Publications

Abstract

Handedness has been studied for association with language-related disorders because of its link with language hemispheric dominance. No clear pattern has emerged, possibly because of small samples, publication bias, and heterogeneous criteria across studies. Non-right-handedness (NRH) frequency was assessed in N = 2503 cases with reading and/or language impairment and N = 4316 sex-matched controls identified from 10 distinct cohorts (age range 6–19 years old; European ethnicity) using a priori set criteria. A meta-analysis (Ncases = 1994) showed elevated NRH % in individuals with language/reading impairment compared with controls (OR = 1.21, CI = 1.06–1.39, p = .01). The association between reading/language impairments and NRH could result from shared pathways underlying brain lateralization, handedness, and cognitive functions.

Abstract

In the present study, the authors examined with event-related brain potentials whether phonological encoding in picture naming is mediated by basic semantic feature retrieval or proceeds independently. In a manual 2-choice go/no-go task the choice response depended on a semantic classification (animal vs. object) and the execution decision was contingent on a classification of name phonology (vowel vs. consonant). The introduction of a semantic task mixing procedure allowed for selectively manipulating the speed of semantic feature retrieval. Serial and parallel models were tested on the basis of their differential predictions for the effect of this manipulation on the lateralized readiness potential and N200 component. The findings indicate that phonological code retrieval is not strictly contingent on prior basic semantic feature processing.

Abstract

In this article a new approach to the distinction between serial/contingent and parallel/independent processing in the human cognitive system is applied to semantic knowledge retrieval and phonological encoding of the word form in picture naming. In two-choice go/nogo tasks pictures of objects were manually classified on the basis of semantic and phonological information. An additional manipulation of the duration of the faster and presumably mediating process (semantic retrieval) allowed to derive differential predictions from the two alternative models. These predictions were tested with two event-related brain potentials (ERPs), the lateralized readiness potential (LRP) and the N200. The findings indicate that phonological encoding can proceed in parallel to the retrieval of semantic features. A suggestion is made how to accommodate these findings with models of speech production.

Abstract

On seeing familiar persons, biographical (semantic) information is typically retrieved faster and more accurately than name information. Serial stage models explain this pattern by suggesting that access to the name follows the retrieval of semantic information. In contrast, interactive activation and competition (IAC) models hold that both processes start together but name retrieval is slower because of structural peculiarities. With a 2-choice go/no-go procedure based on a semantic and a name-related classification, the authors tested differential predictions of the 2 alternative models for reaction times (RTs) and lateralized readiness potentials (LRP). Both LRP (Experiment 1) and RT (Experiment 2) results are in line with IAC models of face identification and naming.

Abstract

Many accounts of working memory posit specialized storage mechanisms for the maintenance of serial order. We explore an alternative, that maintenance is achieved through temporary activation in the language production architecture. Four experiments examined the extent to which the phonological similarity effect can be explained as a sublexical speech error. Phonologically similar nonword stimuli were ordered to create tongue twister or control materials used in four tasks: reading aloud, immediate spoken recall, immediate typed recall, and serial recognition. Dependent measures from working memory (recall accuracy) and language production (speech errors) fields were used. Even though lists were identical except for item order, robust effects of tongue twisters were observed. Speech error analyses showed that errors were better described as phoneme rather than item ordering errors. The distribution of speech errors was comparable across all experiments and exhibited syllable-position effects, suggesting an important role for production processes. Implications for working memory and language production are discussed.

Abstract

Verbal working memory (WM) tasks typically involve the language production architecture for recall; however, language production processes have had a minimal role in theorizing about WM. A framework for understanding verbal WM results is presented here. In this framework, domain-specific mechanisms for serial ordering in verbal WM are provided by the language production architecture, in which positional, lexical, and phonological similarity constraints are highly similar to those identified in the WM literature. These behavioral similarities are paralleled in computational modeling of serial ordering in both fields. The role of long-term learning in serial ordering performance is emphasized, in contrast to some models of verbal WM. Classic WM findings are discussed in terms of the language production architecture. The integration of principles from both fields illuminates the maintenance and ordering mechanisms for verbal information.

Abstract

Speakers vary their speech rate considerably during a conversation, and listeners are able to quickly adapt to these variations in speech rate. Adaptation to fast speech rates is usually measured using artificially time-compressed speech. This study examined adaptation to two types of fast speech: artificially time-compressed speech and natural fast speech. Listeners performed a speeded sentence verification task on three series of sentences: normal-speed sentences, time-compressed sentences, and natural fast sentences. Listeners were divided into two groups to evaluate the possibility of transfer of learning between the time-compressed and natural fast conditions. The first group verified the natural fast before the time-compressed sentences, while the second verified the time-compressed before the natural fast sentences. The results showed transfer of learning when the time-compressed sentences preceded the natural fast sentences, but not when natural fast sentences preceded the time-compressed sentences. The results are discussed in the framework of theories on perceptual learning. Second, listeners show adaptation to the natural fast sentences, but performance for this type of fast speech does not improve to the level of time-compressed sentences.

Abstract

Listeners efficiently exploit sentence prosody to direct attention to words bearing sentence accent. This effect has been explained as a search for focus, furthering rapid apprehension of semantic structure. A first experiment supported this explanation: English listeners detected phoneme targets in sentences more rapidly when the target-bearing words were in accented position or in focussed position, but the two effects interacted, consistent with the claim that the effects serve a common cause. In a second experiment a similar asymmetry was observed with Dutch listeners and Dutch sentences. In a third and a fourth experiment, proficient Dutch users of English heard English sentences; here, however, the two effects did not interact. The results suggest that less efficient mapping of prosody to semantics may be one way in which nonnative listening fails to equal native listening.

Abstract

We report the performance of two patients with lexico-semantic deficits following left MCA CVA. Both patients produce similar numbers of semantic paraphasias in naming tasks, but presented one crucial difference: grapheme-to-phoneme and phoneme-to-grapheme conversion procedures were available only to one of them. We investigated the impact of this availability on the process of lexical selection during word production. The patient for whom conversion procedures were not operational produced semantic errors in transcoding tasks such as reading and writing to dictation; furthermore, when asked to name a given picture in multiple output modalities—e.g., to say the name of a picture and immediately after to write it down—he produced lexically inconsistent responses. By contrast, the patient for whom conversion procedures were available did not produce semantic errors in transcoding tasks and did not produce lexically inconsistent responses in multiple picture-naming tasks. These observations are interpreted in the context of the summation hypothesis (Hillis & Caramazza, 1991), according to which the activation of lexical entries for production would be made on the basis of semantic information and, when available, on the basis of form-specific information. The implementation of this hypothesis in models of lexical access is discussed in detail.

