Publications

Displaying 301 - 359 of 359
  • Speed, L. J., & Majid, A. (2017). Dutch modality exclusivity norms: Simulating perceptual modality in space. Behavior Research Methods, 49(6), 2204-2218. doi:10.3758/s13428-017-0852-3.

    Abstract

    Perceptual information is important for the meaning of nouns. We present modality exclusivity norms for 485 Dutch nouns rated on visual, auditory, haptic, gustatory, and olfactory associations. We found these nouns are highly multimodal. They were rated most dominant in vision, and least in olfaction. A factor analysis identified two main dimensions: one loaded strongly on olfaction and gustation (reflecting joint involvement in flavor), and a second loaded strongly on vision and touch (reflecting joint involvement in manipulable objects). In a second study, we validated the ratings with similarity judgments. As expected, words from the same dominant modality were rated more similar than words from different dominant modalities; but – more importantly – this effect was enhanced when word pairs had high modality strength ratings. We further demonstrated the utility of our ratings by investigating whether perceptual modalities are differentially experienced in space, in a third study. Nouns were categorized into their dominant modality and used in a lexical decision experiment where the spatial position of words was either in proximal or distal space. We found words dominant in olfaction were processed faster in proximal than distal space compared to the other modalities, suggesting olfactory information is mentally simulated as “close” to the body. Finally, we collected ratings of emotion (valence, dominance, and arousal) to assess its role in perceptual space simulation, but the valence did not explain the data. So, words are processed differently depending on their perceptual associations, and strength of association is captured by modality exclusivity ratings.

    Additional information

    13428_2017_852_MOESM1_ESM.xlsx
  • Stanojevic, M., & Alhama, R. G. (2017). Neural discontinuous constituency parsing. In Proceedings of the 2017 Conference on Empirical Methods in Natural Language Processing (pp. 1666-1676). Association for Computational Linguistics.

    Abstract

    One of the most pressing issues in dis-
    continuous constituency transition-based
    parsing is that the relevant information for
    parsing decisions could be located in any
    part of the stack or the buffer. In this pa-
    per, we propose a solution to this prob-
    lem by replacing the structured percep-
    tron model with a recursive neural model
    that computes a global representation of
    the configuration, therefore allowing even
    the most remote parts of the configura-
    tion to influence the parsing decisions. We
    also provide a detailed analysis of how
    this representation should be built out of
    sub-representations of its core elements
    (words, trees and stack). Additionally, we
    investigate how different types of swap or-
    acles influence the results. Our model is
    the first neural discontinuous constituency
    parser, and it outperforms all the previ-
    ously published models on three out of
    four datasets while on the fourth it obtains
    second place by a tiny difference.

    Additional information

    http://aclweb.org/anthology/D17-1174
  • Stergiakouli, E., Martin, J., Hamshere, M. L., Heron, J., St Pourcain, B., Timpson, N. J., Thapar, A., & Smith, G. D. (2017). Association between polygenic risk scores for attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder and educational and cognitive outcomes in the general population. International Journal of Epidemiology, 46(2), 421-428. doi:10.1093/ije/dyw216.

    Abstract

    Background: Children with a diagnosis of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) have lower cognitive ability and are at risk of adverse educational outcomes; ADHD genetic risks have been found to predict childhood cognitive ability and other neurodevelopmental traits in the general population; thus genetic risks might plausibly also contribute to cognitive ability later in development and to educational underachievement.

    Methods: We generated ADHD polygenic risk scores in the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children participants (maximum N: 6928 children and 7280 mothers) based on the results of a discovery clinical sample, a genome-wide association study of 727 cases with ADHD diagnosis and 5081 controls. We tested if ADHD polygenic risk scores were associated with educational outcomes and IQ in adolescents and their mothers.

    Results: High ADHD polygenic scores in adolescents were associated with worse educational outcomes at Key Stage 3 [national tests conducted at age 13–14 years; β = −1.4 (−2.0 to −0.8), P = 2.3 × 10−6), at General Certificate of Secondary Education exams at age 15–16 years (β = −4.0 (−6.1 to −1.9), P = 1.8 × 10−4], reduced odds of sitting Key Stage 5 examinations at age 16–18 years [odds ratio (OR) = 0.90 (0.88 to 0.97), P = 0.001] and lower IQ scores at age 15.5 [β = −0.8 (−1.2 to −0.4), P = 2.4 × 10−4]. Moreover, maternal ADHD polygenic scores were associated with lower maternal educational achievement [β = −0.09 (−0.10 to −0.06), P = 0.005] and lower maternal IQ [β = −0.6 (−1.2 to −0.1), P = 0.03].

    Conclusions: ADHD diagnosis risk alleles impact on functional outcomes in two generations (mother and child) and likely have intergenerational environmental effects.
  • Stergiakouli, E., Smith, G. D., Martin, J., Skuse, D. H., Viechtbauer, W., Ring, S. M., Ronald, A., Evans, D. E., Fisher, S. E., Thapar, A., & St Pourcain, B. (2017). Shared genetic influences between dimensional ASD and ADHD symptoms during child and adolescent development. Molecular Autism, 8: 18. doi:10.1186/s13229-017-0131-2.

    Abstract

    Background: Shared genetic influences between attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptoms and
    autism spectrum disorder (ASD) symptoms have been reported. Cross-trait genetic relationships are, however,
    subject to dynamic changes during development. We investigated the continuity of genetic overlap between ASD
    and ADHD symptoms in a general population sample during childhood and adolescence. We also studied uni- and
    cross-dimensional trait-disorder links with respect to genetic ADHD and ASD risk.
    Methods: Social-communication difficulties (N ≤ 5551, Social and Communication Disorders Checklist, SCDC) and
    combined hyperactive-impulsive/inattentive ADHD symptoms (N ≤ 5678, Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire,
    SDQ-ADHD) were repeatedly measured in a UK birth cohort (ALSPAC, age 7 to 17 years). Genome-wide summary
    statistics on clinical ASD (5305 cases; 5305 pseudo-controls) and ADHD (4163 cases; 12,040 controls/pseudo-controls)
    were available from the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium. Genetic trait variances and genetic overlap between
    phenotypes were estimated using genome-wide data.
    Results: In the general population, genetic influences for SCDC and SDQ-ADHD scores were shared throughout
    development. Genetic correlations across traits reached a similar strength and magnitude (cross-trait rg ≤ 1,
    pmin = 3 × 10−4) as those between repeated measures of the same trait (within-trait rg ≤ 0.94, pmin = 7 × 10−4).
    Shared genetic influences between traits, especially during later adolescence, may implicate variants in K-RAS signalling
    upregulated genes (p-meta = 6.4 × 10−4).
    Uni-dimensionally, each population-based trait mapped to the expected behavioural continuum: risk-increasing alleles
    for clinical ADHD were persistently associated with SDQ-ADHD scores throughout development (marginal regression
    R2 = 0.084%). An age-specific genetic overlap between clinical ASD and social-communication difficulties during
    childhood was also shown, as per previous reports. Cross-dimensionally, however, neither SCDC nor SDQ-ADHD scores
    were linked to genetic risk for disorder.
    Conclusions: In the general population, genetic aetiologies between social-communication difficulties and ADHD
    symptoms are shared throughout child and adolescent development and may implicate similar biological pathways
    that co-vary during development. Within both the ASD and the ADHD dimension, population-based traits are also linked
    to clinical disorder, although much larger clinical discovery samples are required to reliably detect cross-dimensional
    trait-disorder relationships.
  • Stoehr, A., Benders, T., Van Hell, J. G., & Fikkert, P. (2017). Second language attainment and first language attrition: The case of VOT in immersed Dutch–German late bilinguals. Second Language Research, 33(4), 483-518. doi:10.1177/0267658317704261.

    Abstract

    Speech of late bilinguals has frequently been described in terms of cross-linguistic influence (CLI) from the native language (L1) to the second language (L2), but CLI from the L2 to the L1 has received relatively little attention. This article addresses L2 attainment and L1 attrition in voicing systems through measures of voice onset time (VOT) in two groups of Dutch–German late bilinguals in the Netherlands. One group comprises native speakers of Dutch and the other group comprises native speakers of German, and the two groups further differ in their degree of L2 immersion. The L1-German–L2-Dutch bilinguals (N = 23) are exposed to their L2 at home and outside the home, and the L1-Dutch–L2-German bilinguals (N = 18) are only exposed to their L2 at home. We tested L2 attainment by comparing the bilinguals’ L2 to the other bilinguals’ L1, and L1 attrition by comparing the bilinguals’ L1 to Dutch monolinguals (N = 29) and German monolinguals (N = 27). Our findings indicate that complete L2 immersion may be advantageous in L2 acquisition, but at the same time it may cause L1 phonetic attrition. We discuss how the results match the predictions made by Flege’s Speech Learning Model and explore how far bilinguals’ success in acquiring L2 VOT and maintaining L1 VOT depends on the immersion context, articulatory constraints and the risk of sounding foreign accented.
  • Ye, Z., Stolk, A., Toni, I., & Hagoort, P. (2017). Oxytocin modulates semantic integration in speech comprehension. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 29, 267-276. doi:10.1162/jocn_a_01044.

