This study investigates the phonological development of Mandarin voiceless affricates produced by Mandarin-speaking children. Thirty-six monolingual Mandarin-speaking children and twelve adults participated in a speech production task. Auditory-based transcription analysis and acoustic analysis were utilized to quantify the relative order of affricate acquisition. Both methods yielded earlier acquisition of alveopalatal affricates at age three than retroflex and alveolar affricates, whereas they differed in the acquisition order of retroflex and alveolar affricates. The former revealed that both retroflex and alveolar (...) affricates were acquired at age five, regardless of aspiration, while the latter yielded earlier acquisition of retroflex than alveolar affricates. Possible reasons for the discrepancy are discussed in relation to the different nature of the two methods. Overall, the observed acquisition order of Mandarin voiceless affricates suggests that child speech development is a complex process, and is influenced by various factors including oromotor maturation and language-specific phoneme frequencies in the ambient language. (shrink)

In this study, we conducted a pseudosign repetition task with 22 children acquiring American Sign Language as a first language from deaf parents. Thirty-nine pseudosigns with varying complexity were developed and organized into eight categories depending on number of hands, number of simultaneous movement types, and number of movement sequences. Pseudosigns also varied in handshape complexity. The children’s performance on the ASL pseudosign task improved with age, displaying relatively accurate production of location and orientation, but much less accurate handshape and (...) movement, a finding in line with real sign productions for both L1 and L2 signers. Handshapes with higher complexity were correlated with lower accuracy in the handshape parameter. We found main effects of sequential and simultaneous movement combinations on overall performance. Items with no movement sequence were produced with higher overall accuracy than those with a movement sequence. Items with two simultaneous movement types or a single movement type were produced with higher overall accuracy than those with three simultaneous movement types. Finally, number of hands did not affect the overall accuracy. Remarkably, movement sequences impose processing constraints on signing children whereas complex hands and two simultaneous movement types do not significantly lower accuracy, indicating a capacity for processing multiple simultaneous components in signs. Spoken languages, in contrast, manifest greater complexity in temporal length. Hearing children’s pseudoword repetition still displays high levels of accuracy on disyllabic words, with complexity effects affecting only longer multisyllabic words. We conclude that the pseudosign repetition task is an informative tool for studies of signing children’s phonological development and that sheds light on potential modality effects for phonological development. (shrink)

The Featurally Underspecified Lexicon theory predicts that [coronal] is the language universal default place of articulation for phonemes. This assumption has been consistently supported with adult behavioral and event-related potential data; however, this underspecification claim has not been tested in developmental populations. The purpose of this study was to determine whether children demonstrate [coronal] underspecification patterns similar to those of adults. Two English consonants differing in place of articulation, [labial] /b/ and [coronal] /d/, were presented to 24 children characterized by (...) either a typically developing phonological system or a phonological disorder. Two syllables, /bɑ/ and /dɑ/, were presented in an ERP oddball paradigm where both syllables served as the standard and deviant stimulus in opposite stimulus sets. Underspecification was examined with three analyses: traditional mean amplitude measurements, cluster-based permutation tests, and single-trial general linear model analyses of single-subject data. Contrary to previous adult findings, children with PD demonstrated a large positive mismatch response to /bɑ/ while the children with TD exhibited a negative mismatch response ; significant group differences were not observed in the /dɑ/ responses. Moreover, the /bɑ/ deviant ERP response was significantly larger in the TD children than in the children with PD. At the single-subject level, more children demonstrated mismatch responses to /dɑ/ than to /bɑ/, though some children had a /bɑ/ mismatch response and no /dɑ/ mismatch response. While both groups of children demonstrated similar responses to the underspecified /dɑ/, their neural responses to the more specified /bɑ/ varied. These findings are interpreted within a proposed developmental model of phonological underspecification, wherein children with PD are functioning at a developmentally less mature stage of phonological acquisition than their same-aged TD peers. Thus, phonological underspecification is a phenomenon that likely develops over time with experience and exposure to language. (shrink)

Every normally developing human infant solves the difficult problem of mapping their native-language phonology, but the neural mechanisms underpinning this behavior remain poorly understood. Here, motor constellation theory, an integrative neurophonological model, is presented, with the goal of explicating this issue. It is assumed that infants’ motor-auditory phonological mapping takes place through infants’ orosensory “reaching” for phonological elements observed in the language-specific ambient phonology, via reference to kinesthetic feedback from motor systems, and auditory feedback from resulting speech and (...) speech-like sounds. Attempts are regulated by basal ganglion–cerebellar speech neural circuitry, and successful attempts at reproduction are enforced through dopaminergic signaling. Early in life, the pace of anatomical development constrains mapping such that complete language-specific phonological mapping is prohibited by infants’ undeveloped supralaryngeal vocal tract and undescended larynx; constraints gradually dissolve with age, enabling adult phonology. Where appropriate, reference is made to findings from animal and clinical models. Some implications for future modeling and simulation efforts, as well as clinical settings, are also discussed. (shrink)

