Displaying 1 - 62 of 62
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He, J. (2023). Coordination of spoken language production and comprehension: How speech production is affected by irrelevant background speech. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Aarts, E. (2009). Resisting temptation: The role of the anterior cingulate cortex in adjusting cognitive control. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Baggio, G. (2009). Semantics and the electrophysiology of meaning: Tense, aspect, event structure. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Bartolozzi, F. (2023). Repetita Iuvant? Studies on the role of repetition priming as a supportive mechanism during conversation. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Bergmann, C. (2014). Computational models of early language acquisition and the role of different voices. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Bosker, H. R. (2014). The processing and evaluation of fluency in native and non-native speech. PhD Thesis, Utrecht University, Utrecht.
Abstract
Disfluency is a common characteristic of spontaneously produced speech. Disfluencies (e.g., silent pauses, filled pauses [uh’s and uhm’s], corrections, repetitions, etc.) occur in both native and non-native speech. There appears to be an apparent contradiction between claims from the evaluative and cognitive approach to fluency. On the one hand, the evaluative approach shows that non-native disfluencies have a negative effect on listeners’ subjective fluency impressions. On the other hand, the cognitive approach reports beneficial effects of native disfluencies on cognitive processes involved in speech comprehension, such as prediction and attention.
This dissertation aims to resolve this apparent contradiction by combining the evaluative and cognitive approach. The reported studies target both the evaluation (Chapters 2 and 3) and the processing of fluency (Chapters 4 and 5) in native and non-native speech. Thus, it provides an integrative account of native and non-native fluency perception, informative to both language testing practice and cognitive psycholinguists. The proposed account of fluency perception testifies to the notion that speech performance matters: communication through spoken language does not only depend on what is said, but also on how it is said and by whom.
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Brehm, L. (2014). Speed limits and red flags: Why number agreement accidents happen. PhD Thesis, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana-Champaign, Il.
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Buckler, H. (2014). The acquisition of morphophonological alternations across languages. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Byun, K.-S. (2023). Establishing intersubjectivity in cross-signing. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Cablitz, G. (2002). Marquesan: A grammar of space. PhD Thesis, Christian Albrechts U., Kiel.
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Choi, J. (2014). Rediscovering a forgotten language. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Coopmans, C. W. (2023). Triangles in the brain: The role of hierarchical structure in language use. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Davids, N. (2009). Neurocognitive markers of phonological processing: A clinical perspective. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Dimroth, C., & Lasser, I. (
Eds. ). (2002). Finite options: How L1 and L2 learners cope with the acquisition of finiteness [Special Issue]. Linguistics, 40(4). -
Drude, S. (1997). Wörterbücher, integrativ interpretiert, am Beispiel des Guaraní. Magister Thesis, Freie Universität Berlin.
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Egger, J. (2023). Need for speed? The role of speed of processing in early lexical development. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Eijk, L. (2023). Linguistic alignment: The syntactic, prosodic, and segmental phonetic levels. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Fitz, H. (2009). Neural syntax. PhD Thesis, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Institute for Logic, Language, and Computation.