    Abstract

    Listeners interpret utterances by integrating information from multiple sources including word level semantics and world knowledge. When the semantics of an expression is inconsistent with his or her knowledge about the world, the listener may have to search through the conceptual space for alternative possible world scenarios that can make the expression more acceptable. Such cognitive exploration requires considerable computational resources and might depend on motivational factors. This study explores whether and how oxytocin, a neuropeptide known to influence socialmotivation by reducing social anxiety and enhancing affiliative tendencies, can modulate the integration of world knowledge and sentence meanings. The study used a betweenparticipant double-blind randomized placebo-controlled design. Semantic integration, indexed with magnetoencephalography through the N400m marker, was quantified while 45 healthymale participants listened to sentences that were either congruent or incongruent with facts of the world, after receiving intranasally delivered oxytocin or placebo. Compared with congruent sentences, world knowledge incongruent sentences elicited a stronger N400m signal from the left inferior frontal and anterior temporal regions and medial pFC (the N400m effect) in the placebo group. Oxytocin administration significantly attenuated the N400meffect at both sensor and cortical source levels throughout the experiment, in a state-like manner. Additional electrophysiological markers suggest that the absence of the N400m effect in the oxytocin group is unlikely due to the lack of early sensory or semantic processing or a general downregulation of attention. These findings suggest that oxytocin drives listeners to resolve challenges of semantic integration, possibly by promoting the cognitive exploration of alternative possible world scenarios.
  • Sumer, B., Perniss, P. M., & Ozyurek, A. (2017). A first study on the development of spatial viewpoint in sign language acquisition: The case of Turkish Sign Language. In F. N. Ketrez, A. C. Kuntay, S. Ozcalıskan, & A. Ozyurek (Eds.), Social Environment and Cognition in Language Development: Studies in Honor of Ayhan Aksu-Koc (pp. 223-240). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. doi:10.1075/tilar.21.14sum.

    Abstract

    The current study examines, for the first time, the viewpoint preferences of signing children in expressing spatial relations that require imposing a viewpoint (left-right, front-behind). We elicited spatial descriptions from deaf children (4–9 years of age) acquiring Turkish Sign Language (TİD) natively from their deaf parents and from adult native signers of TİD. Adults produced these spatial descriptions from their own viewpoint and from that of their addressee depending on whether the objects were located on the lateral or the sagittal axis. TİD-acquiring children, on the other hand, described all spatial configurations from their own viewpoint. Differences were also found between children and adults in the type of linguistic devices and how they are used to express such spatial relations.
  • Sumer, B., Grabitz, C., & Küntay, A. (2017). Early produced signs are iconic: Evidence from Turkish Sign Language. In G. Gunzelmann, A. Howes, T. Tenbrink, & E. Davelaar (Eds.), Proceedings of the 39th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (CogSci 2017) (pp. 3273-3278). Austin, TX: Cognitive Science Society.

    Abstract

    Motivated form-meaning mappings are pervasive in sign languages, and iconicity has recently been shown to facilitate sign learning from early on. This study investigated the role of iconicity for language acquisition in Turkish Sign Language (TID). Participants were 43 signing children (aged 10 to 45 months) of deaf parents. Sign production ability was recorded using the adapted version of MacArthur Bates Communicative Developmental Inventory (CDI) consisting of 500 items for TID. Iconicity and familiarity ratings for a subset of 104 signs were available. Our results revealed that the iconicity of a sign was positively correlated with the percentage of children producing a sign and that iconicity significantly predicted the percentage of children producing a sign, independent of familiarity or phonological complexity. Our results are consistent with previous findings on sign language acquisition and provide further support for the facilitating effect of iconic form-meaning mappings in sign learning.
  • Tachmazidou, I., Süveges, D., Min, J. L., Ritchie, G. R. S., Steinberg, J., Walter, K., Iotchkova, V., Schwartzentruber, J., Huang, J., Memari, Y., McCarthy, S., Crawford, A. A., Bombieri, C., Cocca, M., Farmaki, A.-E., Gaunt, T. R., Jousilahti, P., Kooijman, M. N., Lehne, B., Malerba, G. and 83 moreTachmazidou, I., Süveges, D., Min, J. L., Ritchie, G. R. S., Steinberg, J., Walter, K., Iotchkova, V., Schwartzentruber, J., Huang, J., Memari, Y., McCarthy, S., Crawford, A. A., Bombieri, C., Cocca, M., Farmaki, A.-E., Gaunt, T. R., Jousilahti, P., Kooijman, M. N., Lehne, B., Malerba, G., Männistö, S., Matchan, A., Medina-Gomez, C., Metrustry, S. J., Nag, A., Ntalla, I., Paternoster, L., Rayner, N. W., Sala, C., Scott, W. R., Shihab, H. A., Southam, L., St Pourcain, B., Traglia, M., Trajanoska, K., Zaza, G., Zhang, W., Artigas, M. S., Bansal, N., Benn, M., Chen, Z., Danecek, P., Lin, W.-Y., Locke, A., Luan, J., Manning, A. K., Mulas, A., Sidore, C., Tybjaerg-Hansen, A., Varbo, A., Zoledziewska, M., Finan, C., Hatzikotoulas, K., Hendricks, A. E., Kemp, J. P., Moayyeri, A., Panoutsopoulou, K., Szpak, M., Wilson, S. G., Boehnke, M., Cucca, F., Di Angelantonio, E., Langenberg, C., Lindgren, C., McCarthy, M. I., Morris, A. P., Nordestgaard, B. G., Scott, R. A., Tobin, M. D., Wareham, N. J., Burton, P., Chambers, J. C., Smith, G. D., Dedoussis, G., Felix, J. F., Franco, O. H., Gambaro, G., Gasparini, P., Hammond, C. J., Hofman, A., Jaddoe, V. W. V., Kleber, M., Kooner, J. S., Perola, M., Relton, C., Ring, S. M., Rivadeneira, F., Salomaa, V., Spector, T. D., Stegle, O., Toniolo, D., Uitterlinden, A. G., Barroso, I., Greenwood, C. M. T., Perry, J. R. B., Walker, B. R., Butterworth, A. S., Xue, Y., Durbin, R., Small, K. S., Soranzo, N., Timpson, N. J., & Zeggini, E. (2017). Whole-Genome Sequencing coupled to imputation discovers genetic signals for anthropometric traits. The American Journal of Human Genetics, 100(6), 865-884. doi:10.1016/j.ajhg.2017.04.014.

    Abstract

    Deep sequence-based imputation can enhance the discovery power of genome-wide association studies by assessing previously unexplored variation across the common- and low-frequency spectra. We applied a hybrid whole-genome sequencing (WGS) and deep imputation approach to examine the broader allelic architecture of 12 anthropometric traits associated with height, body mass, and fat distribution in up to 267,616 individuals. We report 106 genome-wide significant signals that have not been previously identified, including 9 low-frequency variants pointing to functional candidates. Of the 106 signals, 6 are in genomic regions that have not been implicated with related traits before, 28 are independent signals at previously reported regions, and 72 represent previously reported signals for a different anthropometric trait. 71% of signals reside within genes and fine mapping resolves 23 signals to one or two likely causal variants. We confirm genetic overlap between human monogenic and polygenic anthropometric traits and find signal enrichment in cis expression QTLs in relevant tissues. Our results highlight the potential of WGS strategies to enhance biologically relevant discoveries across the frequency spectrum.
  • Takashima, A., Bakker, I., Van Hell, J. G., Janzen, G., & McQueen, J. M. (2017). Interaction between episodic and semantic memory networks in the acquisition and consolidation of novel spoken words. Brain and Language, 167, 44-60. doi:10.1016/j.bandl.2016.05.009.