Abstract

While there are well-known demonstrations that children can use distributional information to acquire multiple components of language, the underpinnings of these achievements are unclear. In the current paper, we investigate the potential pre-requisites for a distributional learning model that can explain how children learn their first words. We review existing literature and then present the results of a series of computational simulations with Vector Space Models, a type of distributional semantic model used in Computational Linguistics, which we evaluate against vocabulary acquisition data from children. We focus on nouns and verbs, and we find that: (i) a model with flexibility to adjust for the frequency of events provides a better fit to the human data, (ii) the influence of context words is very local, especially for nouns, and (iii) words that share more contexts with other words are harder to learn.

Abstract

Different languages map semantic elements of spatial relations onto different lexical and syntactic units. These crosslinguistic differences raise important questions for language development in terms of how this variation is learned by children. We investigated how Turkish-, English-, and Japanese-speaking children (mean age 3;8) package the semantic elements of Manner and Path onto syntactic units when both the Manner and the Path of the moving Figure occur simultaneously and are salient in the event depicted. Both universal and language-specific patterns were evident in our data. Children used the semantic-syntactic mappings preferred by adult speakers of their own languages, and even expressed subtle syntactic differences that encode different relations between Manner and Path in the same way as their adult counterparts (i.e., Manner causing vs. incidental to Path). However, not all types of semantics-syntax mappings were easy for children to learn (e.g., expressing Manner and Path elements in two verbal clauses). In such cases, Turkish- and Japanese-speaking children frequently used syntactic patterns that were not typical in the target language but were similar to patterns used by English-speaking children, suggesting some universal influence. Thus, both language-specific and universal tendencies guide the development of complex spatial expressions.

Abstract

Previous studies have shown that children retreat from argument-structure overgeneralization errors (e.g., *Don’t giggle me) by inferring that frequently encountered verbs are unlikely to be grammatical in unattested constructions, and by making use of syntax-semantics correspondences (e.g., verbs denoting internally caused actions such as giggling cannot normally be used causatively). The present study tested a new account based on a unitary learning mechanism that combines both of these processes. Seventy-two participants (ages 5–6, 9–10, and adults) rated overgeneralization errors with higher (*The funny man’s joke giggled Bart) and lower (*The funny man giggled Bart) degrees of direct external causation. The errors with more-direct causation were rated as less unacceptable than those with less-direct causation. This finding is consistent with the new account, under which children acquire—in an incremental and probabilistic fashion—the meaning of particular constructions (e.g., transitive causative = direct external causation) and particular verbs, rejecting generalizations where the incompatibility between the two is too great.

Abstract

Positive and negative what, why and yes/no questions with the 3sg auxiliaries can and does were elicited from 50 children aged 3;3–4;3. In support of the constructivist “schema-combination” account, only children who produced a particular positive question type correctly (e.g., What does she want?) produced a characteristic “auxiliary-doubling” error (e.g., *What does she doesn't want?) for the corresponding negative question type. This suggests that these errors are formed by superimposing a positive question frame (e.g., What does THING PROCESS?) and an inappropriate negative frame (e.g., She doesn't PROCESS) learned from declarative utterances. In addition, a significant correlation between input frequency and correct production was observed for 11 of the 12 lexical frames (e.g., What does THING PROCESS?), although some negative question types showed higher rates of error than one might expect based on input frequency alone. Implications for constructivist and generativist theories of question-acquisition are discussed.

Abstract

This article examines the grammar, use and meaning of fifteen verbs used in the Basic Locative Construction (BLC) of Likpe — a Ghana-Togo-Mountain language. The verbs fall into four semantic subclasses: (a) basic topological relations: t 'be.at', tk 'be.on', kpé 'be.in', and fi 'be.near'; (b) postural verbs: sí 'sit', ny 'stand', fáka 'hang', yóma 'hang', kps 'lean', fus 'squat', and labe 'lie'; (c) “distribution” verbs: kpó 'be spread, heaped,' and tí 'be covered'; and (d) “adhesion” verbs: má 'be griped, be fixed', mánkla 'be stuck to'. Likpe locative predications reflect an ontological commitment to the overall topological relation between Figure and Ground and are not focused just on the Figure or the Ground. Various factors determine the choice of “competing” verbs for particular scenarios: animacy, nonindividuation of the Figure, permanency of the configuration and the speaker's desire to be referentially precise or to present stereotypical information. It is demonstrated that in situations where there is a choice, speakers tend to use the more general verbs (stereotype information). The implications of this tendency for the development of a language from a multiverb language using several verbs (e.g., 15) in its BLC to using only a small-set of verbs in its BLC, just as some of Likpe's neighbors have done, are considered.

Abstract

Different languages present a variety of ways of talking about emotional experience. Very commonly, feelings are described through the use of ‘body image constructions’ in which they are associated with processes in, or states of, specific body parts. The emotions and the body parts that are thought to be their locus and the kind of activity associated with these body parts vary cross-culturally. This study focuses on the meaning of three ‘body image constructions’ used to describe feelings similar to, but also different from, English ‘jealousy’, ‘envy’, and ‘covetousness’ in the West African language Ewe. It is demonstrated that a ‘moving body’, a pychologised eye, and red eyes are scripted for these feelings. It is argued that the expressions are not figurative and that their semantics provide good clues to understanding the cultural construction of emotions both emotions and the body.

Abstract

Ewe verbs covering the cutting and breaking domain divide into four morpho-syntactic classes that can be ranked according to agentivity. We demonstrate that the highly non-agentive break verbs participate in the causative-inchoative alternation while the highly agentive cut verbs do not, as expected from Guerssel et al.'s (1985) hypothesis. However, four verbs tso 'cut with precision', 'cut', 'snap-off', and dze 'split', are used transitively when an instrument is required for the severance to be effected, and intransitively when not. We reject a lexicalist analysis that would postulate polysemy for these verbs and argue for a construction approach.

