Papers reviewed and determined not to be word norm studies. Use the flag icon to report errors or suggest re-inclusion.
18265 papers
Many languages in Africa are written using Latin-based scripts, but often with extra diacritics (e.g. dots below in Igbo: \({\d i}, {\d o}, {\d u}\)) or modifications to the letters themselves (e.g. open vowels “e” and “o” in Lingala: ɛ, ɔ). While it is possible to render these characters accurately in Unicode, oftentimes keyboard input methods are not easily accessible or are cumbersome to use, and so the vast majority of electronic texts in many African languages are written in plain ASCII. We call the process of converting an ASCII text to its proper Unicode form unicodification. This paper describes an open-source package which performs automatic unicodification, implementing a variant of an algorithm described in previous work of De Pauw, Wagacha, and de Schryver. We have trained models for more than 100 languages using web data, and have evaluated each language using a range of feature sets.
Until recently, most systems performing temporal extraction and reasoning from text have focused on recognizing and normalizing temporal expressions alone, for which the TIDES annotation scheme has been adopted. Temporal awareness of a text, however, involves not only identifying the temporal expressions, but the events which these expressions anchor, as well as other events which must be ordered relative to them. Because of these broader concerns, TimeML has been developed as an annotation specification that encompasses not only temporal expressions, but all temporally relevant aspects of a text. The annotation schemes, however, are not interchangeable, resulting in incompatible corpora and accompanying extraction algorithms for each standard. In this paper, we describe an automatic migration process from the TIMEX2 tags of TIDES to the TIMEX3 tags of TimeML. This transformation procedure has been implemented and evaluated with two different corpora, obtaining 93.3 and 89.2% overall F-Measure respectively.
Every language is a multiple system which includes different forms of linguistic reality. According to one of Languages for Specific Purposes (LSP) definitions it implies a language aimed at satisfying some professional needs. LSP is the result of communication needs of professionals using the language. Languages for Specific Purposes are codes different from the standard language, which have their rules. Some of the features of LSP include specific vocabulary and certain grammatical and lexical means. Everyday language cannot satisfy all the needs so loan words as well as loan translations are widely accepted. Medical language does not differ form other LSP as its vocabulary is based on certain principles. The aim of this paper is to analyze the standardization of medical terminology based on principles which will serve as a guideline for doctors and linguists in their common attempts to standardize medical language in order to avoid misunderstandings. The corpus is based on scientific, professional and popular articles and the analysis will show to which extent medical language is affected by the norms.
WÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊË Second,Williamsis an obviouslyintelligent andwell-read poet, and his learning findsits proper placeinhispoems,sometimes centrally asinthe poem"Marina," mentioned above.Thatsaid,attimes the musty smelloftheacademy canbe detected and be a little off-putting. Whenone poemencounters cows, thespeakermust(ofcourse)think ofIo;whenanother poemdescribes an encounter betweena man and womanon themetro, thespeaker must(ofcourse)recall Gombrowicz foran idea as simpleas physical assertion. Thereare multiple other examples oftimes whenthisreader wishestheauthor wouldputaside hisprofessor's cap. Third, there are too many stretches, even whole poems, in whichthepoet managesto barely includeconcreteimagery.For example, consider theselinesfrom "AllButAlways": "andifyouwere unable to give / an unqualified response to thesequestions, / but were forcedto admitthatyou / couldn't saywithcertainty whether / theactivities of thethingwere yourdoing/ ortheresult ofsome other agency." Suchlongstrings of abstractions seem less like poetry and moreliketherushedhurtle of abstract cogitation bysomeone consuming toomuchespresso. FredDings University ofSouthCarolina Miscellaneous Beyond Words:Translatingthe World. Susan Ouriou, ed. Banff, Alberta. BanffCentre Press. 2010. 175 pages. Can$21.95. isbn 978-1-894773-38-6 BeyondWords:Translating theWorld is a collection oftwenty-one short, mostlyinformal essays,thoughts on translation bya kaleidoscope of translators who have participated at varioustimesin theBanff literary Translation Centre's Summer ResidenceProgram. It is stimulating to confront in a shortspace how twenty-one translators with different approachesand attitudes facetwenty-one different problems oftranslation in as manydifferent ways.How does translating make us think aboutlanguage? Whatcan translators do, caughtin thegaps between twolanguages? How does each individualtextdetermine its translation? Whatabouttranslating from a major language into anindigenouslanguage?Whatis involved intranslating from a minor national language into a major one?What ifa translator isalsoa writer? Howdoes one carryacrossstylistic and linguistic norms from onelanguageto another - eveninthecaseofclosely related languages? How canpoetry be translated? Is translation political?Shoulditbe subjective? Is the translator translating him-or herself?Whataboutliterary imports? ■Hli^^H^H^^HHIII^^^MH^^HHH^^MI^^HHIJ^H ^^^^^HpHBBWBBBBBBBIBBBBBW^BMBBWBHBWpi^BjMIM^M^^^^^fe^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^B^^ What about translationin a bilingual country? How does translation relatetotheory? That all these questions are raised cogently and in briefformin thisbook reveals to the reader the multilayered complexitythatevery translation involves.Especiallyinterestingforthistranslator is theessay "Literary Translation intotheIndigenous Languages of theAmericas," by Enrique ServínHerrera,investigatingproblemsraisedbytherecent "renaissanceofaboriginallanguages as literarymedia of expression," whichcreatesa "realcultural chasm" when a moderncultureis translated intothe conceptsof an archaicculture,leading the translator to "performactsofsocialintervention, thus transcendingthe mere functionof whatwe call translation." "We must remember," theauthorwrites,"that languages are not parallel systems ofsignsthat'reflect' theworld,[but] rather independent - oratleastlargelyindependent - systems ofinterpretationoftheworld." Edith Grossmanwritesthat in translating Cervantes's DonQuixote, "I believethatmyprimary obligation as a literary translator is to re-create for thereaderin Englishthe experience of thereaderin Spanish.... When Cervantes wroteDon Quixote, hislanguage was notarchaicor quaint.He wroteina crackling, up-to-date Spanish thatwas an intrinsic partof his time,... a modernlanguagethat both reflected andhelpedtoshapetheway peopleexperienced theworld." For those who believe translationis simple,FrançoiseRoy offers a not atypical conundrum: "If a verse reads sus hermanos in Spanish,thetranslator intoFrenchmust know the gender of the hermanos and whetherthereis morethanone of each gender in order to decide "j EditedbySusanOuriou "j bey bySusanOuriou m -w ■ I Translating X^| JL JL theWorld ÛWO ras whetherto use sesfrères, leurs frères, sesfrères etsa sœur, sonfrère etsa sœur, sesfrères et ses sœurs,sonfrère etses sœurs,leursfrères et leursœur,leurs frères et leurssœurs,leurfrère et leur sœurorleur frère etleurssœurs." Burton Pike Graduate Center, CUNY Hispanic New York: A Sourcebook. Claudio Iván Remeseira, ed. & intro. AndrewDelbanco, foreword.NewYork. Columbia University Press.2010. xxiv+ 547 pages. $89.50 ($29.95 paper), isbn 978-0-231-14818-4(14819-1 paper) The publication of Hispanic New York:A Sourcebook by Claudio Ivan Remeseira, founder and director of the Hispanic New York Project in the American Studies Program at Columbia University, marks a significantmilestone in Nueva York studies as an interdisciplinary,multinationalfieldwithhemispheric and transatlantic scope. The twenty-five textsanthologized infoursections(HistoricalPerspectives;Race, Ethnicity, and Religion; Language and Literature; Music and Art) represent numerousintersectingsocialscienceand humanities disciplines:demographics, literature, journalism,women's studies, sociology, religion,dialectology,musicology, and art history.Although thisselectionof readingscould not possibly cover, uniformly,every nationalgroup or scholarlyissue of HispanicNew York,thebreadthand depth of the classifiedbibliography helps compensateforany perceived omissionofcoverage.Extensivesubject and name indexes also provide access to thevast rangeoftopicsin thereadings,and thecoverillustration...
This paper discusses the differences between German and Polish in particle translation. It attempts at the discussion on the role of German particles from the synchronic translation perspective. As we know, specialist language differs from general language mainly in vocabulary (retaining the grammatical and phonological systems). Particles are crucial lexical units and they have diverse functions in both written and spoken texts. They affect the structure of a given text as well as the reception of the reader or listener. This article deals with two problems: norm and quality of translation-interpreting of German particles in Polish texts. It is to demonstrate that “the role of particles is unusually limited” (Wierzbicka 1996: 519). It is common knowledge that languages can differ considerably with respect to the use they make of particles. The author scrutinizes particles relying on instruction manuals and linguistic texts, at the same time emphasising the process of translation.
In the era of globalisation and simultaneous grouping, multilingualism has become a norm. In their job or studies, most of educated Estonians have to mediate information from one or more foreign languages. At the same time, several difficulties arise: (1) these people are not familiar with theoretical issues of translation; (2) they may be faced with a lack of suitable special terms in the target language; (3) for marking the same concept, several parallel scientific paradigms and groups characteristic of the era may use different 114 signifiers, and the other way around: the same lexical units may mark different notions. The article mediates empirical findings of editing (and retranslating) CEFR (2001) and PISA 2009 (2008) terminology; some more general conclusions may address practitioners of every-day translating, some others point to problems to be solved on the higher level of society. Keywords multilingualism, LSP, English, Estonian, translation
BACKGROUND: To evaluate the safety of ICSI with epididymal sperm, this study compared children born after ICSI treatment with epididymal sperm and children conceived after IVF and ICSI with ejaculated sperm. Additionally, the results of a multidisciplinary, multicentre follow-up of the children conceived with epididymal sperm at 2 years of age are described. METHODS: This follow-up study included 378 children conceived after ICSI with epididymal sperm (percutaneous epididymal sperm aspiration: PESA group) and a control group of 1192 IVF and 1126 ICSI (with ejaculated sperm) children, all with a gestational age of 20 weeks or more. Questionnaires were sent at birth, 1 year and 4 years of age, collecting data on parental, pregnancy and child factors. A total of 148 PESA children were assessed at 2 years of age for motor performance, mental- and language development and compared with the Dutch norms. RESULTS: PESA children showed no increased risks for stillbirths, total deaths and malformations. They also did not differ from IVF and ICSI children in gender rate, birthweight and gestational age. The mental Bayley score was higher (P < 0.05) for PESA singletons and parents reported fewer (P < 0.05) behavioural problems in the PESA group than the Dutch reference group. The scores for syntactic and lexical development for the PESA singletons were better (P < 0.05) than the Dutch standards. CONCLUSIONS: ICSI with epididymal sperm does not lead to more stillbirths or congenital malformations in comparison to IVF and ICSI with ejaculated sperm and does not lead to poor development in comparison with the Dutch reference group.