    Abstract

    When a novel word is learned, its memory representation is thought to undergo a process of consolidation and integration. In this study, we tested whether the neural representations of novel words change as a function of consolidation by observing brain activation patterns just after learning and again after a delay of one week. Words learned with meanings were remembered better than those learned without meanings. Both episodic (hippocampus-dependent) and semantic (dependent on distributed neocortical areas) memory systems were utilised during recognition of the novel words. The extent to which the two systems were involved changed as a function of time and the amount of associated information, with more involvement of both systems for the meaningful words than for the form-only words after the one-week delay. These results suggest that the reason the meaningful words were remembered better is that their retrieval can benefit more from these two complementary memory systems
  • Takashima, A., & Bakker, I. (2017). Memory consolidation. In H.-J. Schmid (Ed.), Entrenchment and the Psychology of Language Learning: How We Reorganize and Adapt Linguistic Knowledge (pp. 177-200). Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.
  • Tamaoka, K., Makioka, S., Sanders, S., & Verdonschot, R. G. (2017). www.kanjidatabase.com: A new interactive online database for psychological and linguistic research on Japanese kanji and their compound words. Psychological Research, 81(3), 696-708. doi:10.1007/s00426-016-0764-3.

    Abstract

    Most experimental research making use of the Japanese language has involved the 1945 officially standardized kanji (Japanese logographic characters) in the Joyo kanji list (originally announced by the Japanese government in 1981). However, this list was extensively modified in 2010: five kanji were removed and 196 kanji were added; the latest revision of the list now has a total of 2136 kanji. Using an up-to-date corpus consisting of 11 years' worth of articles printed in the Mainichi Newspaper (2000-2010), we have constructed two novel databases that can be used in psychological research using the Japanese language: (1) a database containing a wide variety of properties on the latest 2136 Joyo kanji, and (2) a novel database containing 27,950 two-kanji compound words (or jukugo). Based on these two databases, we have created an interactive website (www.kanjidatabase.com) to retrieve and store linguistic information to be used in psychological and linguistic experiments. The present paper reports the most important characteristics for the new databases, as well as their value for experimental psychological and linguistic research.
  • Tan, Y., Martin, R. C., & Van Dyke, J. A. (2017). Semantic and syntactic interference in sentence comprehension: A comparison of working memory models. Frontiers in Psychology, 8: 198. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2017.00198.

    Abstract

    This study investigated the nature of the underlying working memory system supporting sentence processing through examining individual differences in sensitivity to retrieval interference effects during sentence comprehension. Interference effects occur when readers incorrectly retrieve sentence constituents which are similar to those required during integrative processes. We examined interference arising from a partial match between distracting constituents and syntactic and semantic cues, and related these interference effects to performance on working memory, short-term memory (STM), vocabulary, and executive function tasks. For online sentence comprehension, as measured by self-paced reading, the magnitude of individuals' syntactic interference effects was predicted by general WM capacity and the relation remained significant when partialling out vocabulary, indicating that the effects were not due to verbal knowledge. For offline sentence comprehension, as measured by responses to comprehension questions, both general WM capacity and vocabulary knowledge interacted with semantic interference for comprehension accuracy, suggesting that both general WM capacity and the quality of semantic representations played a role in determining how well interference was resolved offline. For comprehension question reaction times, a measure of semantic STM capacity interacted with semantic but not syntactic interference. However, a measure of phonological capacity (digit span) and a general measure of resistance to response interference (Stroop effect) did not predict individuals' interference resolution abilities in either online or offline sentence comprehension. The results are discussed in relation to the multiple capacities account of working memory (e.g., Martin and Romani, 1994; Martin and He, 2004), and the cue-based retrieval parsing approach (e.g., Lewis et al., 2006; Van Dyke et al., 2014). While neither approach was fully supported, a possible means of reconciling the two approaches and directions for future research are proposed.
  • Tanner, J. E., & Perlman, M. (2017). Moving beyond ‘meaning’: Gorillas combine gestures into sequences for creative display. Language & Communication, 54, 56-72. doi:10.1016/j.langcom.2016.10.006.

    Abstract

    The great apes produce gestures intentionally and flexibly, and sometimes they combine their gestures into sequences, producing two or more gestures in close succession. We reevaluate previous findings related to ape gesture sequences and present qualitative analysis of videotaped gorilla interaction. We present evidence that gorillas produce at least two different kinds of gesture sequences: some sequences are largely composed of gestures that depict motion in an iconic manner, typically requesting particular action by the partner; others are multimodal and contain gestures – often percussive in nature – that are performed in situations of play or display. Display sequences seem to primarily exhibit the performer’s emotional state and physical fitness but have no immediate functional goal. Analysis reveals that some gorilla play and display sequences can be 1) organized hierarchically into longer bouts and repetitions; 2) innovative and individualized, incorporating objects and environmental features; and 3) highly interactive between partners. It is illuminating to look beyond ‘meaning’ in the conventional linguistic sense and look at the possibility that characteristics of music and dance, as well as those of language, are included in the gesturing of apes.
  • Ten Oever, S., Schroeder, C. E., Poeppel, D., Van Atteveldt, N., Mehta, A. D., Megevand, P., Groppe, D. M., & Zion-Golumbic, E. (2017). Low-frequency cortical oscillations entrain to subthreshold rhythmic auditory stimuli. The Journal of Neuroscience, 37(19), 4903-4912. doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3658-16.2017.

    Abstract

    Many environmental stimuli contain temporal regularities, a feature that can help predict forthcoming input. Phase locking (entrainment) of ongoing low-frequency neuronal oscillations to rhythmic stimuli is proposed as a potential mechanism for enhancing neuronal responses and perceptual sensitivity, by aligning high-excitability phases to events within a stimulus stream. Previous experiments show that rhythmic structure has a behavioral benefit even when the rhythm itself is below perceptual detection thresholds (ten Oever et al., 2014). It is not known whether this "inaudible" rhythmic sound stream also induces entrainment. Here we tested this hypothesis using magnetoencephalography and electrocorticography in humans to record changes in neuronal activity as subthreshold rhythmic stimuli gradually became audible. We found that significant phase locking to the rhythmic sounds preceded participants' detection of them. Moreover, no significant auditory-evoked responses accompanied this prethreshold entrainment. These auditory-evoked responses, distinguished by robust, broad-band increases in intertrial coherence, only appeared after sounds were reported as audible. Taken together with the reduced perceptual thresholds observed for rhythmic sequences, these findings support the proposition that entrainment of low-frequency oscillations serves a mechanistic role in enhancing perceptual sensitivity for temporally predictive sounds. This framework has broad implications for understanding the neural mechanisms involved in generating temporal predictions and their relevance for perception, attention, and awareness.
  • Ten Bosch, L., Boves, L., & Ernestus, M. (2017). The recognition of compounds: A computational account. In Proceedings of Interspeech 2017 (pp. 1158-1162). doi:10.21437/Interspeech.2017-1048.

    Abstract

    This paper investigates the processes in comprehending spoken noun-noun compounds, using data from the BALDEY database. BALDEY contains lexicality judgments and reaction times (RTs) for Dutch stimuli for which also linguistic information is included. Two different approaches are combined. The first is based on regression by Dynamic Survival Analysis, which models decisions and RTs as a consequence of the fact that a cumulative density function exceeds some threshold. The parameters of that function are estimated from the observed RT data. The second approach is based on DIANA, a process-oriented computational model of human word comprehension, which simulates the comprehension process with the acoustic stimulus as input. DIANA gives the identity and the number of the word candidates that are activated at each 10 ms time step.

    Both approaches show how the processes involved in comprehending compounds change during a stimulus. Survival Analysis shows that the impact of word duration varies during the course of a stimulus. The density of word and non-word hypotheses in DIANA shows a corresponding pattern with different regimes. We show how the approaches complement each other, and discuss additional ways in which data and process models can be combined.
  • Thompson, P. M., Andreassen, O. A., Arias-Vasquez, A., Bearden, C. E., Boedhoe, P. S., Brouwer, R. M., Buckner, R. L., Buitelaar, J. K., Bulaeva, K. B., Cannon, D. M., Cohen, R. A., Conrod, P. J., Dale, A. M., Deary, I. J., Dennis, E. L., De Reus, M. A., Desrivieres, S., Dima, D., Donohoe, G., Fisher, S. E. and 51 moreThompson, P. M., Andreassen, O. A., Arias-Vasquez, A., Bearden, C. E., Boedhoe, P. S., Brouwer, R. M., Buckner, R. L., Buitelaar, J. K., Bulaeva, K. B., Cannon, D. M., Cohen, R. A., Conrod, P. J., Dale, A. M., Deary, I. J., Dennis, E. L., De Reus, M. A., Desrivieres, S., Dima, D., Donohoe, G., Fisher, S. E., Fouche, J.-P., Francks, C., Frangou, S., Franke, B., Ganjgahi, H., Garavan, H., Glahn, D. C., Grabe, H. J., Guadalupe, T., Gutman, B. A., Hashimoto, R., Hibar, D. P., Holland, D., Hoogman, M., Pol, H. E. H., Hosten, N., Jahanshad, N., Kelly, S., Kochunov, P., Kremen, W. S., Lee, P. H., Mackey, S., Martin, N. G., Mazoyer, B., McDonald, C., Medland, S. E., Morey, R. A., Nichols, T. E., Paus, T., Pausova, Z., Schmaal, L., Schumann, G., Shen, L., Sisodiya, S. M., Smit, D. J., Smoller, J. W., Stein, D. J., Stein, J. L., Toro, R., Turner, J. A., Van den Heuvel, M., Van den Heuvel, O. A., Van Erp, T. G., Van Rooij, D., Veltman, D. J., Walter, H., Wang, Y., Wardlaw, J. M., Whelan, C. D., Wright, M. J., & Ye, J. (2017). ENIGMA and the Individual: Predicting Factors that Affect the Brain in 35 Countries Worldwide. NeuroImage, 145, 389-408. doi:10.1016/j.neuroimage.2015.11.057.
  • Thompson, J. R., Minelli, C., Bowden, J., Del Greco, F. M., Gill, D., Jones, E. M., Shapland, C. Y., & Sheehan, N. A. (2017). Mendelian randomization incorporating uncertainty about pleiotropy. Statistics in Medicine, 36(29), 4627-4645. doi:10.1002/sim.7442.