Abstract
Children learn their mother tongue spontaneously and effortlessly through communicative interaction with their environment; they do not have to be taught explicitly or learn how to learn first. The ambient language to which children are exposed, however, is highly variable and arguably deficient with regard to the learning target. Nonetheless, most normally developing children learn their native language rapidly and with ease. To explain this accomplishment, many theories of acquisition posit innate constraints on learning, or even a biological endowment for language which is specific to language. Usage-based theories, on the other hand, place more emphasis on the role of experience and domain-general learning mechanisms than on innate language-specific knowledge. But languages are lexically open and combinatorial in structure, so no amount of experience covers their expressivity. Usage-based theories therefore have to explain how children can generalize the properties of their linguistic input to an adult-like grammar. In this thesis I provide an explicit computational mechanism with which usage-based theories of language can be tested and evaluated. The focus of my work lies on complex syntax and the human ability to form sentences which express more than one proposition by means of relativization. This `capacity for recursion' is a hallmark of an adult grammar and, as some have argued, the human language faculty itself. The manuscript is organized as follows. In the second chapter, I give an overview of results that characterize the properties of neural networks as mathematical objects and review previous attempts at modelling the acquisition of complex syntax with such networks. The chapter introduces the conceptual landscape in which the current work is located. In the third chapter, I argue that the construction and use of meaning is essential in child language acquisition and adult processing. Neural network models need to incorporate this dimension of human linguistic behavior. I introduce the Dual-path model of sentence production and syntactic development which is able to represent semantics and learns from exposure to sentences paired with their meaning (cf. Chang et al. 2006). I explain the architecture of this model, motivate critical assumptions behind its design, and discuss existing research using this model. The fourth chapter describes and compares several extensions of the basic architecture to accommodate the processing of multi-clause utterances. These extensions are evaluated against computational desiderata, such as good learning and generalization performance and the parsimony of input representations. A single-best solution for encoding the meaning of complex sentences with restrictive relative clauses is identified, which forms the basis for all subsequent simulations. Chapter five analyzes the learning dynamics in more detail. I first examine the model's behavior for different relative clause types. Syntactic alternations prove to be particularly difficult to learn because they complicate the meaning-to-form mapping the model has to acquire. In the second part, I probe the internal representations the model has developed during learning. It is argued that the model acquires the argument structure of the construction types in its input language and represents the hierarchical organization of distinct multi-clause utterances. The juice of this thesis is contained in chapters six to eight. In chapter six, I test the Dual-path model's generalization capacities in a variety of tasks. I show that its syntactic representations are sufficiently transparent to allow structural generalization to novel complex utterances. Semantic similarities between novel and familiar sentence types play a critical role in this task. The Dual-path model also has a capacity for generalizing familiar words to novel slots in novel constructions (strong semantic systematicity). Moreover, I identify learning conditions under which the model displays recursive productivity. It is argued that the model's behavior is consistent with human behavior in that production accuracy degrades with depth of embedding, and right-branching is learned faster than center-embedding recursion. In chapter seven, I address the issue of learning complex polar interrogatives in the absence of positive exemplars in the input. I show that the Dual-path model can acquire the syntax of these questions from simpler and similar structures which are warranted in a child's linguistic environment. The model's errors closely match children's errors, and it is suggested that children might not require an innate learning bias to acquire auxiliary fronting. Since the model does not implement a traditional kind of language-specific universal grammar, these results are relevant to the poverty of the stimulus debate. English relative clause constructions give rise to similar performance orderings in adult processing and child language acquisition. This pattern matches the typological universal called the noun phrase accessibility hierarchy. I propose an input-based explanation of this data in chapter eight. The Dual-path model displays this ordering in syntactic development when exposed to plausible input distributions. But it is possible to manipulate and completely remove the ordering by varying properties of the input from which the model learns. This indicates, I argue, that patterns of interference and facilitation among input structures can explain the hierarchy when all structures are simultaneously learned and represented over a single set of connection weights. Finally, I draw conclusions from this work, address some unanswered questions, and give a brief outlook on how this research might be continued.Additional information
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Forkel, S. J. (2014). Identification of anatomical predictors of language recovery after stroke with diffusion tensor imaging. PhD Thesis, King's College London, London.
Abstract
Background Stroke-induced aphasia is associated with adverse effects on quality of life and the ability to return to work. However, the predictors of recovery are still poorly understood. Anatomical variability of the arcuate fasciculus, connecting Broca’s and Wernicke’s areas, has been reported in the healthy population using diffusion tensor imaging tractography. In about 40% of the population the arcuate fasciculus is bilateral and this pattern is advantageous for certain language related functions, such as auditory verbal learning (Catani et al. 2007). Methods In this prospective longitudinal study, anatomical predictors of post-stroke aphasia recovery were investigated using diffusion tractography and arterial spin labelling. Patients An 18-subject strong aphasia cohort with first-ever unilateral left hemispheric middle cerebral artery infarcts underwent post stroke language (mean 5±5 days) and neuroimaging (mean 10±6 days) assessments and neuropsychological follow-up at six months. Ten of these patients were available for reassessment one year after symptom onset. Aphasia was assessed with the Western Aphasia Battery, which provides a global measure of severity (Aphasia Quotient, AQ). Results Better recover from aphasia was observed in patients with a right arcuate fasciculus [beta=.730, t(2.732), p=.020] (tractography) and increased fractional anisotropy in the right hemisphere (p<0.05) (Tract-based spatial statistics). Further, an increase in left hemisphere perfusion was observed after one year (p<0.01) (perfusion). Lesion analysis identified maximal overlay in the periinsular white matter (WM). Lesion-symptom mapping identified damage to periinsular structure as predictive for overall aphasia severity and damage to frontal lobe white matter as predictive of repetition deficits. Conclusion These findings suggest an important role for the right hemisphere language network in recovery from aphasia after left hemispheric stroke.Additional information
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Frost, R. (2014). Learning grammatical structures with and without sleep. PhD Thesis, Lancaster University, Lancaster.