Schema matching is the problem of finding relationships among concepts across heterogeneous data sources (heterogeneous in format and structure). Schema matching systems usually exploit lexical and semantic information provided by lexical databases/thesauri to discover intra/inter semantic relationships among schema elements. However, most of them obtain poor performance on real world scenarios due to the significant presence of “non-dictionary words”. Non-dictionary words include compound nouns, abbreviations and acronyms. In this paper, we present NORMS (NORMalizer of Schemata), a tool performing schema label normalization to increase the number of comparable labels extracted from schemata.
Documentation of medical records requires professional knowledge,which is also the basis for medical translation.Centering on medical terminology and anatomical logic,this article,by way of examples,discusses Chinese to English translation skills at lexical,syntactical,grammatical and textual levels.It is hoped that these skills will help translators produce English versions of medical records up to the standards and norms of this profession.
The goal of this study was to examine how lexical association and discourse congruence affect the time course of processing incoming words in spoken discourse. In an ERP norming study, we presented prime-target pairs in the absence of a sentence context to obtain a baseline measure of lexical priming. We observed a typical N400 effect when participants heard critical associated and unassociated target words in word pairs. In a subsequent experiment, we presented the same word pairs in spoken discourse contexts. Target words were always consistent with the local sentence context, but were congruent or not with the global discourse (e.g., "Luckily Ben had picked up some salt and pepper/basil", preceded by a context in which Ben was preparing marinara sauce (congruent) or dealing with an icy walkway (incongruent). ERP effects of global discourse congruence preceded those of local lexical association, suggesting an early influence of the global discourse representation on lexical processing, even in locally congruent contexts. Furthermore, effects of lexical association occurred earlier in the congruent than incongruent condition. These results differ from those that have been obtained in studies of reading, suggesting that the effects may be unique to spoken word recognition.
Background The importance and protective nature of children's early communication capacities, from birth to preschool years, in relation to later academic and social functioning is well established in the literature. Studies have shown links between early language competence (from birth to preschool) and later language, literacy, behavioural and social outcomes 1-3 as well as language, literacy and numeracy being shown to serve as key protective factors for positive life outcomes.4 The term ‘communication’ includes speech (the physical production of sounds), language (understanding and expression of spoken and written language, from sounds to words to sentences, to discourse), pragmatics (the social use of language in interactions), fluency (the smooth rhythm and pattern of talking) and voice (the production of sound through the vocal cords). 5, 6 Prelinguistic and early language development are the areas of communication that are of primary interest in this systematic review because they are the predominant aspects of communication that studies measure, when investigating the impact of parent responsiveness on children's communication development. Prelinguistic communication skills are the foundation skills that facilitate infants' communication competence.7-10 The prelinguistic period is typically from 0-12 months and skills include early vocal behaviours such as cooing and babbling,5 symbolic and functional play,(cited in 7) attention,11, 12 gestures such as facial expression,13 eye contact, turn taking, copying9 and phonetic (speech) perception.10 Language development encompasses the sub-components of sound and sound patterns (phonological development), words (lexical development), sentences and grammar (syntactic and morphological development) and the development of communicative competence, incorporating pragmatic skills (language use in a social context).5 Communication development starts from the prelinguistic period and is influenced by environmental factors including parental (particularly maternal) responsiveness and directiveness. Responsiveness refers to adults' ‘prompt, contingent, and appropriate’ (cited in 14 pp64) responses to a child's behaviours. This definition underpins the various aspects or descriptions of responsiveness that have been researched in relation to children's communicative development, for example: maternal encouragement,15 supportive parenting, 16 interpersonal timing, 17 and maternal behavioural and verbal responsiveness.14 Masur and colleagues14 also discuss the importance of considering directiveness (as well as responsiveness) when investigating the impact of parent speech and behaviour on children's communication development. Directiveness is described as being ‘characterised by attempts to command and control children's behaviour or attention’ 14(pp64) and may be supportive or intrusive in nature. Research has shown predictive relationships between parental responsiveness and directiveness and children's language development.14,16,18,19 Enhancing parent responsiveness to children's early communication can have positive effects on child development, social development, self esteem, the attachment relationship between parent and child literacy outcomes. 20-23 Hence, parents, as the primary caregivers, are in a powerful position to influence their child's communication development, and subsequent academic and social success, through the way they respond to their children from birth. The importance of this systematic review This systematic review aims to support and direct evidenced based practice and health promotion in speech pathology and related fields that work with parents and infants or children. To the reviewer's awareness, no systematic reviews on the relationship between parent responsiveness and children's communication development have been developed to date. Systematic reviews can play a role in the education of health professionals and lay people.24 A systematic review on the relationship between parental responsiveness and children's communication development could support health professionals and policy makers in easily accessing synthesised information on this topic. Prevalence data on speech-language difficulties in 2 to 4 ½ year olds has been reported as 5-8%. (cited in 25 & 26) Whilst this percentage is not categorized into causal factors, it is plausible, based on the research on parental responsiveness, that a proportion of these children have speech-language difficulties due to a reduced level of parental responsiveness in their early learning environment. Despite the established evidence regarding the importance of maternal responsiveness on children's early communication development, which in turn, influences later life outcomes, it is the reviewer's opinion that this information is not widely promoted in the general community to serve as a preventative measure. Using Gordon's operational classification of disease prevention, a universal or selective preventative measure would include public education as ‘an essential aspect of the strategy for optimal public health practice’. 27 (pp108) According to Gordon a universal preventative measure is desirable for everybody in the general population (i.e. all parents of infants or expectant parents), while a selective preventative measure is aimed at subgroups of the population who are considered to have characteristics that place them ‘at risk’ (i.e. parents who are at risk of being less responsive to their infants). This systematic review could encourage the focus of universal or selective health promotion and policy development on educating society about the benefits and importance of parent responsiveness in relation to child development outcomes. Health promotion and early parent education on the parent's role in children's early communication development could potentially reduce the number of preschool and school-age children with speech-language difficulties, hence reducing the economic, social and individual costs of this issue. This comprehensive systematic review will incorporate both quantitative and textual components. A preliminary search of the literature has found that studies on parental responsiveness and children's communication development are quantitative by nature. The textual component of this review will set the context of current thinking and action in society in relation to the quantitative component. The textual component is important because it will investigate whether the research is being put into action, or at least has a profile in society. The textual component may help to clarify the direction, if any that government needs to take regarding public education on this topic. A qualitative component of this systematic review is not included because a preliminary search did not identify any qualitative papers, and a qualitative approach is not required to answer the research question presented. Review question/objective The quantitative objective of this review is to determine the best available evidence on the relationship between parents' responsiveness to children's prelinguistic and early communication and their subsequent communication development. More specifically, the questions are: What are the attributes of parental responsiveness? That is: To delimit the attributes of parents' verbal and behavioural responsiveness and directiveness that influences children's preverbal and early communicative development. Do some attributes of parent responsiveness have more consequence to children's early communication development than others? Is the amount or frequency of parent responsiveness important? That is: Do varying levels of parent responsiveness impact differently on children's communication development? Are there parental factors (e.g. education level) within the well population that predict or influence responsiveness quality and quantity? If so, what are they? The textual objective is to identify the current social context within Australia, regarding the topic of parental responsiveness and children's communication development. More specifically, the questions are: Does current government policy on child development reflect the research evidence identified in the quantitative component of this systematic review? What is society's current awareness and standing (perception) on this topic, as identified through policy, expert and public opinion? Are there preventative universal or selective health promotion measures in place relating to the review question? If the answer to question 3 is ‘yes’, then what are they? Inclusion criteria Types of participants The quantitative component of this review will consider studies that include parents as the primary independent variable and children as the secondary, dependent variable. More specifically, the review will include studies with: 1. Parents Because a main goal of this review is to support public education for universal or selective health promotion, parents who are identified as falling within the well or at risk, but not clinically significant population will be included. Well parents refer to the general public who are not affected by current suffering. 27At risk parents may include parents whose social circumstances place them at risk of being less responsive to their children. For example, parents of low education or intellectual capacity, or of certain age. At risk parents will be included in this review because they have characteristics that place them in a position for selective preventive health promotion 27 and could provide insight into the outcomes of varying levels of parent responsiveness to children. The term clinically significant refers to parents who have clinical diagnoses that impact on their capacity to respond to their children. For example, hearing impairment, and mental illnesses such as psychoses, schizophrenia, clinical or post-natal depression. These parents are excluded from the review because they present compounding factors that are beyond the scope of this review. 