Abstract

This special issue is devoted to a relatively neglected topic in linguistics, namely the verbal component of locative statements. English tends, of course, to use a simple copula in utterances like “The cup is on the table”, but many languages, perhaps as many as half of the world's languages, have a set of alternate verbs, or alternate verbal affixes, which contrast in this slot. Often these are classificatory verbs of 'sitting', 'standing' and 'lying'. For this reason, perhaps, Aristotle listed position among his basic (“noncomposite”) categories.

Abstract

Rhythmic patterns in interactive contexts characterize human behaviours such as conversational turn-taking. These timed patterns are also present in other animals, and often described as rhythm. Understanding fine-grained temporal adjustments in interaction requires complementary quantitative methodologies. Here, we showcase how vocal interactive rhythmicity in a non-human animal can be quantified using a multi-method approach. We record vocal interactions in harbour seal pups (Phoca vitulina) under controlled conditions. We analyse these data by combining analytical approaches, namely categorical rhythm analysis, circular statistics and time series analyses. We test whether pups' vocal rhythmicity varies across behavioural contexts depending on the absence or presence of a calling partner. Four research questions illustrate which analytical approaches are complementary versus orthogonal. For our data, circular statistics and categorical rhythms suggest that a calling partner affects a pup's call timing. Granger causality suggests that pups predictively adjust their call timing when interacting with a real partner. Lastly, the ADaptation and Anticipation Model estimates statistical parameters for a potential mechanism of temporal adaptation and anticipation. Our analytical complementary approach constitutes a proof of concept; it shows feasibility in applying typically unrelated techniques to seals to quantify vocal rhythmic interactivity across behavioural contexts.

Abstract

Recent artificial neural networks that process natural language achieve unprecedented performance in tasks requiring sentence-level understanding. As such, they could be interesting models of the integration of linguistic information in the human brain. We review works that compare these artificial language models with human brain activity and we assess the extent to which this approach has improved our understanding of the neural processes involved in natural language comprehension. Two main results emerge. First, the neural representation of word meaning aligns with the context-dependent, dense word vectors used by the artificial neural networks. Second, the processing hierarchy that emerges within artificial neural networks broadly matches the brain, but is surprisingly inconsistent across studies. We discuss current challenges in establishing artificial neural networks as process models of natural language comprehension. We suggest exploiting the highly structured representational geometry of artificial neural networks when mapping representations to brain data.

Abstract

There is a robust positive relationship between reading skills and the time to name aloud an array of letters, digits, objects, or colors as quickly as possible. A convincing and complete explanation for the direction and locus of this association remains, however, elusive. In this study we investigated rapid automatized naming (RAN) of every-day objects and basic color patches in neurotypical illiterate and literate adults. Literacy acquisition and education enhanced RAN performance for both conceptual categories but this advantage was much larger for (abstract) colors than every-day objects. This result suggests that (i) literacy/education may be causal for serial rapid naming ability of non-alphanumeric items, (ii) differences in the lexical quality of conceptual representations can underlie the reading-related differential RAN performance.

Abstract

With a long-term aim of empowering researchers everywhere to contribute to work on language development, we organized the First Truly Global /L+/ International Summer/ Winter School on Language Acquisition, a free 5-day virtual school for early career researchers. In this paper, we describe the school, our experience organizing it, and lessons learned. The school had a diverse organizer team, composed of 26 researchers (17 from under represented areas: Subsaharan Africa, South and Southeast Asia, and Central and South America); and a diverse volunteer team, with a total of 95 volunteers from 35 different countries, nearly half from under represented areas. This helped world-wide Page 5 of 5 promotion of the school, leading to 958 registrations from 88 different countries, with 300 registrants (based in 63 countries, 80% from under represented areas) selected to participate in the synchronous aspects of the event. The school employed asynchronous (pre-recorded lectures, which were close-captioned) and synchronous elements (e.g., discussions to place the recorded lectures into participants' context; networking events) across three time zones. A post-school questionnaire revealed that 99% of participants enjoyed taking part in the school. Not with standing these positive quantitative outcomes, qualitative comments suggested we fell short in several areas, including the geographic diversity among lecturers and greater customization of contents to the participants’ contexts. Although much remains to be done to promote inclusivity in linguistic research, we hope our school will contribute to empowering researchers to investigate and publish on language acquisition in their home languages, to eventually result in more representative theories and empirical generalizations

Abstract

Based on six detailed case studies of languages in which focus is marked morphosyntactically, we propose a novel formal theory of focus marking, which can capture these as well as the familiar English-type prosodic focus marking. Special attention is paid to the patterns of focus syncretism, that is, when different size and/or location of focus are indistinguishably realized by the same form.

The key ingredients to our approach are that complex constituents (not just words) may be directly focally marked, and that the choice of focal marking is governed by blocking.

Abstract

The main goal of the present study is to trace the consequences of local and global markedness for the processing of singular and plural nouns. Decompositional models such as proposed by (Pinker (1997); Pinker (1999)) and (Levelt et al. (1999)) predict a lexeme frequency effect and no effects of the frequencies of the singular and the plural forms. Experiments 1 and 4 reveal the expected lexeme frequency effect. Furthermore, in these experiments there are no clear independent effects of the frequencies of the inflected forms. However, the effects of Entropy and Relative Entropy that emerge from these experiments show that in production knowledge of the probabilities of the individual inflected forms do play a role, albeit indirectly. These entropy effects bear witness to the importance of paradigmatic organization of inflected forms in the mental lexicon, both at the level of individual lexemes (Entropy) and at the general level of the class of nouns (Relative Entropy).

Abstract

As children gradually master grammatical rules, they often go through a period of producing form-meaning associations that were not observed in the input. For example, 2- to 3-year-old English-learning children use the bare form of verbs in settings that require obligatory past tense meaning while already starting to produce the grammatical –ed inflection. While many studies have focused on overgeneralization errors, fewer studies have attempted to explain the root of this earlier stage of rule acquisition. In this work, we use computational modeling to replicate children's production behavior prior to the generalization of past tense production in English. We illustrate how seemingly erroneous productions emerge in a model, without being licensed in the grammar and despite the model aiming at conforming to grammatical forms. Our results show that bare form productions stem from a tension between two factors: (1) trying to produce a less frequent meaning (the past tense) and (2) being unable to restrict the production of frequent forms (the bare form) as learning progresses. Like children, our model goes through a stage of bare form production and then converges on adult-like production of the regular past tense, showing that these different stages can be accounted for through a single learning mechanism.