    Abstract

    Mendelian randomization (MR) requires strong assumptions about the genetic instruments, of which the most difficult to justify relate to pleiotropy. In a two-sample MR, different methods of analysis are available if we are able to assume, M1: no pleiotropy (fixed effects meta-analysis), M2: that there may be pleiotropy but that the average pleiotropic effect is zero (random effects meta-analysis), and M3: that the average pleiotropic effect is nonzero (MR-Egger). In the latter 2 cases, we also require that the size of the pleiotropy is independent of the size of the effect on the exposure. Selecting one of these models without good reason would run the risk of misrepresenting the evidence for causality. The most conservative strategy would be to use M3 in all analyses as this makes the weakest assumptions, but such an analysis gives much less precise estimates and so should be avoided whenever stronger assumptions are credible. We consider the situation of a two-sample design when we are unsure which of these 3 pleiotropy models is appropriate. The analysis is placed within a Bayesian framework and Bayesian model averaging is used. We demonstrate that even large samples of the scale used in genome-wide meta-analysis may be insufficient to distinguish the pleiotropy models based on the data alone. Our simulations show that Bayesian model averaging provides a reasonable trade-off between bias and precision. Bayesian model averaging is recommended whenever there is uncertainty about the nature of the pleiotropy

    Additional information

    sim7442-sup-0001-Supplementary.pdf
  • Travis, C. E., Cacoullos, R. T., & Kidd, E. (2017). Cross-language priming: A view from bilingual speech. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 20(2), 283-298. doi:10.1017/S1366728915000127.

    Abstract

    In the current paper we report on a study of priming of variable Spanish 1sg subject expression in spontaneous Spanish–English bilingual speech (based on the New Mexico Spanish–English Bilingual corpus, Torres Cacoullos & Travis, in preparation). We show both within- and cross-language Coreferential Subject Priming; however, cross-language priming from English to Spanish is weaker and shorter lived than within-language Spanish-to-Spanish priming, a finding that appears not to be attributable to lexical boost. Instead, interactions with subject continuity and verb type show that the strength of priming depends on co-occurring contextual features and particular [pronoun + verb] constructions, from the more lexically specific to the more schematically general. Quantitative patterns in speech thus offer insights unavailable from experimental work into the scope and locus of priming effects, suggesting that priming in bilingual discourse can serve to gauge degrees of strength of within- and cross-language associations between usage-based constructions.
  • Troncoso Ruiz, A., & Elordieta, G. (2017). Prosodic accommodation and salience: The nuclear contours of Andalusian Spanish speakers in Asturias. Loquens, 4(2): e403. doi:10.3989/loquens.2017.043.

    Abstract

    This study investigates the convergent accommodating behaviour of Andalusian speakers (Southern Spain) relocated in Asturias (Northern Spain), a context of dialect contact, in terms of intonation. We aim to address three research questions: (1) is there evidence for accommodation? (2) Do social factors determine accommodation? And (3) does salience predict which prosodic features are more likely to be adopted by relocated speakers? We elaborated a corpus of spontaneous speech including an experimental group of Andalusian speakers in Asturias and two control groups of Asturian and Andalusian people. The relocated Andalusians were interviewed by a speaker of Andalusian Spanish and a speaker of Amestáu (hybrid variety between Asturian and Spanish), and their intonation patterns were compared to the ones found in the control populations. During the interviews, we also gathered data about how integrated these relocated speakers were in Asturias. We found that all participants show a tendency towards convergent accommodation to the Amestáu interlocutor, producing late falling pitch contours in nuclear position in declaratives and final falling contours in absolute interrogatives. The most integrated speakers in the Asturian community are the ones showing more features of the varieties spoken in the area. Finally, the most salient features to an Andalusian ear—the presence of final falls in Asturian, Asturian Spanish and Amestáu absolute interrogatives as opposed to final rises in Andalusian and Standard Peninsular Spanish—were the ones showing the highest percentages of adoption in relocated speakers. We could conclude, then, that the most salient prosodic features are acquired more easily by the most integrated relocated speakers.
  • Tsoukala, C., Frank, S. L., & Broersma, M. (2017). “He's pregnant": Simulating the confusing case of gender pronoun errors in L2 English. In Proceedings of the 39th Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society (CogSci 2017) (pp. 3392-3397). Austin, TX, USA: Cognitive Science Society.

    Abstract

    Even advanced Spanish speakers of second language English tend to confuse the pronouns ‘he’ and ‘she’, often without even noticing their mistake (Lahoz, 1991). A study by AntónMéndez (2010) has indicated that a possible reason for this error is the fact that Spanish is a pro-drop language. In order to test this hypothesis, we used an extension of Dual-path (Chang, 2002), a computational cognitive model of sentence production, to simulate two models of bilingual speech production of second language English. One model had Spanish (ES) as a native language, whereas the other learned a Spanish-like language that used the pronoun at all times (non-pro-drop Spanish, NPD_ES). When tested on L2 English sentences, the bilingual pro-drop Spanish model produced significantly more gender pronoun errors, confirming that pronoun dropping could indeed be responsible for the gender confusion in natural language use as well.
  • Tsuji, S., Fikkert, P., Minagawa, Y., Dupoux, E., Filippin, L., Versteegh, M., Hagoort, P., & Cristia, A. (2017). The more, the better? Behavioral and neural correlates of frequent and infrequent vowel exposure. Developmental Psychobiology, 59, 603-612. doi:10.1002/dev.21534.

    Abstract

    A central assumption in the perceptual attunement literature holds that exposure to a speech sound contrast leads to improvement in native speech sound processing. However, whether the amount of exposure matters for this process has not been put to a direct test. We elucidated indicators of frequency-dependent perceptual attunement by comparing 5–8-month-old Dutch infants’ discrimination of tokens containing a highly frequent [hɪt-he:t] and a highly infrequent [hʏt-hø:t] native vowel contrast as well as a non-native [hɛt-hæt] vowel contrast in a behavioral visual habituation paradigm (Experiment 1). Infants discriminated both native contrasts similarly well, but did not discriminate the non-native contrast. We sought further evidence for subtle differences in the processing of the two native contrasts using near-infrared spectroscopy and a within-participant design (Experiment 2). The neuroimaging data did not provide additional evidence that responses to native contrasts are modulated by frequency of exposure. These results suggest that even large differences in exposure to a native contrast may not directly translate to behavioral and neural indicators of perceptual attunement, raising the possibility that frequency of exposure does not influence improvements in discriminating native contrasts.

    Additional information

    dev21534-sup-0001-SuppInfo-S1.docx
  • Udden, J., Ingvar, M., Hagoort, P., & Petersson, K. M. (2017). Broca’s region: A causal role in implicit processing of grammars with crossed non-adjacent dependencies. Cognition, 164, 188-198. doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2017.03.010.