2. Children Children who's language level is preverbal (i.e. prelinguistic period) up to production of early phrases (E.g.: two-word utterances) will be included in this systematic review. Based on child development norms, these ages would typically include 0 - 3 year olds, however, studies that have older cohorts will also be included, providing the earlier years are also represented within the study. Children who are typically developing, or defined as a ‘late talker’ or as having a specific speech/language issue will be included in this systematic review because these studies may reveal important information about parent responsiveness as a causal or influencing factor. Studies may or may not have control groups. Studies will not be considered for this review when children are identified as having any primary co-morbid condition such as syndromes, global developmental delays or disorders, Autism Spectrum Disorder, or hearing issue including hearing impairment and cochlear implant because this introduces too many confounding factors. Studies on bilingual children will not be included for the same reason. Consideration will be made as whether to include children who spend care time with a carer other than their primary parent/caregiver, for example, childcare. The amount of time spent in the care of persons/institutions other than their parents is important to consider because the review is examining the relationship between the parent's impact on the child through their responsiveness attributes and levels. It is beyond the scope of the review to consider the language development of children independent of their parent's responsiveness. The reviewer will examine the literature to determine the cut off point for time spent in childcare. Where this is not clear, the reviewer will contact the authors of the studies for this specific information. The textual component of this review will consider discourse and opinion reported or published by government agencies, experts, the public and media, about the systematic review question, that is of direct relevance or interest to Australia. Types of intervention(s) The quantitative component of the review will consider any studies that evaluate parent verbal and behavioural responsiveness and directiveness to their children's preverbal and or early linguistic communication. Studies may investigate parent responsiveness and or directiveness in the context of a home or clinical/education environment. The reviewer will take the environment (e.g. home, laboratory, community settings) in which studies gather their data into consideration throughout the review process. The textual component of this review will consider published and unpublished papers that describe society's and government's current attitudes and opinions regarding the topic of parental responsiveness to infant and early communication. Types of outcomes The quantitative component of this review will consider studies that include outcome measures of child prelinguistic and early language development. This includes, but is not limited to, measures of language milestones such as comprehension of first words, speech sound perception, babbling, first word production, first 50 words and first 2-word utterance. The process of the systematic review may reveal other important prelinguistic or early language outcomes, which may be considered for inclusion depending on the validity, reliability and standardisation of the tools used to obtain the data. The preferred type of assessment tools used to retrieve data about child language outcomes will be standardised language/communication assessments. However, parent reports and non-standardised assessments will also be considered for inclusion. The textual component of this review will consider discourse and opinion about the topic of parental responsiveness and children's communication development, as reported in textual or policy papers. The outcome will be the main themes and concepts identified through expert and society opinions, and government policy, in relation to the review question. Types of studies The quantitative component of the review will consider analytical epidemiological study designs including prospective and retrospective cohort studies, case control studies and analytical cross sectional studies for inclusion. Randomised control trials of parent responsiveness are not ethically possible, therefore will not be included in this review. Case series studies have not been identified in preliminary search of the topic, therefore will not be included in this review. The textual component will consider expert opinion, discussion papers, position papers, government policies and reports, conference papers, theses and dissertations, and other text relating to child development/health promotion/early education within the context and parameters of the review question. Discourse must be written in English and be of western culture. Discourse from Australia is of primary interest. Discourse from other countries that constitute western society (i.e.: the Americas, New Zealand and Western Europe)28 will only be included where it has been shown to be of interest to Australia. For example, an Australian expert has commented on a paper from another Western country. Search strategy The search strategy aims to find both published and unpublished studies. A three-step search strategy will be utilised for each component of this review. An initial limited search of PubMed and CINAHL will be undertaken followed by analysis of the text words contained in the title and abstract, and of the index terms used to describe article. A second search using all identified keywords and index terms will then be undertaken across all included databases. Where necessary, terms and indexing language will be adjusted to search the other databases listed. This process will be done in close consultation with the Research Librarian for Mental Health, Psychiatry, Psychology, University of Adelaide. Thirdly, the reference list of all identified reports and articles will be searched for additional studies. Studies published in English will be considered for inclusion in this review. As there are no other identified systematic reviews on this topic, any quantitative studies within an unlimited timeframe will be considered for inclusion in this review, in order to increase the breadth of the results and so not to miss any pertinent earlier studies. To keep textual information of current opinion and policy relevant and up to date, the timeframe will be the past 10 years (2002 - 2012). The databases to be searched include: PubMed PsycINFO CINAHL Embase Scopus Web of Science Mednar Proquest Dissertations and Theses Index to Theses Australian Digital Theses Program The Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations (NDLDT) Keywords and concepts to be used for the initial search of PubMed and CINAHL will include:Table: No Caption available.The search for textual information will also include relevant websites in the English language, related to child development, literacy, parent-infant attachment, government policy on early childhood development and education, and media releases relating to the review question. An initial search to identify a comprehensive list of relevant websites for grey literature will be done through the Google search engine using initial key words seen above and additional keywords including: Government policy Early childhood Parent education Parent training Infant mental health Expert opinion(s) Individual countries (eg Australia, New Zealand, Canada, America, United Kingdom) Examples of potential grey literature sites include: Australian Government Department of Health and Ageing Australian Government Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations Council of Australian Governments The Hanen Centre. Speech and Language Development for Children Assessment of methodological quality Quantitative papers selected for retrieval will be assessed by two independent reviewers for methodological validity prior to inclusion in the review using standardised critical appraisal instruments from the Joanna Briggs Institute Meta Analysis of Statistics Assessment and Review Instrument (JBI-MAStARI) (Appendix I). Textual papers selected for retrieval will be assessed by two independent reviewers for authenticity prior to inclusion in the review using standardised critical appraisal instruments from the Joanna Briggs Institute Narrative, Opinion and Text Assessment and Review Instrument (JBI-NOTARI) (Appendix I). Any disagreements that arise between the reviewers will be resolved through discussion, or with a third reviewer. Data collection Quantitative data will be extracted from papers included in the review using the standardised data extraction tool from JBI-MAStARI (Appendix II). Textual data will be extracted from papers included in the review using the standardised data extraction tool from JBI-NOTARI (Appendix II). The data extracted will include specific details about the interventions, populations, study methods and outcomes of significance to the review question and specific objectives. Data synthesis Quantitative papers will, where possible, be pooled in statistical meta-analysis using JBI-MAStARI. All results will be subject to double data entry. Effect sizes expressed as relative risk for cohort studies and odds ratio for case control studies (for categorical data) and weighted mean differences (for continuous data) and their 95% confidence intervals will be calculated for analysis. A Random effects model will be used and heterogeneity will be assessed statistically using the standard Chi-square. Where statistical pooling is not possible the findings will be presented in narrative form including tables and figures to aid in data presentation where appropriate. Textual papers will, where possible be pooled using JBI-NOTARI. This will involve the aggregation or synthesis of conclusions to generate a set of statements that represent that aggregation, through assembling and categorising these conclusions on the basis of similarity in meaning. These categories are then subjected to a meta-synthesis in order to produce a single comprehensive set of synthesised findings that can be used as a basis for evidence-based practice. Where textual pooling is not possible the conclusions will be presented in narrative form. Conflicts of interest The primary reviewer is not aware of any conflicts of interest at the time of submitting the systematic review protocol. Acknowledgements The primary reviewer would like to acknowledge the support of the secondary reviewer, Matthew Kowald; her principal supervisor, Dr Aye Aye Gyi from the Joanna Briggs Institute, University of Adelaide; her associate supervisor, Dr Debbie James from Research and Evaluation Unit, Children, Youth and Women's Health Service, and Maureen Bell, Research Librarian for Mental Health, Psychiatry, Psychology, University of Adelaide. As this systematic review forms partial submission for the award of Masters of Clinical Sciences degree, a secondary reviewer will be used for critical appraisal only.
Studies in interlanguage pragmatics have shown that L2 learners’ proficiency has an influence on the occurrences of L1 pragmatic transfer. However, questions remain whether the relationship between L1 pragmatic transfer and L2 proficiency is positive or negative. This paper is designed to study L1 pragmatic transfer in requests made by Chinese learners of English at low L2 proficiency level and at high L2 proficiency level and how L1 pragmatic transfer is related to their L2 proficiency. Ten low proficiency learners of English, ten high proficiency learners of English?ten native speakers of English and ten native speakers of Chinese participate in this study. Requests are collected by means of a discourse completion test questionnaire and are analysed in terms of requestive semantic formulas based on the taxonomy of request strategies, internal modifiers and external modifiers. The research results reveal that L1 pragmatic transfer decreases with the increase of L2 proficiency such as learners’ use of direct strategies, lexical and phrasal downgraders, imperatives and grounder and no clear relationship is found between L1 pragmatic transfer and L2 proficiency in terms of the other request strategies, internal modifiers and external modifiers. These results provide partial support to negative correlation hypothesis —high proficiency L2 learners are less likely to transfer their native language pragmatic norms since they have enough control over L2.
This article investigates lexical gender in specialized communication. The key method of analysis is that of forms of address, professional titles, and ’generic man’ in a one million word corpus of business letters. This paper found a mixed results:on the one hand, the ’male-as-norm’ principle contributes to reinforcing typical gender stereotypes:for example, for each woman referred to in the corpus, there are more than 3 occurrences for man. On the other hand, advocates of non-sexist English have also influenced written Business English:for example, Ms is more frequent than Mrs. or Miss, which sustains the claim that equates Ms with professional settings. This article ends by discussing the ways in which the research findings of this study could positively impact upon the teaching of Business English.