Abstract

Pairwise maximum likelihood (PML) estimation is a promising method for multilevel models with discrete responses. Multilevel models take into account that units within a cluster tend to be more alike than units from different clusters. The pairwise likelihood is then obtained as the product of bivariate likelihoods for all within-cluster pairs of units and items. In this study, we investigate the PML estimation method with computationally intensive multilevel random intercept and random slope structural equation models (SEM) in discrete data. In pursuing this, we first reconsidered the general ‘wide format’ (WF) approach for SEM models and then extend the WF approach with random slopes. In a small simulation study we the determine accuracy and efficiency of the PML estimation method by varying the sample size (250, 500, 1000, 2000), response scales (two-point, four-point), and data-generating model (mediation model with three random slopes, factor model with one and two random slopes). Overall, results show that the PML estimation method is capable of estimating computationally intensive random intercept and random slopes multilevel models in the SEM framework with discrete data and many (six or more) latent variables with satisfactory accuracy and efficiency. However, the condition with 250 clusters combined with a two-point response scale shows more bias.

Abstract

Western Austronesian languages, like Tagalog, have unique, complex voice systems that require the correct combinations of verbal and nominal markers, raising many questions about their learnability. In this article, we review the experimental and observational studies on both the L1 and L2 acquisition of Tagalog. The reviewed studies reveal error patterns that reflect the complex nature of the Tagalog voice system. The main goal of the article is to present a full picture of commission errors in young Filipino children’s expression of causation and agency in Tagalog by describing patterns of nominal marking and voice marking in L1 Tagalog and L2 Tagalog. It also aims to provide an overview of existing research, as well as characterize research on nominal and verbal acquisition, specifically in terms of research problems, data sources, and methodology. Additionally, we discuss the research gaps in at least fifty years’ worth of studies in the area from the 1960’s to the present, as well as ideas for future research to advance the state of the art.

Abstract

Gliomas are brain tumors infiltrating healthy cortical and subcortical areas that may host cognitive functions, such as language. If these areas are damaged during surgery, the patient might develop word retrieval or articulation problems. For this reason, many glioma patients are operated on awake, while their language functions are tested. For this practice, quite simple tests are used, for example, picture naming. This paper describes the process and timeline of picture naming (noun retrieval) and shows the timeline and localization of the distinguished stages. This is relevant information for presurgical language testing with navigated Magnetic Stimulation (nTMS). This novel technique allows us to identify cortical involved in the language production process and, thus, guides the neurosurgeon in how to approach and remove the tumor. We argue that not only nouns, but also verbs should be tested, since sentences are built around verbs, and sentences are what we use in daily life. This approach’s relevance is illustrated by two case studies of glioma patients.

Abstract

Changes in oscillatory brain dynamics can be studied by means of induced band power (IBP) analyses, which quantify event-related changes in amplitude of frequency-specific EEG rhythms. Such analyses capture EEG phenomena that are not part of traditional event-related potential measures. The present study investigated whether IBP changes in the δ, θ, and α frequency ranges are sensitive to syntactic violations in sentences. Subjects read sentences that either were correct or contained a syntactic violation. The violations were either grammatical gender agreement violations, where a prenominal adjective was not appropriately inflected for the head noun's gender, or number agreement violations, in which a plural quantifier was combined with a singular head noun. IBP changes of the concurrently measured EEG were computed in five frequency bands of 2-Hz width, individually adjusted on the basis of subjects' α peak, ranging approximately from 2 to 12 Hz. Words constituting a syntactic violation elicited larger increases in θ power than the same words in a correct sentence context, in an interval of 300–500 ms after word onset. Of all the frequency bands studied, this was true for the θ frequency band only. The scalp topography of this effect was different for different violations: following number violations a left-hemispheric dominance was found, whereas gender violations elicited a right-hemisphere dominance of the θ power increase. Possible interpretations of this effect are considered in closing.

Abstract

An important, but often ignored distinction in the analysis of EEG signals is that between evoked activity and induced activity. Whereas evoked activity reflects the summation of transient post-synaptic potentials triggered by an event, induced activity, which is mainly oscillatory in nature, is thought to reflect changes in parameters controlling dynamic interactions within and between brain structures. We hypothesize that induced activity may yield information about the dynamics of cell assembly formation, activation and subsequent uncoupling, which may play a prominent role in different types of memory operations. We then describe a number of analysis tools that can be used to study the reactivity of induced rhythmic activity, both in terms of amplitude changes and of phase variability.

We briefly discuss how alpha, gamma and theta rhythms are thought to be generated, paying special attention to the hypothesis that the theta rhythm reflects dynamic interactions between the hippocampal system and the neocortex. This hypothesis would imply that studying the reactivity of scalp-recorded theta may provide a window on the contribution of the hippocampus to memory functions.

We review studies investigating the reactivity of scalp-recorded theta in paradigms engaging episodic memory, spatial memory and working memory. In addition, we review studies that relate theta reactivity to processes at the interface of memory and language. Despite many unknowns, the experimental evidence largely supports the hypothesis that theta activity plays a functional role in cell assembly formation, a process which may constitute the neural basis of memory formation and retrieval. The available data provide only highly indirect support for the hypothesis that scalp-recorded theta yields information about hippocampal functioning. It is concluded that studying induced rhythmic activity holds promise as an additional important way to study brain function.

Abstract

Objective: To explore the reactivity of the theta and alpha rhythms during visuo-spatial working memory. Methods: One hundred and seventy-four subjects performed a delayed response task. They had to remember the spatial location of a target stimulus on a computer screen for a 1 or a 4 s retention interval. The target either remained visible throughout the entire interval (sensory trials) or disappeared after 150 ms (memory trials). Changes in induced band power (IBP) in the electroencephalogram (EEG) were analyzed in 4 narrow, individually adjusted frequency bands between 4 and 12 Hz. Results: After presentation of the target stimulus, a phasic power increase was found, irrespective of condition and delay interval, in the lower (roughly, 4–8 Hz) frequency bands, with a posterior maximum. During the retention interval, sustained occipital–parietal alpha power increase and frontal theta power decrease were found. Most importantly, the memory trials showed larger IBP decreases in the theta band over frontal electrodes than the sensory trials. Conclusions: The phasic power increase following target onset is interpreted to reflect encoding of the target location. The sustained theta decrease, which is larger for memory trials, is tentatively interpreted to reflect visuo-spatial working memory processes.