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Ganushchak, L. Y., & Acheson, D. J. (
Eds. ). (2014). What's to be learned from speaking aloud? - Advances in the neurophysiological measurement of overt language production. [Research topic] [Special Issue]. Frontiers in Language Sciences. Retrieved from http://www.frontiersin.org/Language_Sciences/researchtopics/What_s_to_be_Learned_from_Spea/1671.Abstract
Researchers have long avoided neurophysiological experiments of overt speech production due to the suspicion that artifacts caused by muscle activity may lead to a bad signal-to-noise ratio in the measurements. However, the need to actually produce speech may influence earlier processing and qualitatively change speech production processes and what we can infer from neurophysiological measures thereof. Recently, however, overt speech has been successfully investigated using EEG, MEG, and fMRI. The aim of this Research Topic is to draw together recent research on the neurophysiological basis of language production, with the aim of developing and extending theoretical accounts of the language production process. In this Research Topic of Frontiers in Language Sciences, we invite both experimental and review papers, as well as those about the latest methods in acquisition and analysis of overt language production data. All aspects of language production are welcome: i.e., from conceptualization to articulation during native as well as multilingual language production. Focus should be placed on using the neurophysiological data to inform questions about the processing stages of language production. In addition, emphasis should be placed on the extent to which the identified components of the electrophysiological signal (e.g., ERP/ERF, neuronal oscillations, etc.), brain areas or networks are related to language comprehension and other cognitive domains. By bringing together electrophysiological and neuroimaging evidence on language production mechanisms, a more complete picture of the locus of language production processes and their temporal and neurophysiological signatures will emerge. -
Giglio, L. (2023). Speaking in the Brain: How the brain produces and understands language. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Hamilton, A., & Holler, J. (
Eds. ). (2023). Face2face: Advancing the science of social interaction [Special Issue]. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series B: Biological Sciences. Retrieved from https://royalsocietypublishing.org/toc/rstb/2023/378/1875.Abstract
Face to face interaction is fundamental to human sociality but is very complex to study in a scientific fashion. This theme issue brings together cutting-edge approaches to the study of face-to-face interaction and showcases how we can make progress in this area. Researchers are now studying interaction in adult conversation, parent-child relationships, neurodiverse groups, interactions with virtual agents and various animal species. The theme issue reveals how new paradigms are leading to more ecologically grounded and comprehensive insights into what social interaction is. Scientific advances in this area can lead to improvements in education and therapy, better understanding of neurodiversity and more engaging artificial agents -
Hammond, J. (2009). The grammar of nouns and verbs in Whitesands, an oceanic language of Southern Vanuatu. Master Thesis, University of Sydney, Sydney.
Abstract
Whitesands is an under-described language of southern Vanuatu, and this thesis presents Whitesands-specific data based on primary in-situ field research. The thesis addresses the distinction of noun and verb word classes in the language. It claims that current linguistic syntax theory cannot account for the argument structure of canonical object-denoting roots. It is shown that there are distinct lexical noun and verb classes in Whitesands but this is only a weak dichotomy. Stronger is the NP and VP distinction, and this is achieved by employing a new theoretical approach that proposes functional categories and their selection of complements as crucial tests of distinction. This approach contrasts with previous analyses of parts of speech in Oceanic languages and cross-linguistically. It ultimately explains many of the syntactic phenomena seen in the language family, including the above argument assignment dilemma, the alienable possession of nouns with classifiers and also the nominalisation processes. -
Haveman, A. (1997). The open-/closed-class distinction in spoken-word recognition. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen. doi:10.17617/2.2057704.