You have accessThe ASHA LeaderFeature1 Feb 2011Discourse Analyses: Characterizing Cognitive-Communication Disorders Following TBI Karen Lê, MA, CCC-SLP Jennifer Mozeiko andMA, CCC-SLP Carl CoelhoPhD, CCC-SLP, BC-ANCDS Karen Lê Google Scholar, MA, CCC-SLP, Jennifer Mozeiko Google Scholar, MA, CCC-SLP and Carl Coelho Google Scholar, PhD, CCC-SLP, BC-ANCDS https://doi.org/10.1044/leader.FTR4.16022011.18 SectionsAbout ToolsAdd to favorites ShareFacebookTwitterLinked In http://www.asha.org/Publications/leader/2011/110215/Discourse-Analyses.htm In the United States, approximately 1.4 million traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) occur every year with 230,000 resulting in hospitalization and an estimated 80,000 resulting in long-term disability annually (Thurman, Coronado, & Selassie, 2007). The prevalence of TBI in the United States was estimated to be 1.1% of the U.S. civilian population at the beginning of 2005 or approximately 3.17 million people who are living with a long-term disability secondary to TBI (Zaloshnja, Miller, Langlois, & Selassie, 2008). America's armed forces engaged in conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan have experienced TBIs from explosions of rocket-propelled grenades, improvised explosive devices, and land mines. The prevalence of TBI has been estimated to be more than 22% among injured service members (Warden, 2006). Diffuse brain damage caused by TBI often results in persistent physical, psychosocial, cognitive, and communicative problems. Impaired discourse is the hallmark of post-TBI cognitive-communication disorder and, due to the central role discourse plays in everyday communication, impaired discourse abilities contribute to the participation restrictions that underlie the social isolation commonly experienced among individuals living with TBI. The extent of discourse impairments in individuals with TBI influences the diagnostic process, formulation of prognoses, and development of effective interventions for social reintegration. Cognitive-communication disorders, including discourse impairments associated with TBI, may be related to a disruption of executive functions (Ylvisaker & Szekeres, 1989). More than any other cognitive process, executive function skills are linked to the success of community reintegration (Sohlberg & Mateer, 2001). Aspects of executive functions thought to be critical for effective communication are self-awareness and goal-setting, planning, self-directing and initiating, self-inhibiting, self-monitoring, self-evaluation, and flexible problem-solving (Ylvisaker & Szekeres, 1989). Impairments of executive functions are widely reported in the literature on TBI. For example, the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST), a commonly used index of executive function, has been correlated with measures of monologic discourse (monologues) among children and adults with TBI (Brookshire et al., 2000; Coelho, 2002). Of the multiple and diverse sequela of TBI, memory difficulty has been reported as a leading subjective complaint from survivors and caregivers (Murray, Ramage, & Hopper, 2001). However, the relationship between memory deficits and cognitive-communication disorders remains unclear (Marsh & Knight, 1991). Importantly, working memory, which is a type of short-term memory that temporarily stores information while it is being processed, has been linked to discourse-production deficits following TBI. Modest correlations have been found between working memory and narrative discourse measures (Chapman, Gamino, Cook, Hanten, Li, & Levin, 2006; Youse & Coelho, 2005). Also, working memory has been associated with figurative language use and syntactic processing (Moran, Nippold, & Gillon, 2006; Turkstra & Holland, 1998), both of which also may affect discourse functioning. Discourse Genres Discourse genres are separated into two broad categories: monologic (monologues) and interactive. Monologues, which do not require interaction, encompass a number of genres including descriptions, narratives, and procedural and expository discourse (Cherney, 1998). Descriptive discourse entails the attribution of features and concepts of a stimulus. Narratives involve storytelling, either through story creation or story retelling. Procedural discourse includes explanations of a series of actions to perform a task. Expository discourse informs a listener of a topic through facts or interpretation and draws upon higher-level thinking skills, such as comparison and contrast, cause and effect, and generalization. In contrast, conversational discourse is interactive with participants alternating roles as speaker and listener to exchange ideas, thoughts, and feelings. Because conversation is such a prevalent mode of human communication, it may be argued that it has greater ecologic validity—how well a measure relates to real-life situations—than monologic discourse and that, therefore, assessment of discourse among individuals with TBI should focus primarily on conversational discourse. However, monologic discourse also has ecologic validity, as everyday conversation often incorporates a narrative framework. Furthermore, storytelling often is embedded in social exchanges (Mar, 2004). Monologic discourse may be more useful clinically than conversation. In a study of the relationship of discourse to functional outcomes after TBI, narrative and procedural discourse measures were better correlated than conversational discourse measures with social integration and quality of life (Galski et al., 2008). Four of the five significant predictors for social integration were monologic discourse measures related to efficiency, organization, and productivity. Additionally, quality of life was correlated only with monologic discourse measures. These findings suggest that conversational tasks may not be sufficiently difficult or cognitively demanding or may be too variable to use in the valuation of cognitive-communication abilities underlying successful community reintegration and life satisfaction. Methodologically, narrative discourse presents the possibility of systematic and quantitative examinations not offered by conversational discourse. In addition, elicitation of discourse through the use of stories or procedures makes it possible to identify the elements of the targeted output that can serve as the standard for comparison. For example, a story retelling task requires all participants to provide an account of the same basic elements of the stimulus story. By contrast, conversational tasks do not provide an equivalent target against which an elicited interaction can be evaluated. Although both conversational and monologic discourse sample distinct aspects of communication, monologic discourse has methodological advantages over conversation and therefore may be better suited for predicting and monitoring recovery following TBI. Discourse Analyses Monologic discourse affords multilevel analyses that provide a systematic way to gain insights into the nature of discourse deficits. Monologic discourse measures are organized at four levels: within-sentence, across-sentence, text-level, and story grammar. Within-sentence analyses, sometimes referred to as microlinguistic analyses, focus on lexical, semantic, and grammatical processes. Within-sentence analyses include sentential complexity, propositional analyses, verbal errors, productivity measures, and essential content units. Across-sentence measures, referred to as microstructural measures, involve measures of cohesion. Cohesion refers to inter-sentential organization that is established by meaning relations that connect one utterance to the next. Cohesive markers, such as anaphoric references (e.g., she, his), bridge meaning between sentences. Examination of cohesion may involve judgments of cohesive adequacy or identification of usage patterns. Beyond the sentence level, text-level analyses are global measures that involve the whole discourse sample. Text-level analyses, sometimes referred to as macrolinguistic analyses, include gist summarization (extrapolation and refinement of the central meaning of a discourse sample) and coherence (thematic unity of the discourse sample measures). Local coherence reflects how well two sentences are thematically linked; global coherence reflects how well each sentence of the sample relates to the overall theme. Story grammar analyses examine the over-arching discourse structure, known as the schema. Story grammar rules govern the schema and facilitate comprehension and production of a story, specifying logical connections between characters and events. The episode unit is central to measures of story grammar. An episode consists of an initiating event that provides the motivation for a character's goal-based behavior; an attempt on behalf of the character toward the goal; and a direct consequence, reflecting attainment or nonattainment of the goal. Sensitivity of discourse measures to the subtle communicative deficits of TBI varies according to the analysis used. Findings associated with within- and across-sentence measures are mixed. For example, some studies examining cohesion have found significant differences between individuals with TBI and non-brain-injured individuals; others have found comparable performance among the groups. In contrast, text-level and story grammar analyses in the TBI literature have consistently demonstrated sensitivity, indicating that global discourse analyses may be more fruitful in understanding the relationship between discourse ability and cognition (Coelho, Ylvisaker, & Turkstra, 2005; Chapman et al., 2006; Moran & Gillon, 2010). Neural Correlates of Discourse Discourse is situated at the crossroads of language and cognition. Following TBI, linguistic abilities are generally spared (i.e., phonological and syntactic aspects of single words and sentences in the absence of context) and frank aphasias are relatively uncommon. As a result, the disruption of discourse ability is thought to have cognitive underpinnings. The systematic examination of discourse in relation to cognition may shed light on the processes involved in discourse production and on organization of the neural structures involved in the production and comprehension of discourse. Imaging studies have implicated a variety of cortical areas that appear to be important for discourse production and comprehension, suggesting that discourse ability is widely distributed in the brain. Both medial and lateral prefrontal cortices (PFC), temporoparietal and anterior temporal regions, and posterior cingulate have shown activation during production of stories (Mar, 2004). The medial PFC is identified as a key site for regulation of motivation and is associated with discourse processes of sequencing and selection. Additionally, it has been implicated in theory-of-mind tasks, pointing to a potential role in inferencing. The lateral PFC has multiple efferent and afferent connections with all other lobes of the brain—temporal, parietal, and occipital (see Figure 1 [PDF]). Given such extensive circuitry, it is not surprising that the lateral PFC, particularly the dorsolateral region, has been shown to mediate a number of important cognitive processes, such as executive functions, working memory, information retrieval, and set shifting (Frattali & Grafman, 2005). Temporal sequencing of stories, which is thought to reflect working memory processes, also appears to be a function of lateral PFC. Some evidence suggests that lateral PFC mediates retrieval of episodic information. Temporoparietal and anterior temporal regions appear to be responsible for mental inferencing, such as theory of mind. Although some areas of the temporal lobes are responsible for basic semantic processes, these areas are not the same temporal areas implicated in discourse. However, some researchers have raised the possibility that the temporoparietal and anterior temporal regions may be involved in more complex sentence processing (Mar, 2004). The posterior cingulate is associated with multiple functions, such as updating schemas with new information, imagery, and retrieval of episodic information. Emotional stimuli also appear to engage the posterior cingulate, suggesting that the posterior cingulate may regulate the influence of emotions on memory-related processes. The diverse processes housed within the posterior cingulate point to its potential role as a site for mental simulation of discourse (Mar, 2004). The extensive connections of the PFC to other areas of brain make it a likely candidate for control and regulation of goal-oriented functions, such as discourse ability. Several models of PFC functioning converge on the notion that the PFC is critical for automatic and controlled processing. For example, Grafman (1995) proposed that the PFC is responsible for plan-specific knowledge, represented as memory units called structured event complexes (SECs). SECs specify goal-oriented event information in sequence. They are dynamic representations such that experience modifies their information. For example, hosting a dinner party with the goal of having the entire meal prepared by a certain time activates the appropriate SEC for that task. Sequences for this particular SEC might include sending out invitations, buying groceries to meet the needs of the selected recipes, setting the table, and sequencing the cooking so that all the food is ready on time. The organizational framework of SECs is analogous to that of story grammar and scripts, suggesting that SECs may form the basis for knowledge representation in discourse (Frattali & Grafman, 2005). Assessment Challenges Cognitive-communication impairments are characteristic of TBI and difficult to quantify because typical language batteries tend to be geared toward individuals with aphasia. These batteries generally assess linguistic form and content, abilities that are often spared following TBI. Despite the facility of their spoken language, individuals with TBI may have more difficulty in conversational exchanges than individuals without brain injury; they may be tangential, disorganized, and poorer at conversational turn-taking (Coelho, Liles, & Duffy, 1991; McDonald, 1993). Such individuals are good talkers but poor communicators, and often rely on their conversational partners to assume the burden of organizing or providing structure for the successful exchange of information. Individuals with TBI also struggle with pragmatics and in particular "reading" the social context, which in large measure determines the effectiveness of a communicative exchange (Body, Perkins, & McDonald, 1999). Successful communication depends on conveying appropriate content in a way that encourages the communication partner to sustain an interaction. The social isolation of individuals following TBI reflects their difficulty with discourse engagement. Social communication has been shown to correlate significantly with life satisfaction, social integration, social productivity, and occupational participation (Dahlberg et al., 2006; Galski, Tompkins, & Johnston, 1998). Standardized language assessment batteries may not be the best approach to assess social communication abilities as they cannot factor the context of communication into the results and thus tend to provide an inaccurate index of functional communication abilities. In a review of 84 standardized assessments recommended by speech-language pathologists in response to a survey, only 31 mentioned TBI in the test manual (Turkstra, Coelho, & Ylvisaker, 2005). Of those, seven were deemed reliable and valid according to measures established by the Agency for Health Care Research and Quality. The authors of the review remarked on the "striking absence of a test developed for the evaluation of communication in individuals with cognitive-communication disorders" (p. 219). Discourse is complex use of language that depends on both linguistic and nonlinguistic cognitive abilities. Individuals with TBI are challenged to produce coherent and cohesive discourse, but no standardized or norm-referenced assessment can delineate the degree of difficulty they encounter. Non-standardized assessments serve a variety of functions, including determining competencies in domains for which there are no standardized tests as well as describing performance in the context of real-world settings and activities (Coelho, Ylvisaker, & Turkstra, 2005). Discourse analysis is non-standardized assessment. Discourse analyses are time-consuming to perform but yield information regarding linguistic, cognitive, and social functioning that can be helpful in designing customized interventions for individuals with TBI. Implications for Treatment As a group, individuals with TBI, particularly in the chronic stage (two or more years post-injury), demonstrate relatively preserved linguistic abilities. Impairments noted in their narrative discourse production are associated with problems at a more macro-level—what Glosser (1993) described as cognitive procedures for integrating linguistic and nonlinguistic knowledge in order to maintain conceptual, semantic, and pragmatic organization of discourse. There are a variety of cognitively based explanations for these breakdowns including difficulties with executive functioning (including working memory), memory (i.e., the ability to integrate prior world knowledge within ongoing discourse), and attention. Such explanations suggest that intervention for discourse deficits may be more effective when directed toward the improvement of cognitive abilities rather than discourse alone. More research aimed at identifying the key elements of a successful rehabilitation program for individuals with TBI is critically needed, especially to address their discourse deficits as they persist and pose a significant barrier to successful community reentry. Cognitive-communication problems create serious challenges to an individual's potential for social, vocational, and academic success. Therefore, management of individuals with TBI should incorporate assessment and treatment of discourse impairments. Discourse Genres Commonly Used in Assessing Individuals With TBI Conversational discourse: interactive, requires a communicative dyad, involves turn-taking as speaker and listener alternate roles. Monologic discourse: non-interactive, but often is embedded in social exchanges. Descriptive discourse: attribution of features and concepts of a given stimulus (e.g., object) or personal experience (e.g., favorite hobby). Narrative discourse: telling of a story, typically through generation of a spontaneous story or retelling of a story previously presented. Procedural discourse: explanations of action sequences to perform a task. Expository discourse: informing a listener of a topic through facts or interpretation; draws upon higher-level thinking skills (e.g., inferencing, understanding cause and effect). Examples of Discourse Measures Within-sentence analyses Sentential complexity Propositional analyses and counts Verbal output errors (e.g., mazes, lexical errors, verbal paraphasias) Productivity Essential content units Across-sentence analyses Cohesive adequacy Cohesive errors Usage patterns for cohesive markers Text-level analyses Local and global coherence Gist summarization Story grammar analysis Episode counts Proportion of utterances in episodes References Body R., Perkins M., & McDonald S. (1999). Pragmatics, cognition, and communication in traumatic brain injury.In Code C. (Ed.), Communication disorders following traumatic brain injury. (pp. 81–112). Hove, England: Psychology Press/Taylor & Francis (UK). Google Scholar Brookshire B. L., Chapman S. B., Song J., & Levin H. S. (2000). Cognitive and linguistic correlates of children's discourse after closed head injury: A three-year follow-up.Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society, 6(7), 741–751. doi:10.1017/S1355617700677019 Google Scholar Chapman S. B., Gamino J. F., Cook L. G., Hanten G., Li X., & Levin H. S. (2006). Impaired discourse gist and working memory in children after brain injury.Brain and Language, 97(2), 178–188. doi:10.1016/j.bandl.2005.10.002 CrossrefGoogle Scholar Cherney L. R. (1998). Pragmatics and discourse: An introduction.In Cherney L. R., Shadden B. B., & Coelho C. A. (Eds.), (pp. 1–7). Gaithersburg, MD: Aspen Publishers, Inc. Google Scholar Coelho C. A. (2002). Story narratives of adults with closed head injury and non-brain-injured adults: Influence of socioeconomic status, elicitation task, and executive functioning.Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 45(6), 1232–1248. doi:10.1044/1092-4388(2002/099) LinkGoogle Scholar Coelho C. A., Liles B. Z., & Duffy R. J. (1991). The use of discourse analyses for the evaluation of higher level traumatically brain-injured adults.Brain Injury, 5(4), 381–392. CrossrefGoogle Scholar Coelho C., Ylvisaker M., & Turkstra L. (2005). Nonstandardized assessment approaches for individuals with traumatic brain injuries.Seminars in Speech and Language, 26(4), 223–241. doi:10.1055/s-2005-922102. CrossrefGoogle Scholar Dahlberg C., Hawley L., Morey C., Newman J., Cusick C. P., & Harrison-Felix C. (2006). Social communication skills in persons with post-acute traumatic brain injury: Three perspectives.Brain Injury, 20(4), 425–435. doi:10.1080/02699050600664574 CrossrefGoogle Scholar Frattali C., & Grafman J. (2005). Language and discourse deficits following prefrontal cortex damage.Aphasia and related neurogenic language disorders (3rd ed.) (pp. 51–67). New York, NY: Thieme. Google Scholar Galski T., Tompkins C., & Johnston M. V. (1998). Competence in discourse as a measure of social integration and quality of life in persons with traumatic brain injury.Brain Injury, 12(9), 769–782. doi:10.1080/026990598122160 CrossrefGoogle Scholar Glosser G. (1993). Discourse production patterns in neurologically impaired and aged populations.In Brownell H.H., Joanette Y. (Eds.) Narrative discourse in neurologically impaired and normal aging adults. San Diego, CA: Singular Google Scholar Grafman J. and among models of prefrontal cortical Grafman J., J., (Eds.), and functions of the human prefrontal cortex (pp. New York, NY: New of Google Scholar in and of the for Research in in and Google Scholar R. A. The of Story comprehension, story production and their Scholar L., & brain injuries in the Afghanistan and Iraq of from Google Scholar McDonald S. (1993). language skills after closed head injury: to meet the needs of the and Language, Google Scholar Moran C., & G. Expository discourse in children and with traumatic brain injury.In M. A., C. M., M. A., C. M. (Eds.), Expository discourse in and adults: and disorders (pp. New York, Psychology from Google Scholar L. L., A. & impairments in adults with neurogenic communication in Speech and Language, Google Scholar M. M., & C. A. Cognitive An New Google Scholar L., B., J., & brain injury findings in a of from Google Scholar J., A. The of for & R. (Eds.), injury (pp. New York, NY: Google Scholar Turkstra L., Coelho C., & Ylvisaker M. (2005). The use of standardized tests for individuals with cognitive-communication in Speech and Language, 26(4), CrossrefGoogle Scholar Ylvisaker M., S. F., & In R. (Ed.), Language intervention in and related neurogenic communication MD: and Google Scholar Ylvisaker M., & S. and executive impairments in children and in Language Google Scholar T., of long-term disability from traumatic brain injury in the civilian population of the United States, of Scholar is a at the of research on discourse and brain injury. at is a at the of research include rehabilitation in chronic and discourse following brain injury. at is and head of the Communication at the of research on understanding how and brain damage complex language processes such as discourse at With With of of Discourse to Cognitive Communication Following With and M. M. A. S. and Carl A. of Assessment of Cognitive-Communication Following A Jennifer and J. of Speech, Language, and Hearing of the Assessment of Verbal and Test in the and to in Feb &
Pragmatic markers are an important part of the grammar of conversation and not simply markers of disfluency. They have a number of functions that help the speaker to organise the conversation and to express feelings and attitudes. Advanced EFL learners use frequent pragmatic markers such as well. However their use of well diverges from the native speaker norm. The present study uses data from the Swedish component of the LINDSEI corpus and its native speaker counterpart (LOCNEC) to examine similarities and differences between native and non-native speakers. The overall picture is that Swedish learners overuse well, although there are considerable individual differences. Thus learners use well above all as a fluency device to cope with speech management problems but underuse it for attitudinal purposes. Pragmatic markers cannot be taught in the same way as other lexical items but it is important to discuss how and where they are used.
Tant dans le domaine de la psychologie que dans celui du traitement automatique des langues, les normes portant sur des proprietes semantiques, comme le caractere concret ou abstrait, la polarite ou le caractere emotionnel, constituent des ressources importantes. La construction manuelle de ces normes, par l’intermediaire d’evaluateurs, est couteuse, d’ou l’interet de developper des methodes de construction ou d’extension automatique. Plusieurs methodes ont ete proposees, mais elles portent sur une seule dimension: la polarite. Nous proposons de voir dans quelle mesure l’une d’entre elles peut etre etendue a six autres normes, et ce pour le francais et l’espagnol. Les experimentations confirment l’efficacite de la technique non seulement pour etendre une norme, mais egalement pour mettre en evidence des mots pour lesquels les valeurs attribuees par les evaluateurs sont sujettes a caution.
Correlational research investigating the relationship between scores on self-report imagery questionnaires and measures of social desirable responding has shown only a weak association. However, researchers have argued that this research may have underestimated the size of the relationship because it relied primarily on the Marlowe–Crowne scale (MC; Crowne & Marlowe, Journal of Consulting Psychology, 24, 349–354, 1960), which loads primarily on the least relevant form of social desirable responding for this particular context, the moralistic bias. Here we report the analysis of data correlating the Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire (VVIQ; Marks, Journal of Mental Imagery, 19, 153–166, 1973) with the Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (BIDR; Paulhus, 2002) and the MC scale under anonymous testing conditions. The VVIQ correlated significantly with the Self-Deceptive Enhancement (SDE) and Agency Management (AM) BIDR subscales and with the MC. The largest correlation was with SDE. The ability of SDE to predict VVIQ scores was not significantly enhanced by adding either AM or MC. Correlations between the VVIQ and BIDR egoistic scales were larger when the BIDR was continuously rather than dichotomously scored. This analysis indicates that the relationship between self-reported imagery and social desirable responding is likely to be stronger than previously thought.
Amazon’s Mechanical Turk (AMT) is a Web application that provides instant access to thousands of potential participants for survey-based psychology experiments, such as the acceptability judgment task used extensively in syntactic theory. Because AMT is a Web-based system, syntacticians may worry that the move out of the experimenter-controlled environment of the laboratory and onto the user-controlled environment of AMT could adversely affect the quality of the judgment data collected. This article reports a quantitative comparison of two identical acceptability judgment experiments, each with 176 participants (352 total): one conducted in the laboratory, and one conducted on AMT. Crucial indicators of data quality—such as participant rejection rates, statistical power, and the shape of the distributions of the judgments for each sentence type—are compared between the two samples. The results suggest that aside from slightly higher participant rejection rates, AMT data are almost indistinguishable from laboratory data.