Abstract

By analyzing event-related changes in induced band power in narrow frequency bands of the human electroencephalograph, the present paper explores a possible functional role of the alpha and theta rhythms during the processing of words and of sentences. The results show a phasic power increase in the theta frequency range, together with a phasic power decrease in the alpha frequency range, following the presentation of words in a sentence. These effects may be related to word processing, either lexical or in relation to sentence context. Most importantly, there is a slow and highly frequency-specific increase in theta power as a sentence unfolds, possibly related to the formation of an episodic memory trace, or to incremental verbal working memory load.

Abstract

Previous research has suggested that the stimulus-preceding negativity (SPN) is largely independent of stimulus modality. In contrast, the scalp topography of the event related desynchronization (ERD) related to the anticipation of stimuli providing knowledge of results (KR) is modality dependent. These findings, combined with functional SPN research, lead to the hypothesis that anticipatory ERD reflects anticipatory attention, whereas the SPN mainly depends on the affective-motivational properties of the anticipated stimulus. To further investigate the prestimulus ERD, and compare this measure with the SPN, 12 participants performed a time-estimation task, and were informed about the quality of their time estimation by an auditory or a visual stimulus providing KR. The KR stimuli could be either intact or degraded. Auditory degraded KR stimuli were less effective than other KR stimuli in guiding subsequent behavior, and were preceded by a larger SPN. There were no effects of degradation on the SPN in the visual modality. Preceding auditory KR stimuli no ERD was present, whereas preceding visual stimuli an occipital ERD was found. However, contrary to expectation, the latter was larger preceding intact than preceding degraded stimuli. It is concluded that the data largely agree with an interpretation of the pre-KR SPN as a reflection of the anticipation of the affective-motivational value of KR stimuli, and of the prestimulus ERD as a perceptual anticipatory attention process.

Abstract

While formal variation in Latin’s numerals is generally acknowledged, little is known about (relative) incidence, distribution, context, or linguistic productivity. Addressing this lacuna, this article examines “decads+” in Latin, which convey the numbers between the full decads: the teens (‘eleven’ through ‘nineteen’) as well as the numerals between the higher decads starting at ‘twenty-one’ through ‘ninety-nine’. Latin’s decads+ are compounds and prone to variation. The data, which are drawn from a variety of sources, reveal (a) substantial formal variation in Latin, both internally and typologically; (b) co-existence of several types of formation; (c) productivity of potential borrowings; (d) resilience of early formations; (e) patterns in structure and incidence that anticipate the Romance numerals; and (f) historical trends. From a typological and general linguistic perspective as well, Latin’s decads+ are most relevant because their formal variation involves sequence, connector, and arithmetical operations and because their historical depth shows a gradual shift away from widespread formal variation, eventually resulting in the relatively rigid system found in Romance. Moreover, the combined system attested in decads+ in Latin – based on a combination of inherited, innovative and borrowed patterns and reflecting different stages of development – presents a number of typological inconsistencies that require further assessment

Abstract

We compared the performance of young (college-aged) and older (50+years) speakers in a single object and a multiple object naming task and assessed their susceptibility to semantic and phonological context effects when producing words amidst semantically or phonologically similar or dissimilar words. In single object naming, there were no performance differences between the age groups. In multiple object naming, we observed significant age-related slowing, expressed in longer gazes to the objects and slower speech. In addition, the direction of the phonological context effects differed for the two groups. The results of a supplementary experiment showed that young speakers, when adopting a slow speech rate, coordinated their eye movements and speech differently from the older speakers. Our results imply that age-related slowing in connected speech is not a direct consequence of a slowing of lexical retrieval processes. Instead, older speakers might allocate more processing capacity to speech monitoring processes, which would slow down their concurrent speech planning processes

Abstract

We investigated the time course of conjunctive ''same''-''different'' judgements for visually presented object pairs by means of combined reaction time and on-line eye movement measurements. The analyses of viewing patterns, viewing times, and reaction times showed that participants engaged in a parallel self-terminating search for differences. In addition, the results obtained for objects differing in only one dimension suggest that processing times may depend on the relative codability of the stimulus dimensions. The results are reviewed in a broader framework in view of higher-order processes. We propose that overspecifications of colour, often found in object descriptions, may have an ''early'' visual rather than a ''late'' linguistic origin. In a parallel assessment of the detection materials, participants overspecified the objects' colour substantially more often than their size. We argue that referential overspecifications of colour are largely attributable to mechanisms of visual discrimination.

Abstract

In face-to-face communication, humans are faced with multiple layers of discontinuous multimodal signals, such as head, face, hand gestures, speech and non-speech sounds, which need to be interpreted as coherent and unified communicative actions. This implies a fundamental computational challenge: optimally binding only signals belonging to the same communicative action while segregating signals that are not connected by the communicative content. How do we achieve such an extraordinary feat, reliably, and efficiently? To address this question, we need to further move the study of human communication beyond speech-centred perspectives and promote a multimodal approach combined with interdisciplinary cooperation. Accordingly, we seek to reconcile two explanatory frameworks recently proposed in psycholinguistics and sensory neuroscience into a neurocognitive model of multimodal face-to-face communication. First, we introduce a psycholinguistic framework that characterises face-to-face communication at three parallel processing levels: multiplex signals, multimodal gestalts and multilevel predictions. Second, we consider the recent proposal of a lateral neural visual pathway specifically dedicated to the dynamic aspects of social perception and reconceive it from a multimodal perspective (“lateral processing pathway”). Third, we reconcile the two frameworks into a neurocognitive model that proposes how multiplex signals, multimodal gestalts, and multilevel predictions may be implemented along the lateral processing pathway. Finally, we advocate a multimodal and multidisciplinary research approach, combining state-of-the-art imaging techniques, computational modelling and artificial intelligence for future empirical testing of our model.