In the context of comparing linguistic profiles across neurodevelopmental disorders, Down syndrome has captured growing attention for its uneven profile. Although specific weaknesses in grammatical and phonological processing have been reported, research evidence on phonological development remains scarce, particularly beyond early childhood. The purpose of this study was to explore the phonological profiles of children and adolescents with Down syndrome. The profiles were based on the frequency and relative proportion of the processes observed by classes, and (...) they were compared to those of typically developing preschool children of similar verbal age. A complementary goal was to assess the effect of two different methods of elicitation: a test of articulation and spontaneous speech sampling. Finally, intergroup and intragroup differences in full match percentages between three positions at syllable-level were assessed. The results of the present study confirmed that the frequency of phonological processes in children and adolescents with DS is atypically high and is above what is expected for lexical age and at the same level as grammatical age. Highly increased frequency of processes, consistent in all kinds of processes and positions at the syllable-level, and asynchronous with verbal age and mental age suggest atypical developmental trajectories of phonological development in the Down syndrome population. (shrink)

In the 1920s and 1930s, some of the most talented linguists of the Soviet Union, among whom one can highlight N.F. Jakovlev and E.D. Polivanov, were involved in the process of “language building”. Their role in the success of this process is examined from the point of view of the phonological theory that they developed for creating scripts for the numerous peoples of the Soviet Union, Turkic and Caucasian above all. Jakovlev’s phonology, that Polivanov termed “social phonology”, was very (...) different from the one that N. Trubetskoj proposed some 10 years later. We will try to explain their ambitious script projects, which remain difficult to understand from the point of view of the modern phonology. (shrink)

This commentary supports MacNeilage's dismissal of an evolutionary development from sign language to spoken language but presents evidence of a feature in sign language (echo phonology) that links iconic signs to abstract vocal syllables. These data provide an insight into possible mechanism by which iconic manual gestures accompanied by vocalisation could have provided a route for the evolution of spoken language with its characteristically arbitrary form–meaning relationship.

En este artículo describiremos la vitalidad del sistema fonológico del mapudungun hablado por escolares pewenches de la Provincia del Biobío, VIII Región. Específicamente, nos hemos propuesto: a) Determinar los fonos/fonemas, y su fonotaxis, que se relevan como indicadores de vitalidad, b) Identificar las transferencias fonético-fonológicas presentes en la fonología del pewenche hablado por estos escolares y c) Interpretar las transferencias encontradas en términos del grado de vitalidad de la fonología de la lengua. La muestra está conformada por un grupo de (...) 20 escolares bilingües de entre 12 y 15 años de edad, que se encuentran cursando 7° y 8° año básico en escuelas rurales pertenecientes a dos comunidades pewenches del valle del Queuco, en la comuna de Alto Biobío. Para la recolección del material fonológico, se aplicó a los participantes una lista léxica de 65 ítems, material que se complementó con la narración oral en mapudungun de un cuento. Según nuestros datos, hemos podido constatar la existencia de una serie de rasgos fónicos en el mapudungun hablado por los escolares pewenches que obedece a la influencia de las estructuras fonológicas del castellano. Sin embargo, el grado y la difusión de los fenómenos de transferencia se desarrollan de manera heterogénea en ambas comunidades en estudio, debido, entre otros factores, a la intensidad del contacto. In this article we will describe the vitality of the phonological system Mapudungun spoken by Pewenche schoolchildren from the Biobío province, VIII Region. We intend: a) To determine the phones/phonemes, and their phonotactics, which are revealed as vitality markers. b) To identify the phonetic-phonological transferences which are present in the Pewenche spoken by these schoolchildren, and, c) To interpret the transferences found in terms of the degree of the language phonological vitality. The sample is composed of 20 bilingual schoolchildren from 12 to 15 years old, who are in 7th and 8th grade in rural primary schools belonging to two Pehuenche comunities from Valle del Queuco, in the city of Alto Biobío. To collect the phonological material, we applied a 64-item lexical list, which was complemented with the oral narration of a tale in Mapudungun. According to our data, we have been able to verify the existence of a series of phonic features in the Mapudungun spoken by Pewenche schoolchildren, which originate because of the influence of the Spanish phonological structure. However, the degree and spread of the transference phenomena develop in a heterogeneous way in both of the studied communities. due to the contact intensity, among other possible factors. (shrink)