Because fast and frugal heuristics theorists believe that people make all decisions, including decisions about whether to comply with legal regulations, by looking to a small number of lexically-processed decision-relevant cues, they argue that we will not manipulate crime rates as well by tinkering with expected punishments as we will by, for instance, engraining habits or conforming law to pre-existing social norms or altering the capacity of putative violators to engage in unwanted conduct. Heuristics and biases theorists believe that would-be criminals may care about the expected value of crimes they are considering committing, but that they often misestimate the probability of being sanctioned and evaluate sanctions in ways that are highly contextually sensitive. The chances of punishment may often be underestimated, and both the experienced and remembered pain of the punishment that criminals actually suffer may be counter-intuitively low. Incapacitationists should note that F&F scholars are wary of using multi-cue regression measures in predicting future dangerousness, and that H&B work should lead us to worry that we will systematically overestimate the dangerousness of criminals.
The paper addresses the core problems at building the communication competencies of foreign student and justifies the language culture course as mean to build the required skills, the paper also proposes methodology of teaching those skills in the lexical norms study.
Flicker-induced change blindness paradigms have been used to explore attentional biases for a range of concern-related cues. However, previous studies have had limitations related to concerns about carryover effects in repeated measures designs, as well as problems with response modalities. The present article develops a repeated measures paradigm utilising nonverbal responses and explores the implications of these design modifications for the reliability and validity of the paradigm. Affective stimuli were presented to participants, and the results suggest that the modified paradigm is a useful tool for assessing attentional bias. A number of recommendations for the future use of this methodology are made.
Cognitive effort is reflected in pupil dilation, but the assessment of pupil size is potentially susceptible to changes in gaze position. This study exemplarily used sentence reading as a stand-in for paradigms that assess pupil size in tasks during which changes in gaze position are unavoidable. The influence of gaze position on pupil size was first investigated by an artificial eye model with a fixed pupil size. Despite its fixed pupil size, the systematic measurements of the artificial eye model revealed substantial gaze-position-dependent changes in the measured pupil size. We evaluated two functions and showed that they can accurately capture and correct the gaze-dependent measurement error of pupil size recorded during a sentence-reading and an effortless z-string-scanning task. Implications for previous studies are discussed, and recommendations for future studies are provided.
Bilingualism provides a unique opportunity for understanding the relative roles of proficiency and order of acquisition in determining how the brain represents language. In a previous study, we combined magnetoencephalography (MEG) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to examine the spatiotemporal dynamics of word processing in a group of Spanish- English bilinguals who were more proficient in their native language. We found that from the earliest stages of lexical processing, words in the second language evoke greater activity in bilateral posterior visual regions, while activity to the native language is largely confined to classical left hemisphere fronto-temporal areas. In the present study, we sought to examine whether these effects relate to language proficiency or order of language acquisition by testing Spanish-English bilingual subjects who had become dominant in their second language. Additionally, we wanted to determine whether activity in bilateral visual regions was relat)
This study examined the performance of selection criteria available in the major statistical packages for both mean model and covariance structure. Unbalanced designs due to missing data involving both a moderate and large number of repeated measurements and varying total sample sizes were investigated. The study also investigated the impact of using different estimation strategies for information criteria, the impact of different adjustments for calculating the criteria, and the impact of different distribution shapes. Overall, we found that the ability of consistent criteria in any of the their examined forms to select the correct model was superior under simple covariance patterns than under complex covariance patterns, and vice versa for the efficient criteria. The simulation studies covered in this paper also revealed that, regardless of method of estimation used, the consistent criteria based on number of subjects were more effective than the consistent criteria based on total number of observations, and vice versa for the efficient criteria. Furthermore, results indicated that, given a dataset with missing values, the efficient criteria were more affected than the consistent criteria by the lack of normality.
1 IntroductionThis paper deals with contrastive analysis of computer terms in Slovenian and Serbian language. Problematic aspects of computer jargon in two similar and related languages are considered in context of cultural and linguistic differences noticed during translation from Slovenian to Serbian. The analytic framework is grounded in concrete translator's challenges of some lexical issues in translation process. As George Steiner claims that ordinary language, literally at every moment, mutates in many forms: words enter as old words lapse. Grammatical conventions are changed under pressure of idiomatic use or by cultural ordinance. (Steiner 1998:19)When we are translating a text into another language we are confronted with cultural differences and, for translator, translating professional texts represents a big challenge. He has to be a mediator from professional idiom in one language to professional idiom in other languages. In era of rapidly changing computer technology, spreading new ways of global communication and developing of social networks, we are surrounded by computers and we use some of computer terms in our everyday lives. But, different cultures have different language politics and they relate differently to translating of terms taken from English as modern-day global language. As has been stated, all speech communities have experienced need to modernize and keep abreast of developments in science, technology, etc. (Winford 2007:37), and the spread of English loanwords into many languages across globe may fill gaps in lexicon (Winford 2007:38), but this massive lexical borrowing caused by innovation in field of computer science and technology may be regulated. Lexical borrowing is determined by norms, network structures and language ideology of community: Loyalty to one's native language and pride in its autonomy may encourage resistance to any foreign incursions (Winford 2007:41).Lexical borrowing into lexicon can have consequences on phonology, morphology or on lexicon itself. New lexical fields in recipient language may be created by using computeresse (Winford 2007:58).We attend to show correlation between language politic and accepting of English IT terms. There are two opposite attitudes about this kind of lexical borrowing in professional language: a) usage of Anglicisms is recommended because of globalisation; they provide understanding between experts from different countries; English terms in computer jargon have same purpose as Latin terms in field of medicine and natural science at all; b) translation, or at least adaptation, of these terms is necessary, they become a part of lexical system of recipient language and its standardisation is strongly recommended. We will show which of these attitudes is more common among users of computer jargon.2 Material and methodsThe research is carried out on basis of data excerpted during translation of graduate work Odnos studentov do zasebnosti na spletni skupnosti Facebook and term paper Etika in internet: oglasevanje na internetu, both published on Internet page of Faculty of Economy, University of Ljubljana, and supplemented by examples collected from internet dictionaries of computer terms (http://www.islovar.org, http://sverapoj.nedohodnik.net/gloss/, http://www.mikroknjiga.rs/pub/rmk/index.php). Islovar is project of Linguistic Section of Slovenian Society INFORMATIKA, established in year 2000, with purpose of increasing concern for professional language, equalizing IT terms and recruiting experts and common people for its modelling, through free interactive use and interactive development of dictionary. This internet dictionary has a large repertoire of computer terms and number of entries is constantly growing. …
The three syllable-final nasals /m/, /n/, and /ŋ/ in old Chinese have merged into two (/n, ŋ/) or only one (/ŋ/) nasal in modern Chinese languages. The perceptual confusability of place of articulation was investigated with speakers of Southern Min, a Chinese language which preserves all three final nasals. Three experiments of forced-choice nasal-identification were conducted: (1) complete CVN syllables embedded in noise, (2) CV-truncations of the CVN syllables, and (3) the excised nasal murmur, −N. The first experiment revealed that /m/ was the most and /n/ was the least confusable. Responses were highly accurate in the second experiment (above 85%) and around chance in the third experiment (below 40%), which indicated that listeners relied on the information in the vowel rather than the nasal murmur to identify final nasals. The vowel /i/ resulted in the most and /a/ the least misidentification of final nasals among /i, ə, a/. Low-level and falling tones resulted in more misidentification of final nasals than mid-level, high-level, and rising tones. Segment duration, F0, and formant transitions are analyzed across the vowel and tone types for insight into these findings. Lexical familiarity ratings did not show significant correlation with the perceptual results.
Attachment-related strategies are thought to be critical for regulation and processing of emotional information. This study examined biases in selective attention to emotional stimuli as a function of insecure attachment. Participants searched for a single target image preceded by to-be-ignored distracters depicting emotional images varying in valence and arousal. Results revealed that, in general, negative distracters affected accuracy levels, and that the anxious attached participants showed a clear interference of the emotional distracters. In contrast, the avoidant group evinced a higher control on such interference. In addition, arousal ratings to distracter images indicated superior emotional activation only for anxious attached participants. Consistent with the evolutionary-based attachment theory threat-related stimuli prompted priority attentional responses. Present findings are in line with evidence showing the deployment of distinct strategies in insecurely attached individuals for the regulation of attention to emotional information.
This article describes the RMediation package,which offers various methods for building confidence intervals (CIs) for mediated effects. The mediated effect is the product of two regression coefficients. The distribution-of-the-product method has the best statistical performance of existing methods for building CIs for the mediated effect. RMediation produces CIs using methods based on the distribution of product, Monte Carlo simulations, and an asymptotic normal distribution. Furthermore, RMediation generates percentiles, quantiles, and the plot of the distribution and CI for the mediated effect. An existing program, called PRODCLIN, published in Behavior Research Methods, has been widely cited and used by researchers to build accurate CIs. PRODCLIN has several limitations: The program is somewhat cumbersome to access and yields no result for several cases. RMediation described herein is based on the widely available R software, includes several capabilities not available in PRODCLIN, and provides accurate results that PRODCLIN could not.
Reaction time tasks are used widely in basic and applied psychology. There is a need for an easy-to-use, freely available programme that can run simple and choice reaction time tasks with no special software. We report the development of, and make available, the Deary-Liewald reaction time task. It is initially tested here on 150 participants, aged from 18 to 80, alongside another widely used reaction time device and tests of fluid and crystallised intelligence and processing speed. The new task’s parameters perform as expected with respect to age and intelligence differences. The new task’s parameters are reliable, and have very high correlations with the existing task. We also provide instructions for downloading and using the new reaction time programme, and we encourage other researchers to use it.
In today’s digital multilingual world, language technology is crucial for providing access to information and opportunities for economic development. With approximately two thousand different languages, Africa is a multilingual continent par excellence, presenting acute challenges for those seeking to promote and use African languages in the areas of business development, education and relief aid. In recent times a number of researchers and institutions, both from Africa and elsewhere, have come forward to share the common goal of developing capabilities in language technology for African languages. In 2009 and 2010, the first two workshops on African Language Technology were organized (De Pauw et al. 2009, 2010a) as a forum to bring together a wide range of researchers working in this domain.