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Hellwig, B., Allen, S. E. M., Davidson, L., Defina, R., Kelly, B. F., & Kidd, E. (
Eds. ). (2023). The acquisition sketch project [Special Issue]. Language Documentation and Conservation Special Publication, 28.Abstract
This special publication aims to build a renewed enthusiasm for collecting acquisition data across many languages, including those facing endangerment and loss. It presents a guide for documenting and describing child language and child-directed language in diverse languages and cultures, as well as a collection of acquisition sketches based on this guide. The guide is intended for anyone interested in working across child language and language documentation, including, for example, field linguists and language documenters, community language workers, child language researchers or graduate students. -
Indefrey, P. (2002). Listen und Regeln: Erwerb und Repräsentation der schwachen Substantivdeklination des Deutschen. PhD Thesis, Heinrich Heine Universität, Düsseldorf.
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De Jong, N. H. (2002). Morphological families in the mental lexicon. PhD Thesis, University of Nijmegen, Nijmegen. doi:10.17617/2.57697.
Abstract
Words can occur as constituents of other words. Some words have a high morphological productivity, in that they occur in many complex words, whereas others are morphological islands. Previous studies have found that the size of a word's morphological family can co-determine response latencies in lexical decision tasks. This thesis shows, using lexical decision as well as otherexperimental tasks, that the effect of family size is a semantic effect,reflecting the spreading of activation in the mental lexicon along the lines of morphological and semantic relatedness between words.Additional information
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Jordanoska, I., Kocher, A., & Bendezú-Araujo, R. (
Eds. ). (2023). Marking the truth: A cross-linguistic approach to verum [Special Issue]. Zeitschrift für Sprachwissenschaft, 42(3). -
Klein, W. (
Ed. ). (2002). Sprache des Rechts II [Special Issue]. Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik, 128. -
Klein, W., & Jungbluth, K. (
Eds. ). (2002). Deixis [Special Issue]. Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik, 125. -
Klein, W. (
Ed. ). (1997). Technologischer Wandel in den Philologien [Special Issue]. Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik, (106). -
Klein, W. (
Ed. ). (1988). Sprache Kranker [Special Issue]. Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik, (69). -
Klein, W. (
Ed. ). (1987). Sprache und Ritual [Special Issue]. Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik, (65). -
Klein, W., & Dimroth, C. (
Eds. ). (2009). Worauf kann sich der Sprachunterricht stützen? [Special Issue]. Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik, 153. -
Kok, P. (2014). On the role of expectation in visual perception: A top-down view of early visual cortex. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Kösem, A. (2014). Cortical oscillations as temporal reference frames for perception. PhD Thesis, Université Pierre et Marie Curie-Paris VI, Paris.
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Kuzla, C. (2009). Prosodic structure in speech production and perception. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Lasser, I. (1997). Finiteness in adult and child German. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen. doi:10.17617/2.2057674.
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Mauth, K. (2002). Morphology in speech comprehension. PhD Thesis, University of Nijmegen, Nijmegen. doi:10.17617/2.60024.
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Meyer, A. S. (1988). Phonological encoding in language production: A priming study. PhD Thesis, Katholieke Universiteit Nijmegen.
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Nijland, L., & Janse, E. (
Eds. ). (2009). Auditory processing in speakers with acquired or developmental language disorders [Special Issue]. Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics, 23(3). -
Norcliffe, E. (2009). Head-marking in usage and grammar: A study of variation and change in Yucatec Maya. PhD Thesis, Stanford University, Stanford, CA.