Den Schwerpunkt des vorliegenden Buches von C. Caragounis (im Folgenden C.), Professor für Neutestamentliche Exegese an der Universität Lund, bildet der Beitrag über die Kenntnisse der neugriechischen Sprache für die Textkritik und die Interpretation des Neuen Testaments (im Folgenden NT). Dieser besteht aus einer Einleitung und 8 Kapiteln, die in drei Hauptteile gegliedert sind. Der erste Teil bietet einen Überblick über die Geschichte der griechischen Sprache von den ersten schriftlichen Zeugnissen bis heute, in dem die Kontinuität der griechischen Sprache und (...) Kultur aufgezeigt werden soll. Der zweite Teil beschreibt an ausgewählten Beispielen den Wandel vom Klassischen Griechisch zum Neugriechischen aufgrund verschiedener morphologischer und syntaktischer Erscheinungen. Hierbei wurde der Versuch unternommen, die neutestamentliche Sprache in diese Entwicklung einzuordnen. Im dritten Teil beschäftigt sich der Autor mit dem Thema „Aussprache des Altgriechischen“, zu dem er die These vertritt, dass das neugriechische phonologische System bereits vor dem 5. Jh. v. Chr. herausgebildet war. Im Folgenden ist er bestrebt, bei verschiedenen textkritischen und hermeneutischen Problemen des NTs zu belegen, dass ein Verstehensprozess, der nur von der Kenntnis der klassischen Sprache ausgeht, in einigen Fällen zu Missverständnissen und Inkonsequenzen führt, wohingegen die Kenntnis der späteren sprachlichen Phasen die Lösung findet. (shrink)

In the 1920s and 1930s, some of the most talented linguists of the Soviet Union, among whom one can highlight N. F. Jakovlev and E. D. Polivanov, were involved in the process of "language building". Their role in the success of this process is examined from the point of view of the phonological theory that they developed for creating scripts for the numerous peoples of the Soviet Union, Turkic and Caucasian above all. Jakovlev's phonology, that Polivanov termed "social phonology", (...) was very different from the one that N. Trubetskoj proposed some 10 years later. We will try to explain their ambitious script projects, which remain difficult to understand from the point of view of the modern phonology. (shrink)

A narrow focus on the jaw (or on motor generators) does not account for individual and language-specific differences in babbling and early speech. Furthermore, data from Yoshinaga-Itano's laboratory support earlier findings that show glottal rather than oral stops in deaf infants' babbling: audition is crucial for developing normal syllables.

The Buddha considered names of things and people to be arbitrary designations, with their meaning created by agreement. The early suttas show clearly that inter alia, names, perceptions, feelings, thinking, conceptions and mental proliferations were all conditioned dhammas which, when their nature is misunderstood, led to the creation of a sense of ‘I’, as well as craving, clinging and afflictions. Although names were potentially afflictive and ‘had everything under their power’, this did not mean that they were to be ignored (...) or even neglected; words were to be penetrated and thoroughly understood, as an essential instrument for liberation. One of the problems of transmitting the Buddha’s teachings was the large number of disciples who did not speak an Indo-Aryan language as their first language or spoke a dialect different from that of the Teacher. This also led to altered transmission of the Vinaya and Suttas by disciples who could not hear certain phonological distinctions not present in their own language or dialect. Hundreds of these anomalies are preserved in the different editions of the canon, testifying to these transmission ambiguities. The passages dealing with this problem provide a valuable insight into the phonological issues that the early sa?gha had to deal with to try and preserve the integrity of the s?sana. At the same time the etymological practices of Brahmanism were imported into Buddhism very early, probably from the time of the Buddha himself, to demonstrate the intellectual superiority of the Buddha and his teachings. Despite the Buddha’s teachings on the arbitrary nature of language, the commentarial and grammatical traditions developed a sophisticated theoretical framework to analyse, explicate and reinforce some of the key Buddhist doctrinal terms. Also, an elaborate classification system of different types of names was developed, to show that the language of the Buddha was firmly grounded in saccika??ha, the highest truth, and that some terms were spontaneously arisen, even though such a concept — that words by themselves could arise spontaneously and directly embody ultimate truth — was quite foreign to their Founder. (shrink)