Based on an analysis of the speech of long-term émigrés of German and Dutch origin, the present investigation discusses to what extent hesitation patterns in language attrition may be the result of the creation of an interlanguage system, on the one hand, or of language-internal attrition patterns on the other. We compare speech samples elicited by a film retelling task from German émigrés in Canada (n = 52) and the Netherlands (n = 50) and from Dutch émigrés in Canada (n = 45) to retellings produced by predominantly monolingual control groups in Germany (n = 53) and the Netherlands (n = 45). Findings show that the attriting groups overuse empty pauses, repetitions, and retractions, whereas the distribution of filled pauses appears to conform more closely to the second language norm. An investigation of the location at which disfluency markers appear within the sentence suggests that they are indicators of difficulties that the attriters experience largely in the context of lexical retrieval.
The name-picture verification task is often used to assess the difficulty of prelexical processes (object recognition and semantic access) during picture naming. However, whether to use responses from word-picture match or from mismatch trials to index the difficulty of pre-lexical processes is debated. Levelt (2002) argued for the use of mismatch trials because on match trials the printed object name might facilitate picture recognition. However, in a study with speakers of Spanish Stadthagen-Gonzalez et al. (2009) showed that visual and conceptual properties of objects only correlated with the latencies of match responses but not with those of mismatch responses and therefore advocated the use of match responses. The present study aimed to replicate Stadthagen- Gonzalez et al. (2009) findings using native British English speakers and English norms for non-lexical and lexical variables. We replicated the finding that non-lexical variables affected the speed of match, but not mismatch responses. However, in addition, we found that lexical variables also affected the speed of match responses, which means that these latencies need to be interpreted with caution. In other words, neither match nor mismatch responses seem ideally suited to assess the difficulty of pre-lexical processes in picture naming. Levelt, W. J. M. (2002). Picture naming and word frequency. Language and Cognitive Processes, 17, 663–671. Stadthagen-Gonzalez, H., Damian, M. F., Pérez, M. A., Bowers, J. S., & Marín, J. (2009). Name-picture verification as a control measure for object naming: A task analysis and norms for a
Proceedings of the Ninth International Workshop \non Treebanks and Linguistic Theories. \nEditors: Markus Dickinson, Kaili Müürisep and Marco Passarotti. \nNEALT Proceedings Series, Vol. 9 (2010), 7-18. \n© 2010 The editors and contributors. \nPublished by \nNorthern European Association for Language \nTechnology (NEALT) \nhttp://omilia.uio.no/nealt. \nElectronically published at \nTartu University Library (Estonia) \nhttp://hdl.handle.net/10062/15891.
The purpose of this paper is to examine some issues concerning linguistic norms and language variations with special emphasis on the Standard of...
Proceedings of the Workshop on Annotation and \nExploitation of Parallel Corpora AEPC 2010. \nEditors: Lars Ahrenberg, Jörg Tiedemann and Martin Volk. \nNEALT Proceedings Series, Vol. 10 (2010), 44-52. \n© 2010 The editors and contributors. \nPublished by \nNorthern European Association for Language \nTechnology (NEALT) \nhttp://omilia.uio.no/nealt. \nElectronically published at \nTartu University Library (Estonia) \nhttp://hdl.handle.net/10062/15893.
The phenomenon of a steadily increasing number of divorces in many cultures calls for a growing need for couples contemplating marriage to foresee future divergences in their married life and to try to prevent them through premarital agreements. Premarital, prenuptial, or antenuptial agreements (commonly abbreviated to ‘prenups’ or ‘prenupts’) “describe the rights, duties and obligations of prospective spouses during and upon termination of marriage through death or divorce” (Greenstein 1992). They are a type of mediation within the framework of Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR), aiming at resolving disputes other than through litigation, and taking the form of contracts used by individuals who want to precisely define the disposition of their assets. \nThe present study aims at investigating premarital agreements in an intercultural perspective. Object of the investigation will be a comparison between some linguistic features in two examples of American prenuptial agreements and two Spanish modelos de capitulaciones matrimoniales, chosen for the purpose of this study and selected among a wider corpus which is currently being built up. \nPrenups can be classified as “operative legal documents, in that they create or modify legal relations” (Tiersma 1999: 139). Moreover, they “tend to have not only very formal and formulaic legal language, but they traditionally adhere to a very rigid structure” (Tiersma 1999: 139). They are prescriptive legal texts whose priority is to set up rules to regulate the matter of property division after divorce or death, “in such a way as to ensure that there is no room for misinterpretation” (Williams 2005: 122). This entails their compliance with specific rules or norms and certain linguistic choices typical of their specific text genre. As Gotti puts it, “there is usually a close link between the type of specialized text and its structure, which in turn implies a number of correlations between the conceptual, rhetorical and linguistic features that characterize the text itself” (2005: 112). \nAfter a brief overview of the legal aspects of prenups in the USA and in Spain, we will frame them as the ADR method of mediation and investigate them as texts belonging to the specific genre of contracts. The linguistic analysis will focus on: \n1)\tthe textual organization of the agreements, the organization of their several parts and their contribution to the overall pattern; \n2)\tthe lexical items referring to participants or human actors in the agreements.
The main point of our study was to examine the vocabulary knowledge of pupils in grades 3-6, and in particular the relative reading vocabulary disadvantage of hearing-impaired pupils. The achievements of 394 pupils with normal hearing and 106 pupils with a hearing impairment were examined on two vocabulary assessment tasks: a lexical decision task and a use decision task. The target words in both tasks represent the vocabulary children should have at the end of primary school. The results showed that most hearing pupils reached this norm, whereas most hearing-impaired pupils did not. In addition, results showed that hearing-impaired pupils not only knew fewer words, but that they also knew them less well. This lack of deeper knowledge remained even when matching hearing and hearing-impaired children on minimal word knowledge. Additionally, comparison of the two tasks demonstrated the efficacy of the lexical decision task as a measure of lexical semantic knowledge.
This paper demonstrates the implementation of a small monolingual lexical database for German (currently 7000 entries) for the purpose of manual and automated lexical queries. The lexicon is part of a web based text analysis application which serves to systematically analyze patient’s narratives from psychotherapy sessions. The narratives, small stories from everyday life, are conceived as dramaturgically constructed and performed linguistic productions (Boothe, 2004). The specific function of the lexicon in this context is to provide the means for the lexical coding of the story vocabulary, which is an important step in the narrative analysis1. The interdisciplinary project is located in psychology, but involves likewise linguistics, corpus linguistics, lexicography, interactional linguistics and conversation analysis.
Reviewed by: Laboratory phonology 8 Jaye Padgett Laboratory phonology 8. Ed. by Louis Goldstein, D. H. Whalen, and Catherine T. Best. (Phonology and phonetics 4-2.) Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 2006. Pp. xvi, 675. ISBN 9783110176780. $192 (Hb). This collection of papers is the end-product of the eighth Conference on Laboratory Phonology (LabPhon), held in New Haven, Connecticut, in June 2002, and hosted by Yale University and Haskins Laboratories. The volume is dedicated to the memory of Catherine P. Browman. If the LabPhon conferences and volumes were a bit renegade when they began, they are now more of an institution. It was still unusual in the 1980s to combine phonological theorizing with experimental methods and with theories drawn from phonetics and psycholinguistics, but to do so now seems more the norm. Out of thirteen papers published in the 1989 issue of Phonology, three incorporate experimental methodologies. (I construe ‘experimental’ broadly to include, for example, gestural or neural network modeling and formal learning theory.) In 2009 it was nine out of thirteen. (Six of these were from a special issue called ‘Phonological models and experimental data’; the reader can decide whether this strengthens or weakens the point.) The early ‘labphon’ movement can take credit for much of this change. This year we should see the inaugural publication of a laboratory phonology journal to replace the published volumes. In my view, this shift to a regular, peer-reviewed, and more accessible forum is very welcome. The book contains twenty-six contributions (including four commentary pieces) and an introduction. It is divided into three sections (two of them further subdivided): ‘Qualitative and variable faces of phonological competence’, ‘Sources of variation and their role in the acquisition of phonological competence’, and ‘Knowledge of language-specific organization of speech gestures’. I found these groupings to be nebulous; what comes through much more clearly is a second theme, on sign languages and comparisons between spoken and sign language. The deployment of laboratory methods and ‘philosophy’ in exploring sign languages is an exciting development. Other leitmotifs in the book draw on gestural phonology, exemplar modeling, acquisition, and the roles of abstract and categorical vs. concrete and gradient notions in representation and usage. Some of the papers are probably longer and less clearly written than they might be, but this is a minor complaint about a very interesting collection of works. Given space limitations here, I could not do justice to all twenty-six contributions; instead I focus on highlighting a few of them. Mirjam Ernestus and Harald Baayen, in ‘The functionality of incomplete neutralization in Dutch: The case of past-tense formation’ (27–49), replicate, for one speaker, the finding in Warner et al. 2004, 2006 of incomplete neutralization (IN) of final devoicing in Dutch, based on a reading task involving nonce verb forms. (Unlike in Warner et al., the forms were not presented as minimal pairs.) Particularly interesting are the results of their perception experiments using the speaker’s productions as stimuli. Ernestus and Baayen show that subjects not only detected IN but also used it to choose the appropriate past-tense ending (-te or -de) for the nonce verb stimulus forms, a task that requires the listener to infer the underlying voicing of the stem-final obstruent. The authors argue that IN, as well as their perception results, are due to the storage of lexical paradigms, among other things. Consider for example the form [vεrvεit] ‘widen’ and its infinitival form [vεrvεid n]. Even if the former is stored in its surface form (contrary to the assumption of [End Page 957] most generative phonologists), both the production and the perception of its final consonant will be influenced by activation of the associated form [vεrvεid n] (see also Bybee 2001). IN has posed a serious problem for the traditional understanding of the phonology-phonetics relation, in which discrete phonology is transduced into continuous phonetics, because if /vεrvεid/ is categorically devoiced to [vεrvεit] by phonology, then phonetic implementation has no means of recovering underlying voicing in order to produce IN. The storage and use of entire paradigms circumvents this problem. Since not all...