    Abstract

    Non-adjacent dependencies are challenging for the language learning machinery and are acquired later than adjacent dependencies. In this transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) study, we show that participants successfully discriminated between grammatical and non-grammatical sequences after having implicitly acquired an artificial language with crossed non-adjacent dependencies. Subsequent to transcranial magnetic stimulation of Broca’s region, discrimination was impaired compared to when a language-irrelevant control region (vertex) was stimulated. These results support the view that Broca’s region is engaged in structured sequence processing and extend previous functional neuroimaging results on artificial grammar learning (AGL) in two directions: first, the results establish that Broca’s region is a causal component in the processing of non-adjacent dependencies, and second, they show that implicit processing of non-adjacent dependencies engages Broca’s region. Since patients with lesions in Broca’s region do not always show grammatical processing difficulties, the result that Broca’s region is causally linked to processing of non-adjacent dependencies is a step towards clarification of the exact nature of syntactic deficits caused by lesions or perturbation to Broca’s region. Our findings are consistent with previous results and support a role for Broca’s region in general structured sequence processing, rather than a specific role for the processing of hierarchically organized sentence structure.
  • Udden, J., Snijders, T. M., Fisher, S. E., & Hagoort, P. (2017). A common variant of the CNTNAP2 gene is associated with structural variation in the left superior occipital gyrus. Brain and Language, 172, 16-21. doi:10.1016/j.bandl.2016.02.003.

    Abstract

    The CNTNAP2 gene encodes a cell-adhesion molecule that influences the properties of neural networks and the morphology and density of neurons and glial cells. Previous studies have shown association of CNTNAP2 variants with language-related phenotypes in health and disease. Here, we report associations of a common CNTNAP2 polymorphism (rs7794745) with variation in grey matter in a region in the dorsal visual stream. We tried to replicate an earlier study on 314 subjects by Tan and colleagues (2010), but now in a substantially larger group of more than 1700 subjects. Carriers of the T allele showed reduced grey matter volume in left superior occipital gyrus, while we did not replicate associations with grey matter volume in other regions identified by Tan et al (2010). Our work illustrates the importance of independent replication in neuroimaging genetic studies of language-related candidate genes.
  • De Vaan, L. (2017). Mental representations of Dutch regular morphologically complex neologisms. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
  • De Vaan, L., Van Krieken, K., Van den Bosch, W., Schreuder, R., & Ernestus, M. (2017). The traces that novel morphologically complex words leave in memory are abstract in nature. The Mental Lexicon, 12(2), 181-218. doi:10.1075/ml.16006.vaa.

    Abstract

    Previous work has shown that novel morphologically complex words (henceforth neologisms) leave traces in memory after just one encounter. This study addressed the question whether these traces are abstract in nature or exemplars. In three experiments, neologisms were either primed by themselves or by their stems. The primes occurred in the visual modality whereas the targets were presented in the auditory modality (Experiment 1) or vice versa (Experiments 2 and 3). The primes were presented in sentences in a selfpaced reading task (Experiment 1) or in stories in a listening comprehension task (Experiments 2 and 3). The targets were incorporated in lexical decision tasks, auditory or visual (Experiment 1 and Experiment 2, respectively), or in stories in a self-paced reading task (Experiment 3). The experimental part containing the targets immediately followed the familiarization phase with the primes (Experiment 1), or after a one week delay (Experiments 2 and 3). In all experiments, participants recognized neologisms faster if they had encountered them before (identity priming) than if the familiarization phase only contained the neologisms’ stems (stem priming). These results show that the priming effects are robust despite substantial differences between the primes and the targets. This suggests that the traces novel morphologically complex words leave in memory after just one encounter are abstract in nature.
  • De Valk, J. M., Wnuk, E., Huisman, J. L. A., & Majid, A. (2017). Odor-color associations differ with verbal descriptors for odors: A comparison of three linguistically diverse groups. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 24(4), 1171-1179. doi:10.3758/s13423-016-1179-2.

    Abstract

    People appear to have systematic associations between odors and colors. Previous research has emphasized the perceptual nature of these associations, but little attention has been paid to what role language might play. It is possible odor–color associations arise through a process of labeling; that is, participants select a descriptor for an odor and then choose a color accordingly (e.g., banana odor → “banana” label → yellow). If correct, this would predict odor–color associations would differ as odor descriptions differ. We compared speakers of Dutch (who overwhelmingly describe odors by referring to the source; e.g., smells like banana) with speakers of Maniq and Thai (who also describe odors with dedicated, abstract smell vocabulary; e.g., musty), and tested whether the type of descriptor mattered for odor–color associations. Participants were asked to select a color that they associated with an odor on two separate occasions (to test for consistency), and finally to label the odors. We found the hunter-gatherer Maniq showed few, if any, consistent or accurate odor–color associations. More importantly, we found the types of descriptors used to name the smells were related to the odor–color associations. When people used abstract smell terms to describe odors, they were less likely to choose a color match, but when they described an odor with a source-based term, their color choices more accurately reflected the odor source, particularly when the odor source was named correctly (e.g., banana odor → yellow). This suggests language is an important factor in odor–color cross-modal associations

    Additional information

    13423_2016_1179_MOESM1_ESM.docx
  • Van der Ven, F., Takashima, A., Segers, A., & Verhoeven, L. (2017). Semantic priming in Dutch children: Word meaning integration and study modality effects. Language Learning, 67(3), 546-568. doi:10.1111/lang.12235.
  • Van Dooren, A., Dieuleveut, A., Cournane, A., & Hacquard, V. (2017). Learning what must and can must and can mean. In A. Cremers, T. Van Gessel, & F. Roelofsen (Eds.), Proceedings of the 21st Amsterdam Colloquium (pp. 225-234). Amsterdam: ILLC.

    Abstract

    This corpus study investigates how children figure out that functional modals
    like must can express various flavors of modality. We examine how modality is
    expressed in speech to and by children, and find that the way speakers use
    modals may obscure their polysemy. Yet, children eventually figure it out. Our
    results suggest that some do before age 3. We show that while root and
    epistemic flavors are not equally well-represented in the input, there are robust
    correlations between flavor and aspect, which learners could exploit to discover
    modal polysemy.
  • Van Dooren, A. (2017). Dutch must more structure. In A. Lamont, & K. Tetzloff (Eds.), NELS 47: Proceedings of the Forty-Seventh Annual Meeting of the North East Linguistic Society (pp. 165-175). Amherst: GLSA.
  • Van Leeuwen, E. J. C., & Call, J. (2017). Conservatism and “copy-if-better” in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes). Animal Cognition, 20(3), 575-579. doi:10.1007/s10071-016-1061-7.

    Abstract

    Social learning is predicted to evolve in socially living animals provided the learning process is not random but biased by certain socio-ecological factors. One bias of particular interest for the emergence of (cumulative) culture is the tendency to forgo personal behaviour in favour of relatively better variants observed in others, also known as the “copy-if-better” strategy. We investigated whether chimpanzees employ copy-if-better in a simple token-exchange paradigm controlling for individual and random social learning. After being trained on one token-type, subjects were confronted with a conspecific demonstrator who either received the same food reward as the subject (control condition) or a higher value food reward than the subject (test condition) for exchanging another token-type. In general, the chimpanzees persisted in exchanging the token-type they were trained on individually, indicating a form of conservatism consistent with previous studies. However, the chimpanzees were more inclined to copy the demonstrator in the test compared to the control condition, indicating a tendency to employ a copy-if-better strategy. We discuss the validity of our results by considering alternative explanations and relate our findings to the emergence of cumulative culture.
  • Van der Ven, F., Segers, F., Takashima, A., & Verhoeven, L. (2017). Effects of a tablet game intervention on simple addition and subtraction fluency in first graders computers in human behavior. Computers in Human Behavior, 72, 200-207. doi:10.1016/j.chb.2017.02.031.
  • Van Leeuwen, E. J. C., Mundry, R., Cronin, K. A., Bodamer, M., & Haun, D. B. (2017). Chimpanzee culture extends beyond matrilineal family units. Current Biology, 27(12), R588-R590. doi:10.1016/j.cub.2017.05.003.

    Abstract

    The ‘grooming handclasp’ is one of the most well-established cultural traditions in chimpanzees. A recent study by Wrangham et al. [1] reduced the cultural scope of grooming-handclasp behavior by showing that grooming-handclasp style convergence is “explained by matrilineal relationship rather than conformity” [1]. Given that we previously reported cultural differences in grooming-handclasp style preferences in captive chimpanzees [2], we tested the alternative view posed by Wrangham et al. [1] in the chimpanzee populations that our original results were based on. Using the same outcome variable as Wrangham et al. [1] — the proportion of high-arm grooming featuring palm-to-palm clasping — we found that matrilineal relationships explained neither within-group homogeneity nor between-group heterogeneity, thereby corroborating our original conclusion that grooming-handclasp behavior can represent a group-level cultural tradition in chimpanzees.
  • Van Rijswijk, R., Muntendam, A., & Dijkstra, T. (2017). Focus in Dutch reading: an eye-tracking experiment with heritage speakers of Turkish. Language, Cognition and Neuroscience, 32, 984-1000. doi:10.1080/23273798.2017.1279338.