A broad sketch for a model of speech production is outlined which describes developmental aspects of its cognitive-linguistic and sensorimotor components. A description of the emergence of phonological knowledge is a central point in our model sketch. It will be shown that the phonological form level emerges during speech acquisition and becomes an important representation at the interface between cognitive-linguistic and sensorimotor processes. Motor planning as well as motor programming are defined as separate processes in our model sketch (...) and it will be shown that both processes revert to the phonological information. Two computational simulation experiments based on quantitative implementations are undertaken to show proof of principle of key ideas of the model sketch: the emergence of phonological information over developmental stages, the adaptation process for generating new motor programs, and the importance of various forms of phonological representation in that process. Based on the ideas developed within our sketch of a production model and its quantitative spell-out within the simulation models, motor planning can be defined here as the process of identifying a succession of executable chunks from a currently activated phoneme sequence and of coding them as raw gesture scores. Motor programming can be defined as the process of building up the complete set of motor commands by specifying all gestures in detail. This full specification of gesture scores is achieved in our model by adapting motor information from phonologically similar syllables or by assembling motor programs from sub-syllabic units. (shrink)

Intelligible speakers achieve specific vocal tract constrictions in rapid sequence. These constrictions are associated in theory with speech motor goals. Adult-focused models of speech production assume that discrete phonological representations, sequenced into word-length plans for output, define these goals. This assumption introduces a serial order problem for speech. It is also at odds with children's speech. In particular, child phonology and timing control suggest holistic speech plans, and so the hypothesis of whole word production. This hypothesis solves the serial (...) order problem by avoiding it. When the same solution is applied to adult speech the problem becomes how to explain the development of highly intelligible speech. This is the problem addressed here. A modeling approach is used to demonstrate how perceptual-motor units of production emerge over developmental time with the perceptual-motor integration of holistic speech plans that are also phonological representations; the specific argument is that perceptual-motor units are a product of trajectories (nearly) crossing in motor space. The model, which focuses on the integration process, defines the perceptual-motor map as a set of linked pairs of experienced perceptual and motor trajectories. The trajectories are time-based excursions through speaker-defined perceptual and motor spaces. By hypothesis, junctures appear where motor trajectories near or overlap one another in motor space when the shared (or extremely similar) articulatory configurations in these regions are exploited to combine perceptually-linked motor paths along different trajectories. Junctures form in clusters in motor space. These clusters, along with their corresponding (linked) perceptual points, represent perceptual-motor units of production, albeit at the level of speech motor control only. The units serve as pivots in motor space during speaking; they are points of transition from one motor trajectory to another along perceptually-linked paths that are selected to produce best approximations of whole word targets. (shrink)

The aim of this study is to determine to what extent the tense markers of tense logic represent what is represented by the tense forms of natural language. To achieve this, it will be necessary to report the findings of linguistics on what the tense forms of natural languages do represent. The justification for this study lies in a fundamental difference between natural and logical languages. Where natural languages develop to meet the needs of their speakers, logical language is used (...) for testing the validity of argument of a certain kind. Tense logic has been used to examine philosophical issues, and in linguistics to examine how tenses describe many different possible structures of time. (shrink)

A number of recent studies have revealed correspondences between song- and language-related neural structures, pathways, and gene expression in humans and songbirds. Analyses of vocal learning, song structure, and the distribution of song elements have similarly revealed a remarkable number of shared characteristics with human speech. This article reviews recent developments in the understanding of these issues with reference to the phonological phenomena observed in human language. This investigation suggests that birds possess a host of abilities necessary for human (...) phonological computation, as evidenced by behavioral, neuroanatomical, and molecular genetic studies. Vocal-learning birds therefore present an excellent model for studying some areas of human phonology, though differences in the primitives of song and language as well as the absence of a human-like morphosyntax make human phonology differ from birdsong phonology in crucial ways. (shrink)

There is a relationship between reading and math skills, as well as comorbidity between reading and math disorders. A mutual foundation for this comorbidity could be that the quality of phonological representations is important for both early reading and arithmetic. In this study, we examine this hypothesis in a sample traced longitudinally from preschool to first grade. The results show that phonological awareness does not explain development in arithmetic, but that there is an indirect effect between phoneme (...) awareness in preschool and arithmetic in first grade via phoneme awareness in first grade. This effect is, however, weak and restricted to verbal arithmetic and not arithmetic fluency. This finding is only partly in line with other studies, and a reason could be that this study more strongly controls for confounders and previous skills than other studies. (shrink)