Twentieth-century writers, scholars and critics have formulated explicitly and illustrated systematically the doctrine that literary language is autonomous. The aim of our thesis is to analyse the scope and implications of this now widespread view of literary language, which we examine here with particular reference to twentieth-century French literature. Our study follows three main lines of inquiry: In the first part we analyse how-the belief in the autonomy of literary language came to be formulated. We then try to envisage such an autonomous literary language in practical terms. Finally we outline some of its broader implications for our understanding of literature. An analysis of the scattered doctrines of the Tel Quel group, dedicated to bringing about the semiotic autonomy of the literary text," reveals the existence of a philosophy of literature based on the premise that, in its very essence, the literary text is not meant to communicate or to transmit an intelligible message and is, in fact, not dependent on any pre-established norms. Since full consideration of a theoretical view involves as well an appreciation of its applicability to the real world, we examine in the second part of our study the theory of an autonomous literary language from a pragmatic point of view. Linguists will readily admit that, in a theoretical sense, every individual is free to create his own independent linguistic code; but they will also maintain that, in realistic terms, the utilization of such a freedom is "absurd," since the process of communication per se can exist only at a socialized level. One must therefore conclude that any theory which propounds the practice of an autonomous literary language is not meant to be taken literally but calls for a metaphorical interpretation. We have searched out this metaphorical meaning by attempting to determine at what precise level, the literary proponents of this doctrine depart, in their own writings, from what linguists have defined as the normal process of communication; in other words, at what level do their writings become incomprehensible to, for example, the educated French reader? It becomes clear in the process that if such literary works in fact need to be "deciphered" it is not because they possess their own private phonological, lexical and syntactical systems but rather because they do not rely on the conventional coherence of traditional narrative. Instead of deriving from a subordination of events in a hierarchy of causal relations, this "new coherence" presents the reader with no more than a simple juxtaposition of semantically related narrative elements. The subordination of narrative units in a cause/effect hierarchy is not essential to the reader's understanding of the linguistic code of a particular novel or work. It is, however, clearly an essential element of the process of communication for without it the reader cannot objectively perceive the context to which the work refers. But what we have labelled a "new coherence" implies the very absence of such a hierarchy essential to the process of communication. Consequently we are forced to the conclusion that the doctrine of an autonomous literary language is significant enough to require new definitions of some fundamental aspects of narration, as well as a radical change in our perception of the historical development of literature and in our cognition of the individual literary text.
The article is devoted to studying the norms of word usage. The author analyzed the lexical errors in the Chelyabinsk's press associated with dynamic processes in orthological system of modern Russian language.
Many of the neuropsychological measures utilized with primarily Spanish-speaking adults in the US are literal translations, which do not account for the influence of language and culture and for which normative data is non-existent. Clinical and research settings have utilized three lexical fluency measures with primarily Spanish-speakers: FAS, (literal translation) and PMR and ABS, which are published, alternate forms based on cultural modifications. The goal of this study is to examine possible differences in performance across lexical fluency measures in primarily Spanish-speaking adults and to provide a comparison between our collected age and education stratified data and the English norms, which are commonly used. Forty-nine primarily Spanish speaking HCs, ages 50-59, were administered lexical fluency measures (FAS, PMR & ABS) and the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II) as part of a norming study for a comprehensive neuropsychological older adult battery. Of the 49 HCs, one participant was excluded due to cognitive declines associated with a medical condition and 5 participants due to moderate-to-severe levels of depression. The group was stratified by level of education (basic education [BE]=6-12 years and college education [CE]=13 years plus). The BE group had a mean age of 54.4 and 8.68 years of education. The CE group was on average 54.4 years of age with 14.7 years of education. A statistically significant difference was found between the HCs on the 3 measures of verbal fluency with the BE group providing less responses on the FAS measure in comparison to their college educated counterparts (p = 0.04). A significant difference was not found for either PMR or ABS based on educational attainment. In comparison to English normative data, significant differences varied for the BE group (p = 0.66; p = 0.10; p = 0.03) depending on the normative data utilized. Thus, the clinical classification of strengths and weaknesses for the Spanish-speaking HCs varied across English normative data. Significant differences between the CE group and the English normative data were not found. The need to norm current translations of English neuropsychological measures is warranted. As was shown with our BE group, the use of English normative data may not always accurately identify areas of cognitive strength and weakness.
Exclusive experience with standardized languages produces an expectation that speech community members will assess competing variants by their supposed correctness. This does not happen in the persistently divergent but socially neutral variant use of Embo Gaelic speakers, including close kin and age mates. Communities elsewhere show both variation akin to Embo's personal‐pattern variation and similar social‐organization and social‐setting features: small population size, isolation, use of a minority language unrelated/distantly related to the dominant language, weak/absent extra‐community linguistic norms, social homogeneity with high interaction density and multiplex social roles, absence of linguistic accommodation. The ideologies of linguists from dominant‐language societies hamper recognition of different linguistic ideologies among other peoples. The importance of personal‐pattern variation to individual voice in homogeneous communities is discussed and exemplified. Ongoing transmission of individual variant‐use patterns is seen to have been in keeping with high‐variation language input to children and with diffuse child‐care patterns and peer‐group structure.
It was evaluated the effect of environmental alteration in affect, perceived exertion and in physiological parameters during treadmill running in athletes. Eighteen handball players participated in four running experimental sessions (baseline, fragmented overrated and unknown) for 20 minutes. It was analyzed: affect, rating of perceived exertion, heart rate and cortisol. Information about the running duration was manipulated. It was observed a statistically significant increase in affect during the treadmill running for the “fragmented” and “overrated ” sessions, as well as in salivary cortisol level at the 11th minute of running. The control of athletes’ affective behavior seems to relieve physiological damage when facing unknown opponents and uncertain game conditions.
On the question of precisely what role common sense (or related datum like folk psychology, trust in pre-theoretic/intuitive judgments, etc.) should have in reigning in the possible excesses of our philosophical methods, the so-called 'continental' answer to this question, for the vast majority, would be "as little as possible", whereas the analytic answer for the vast majority would be "a reasonably central one". While this difference at the level of both rhetoric and meta-philosophy is sometimes -perhaps often -problematised by the actual philosophical practices of representative philosophers of either tradition, I will argue that this norm (and its absence) nonetheless continues to play an important justificatory role in relation to the use of some rather different methodological practices. In particular, many analytic philosophers not only explicitly invoke the value of common sense, but they also implicitly value it via techniques like conceptual analysis that want to explicate folk psychology and/or lay bare what is already embedded in the linguistic norms of a given culture, the widespread use of thought experiments and the way they function as 'intuition pumps', as well as the general aim to achieve 'reflective equilibrium' between our intuitions and reflective judgments in epistemology and political philosophy. Such methods, I will argue, enshrine a conservative, or, more positively, a modest understanding of the philosophical project in that it is invested in cohering with both a given body of knowledge and common sense. These methods are notably less perspicuous in continental philosophy. To bring some of the reasons why this might be so to the fore, this paper considers Deleuze's sustained attack on both good and common sense, which he argues are fundamental to the prevalence of a dogmatic image of thought. If Deleuze is right about this, and if the analytic tradition distils and perfects certain methods that are closely associated with this image of thought, then we have here a rather stark methodological contrast that calls for elaboration and evaluation.
Several software programs exist to assist researchers in setting up online questionnaires. Existing tools are of little help for delivering online rating studies, for which it is often desirable to collect data from participants for only a subset of a stimulus set. OR-Vis enables researchers to quickly set up online rating studies by supplying the set of items to be rated, the number of stimuli an individual participant responds to, the number of participants an item is shown to, and the rating questions. The software then generates and delivers unique questionnaires for each participant, while managing the data collection process. The present article describes OR-Vis, its installation process, and how to use it to gather data. OR-Vis is open-source software and can be downloaded from www.orvis.uni-muenster.de.
Korean Word Associations (KorWA) were collected to build a semantic network for the Korean language. A graphic representation approach of applying coefficients to complex networks allows us to discern the semantic structures within words. A semantic network of the KorWA was found to exhibit the scalefree property in its degree distribution. The growth of the network around hub words was also confirmed through two experimental phases. As an issue for further research, we suggest that the present results may yield insights for computational neurolinguistics, as a semantic network of word association norms can bridge the gap between information about lexical co-occurrences derived from a corpora and anatomical networks as a basis for mapping out neural activations. 1
In addition to characterizing body image in these samples, the goals for this dissertation were to examine affective responses to bodies and to examine how affective regulation of body image affects prefrontal cortical function in the brain. Two models were used: 1) older versus younger women, and 2) women who had recovered from anorexia nervosa (AN) versus women who had never had an eating disorder. The study in Chapter 1 compared body image in younger versus older women using standardized questionnaires and behavioral measures of women’s responses to fatter and thinner images of their own bodies. Younger and older women reported similar body dissatisfaction, but younger women reported a higher drive for thinness and experienced more societal influence on their body image than older women. Images of one’s own body versus line drawings of bodies resulted in similar ratings of body dissatisfaction in younger and older women. These data suggest that age affects particular facets of body image, but that ratings of body image do not differ in normal, healthy younger and older women when personalized measures are used. For the study in Chapter 2, women assigned valence ratings to bodies of varying sizes, and then a subset of those bodies were used as distracters in a working memory task. Younger and older women both rated normal weight bodies as most positive, were slower to categorize bodies as positive than to categorize them as negative, and rated a smaller percentage of bodies as positive than as negative. Additionally, positive bodies were more disruptive to working memory performance than negative or neutral bodies in both younger and older women. Thus, despite older women experiencing less negative affect than younger women, these groups did not differ in their affective responses to Pruis Dissertation vii bodies or the disruption of working memory by bodies. This suggests that the positivity bias in aging does not extend to body stimuli in women nor influence the emotional disruption of working memory. The study in Chapter 3 used fMRI to examine brain activity in women who had recovered from AN versus healthy controls when bodies of varying sizes were used as distracter stimuli in a working memory task. Bodies rated as negative were more disruptive to working memory than bodies rated as neutral or positive in women who had recovered from AN and in controls. Although working memory performance was similar in both groups, underlying brain activity differed. The amygdala activated during the working memory task in women who had recovered from AN but not in controls, and the fusiform responded more in response to bodies in women who had recovered from AN than in control women. There was more suppression of medial prefrontal cortex activity in women who had recovered from AN than in controls when the distracter stimulus was a negative body. These results suggested that higher amygdala and fusiform activity in response to body stimuli occurred despite recovery and that medial prefrontal suppression may have permitted recovery in the face of continued negativity towards bodies in women who had recovered from AN. Overall, older women had similar behavioral outcomes regarding body stimuli as younger women, despite experiencing less negative affect and having overall better body image. Women who recovered from AN also had similar behavioral outcomes as control women; however, they had different underlying brain activation. This suggests that similar behavior relies on differential brain activity and that compensatory mechanisms Pruis Dissertation viii involve suppression of the default network in order to produce normal cognitive