    Abstract

    This study examines whether heritage speakers of Turkish in the Netherlands interpret focus in written Dutch sentences differently from L1 speakers of Dutch (controls). Where most previous studies examined effects from the dominant L2 on the heritage language, we investigated whether there are effects from the weaker heritage language on the dominant L2. Dutch and Turkish differ in focus marking. Dutch primarily uses prosody to encode focus, whereas Turkish uses prosody and syntax, with a preverbal area for focused information and a postverbal area for background information. In written sentences no explicit prosody is available, which possibly enhances the role of syntactic cues in interpreting focus. An eye-tracking experiment suggests that, unlike the controls, the bilinguals associate the preverbal area with focus and the postverbal area with background information. These findings are in line with transfer from the weaker L1 to the dominant L2 at the syntax–discourse interface.

    Additional information

    plcp_a_1279338_sm2618.docx
  • Van Rijswijk, R., Muntendam, A., & Dijkstra, T. (2017). Focus marking in Dutch by heritage speakers of Turkish and Dutch L1 speakers. Journal of Phonetics, 61, 48-70. doi:10.1016/j.wocn.2017.01.003.

    Abstract

    Studies on heritage speakers generally reveal effects from the dominant L2 on the weaker L1, but it is less clear whether cross-linguistic transfer also occurs in the other direction: from the L1 to the dominant L2. This study explores whether the Dutch prosody of heritage speakers of Turkish in the Netherlands differs from that of L1 speakers of Dutch who do not speak Turkish, and whether observed differences could be attributed to an effect of Turkish. The experiment elicited semi-spontaneous sentences in broad and contrastive focus. The analysis included f0 movements, peak alignment, and duration. Although both participant groups used prosody to mark focus (e.g., time-compressed f0 movements for contrastive focus), there were also differences between the groups. For instance, while the L1 speakers of Dutch showed declination, the bilinguals remained at the same pitch level throughout the sentence. Ipek (2015) and Kamalı (2011) also noted a limited pitch range in the prenuclear area in Turkish. We argue that the prosodic differences could be due to an effect of Turkish on Dutch prosody, suggesting that the weaker L1 in Turkish heritage speakers may affect the dominant L2 in the prosodic domain.
  • Van Putten, S. (2017). Motion in serializing languages revisited: The case of Avatime. STUF - Language Typology and Universals, 70(2), 303-329. doi:10.1515/stuf-2017-0016.

    Abstract

    In the typology of motion lexicalization, two types of languages have traditionally been distinguished: satellite-framed and verb-framed. Serializing languages are difficult to fit into this typology and have been claimed to belong to a third type: equipollently framed. In this paper I use grammatical criteria to show that Avatime, a serializing language, should indeed be classified as equipollently framed. I also study motion descriptions in narratives. Avatime is similar to other serializing languages with respect to path elaboration, but unlike other serializing languages, it has low manner saliency. Equipollently framed languages thus do not behave as a single type.
  • Van Gijn, R., Hammarström, H., Van de Kerke, S., Krasnoukhova, O., & Muysken, P. (2017). Linguistic Areas, Linguistic Convergence and River Systems in South America. In R. Hickey (Ed.), The Cambridge Handbook of Areal Linguistics (pp. 964-996). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/9781107279872.034.
  • Van Bergen, G., & Flecken, M. (2017). Putting things in new places: Linguistic experience modulates the predictive power of placement verb semantics. Journal of Memory and Language, 92, 26-42. doi:10.1016/j.jml.2016.05.003.

    Abstract

    A central question regarding predictive language processing concerns the extent to which linguistic experience modulates the process. We approached this question by investigating sentence processing in advanced second language (L2) users with different native language (L1) backgrounds. Using a visual world eye tracking paradigm, we investigated to what extent L1 and L2 participants showed anticipatory eye movements to objects while listening to Dutch placement event descriptions. L2 groups differed in the degree of similarity between Dutch and their L1 with respect to placement verb semantics: German, like Dutch, specifies object position in placement verbs (put.STAND vs. put.LIE), whereas English and French typically leave position underspecified (put). Results showed that German L2 listeners, like native Dutch listeners, anticipate objects that match the verbally encoded position immediately upon encountering the verb. French/English L2 participants, however, did not show any prediction effects, despite proper understanding of Dutch placement verbs. Our findings suggest that prior experience with a specific semantic contrast in one’s L1 facilitates prediction in L2, and hence adds to the evidence that linguistic experience modulates predictive sentence processing
  • Van Ekert, J., Wegman, J., Jansen, C., Takashima, A., & Janzen, G. (2017). The dynamics of memory consolidation of landmarks. Hippocampus, 27(4), 303-404. doi:10.1002/hipo.22698.

    Abstract

    Navigating through space is fundamental to human nature and requires the ability to retrieve relevant information from the remote past. With the passage of time, some memories become generic, capturing only a sense of familiarity. Yet, others maintain precision, even when acquired decades ago. Understanding the dynamics of memory consolidation is a major challenge to neuroscientists. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we systematically examined the effects of time and spatial context on the neural representation of landmark recognition memory. An equal number of male and female subjects (males N = 10, total N = 20) watched a route through a large-scale virtual environment. Landmarks occurred at navigationally relevant and irrelevant locations along the route. Recognition memory for landmarks was tested directly following encoding, 24 h later and 30 days later. Surprisingly, changes over time in the neural representation of navigationally relevant landmarks differed between males and females. In males, relevant landmarks selectively engaged the parahippocampal gyrus (PHG) regardless of the age of the memory. In females, the response to relevant landmarks gradually diminished with time in the PHG but strengthened progressively in the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG). Based on what is known about the functioning of the PHG and IFG, the findings of this study suggest that males maintain access to the initially formed spatial representation of landmarks whereas females become strongly dependent on a verbal representation of landmarks with time. Our findings yield a clear objective for future studies
  • Van Leeuwen, E. J. C., Cronin, K. A., & Haun, D. B. M. (2017). Tool use for corpse cleaning in chimpanzees. Scientific Reports, 7: 44091. doi:10.1038/srep44091.

    Abstract

    ct For the first time, chimpanzees have been observed using tools to clean the corpse of a deceased group member. A female chimpanzee sat down at the dead body of a young male, selected a firm stem of grass, and started to intently remove debris from his teeth. This report contributes novel behaviour to the chimpanzee's ethogram, and highlights how crucial information for reconstructing the evolutionary origins of human mortuary practices may be missed by refraining from developing adequate observation techniques to capture non-human animals' death responses
  • Van Goch, M. M., Verhoeven, L., & McQueen, J. M. (2017). Trainability in lexical specificity mediates between short-term memory and both vocabulary and rhyme awareness. Learning and Individual Differences, 57, 163-169. doi:10.1016/j.lindif.2017.05.008.

    Abstract

    A major goal in the early years of elementary school is learning to read, a process in which children show substantial individual differences. To shed light on the underlying processes of early literacy, this study investigates the interrelations among four known precursors to literacy: phonological short-term memory, vocabulary size, rhyme awareness, and trainability in the phonological specificity of lexical representations, by means of structural equation modelling, in a group of 101 4-year-old children. Trainability in lexical specificity was assessed by teaching children pairs of new phonologically-similar words. Standardized tests of receptive vocabulary, short-term memory, and rhyme awareness were used. The best-fitting model showed that trainability in lexical specificity partially mediated between short-term memory and both vocabulary size and rhyme awareness. These results demonstrate that individual differences in the ability to learn phonologically-similar new words are related to individual differences in vocabulary size and rhyme awareness.
  • Vanlangendonck, F. (2017). Finding common ground: On the neural mechanisms of communicative language production. PhD Thesis, Radboud University, Nijmegen.
  • Varma, S., Takashima, A., Krewinkel, S., Van Kooten, M., Fu, L., Medendorp, W. P., Kessels, R. P. C., & Daselaar, S. M. (2017). Non-interfering effects of active post-encoding tasks on episodic memory consolidation in humans. Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, 11: 54. doi:10.3389/fnbeh.2017.00054.