Abstract

Language is a universal human ability, acquired readily by young children, whootherwise struggle with many basics of survival. And yet, language ability is variableacross individuals. Naturalistic and experimental observations suggest that children’slinguistic skills vary with factors like socioeconomic status and children’s gender.But which factors really influence children’s day-to-day language use? Here, weleverage speech technology in a big-data approach to report on a unique cross-culturaland diverse data set: >2,500 d-long, child-centered audio-recordings of 1,001 2- to48-mo-olds from 12 countries spanning six continents across urban, farmer-forager,and subsistence-farming contexts. As expected, age and language-relevant clinical risksand diagnoses predicted how much speech (and speech-like vocalization) childrenproduced. Critically, so too did adult talk in children’s environments: Children whoheard more talk from adults produced more speech. In contrast to previous conclusionsbased on more limited sampling methods and a different set of language proxies,socioeconomic status (operationalized as maternal education) was not significantlyassociated with children’s productions over the first 4 y of life, and neither weregender or multilingualism. These findings from large-scale naturalistic data advanceour understanding of which factors are robust predictors of variability in the speechbehaviors of young learners in a wide range of everyday contexts

Abstract

Telling time is an exercise in coordinating language production with visual perception. By coupling different ways of saying times with different ways of seeing them, the performance of time-telling can be used to track cognitive transformations from visual to verbal information in connected speech. To accomplish this, we used eyetracking measures along with measures of speech timing during the production of time expressions. Our findings suggest that an effective interface between what has been seen and what is to be said can be constructed within 300 ms. This interface underpins a preverbal plan or message that appears to guide a comparatively slow, strongly incremental formulation of phrases. The results begin to trace the divide between seeing and saying -or thinking and speaking- that must be bridged during the creation of even the most prosaic utterances of a language.

Abstract

We know that speech planning in conversational turn-taking can happen in overlap with the previous turn and research suggests that it starts as early as possible, that is, as soon as the gist of the previous turn becomes clear. The present study aimed to investigate whether planning proceeds all the way up to the last stage of articulatory preparation (i.e., putting the articulators in place for the first phoneme of the response) and what the timing of this process is. Participants answered pre-recorded quiz questions (being under the illusion that they were asked live), while their tongue movements were measured using ultrasound. Planning could start early for some quiz questions (i.e., midway during the question), but late for others (i.e., only at the end of the question). The results showed no evidence for a difference between tongue movements in these two types of questions for at least two seconds after planning could start in early-planning questions, suggesting that speech planning in overlap with the current turn proceeds more slowly than in the clear. On the other hand, when time-locking to speech onset, tongue movements differed between the two conditions from up to two seconds before this point. This suggests that articulatory preparation can occur in advance and is not fully tied to the overt response itself.

Abstract

The Mayan languages Tzeltal and Yucatec have large form classes of “dispositional” roots which lexicalize spatial properties such as orientation, support/suspension/blockage of motion, and configurations of parts of an entity with respect to other parts. But speakers of the two languages deploy this common lexical resource quite differently. The roots are used in both languages to convey dispositional information (e.g., answering “how” questions), but Tzeltal speakers also use them in canonical locative descriptions (e.g., answering “where” questions), whereas Yucatec speakers only use dispositionals in locative predications when prompted by the context to focus on dispositional properties. We describe the constructions used in locative and dispositional descriptions in response to two different picture stimuli sets. Evidence against the proposal that Tzeltal uses dispositionals to compensate for its single, semantically generic preposition (Brown 1994; Grinevald 2006) comes from the finding that Tzeltal speakers use relational spatial nominals in the “Ground phrase” — the expression of the place at which an entity is located — about as frequently as Yucatec speakers. We consider several alternative hypotheses, including a possible larger typological difference that leads Tzeltal speakers, but not Yucatec speakers, to prefer “theme-specific” verbs not just in locative predications, but in any predication involving a theme argument.

Abstract

We examine universals and crosslinguistic variation in constraints on event segmentation. Previous typological studies have focused on segmentation into syntactic (Pawley 1987) or intonational units (Givón 1991). We argue that the correlation between such units and semantic/conceptual event representations is language-specific. As an alternative, we introduce the MACRO-EVENT PROPERTY (MEP): a construction has the MEP if it packages event representations such that temporal operators necessarily have scope over all subevents. A case study on the segmentation of motion events into macro-event expressions in eighteen genetically and typologically diverse languages has produced evidence of two types of design principles that impact motion-event segmentation: language-specific lexicalization patterns and universal constraints on form-to-meaning mapping.

Abstract

This article examines how narratives are structured in a language in which event order is largely not coded. Yucatec Maya lacks both tense inflections and temporal connectives corresponding to English after and before. It is shown that the coding of events in Yucatec narratives is subject to a strict iconicity constraint within paragraph boundaries. Aspectual viewpoint shifting is used to reconcile iconicity preservation with the requirements of a more flexible narrative structure.

Abstract

Fictive Motion is the metaphoric use of path relators in the expression of spatial relations or configurations that are static, or at any rate do not in any obvious way involve physical entities moving in real space. The goal is to study the expression of such relations or configurations in the target language, with an eye particularly on whether these expressions exclusively/preferably/possibly involve motion verbs and/or path relators, i.e., Fictive Motion. Section 2 gives Talmy’s (2000: ch. 2) phenomenology of Fictive Motion construals. The researcher’s task is to “distill” the intended spatial relations/configurations from Talmy’s description of the particular Fictive Motion metaphors and elicit as many different examples of the relations/configurations as (s)he deems necessary to obtain a basic sense of whether and how much Fictive Motion the target language offers or prescribes for the encoding of the particular type of relation/configuration. As a first stab, the researcher may try to elicit natural translations of culturally appropriate adaptations of the examples Talmy provides with each type of Fictive Motion metaphor.

Abstract

Landscape terms reflect the relationship between geographic reality and human cognition. Are ‘mountains’, ‘rivers, ‘lakes’ and the like universally recognised in languages as naturally salient objects to be named? The landscape subproject is concerned with the interrelation between language, cognition and geography. Specifically, it investigates issues relating to how landforms are categorised cross-linguistically as well as the characteristics of place naming.