Abstract
Many Mayan languages make use of a special dependent verb form (the Agent Focus, or AF verb form), which alternates with the normal transitive verb form (the synthetic verb form) of main clauses when the subject of a transitive verb is focused, questioned or relativized. It has been a centerpiece of research in Mayan morphosyntax over the last forty years, due to its puzzling formal and distributional properties. In this dissertation I show how a usage-oriented approach to the phenomenon can provide important insights into this area of grammar which resists any categorical explanation. I propose that the historical origins of these special verb forms can be traced to the emergence of head marking. Drawing on cross-linguistic and historical data, I argue that the special verbs that occur in A-bar dependencies in Yucatec and a range of head-marking languages are byproducts of the frequency-sensitive gramaticalization process by which independent pronouns become pronominal inflection on verbs. I show that the relatively low frequency of adjacent pronoun-verb combinations in extraction contexts (where gaps are more frequent than resumptive pronouns) can give rise to asymmetric patterns of pronoun grammaticalization, and thus lead to the emergence of these morphological alternations. The asymmetric frequency distributions of gaps and RPs (within and across languages) in turn can be explained by processing preferences. I present three experiments which show that Yucatec speakers are more likely to use the resumptive verb form in embedded environments, and where the antecedent is indefinite. Specifically, these studies indicate the need to bring discourse-level processing principles into the account of what have often been taken to be autonomously sentence-internal phenomena: factors such as distance and the referential salience of the antecedent have been shown to influence referential form choice in discourse, suggesting that the same cognitive principles lie behind both types of variation. More generally, the Yucatec studies demonstrate that production preferences in Yucatec relative clauses reflect patterns of RP/gap distributions that have been attested across grammars. The Highest Subject Restriction (the ban on subject RPs in local dependencies), which is apparently a categorical constraint in many languages, is reflected probabilistically in Yucatec in terms of production preferences. The definiteness restriction (RPs are obligatory with indefinite antecedents), which has been reported categorically in other languages, is also visible probabilistically in Yucatec production. This lends some statistically robust support to the view that typological patterns can arise via the conventionalization of processing preferences. -
Nota, N. (2023). Talking faces: The contribution of conversational facial signals to language use and processing. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Piai, V. (2014). Choosing our words: Lexical competition and the involvement of attention in spoken word production. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Rasenberg, M. (2023). Mutual understanding from a multimodal and interactional perspective. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Reifegerste, J. (2014). Morphological processing in younger and older people: Evidence for flexible dual-route access. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Rojas-Berscia, L. M. (2014). A Heritage Reference Grammar of Selk’nam. Master Thesis, Radboud University, Nijmegen.
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Schiller, N. O. (1997). The role of the syllable in speech production: Evidence from lexical statistics, metalinguistics, masked priming, and electromagnetic midsagittal articulography. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen. doi:10.17617/2.2057707.
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Schimke, S. (2009). The acquisition of finiteness by Turkish learners of German and Turkish learners of French: Investigating knowledge of forms and functions in production and comprehension. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
Abstract
Sarah Schimke onderzocht hoe mensen die op volwassen leeftijd naar een ander land verhuizen de taal van dit land leren, ook zonder veel taalinstructie te krijgen. Twee groepen werden onderzocht: Turkse immigranten in Frankrijk en Turkse immigranten in Duitsland. De resultaten laten zien dat volwassen leerlingen in het begin van het verwervingsproces een gemakkelijkere variatie van de doeltaal creëren. Er worden wel woorden van de doeltaal verworven en gebruikt, maar er wordt een gesimplificeerde grammatica toegepast. In het bijzonder gebruiken leerlingen in deze fase geen finietheid, dus geen morfologische variaties van werkwoorden. Schimke toont aan dat als finietheid wordt verworven, dit de grammatica van de leerlingen sterk verandert en dat deze veel sterker op de doeltaalgrammatica begint te lijken. Ook toont ze aan dat dit proces door karakteristieken van de doeltaal, zoals de woordvolgorde en de complexiteit van de morfologie, wordt beïnvloedAdditional information
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Schmitt, B. M. (1997). Lexical access in the production of ellipsis and pronouns. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen. doi:10.17617/2.2057702.
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Simanova, I. (2014). In search of conceptual representations in the brain: Towards mind-reading. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Thorgrimsson, G. (2014). Infants' understanding of communication as participants and observers. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Tsuji, S. (2014). The road to native listening. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Turco, G. (2014). Contrasting opposite polarity in Germanic and Romance languages: Verum focus and affirmative particles in native speakers and advanced L2 learners. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Van Turennout, M. (1997). The electrophysiology of speaking: Investigations on the time course of semantic, syntactic, and phonological processing. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen. doi:10.17617/2.2057711.
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Van Putten, S. (2014). Information structure in Avatime. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Van Putten, S. (2009). Talking about motion in Avatime. Master Thesis, Leiden University.
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Veenstra, A. (2014). Semantic and syntactic constraints on the production of subject-verb agreement. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Verhagen, J. (2009). Finiteness in Dutch as a second language. PhD Thesis, VU University, Amsterdam.
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Verkerk, A. (2014). The evolutionary dynamics of motion event encoding. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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Willems, R. M. (2009). Neural reflections of meaning in gesture, language, and action. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
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