    Abstract

    So far, studies that investigated interference effects of post-learning processes on episodic memory consolidation in humans have used tasks involving only complex and meaningful information. Such tasks require reallocation of general or encoding-specific resources away from consolidation-relevant activities. The possibility that interference can be elicited using a task that heavily taxes our limited brain resources, but has low semantic and hippocampal related long-term memory processing demands, has never been tested. We address this question by investigating whether consolidation could persist in parallel with an active, encoding-irrelevant, minimally semantic task, regardless of its high resource demands for cognitive processing. We distinguish the impact of such a task on consolidation based on whether it engages resources that are: (1) general/executive, or (2) specific/overlapping with the encoding modality. Our experiments compared subsequent memory performance across two post-encoding consolidation periods: quiet wakeful rest and a cognitively demanding n-Back task. Across six different experiments (total N = 176), we carefully manipulated the design of the n-Back task to target general or specific resources engaged in the ongoing consolidation process. In contrast to previous studies that employed interference tasks involving conceptual stimuli and complex processing demands, we did not find any differences between n-Back and rest conditions on memory performance at delayed test, using both recall and recognition tests. Our results indicate that: (1) quiet, wakeful rest is not a necessary prerequisite for episodic memory consolidation; and (2) post-encoding cognitive engagement does not interfere with memory consolidation when task-performance has minimal semantic and hippocampally-based episodic memory processing demands. We discuss our findings with reference to resource and reactivation-led interference theories
  • Verga, L., & Kotz, S. A. (2017). Help me if I can't: Social interaction effects in adult contextual word learning. Cognition, 168, 76-90. doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2017.06.018.

    Abstract

    A major challenge in second language acquisition is to build up new vocabulary. How is it possible to identify the meaning of a new word among several possible referents? Adult learners typically use contextual information, which reduces the number of possible referents a new word can have. Alternatively, a social partner may facilitate word learning by directing the learner’s attention toward the correct new word meaning. While much is known about the role of this form of ‘joint attention’ in first language acquisition, little is known about its efficacy in second language acquisition. Consequently, we introduce and validate a novel visual word learning game to evaluate how joint attention affects the contextual learning of new words in a second language. Adult learners either acquired new words in a constant or variable sentence context by playing the game with a knowledgeable partner, or by playing the game alone on a computer. Results clearly show that participants who learned new words in social interaction (i) are faster in identifying a correct new word referent in variable sentence contexts, and (ii) temporally coordinate their behavior with a social partner. Testing the learned words in a post-learning recall or recognition task showed that participants, who learned interactively, better recognized words originally learned in a variable context. While this result may suggest that interactive learning facilitates the allocation of attention to a target referent, the differences in the performance during recognition and recall call for further studies investigating the effect of social interaction on learning performance. In summary, we provide first evidence on the role joint attention in second language learning. Furthermore, the new interactive learning game offers itself to further testing in complex neuroimaging research, where the lack of appropriate experimental set-ups has so far limited the investigation of the neural basis of adult word learning in social interaction.
  • Vernes, S. C. (2017). What bats have to say about speech and language. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 24(1), 111-117. doi:10.3758/s13423-016-1060-3.

    Abstract

    Understanding the biological foundations of language is vital to gaining insight into how the capacity for language may have evolved in humans. Animal models can be exploited to learn about the biological underpinnings of shared human traits, and although no other animals display speech or language, a range of behaviors found throughout the animal kingdom are relevant to speech and spoken language. To date, such investigations have been dominated by studies of our closest primate relatives searching for shared traits, or more distantly related species that are sophisticated vocal communicators, like songbirds. Herein I make the case for turning our attention to the Chiropterans, to shed new light on the biological encoding and evolution of human language-relevant traits. Bats employ complex vocalizations to facilitate navigation as well as social interactions, and are exquisitely tuned to acoustic information. Furthermore, bats display behaviors such as vocal learning and vocal turn-taking that are directly pertinent for human spoken language. Emerging technologies are now allowing the study of bat vocal communication, from the behavioral to the neurobiological and molecular level. Although it is clear that no single animal model can reflect the complexity of human language, by comparing such findings across diverse species we can identify the shared biological mechanisms likely to have influenced the evolution of human language. Keywords
  • Viebahn, M., Ernestus, M., & McQueen, J. M. (2017). Speaking style influences the brain’s electrophysiological response to grammatical errors in speech comprehension. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 29(7), 1132-1146. doi:10.1162/jocn_a_01095.

    Abstract

    This electrophysiological study asked whether the brain processes grammatical gender
    violations in casual speech differently than in careful speech. Native speakers of Dutch were
    presented with utterances that contained adjective-noun pairs in which the adjective was either
    correctly inflected with a word-final schwa (e.g. een spannende roman “a suspenseful novel”) or
    incorrectly uninflected without that schwa (een spannend roman). Consistent with previous
    findings, the uninflected adjectives elicited an electrical brain response sensitive to syntactic
    violations when the talker was speaking in a careful manner. When the talker was speaking in a
    casual manner, this response was absent. A control condition showed electrophysiological responses
    for carefully as well as casually produced utterances with semantic anomalies, showing that
    listeners were able to understand the content of both types of utterance. The results suggest that
    listeners take information about the speaking style of a talker into account when processing the
    acoustic-phonetic information provided by the speech signal. Absent schwas in casual speech are
    effectively not grammatical gender violations. These changes in syntactic processing are evidence
    of contextually-driven neural flexibility.

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  • Vogels, J., & Van Bergen, G. (2017). Where to place inaccessible subjects in Dutch: The role of definiteness and animacy. Corpus linguistics and linguistic theory, 13(2), 369-398. doi:10.1515/cllt-2013-0021.

    Abstract

    Cross-linguistically, both subjects and topical information tend to be placed at the beginning of a sentence. Subjects are generally highly topical, causing both tendencies to converge on the same word order. However, subjects that lack prototypical topic properties may give rise to an incongruence between the preference to start a sentence with the subject and the preference to start a sentence with the most accessible information. We present a corpus study in which we investigate in what syntactic position (preverbal or postverbal) such low-accessible subjects are typically found in Dutch natural language. We examine the effects of both discourse accessibility (definiteness) and inherent accessibility (animacy). Our results show that definiteness and animacy interact in determining subject position in Dutch. Non-referential (bare) subjects are less likely to occur in preverbal position than definite subjects, and this tendency is reinforced when the subject is inanimate. This suggests that these two properties that make the subject less accessible together can ‘gang up’ against the subject first preference. The results support a probabilistic multifactorial account of syntactic variation.
  • Volker-Touw, C. M., de Koning, H. D., Giltay, J., De Kovel, C. G. F., van Kempen, T. S., Oberndorff, K., Boes, M., van Steensel, M. A., van Well, G. T., Blokx, W. A., Schalkwijk, J., Simon, A., Frenkel, J., & van Gijn, M. E. (2017). Erythematous nodes, urticarial rash and arthralgias in a large pedigree with NLRC4-related autoinflammatory disease, expansion of the phenotype. British Journal of Dermatology, 176(1), 244-248. doi:10.1111/bjd.14757.

    Abstract

    Autoinflammatory disorders (AID) are a heterogeneous group of diseases, characterized by an unprovoked innate immune response, resulting in recurrent or ongoing systemic inflammation and fever1-3. Inflammasomes are protein complexes with an essential role in pyroptosis and the caspase-1-mediated activation of the proinflammatory cytokines IL-1β, IL-17 and IL-18.
  • Warner, N., & Cutler, A. (2017). Stress effects in vowel perception as a function of language-specific vocabulary patterns. Phonetica, 74, 81-106. doi:10.1159/000447428.

    Abstract

    Background/Aims: Evidence from spoken word recognition suggests that for English listeners, distinguishing full versus reduced vowels is important, but discerning stress differences involving the same full vowel (as in mu- from music or museum) is not. In Dutch, in contrast, the latter distinction is important. This difference arises from the relative frequency of unstressed full vowels in the two vocabularies. The goal of this paper is to determine how this difference in the lexicon influences the perception of stressed versus unstressed vowels. Methods: All possible sequences of two segments (diphones) in Dutch and in English were presented to native listeners in gated fragments. We recorded identification performance over time throughout the speech signal. The data were here analysed specifically for patterns in perception of stressed versus unstressed vowels. Results: The data reveal significantly larger stress effects (whereby unstressed vowels are harder to identify than stressed vowels) in English than in Dutch. Both language-specific and shared patterns appear regarding which vowels show stress effects. Conclusion: We explain the larger stress effect in English as reflecting the processing demands caused by the difference in use of unstressed vowels in the lexicon. The larger stress effect in English is due to relative inexperience with processing unstressed full vowels
  • Wegman, J., Tyborowska, A., Hoogman, M., Vasquez, A. A., & Janzen, G. (2017). The brain-derived neurotrophic factor Val66Met polymorphism affects encoding of object locations during active navigation. European Journal of Neuroscience, 45(12), 1501-1511. doi:10.1111/ejn.13416.