Abstract

This Field Manual entry has been superceded by the 2008 version: https://doi.org/10.17617/2.492932

Abstract

While listening to meaningful speech, auditory input is processed more rapidly near the end (vs. beginning) of sentences. Although several studies have shown such word-to-word changes in auditory input processing, it is still unclear from which processing level these word-to-word dynamics originate. We investigated whether predictions derived from sentential context can result in auditory word-processing dynamics during sentence tracking. We presented healthy human participants with auditory stimuli consisting of word sequences, arranged into either predictable (coherent sentences) or less predictable (unstructured, random word sequences) 42-Hz amplitude-modulated speech, and a continuous 25-Hz amplitude-modulated distractor tone. We recorded RTs and frequency-tagged neuroelectric responses 1(auditory steady-state responses) to individual words at multiple temporal positions within the sentences, and quantified sentential context effects at each position while controlling for individual word characteristics (i.e., phonetics, frequency, and familiarity). We found that sentential context increasingly facilitates auditory word processing as evidenced by accelerated RTs and increased auditory steady-state responses to later-occurring words within sentences. These purely top–down contextually driven auditory word-processing dynamics occurred only when listeners focused their attention on the speech and did not transfer to the auditory processing of the concurrent distractor tone. These findings indicate that auditory word-processing dynamics during sentence tracking can originate from sentential predictions. The predictions depend on the listeners' attention to the speech, and affect only the processing of the parsed speech, not that of concurrently presented auditory streams.

Abstract

Reprinted from; Bowerman, M. (1989). Learning a semantic system: What role do cognitive predispositions play? In M.L. Rice & R.L Schiefelbusch (Ed.), The teachability of language (pp. 133-169). Baltimore: Paul H. Brookes.

Abstract

Reprinted from Bowerman, M. & Choi, S. (2003). Space under construction: Language-specific spatial categorization in first language acquisition. In D. Gentner & S. Goldin-Meadow (Eds.), Language in Mind (pp. 387-427). Cambridge: MIT Press.

Abstract

Among children’s earliest spatial words are topological forms like ‘in’ and ‘on’. Although these forms name spatial relationships, they also presuppose a classification of ground objects into entities such as “containers” and “surfaces”; hence their relevance for a volume on “spatial entities”. Traditionally, researchers have assumed that semantic categories of space are universal, reflecting a human way of nonlinguistically perceiving and cognizing space. But, as this chapter discusses, spatial categories in fact differ strikingly across languages, and children begin to home in on language-specific classifications extremely early, before age two. Learners do not, it seems, draw only on purely nonlinguistic spatial concepts; they can also actively construct spatial categories on the basis of the linguistic input. Evidence is drawn primarily from research on children learning Korean vs. English.

Abstract

Reprinted from: Bowerman, M. & Choi, S. (2001). Shaping meanings for language: Universal and language specific in the acquisition of spatial semantic categories. In M. Bowerman & S.L. Levinson (Eds.), Language acquisition and conceptual development (pp. 475-511). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Abstract

Reprinted from: Bowerman, M. (1990). Mapping thematic roles onto syntactic functions: Are children helped by innate linking rules? Linguistics, 28, 1253-1289.

Abstract

Kids’ Cut & Break is a task inspired by the original Cut & Break task (see MPI L&C Group Field Manual 2001), but designed for use with children as well as adults. There are fewer videoclips to be described (34 as opposed to 61), and they are “friendlier” and more interesting: the actors wear colorful clothes, smile, and act cheerfully. The first 2 items are warm-ups and 4 more items are fillers (interspersed with test items), so only 28 of the items are actually “test items”. In the original Cut & Break, each clip is in a separate file. In Kids’ Cut & Break, all 34 clips are edited into a single file, which plays the clips successively with 5 seconds of black screen between each clip.

Abstract

Reprinted from: Bowerman, M. (1981). The child's expression of meaning: Expanding relationships among lexicon, syntax, and morphology. In H. Winitz (Ed.), Native language and foreign language acquisition (pp. 172 189). New York: New York Academy of Sciences.

Abstract

Previous studies have shown a significant association between reading skills and the performance on visuo-motor tasks. In order to clarify whether reading and writing skills modulate non-linguistic domains, we investigated the performance of two literacy groups on a visuo-motor integration task with non-linguistic stimuli. Twenty-one illiterate participants and twenty matched literate controls were included in the experiment. Subjects were instructed to use the right or the left index finger to point to and touch a randomly presented target on the right or left side of a touch screen. The results showed that the literate subjects were significantly faster in detecting and touching targets on the left compared to the right side of the screen. In contrast, the presentation side did not affect the performance of the illiterate group. These results lend support to the idea that having acquired reading and writing skills, and thus a preferred left-to-right reading direction, influences visual scanning. (JINS, 2007, 13, 359–364

Abstract

In numerous comprehension studies, across different languages, children have performed worse on object relatives (e.g., the dog that the cat chased) than on subject relatives (e.g., the dog that chased the cat). One possible reason for this is that the test sentences did not exactly match the kinds of object relatives that children typically experience. Adults and children usually hear and produce object relatives with inanimate heads and pronominal subjects (e.g., the car that we bought last year) (cf. Kidd et al., Language and Cognitive Processes 22: 860–897, 2007). We tested young 3-year old German- and English-speaking children with a referential selection task. Children from both language groups performed best in the condition where the experimenter described inanimate referents with object relatives that contained pronominal subjects (e.g., Can you give me the sweater that he bought?). Importantly, when the object relatives met the constraints identified in spoken discourse, children understood them as well as subject relatives, or even better. These results speak against a purely structural explanation for children's difficulty with object relatives as observed in previous studies, but rather support the usage-based account, according to which discourse function and experience with language shape the representation of linguistic structures.

Abstract

This paper investigates stress assignment in Dutch aphasic patients in non-word repetition, as well as in real-word and non-word reading. Performance on the non-word reading task was similar for the aphasic patients and the control group, as mainly regular stress was assigned to the targets. However, there were group differences on the real-word reading and non-word repetition tasks. Unlike the non-brain-damaged group, the patients showed a strong regularization tendency in their repetition of irregular patterns. The patients’ stress error patterns suggest an impairment in retention or retrieval of targets with irregular stress patterns. Limited verbal short-term memory is proposed as a possible underlying cause for the stress difficulties.

