criteria.

Abstract

This study investigated the phonological representations of vowels in children's native and non-native lexicons. Two experiments were mispronunciation tasks (i.e., a vowel in words was substituted by another vowel from the same language). These were carried out by Dutch-speaking 9–12-year-old children and Dutch-speaking adults, in their native (Experiment 1, Dutch) and non-native (Experiment 2, English) language. A third experiment tested vowel discrimination. In Dutch, both children and adults could accurately detect mispronunciations. In English, adults, and especially children, detected substitutions of native vowels (i.e., vowels that are present in the Dutch inventory) by non-native vowels more easily than changes in the opposite direction. Experiment 3 revealed that children could accurately discriminate most of the vowels. The results indicate that children's L1 categories strongly influenced their perception of English words. However, the data also reveal a hint of the development of L2 phoneme categories.

Abstract

Aim Sex chromosome aneuploidies increase the risk of spoken or written language disorders but individuals with specific language impairment (SLI) or dyslexia do not routinely undergo cytogenetic analysis. We assess the frequency of sex chromosome aneuploidies in individuals with language impairment or dyslexia. Method Genome-wide single nucleotide polymorphism genotyping was performed in three sample sets: a clinical cohort of individuals with speech and language deficits (87 probands: 61 males, 26 females; age range 4 to 23 years), a replication cohort of individuals with SLI, from both clinical and epidemiological samples (209 probands: 139 males, 70 females; age range 4 to 17 years), and a set of individuals with dyslexia (314 probands: 224 males, 90 females; age range 7 to 18 years). Results In the clinical language-impaired cohort, three abnormal karyotypic results were identified in probands (proband yield 3.4%). In the SLI replication cohort, six abnormalities were identified providing a consistent proband yield (2.9%). In the sample of individuals with dyslexia, two sex chromosome aneuploidies were found giving a lower proband yield of 0.6%. In total, two XYY, four XXY (Klinefelter syndrome), three XXX, one XO (Turner syndrome), and one unresolved karyotype were identified. Interpretation The frequency of sex chromosome aneuploidies within each of the three cohorts was increased over the expected population frequency (approximately 0.25%) suggesting that genetic testing may prove worthwhile for individuals with language and literacy problems and normal non-verbal IQ. Early detection of these aneuploidies can provide information and direct the appropriate management for individuals.

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Perceptual compensation for speaker vocal tract properties was investigated in four groups of listeners: native speakers of English and native speakers of Dutch, native speakers of Spanish with low proficiency in English, and Spanish-English bilinguals. Listeners categorized targets on a [sofo] to [sufu] continuum. Targets were preceded by sentences that were manipulated to have either a high or a low F1 contour. All listeners performed the categorization task for targets that were preceded by Spanish, English and Dutch precursors. Results show that listeners from each of the four language backgrounds compensate for speaker vocal tract properties regardless of language-specific vowel inventory properties. Listeners also compensate when they listen to stimuli in another language. The results suggest that patterns of compensation are mainly determined by auditory properties of precursor sentences.