    Abstract

    The brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) was shown to be involved in spatial memory and spatial strategy preference. A naturally occurring single nucleotide polymorphism of the BDNF gene (Val66Met) affects activity-dependent secretion of BDNF. The current event-related fMRI study on preselected groups of ‘Met’ carriers and homozygotes of the ‘Val’ allele investigated the role of this polymorphism on encoding and retrieval in a virtual navigation task in 37 healthy volunteers. In each trial, participants navigated toward a target object. During encoding, three positional cues (columns) with directional cues (shadows) were available. During retrieval, the invisible target had to be replaced while either two objects without shadows (objects trial) or one object with a shadow (shadow trial) were available. The experiment consisted of blocks, informing participants of which trial type would be most likely to occur during retrieval. We observed no differences between genetic groups in task performance or time to complete the navigation tasks. The imaging results show that Met carriers compared to Val homozygotes activate the left hippocampus more during successful object location memory encoding. The observed effects were independent of non-significant performance differences or volumetric differences in the hippocampus. These results indicate that variations of the BDNF gene affect memory encoding during spatial navigation, suggesting that lower levels of BDNF in the hippocampus results in less efficient spatial memory processing
  • Wiese, R., Orzechowska, P., Alday, P. M., & Ulbrich, C. (2017). Structural Principles or Frequency of Use? An ERP Experiment on the Learnability of Consonant Clusters. Frontiers in Psychology, 7: 2005. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2016.02005.

    Abstract

    Phonological knowledge of a language involves knowledge about which segments can be combined under what conditions. Languages vary in the quantity and quality of licensed combinations, in particular sequences of consonants, with Polish being a language with a large inventory of such combinations. The present paper reports on a two-session experiment in which Polish-speaking adult participants learned nonce words with final consonant clusters. The aim was to study the role of two factors which potentially play a role in the learning of phonotactic structures: the phonological principle of sonority (ordering sound segments within the syllable according to their inherent loudness) and the (non-) existence as a usage-based phenomenon. EEG responses in two different time windows (adversely to behavioral responses) show linguistic processing by native speakers of Polish to be sensitive to both distinctions, in spite of the fact that Polish is rich in sonority-violating clusters. In particular, a general learning effect in terms of an N400 effect was found which was demonstrated to be different for sonority-obeying clusters than for sonority-violating clusters. Furthermore, significant interactions of formedness and session, and of existence and session, demonstrate that both factors, the sonority principle and the frequency pattern, play a role in the learning process.
  • Wnuk, E., De Valk, J. M., Huisman, J. L. A., & Majid, A. (2017). Hot and cold smells: Odor-temperature associations across cultures. Frontiers in Psychology, 8: 1373. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01373.

    Abstract

    It is often assumed odors are associated with hot and cold temperature, since odor processing may trigger thermal sensations, such as coolness in the case of mint. It is unknown, however, whether people make consistent temperature associations for a variety of everyday odors, and, if so, what determines them. Previous work investigating the bases of cross-modal associations suggests a number of possibilities, including universal forces (e.g., perception), as well as culture-specific forces (e.g., language and cultural beliefs). In this study, we examined odor-temperature associations in three cultures—Maniq (N = 11), Thai (N = 24), and Dutch (N = 24)—who differ with respect to their cultural preoccupation with odors, their odor lexicons, and their beliefs about the relationship of odors (and odor objects) to temperature. Participants matched 15 odors to temperature by touching cups filled with hot or cold water, and described the odors in their native language. The results showed no consistent associations among the Maniq, and only a handful of consistent associations between odor and temperature among the Thai and Dutch. The consistent associations differed across the two groups, arguing against their universality. Further analysis revealed cross-modal associations could not be explained by language, but could be the result of cultural beliefs
  • Wong, M. M. K., Watson, L. M., & Becker, E. B. E. (2017). Recent advances in modelling of cerebellar ataxia using induced pluripotent stem cells. Journal of Neurology & Neuromedicine, 2(7), 11-15. doi:10.29245/2572.942X/2017/7.1134.

    Abstract

    The cerebellar ataxias are a group of incurable brain disorders that are caused primarily by the progressive dysfunction and degeneration of cerebellar Purkinje cells. The lack of reliable disease models for the heterogeneous ataxias has hindered the understanding of the underlying pathogenic mechanisms as well as the development of effective therapies for these devastating diseases. Recent advances in the field of induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) technology offer new possibilities to better understand and potentially reverse disease pathology. Given the neurodevelopmental phenotypes observed in several types of ataxias, iPSC-based models have the potential to provide significant insights into disease progression, as well as opportunities for the development of early intervention therapies. To date, however, very few studies have successfully used iPSC-derived cells to cerebellar ataxias. In this review, we focus on recent breakthroughs in generating human iPSC-derived Purkinje cells. We also highlight the future challenges that will need to be addressed in order to fully exploit these models for the modelling of the molecular mechanisms underlying cerebellar ataxias and the development of effective therapeutics.
  • Yager, J., & Burenhult, N. (2017). Jedek: a newly discovered Aslian variety of Malaysia. Linguistic Typology, 21(3), 493-545. doi:10.1515/lingty-2017-0012.

    Abstract

    Jedek is a previously unrecognized variety of the Northern Aslian subgroup of the Aslian branch of the Austroasiatic language family. It is spoken by c. 280 individuals in the resettlement area of Sungai Rual, near Jeli in Kelantan state, Peninsular Malaysia. The community originally consisted of several bands of foragers along the middle reaches of the Pergau river. Jedek’s distinct status first became known during a linguistic survey carried out in the DOBES project Tongues of the Semang (2005-2011). This paper describes the process leading up to its discovery and provides an overview of its typological characteristics.
  • Yoshihara, M., Nakayama, M., Verdonschot, R. G., & Hino, Y. (2017). The phonological unit of Japanese Kanji compounds: A masked priming investigation. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 43(7), 1303-1328. doi:10.1037/xhp0000374.

    Abstract

    Using the masked priming paradigm, we examined which phonological unit is used when naming Kanji compounds. Although the phonological unit in the Japanese language has been suggested to be the mora, Experiment 1 found no priming for mora-related Kanji prime-target pairs. In Experiment 2, significant priming was only found when Kanji pairs shared the whole sound of their initial Kanji characters. Nevertheless, when the same Kanji pairs used in Experiment 2 were transcribed into Kana, significant mora priming was observed in Experiment 3. In Experiment 4, matching the syllable structure and pitch-accent of the initial Kanji characters did not lead to mora priming, ruling out potential alternative explanations for the earlier absence of the effect. A significant mora priming effect was observed, however, when the shared initial mora constituted the whole sound of their initial Kanji characters in Experiments 5. Lastly, these results were replicated in Experiment 6. Overall, these results indicate that the phonological unit involved when naming Kanji compounds is not the mora but the whole sound of each Kanji character. We discuss how different phonological units may be involved when processing Kanji and Kana words as well as the implications for theories dealing with language production processes.
  • Zhang, Y., & Yu, C. (2017). How misleading cues influence referential uncertainty in statistical cross-situational learning. In M. LaMendola, & J. Scott (Eds.), Proceedings of the 41st Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD 41) (pp. 820-833). Boston, MA: Cascadilla Press.
  • Zhen, Z., Kong, X., Huang, L., Yang, Z., Wang, X., Hao, X., Huang, T., Song, Y., & Liu, J. (2017). Quantifying the variability of scene-selective regions: Interindividual, interhemispheric, and sex differences. Human Brain Mapping, 38(4), 2260-2275. doi:10.1002/hbm.23519.

    Abstract

    Scene-selective regions (SSRs), including the parahippocampal place area (PPA), retrosplenial cortex (RSC), and transverse occipital sulcus (TOS), are among the most widely characterized functional regions in the human brain. However, previous studies have mostly focused on the commonality within each SSR, providing little information on different aspects of their variability. In a large group of healthy adults (N = 202), we used functional magnetic resonance imaging to investigate different aspects of topographical and functional variability within SSRs, including interindividual, interhemispheric, and sex differences. First, the PPA, RSC, and TOS were delineated manually for each individual. We then demonstrated that SSRs showed substantial interindividual variability in both spatial topography and functional selectivity. We further identified consistent interhemispheric differences in the spatial topography of all three SSRs, but distinct interhemispheric differences in scene selectivity. Moreover, we found that all three SSRs showed stronger scene selectivity in men than in women. In summary, our work thoroughly characterized the interindividual, interhemispheric, and sex variability of the SSRs and invites future work on the origin and functional significance of these variabilities. Additionally, we constructed the first probabilistic atlases for the SSRs, which provide the detailed anatomical reference for further investigations of the scene network.
  • De Zubicaray, G., & Fisher, S. E. (Eds.). (2017). Genes, brain and language [Special Issue]. Brain and Language, 172.
  • De Zubicaray, G., & Fisher, S. E. (2017). Genes, Brain, and Language: A brief introduction to the Special Issue. Brain and Language, 172, 1-2. doi:10.1016/j.bandl.2017.08.003.

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