Abstract

Theoretical linguists have traditionally relied on linguistic intuitions such as grammaticality judgments for their data. But the massive growth of computer-readable texts and recordings, the availability of cheaper, more powerful computers and software, and the development of new probabilistic models for language have now made the spontaneous use of language in natural settings a rich and easily accessible alternative source of data. Surprisingly, many linguists believe that such ‘usage data’ are irrelevant to the theory of grammar. Four problems are repeatedly brought up in the critiques of usage data— 1. correlated factors seeming to support reductive theories, 2. pooled data invalidating grammatical inference, 3. syntactic choices reducing to lexical biases, and 4. cross-corpus differences undermining corpus studies. Presenting a case study of work on the English dative alternation, we show first,that linguistic intuitions of grammaticality are deeply flawed and seriously underestimate the space of grammatical possibility, and second, that the four problems in the critique of usage data are empirical issues that can be resolved by using modern statistical theory and modelling strategies widely used in other fields. The new models allow linguistic theory to solve more difficult problems than it has in the past, and to build convergent projects with psychology, computer science, and allied fields of cognitive science.

Abstract

We employed a parametric psychophysical design in combination with functional imaging to examine the influence of metric changes in perceptual incongruence on perceptual alternation rates and cortical responses. Subjects viewed a bistable stimulus defined by incongruent depth cues; bistability resulted from incongruence between binocular disparity and monocular perspective cues that specify different slants (slant rivalry). Psychophysical results revealed that perceptual alternation rates were positively correlated with the degree of perceived incongruence. Functional imaging revealed systematic increases in activity that paralleled the psychophysical results within anterior intraparietal sulcus, prior to the onset of perceptual alternations. We suggest that this cortical activity predicts the frequency of subsequent alternations, implying a putative causal role for these areas in initiating bistable perception. In contrast, areas implicated in form and depth processing (LOC and V3A) were sensitive to the degree of slant, but failed to show increases in activity when these cues were in conflict.

Abstract

This paper focuses on ‘minimality’ in initial references to persons in the Mayan language Tzeltal, spoken in southern Mexico. Inspection of initial person-referring expressions in 25 Tzeltal videotaped conversations reveals that, in this language, if speaker and/or recipient are related through ‘kinship’ to the referent, a kin term (or other relational term like ‘namesake’) is the default option for initial reference to persons. Additionally, further specification via names and/or geographical location (of home base) is also often used to home in on the referent (e.g. ‘your-cousin Alonzo’, ‘our mother’s brother behind the mountain’). And often (~ 70 cases in the data examined) initial references to persons combine more than one referring expression, for example: ‘this old man my brother-in-law old man Antonio here in the pines’, or ‘the father of that brother-in-law of yours the father-in-law of your elder-sister Xmaruch’. Seen in the light of Schegloff’s (1979, 1996) two basic preferences for referring to persons in conversation: (i.) for a recognitional form and (ii.) for a minimal form, these Tzeltal person-referring expressions seem to be relatively elaborated. This paper examines the sequential contexts where such combinations appear, and proposes a third preference operative in Tzeltal (and possibly in other kinship-term-based systems) for associating the referent as closely as possible to the participants.

Abstract

In a famous paper Harvey Sacks (1974) argued that the sequential properties of greeting conventions, as well as those governing the flow of information, mean that 'everyone has to lie'. In this paper I show this dictum to be equally true in the Tzeltal Mayan community of Tenejapa, in southern Mexico, but for somewhat different reasons. The phenomenon of interest is the practice of routine fearsome threats to small children. Based on a longitudinal corpus of videotaped and tape-recorded naturally-occurring interaction between caregivers and children in five Tzeltal families, the study examines sequences of Tzeltal caregivers' speech aimed at controlling the children's behaviour and analyzes the children's developing pragmatic skills in handling such controlling utterances, from prelinguistic infants to age five and over. Infants in this society are considered to be vulnerable, easily scared or shocked into losing their 'souls', and therefore at all costs to be protected and hidden from outsiders and other dangers. Nonetheless, the chief form of control (aside from physically removing a child from danger) is to threaten, saying things like "Don't do that, or I'll take you to the clinic for an injection," These overt scare-threats - rarely actually realized - lead Tzeltal children by the age of 2;6 to 3;0 to the understanding that speech does not necessarily convey true propositions, and to a sensitivity to the underlying motivations for utterances distinct from their literal meaning. By age 4;0 children perform the same role to their younger siblings;they also begin to use more subtle non-true (e.g. ironic) utterances. The caretaker practice described here is related to adult norms of social lying, to the sociocultural context of constraints on information flow, social control through gossip, and the different notion of 'truth' that arises in the context of non-verifiability characteristic of a small-scale nonliterate society.

Abstract

Three-place predicates are an important locus for examining how children acquire argument structure and how this process is influenced by the typology of the language they are learning as well as by culturally-specific semantic categories. From a typological perspective, there is reason to expect children to have some trouble expressing three-participant events, given the considerable variation across languages in how these are linguistically coded. Verbs of transfer (‘give’, ‘receive’, etc.) are often considered to be the verbs which canonically appear with three arguments (e.g., Slobin 1985, Gleitman 1990). Yet in the Mayan language Tzeltal, verbs other than transfer verbs appear routinely in the ditransitive construction. Although the three participants are rarely all overtly expressed as NPs, this construction ensures that the ‘recipient’ or or ‘affectee’ participant is overtly marked on the verb. Tzeltal children’s early acquisition of this construction (well before the age of 3;0) shows that they are sensitive to its abstract constructional meaning of ‘affected’ third participant: they do not go initially for ‘transfer’ meanings but are attuned to benefactive or malefactive uses despite the predominance of the verb ‘give’ in the input with this construction. This poses a challenge to acquisition theories (Goldberg 2001, Ninio 1999) that see construction meaning arising from the meaning of the verb most frequently used in a construction.

Abstract

This paper describes the lexical resources for expressing events of cutting and breaking (C&B hereafter) in the Mayan language Tzeltal. This notional set of verbs is not a class in any grammatical sense; C&B verbs are formally undistinguishable from many other transitive state-change verbs. But they nicely reveal the characteristic specificity of Tzeltal verb semantics: C&B actions are finely differentiated according to the spatial and textural properties of the theme object, with no superordinate term meaning 'either cut in general' or 'break in general'. The paper characterizes the semantics of these verbs and shows that in the great majority of cases it does not predict their argument structure.

Abstract

This article is a reprint of parts of chapters 2 and 3 from Brown and Levinson (1987) discussing the concept of 'Face Threatening Acts'.