This paper explores a structure ubiquitous in grammar, the embedded tree, and develops a proposal for how such embedded structures played a fundamental role in the evolution of consonants and vowels. Assuming that linguistic capabilities emerged as a cognitive system from a simply reactive system and that such a transition required the construction of an internal mapping of the system body, we propose that this mapping was determined through articulation and acoustics. By creating distinctions between articulators in the vocal tract (...) or by acoustic features of sounds, and then embedding these distinctions, the various possible properties of consonants and vowels emerged. These embedded distinctions represent paradigmatic options for the production of sounds, which provide the basic building blocks for prosodic structure. By anchoring these embedded structures in the anatomy and physiology of the vocal tract, the evolution of phonology itself can be explained by extra-linguistic factors. (shrink)

Compared with the large number of studies on reading of children with hearing loss in alphabetic languages, there are only a very limited number of studies on reading of Chinese-speaking children with HL. It remains unclear how phonological, orthographic, and semantic skills contribute to reading fluency of Chinese school-age children with HL. The present study explored this issue by examining the performances of children with HL on reading fluency and three linguistic skills compared with matched controls with normal hearing. (...) Specifically, twenty-eight children with HL and 28 chronological-age-matched children with NH were tested on word/sentence reading fluency, phonological awareness which was composed of onset/vowel/lexical tone awareness, orthographic knowledge, and semantic competence which comprised animal word identification, pseudo-homophone detection, and word segmentation. Results showed that children with HL lagged behind their peers with NH in WRF/SRF and most of the phonological, orthographic, and semantic subskills except onset awareness and pseudo-homophone detection. Furthermore, the significant contributors to WRF differed between the two groups with PA being the significant contributor in the children with NH while OK being the significant contributor in the children with HL. However, the significant contributor to SRF did not differ between the two groups with SC being the only significant contributor. These results revealed not only between-group differences but also similarities in the relative contributions of PA, OK, and SC to reading fluency at both word and sentence levels, which has practical implications for developing better training programs to improve reading for children with HL. (shrink)

Reading disability has been considered as a disconnection syndrome. Recently, an increasing number of studies have emphasized the role of subcortical regions in reading. However, the majority of research on reading disability has focused on the connections amongst brain regions within the classic cortical reading network. Here, we used graph theoretical analysis to investigate whether subcortical regions serve as hubs during reading both in Chinese children with reading disability and in age-matched typically developing children using a visual rhyming judgment task (...) and a visual meaning judgment task. We found that the bilateral thalami were the unique hubs for typically developing children across both tasks. Additionally, subcortical regions were also unique hubs for typically developing children but only in the rhyming task. Among these subcortical hub regions, the left pallidum showed reduced connectivity with inferior frontal regions in the rhyming judgment but not semantic task in reading disabled compared with typically developing children. These results suggest that subcortical-cortical disconnection, which may be particularly relevant to the phonological and phonology-related learning process, may be associated with Chinese reading disability. (shrink)

With the goal of broadening the range of possible extant theories of phonological contrast from which kinship studies can draw, I outline, and briefly apply to the Seneca vs. English kinship systems, three approaches developed for predicting universals and variations of vowel system contrast.

Dr Batóg is Lecturer in Logic at the University of Poznan. In Poland mathematical logic has been as characteristic an object of study and development as that of the atom elsewhere. The names of Fr Bochenski and Tarski are of as much importance in the logical field as are those of Bohr and Rutherford in the physical. The Polish approach seems to have been based chiefly on Whitehead & Russell’s Principia Mathematica, that Homeric work whose effect abroad was far (...) greater than at home. The bearing of this fact on the present book will be discussed in due course, for it has determined our author’s treatment of his subject. (shrink)

The effects of psycholinguistic variables on reading development are critical to the evaluation of theories about the reading system. Although we know that the development of reading depends on both individual differences (endogenous) and item-level effects (exogenous), developmental research has focused mostly on average-level performance, ignoring individual differences. We investigated how the development of word recognition in Chinese children in both Chinese and English is affected by (a) item-level, exogenous effects (word frequency, radical consistency, and curricular grade (...) level); (b) subject-level, endogenous individual differences (orthographic awareness and phonological awareness); and (c) their interactive effect. We tested native Chinese (Putonghua)-speaking children (n = 763) in grades 1 to 6 with both Chinese character and English word identification (lexical) decision tasks. Our findings show that (a) there were effects of both word frequency and age of acquisition in both Chinese and English, but these item-level effects generally weakened with increasing age; (b) individual differences in phonological and orthographic awareness each contributed to successful performance; and (c) in Chinese, item-level effects were weaker for more proficient readers. We contend that our findings can be explained by theoretical models that incorporate cumulative learning as the basis for development of item-level effects in the reading system. (shrink)

This book is part of the Phoneme Factory Project undertaken by Granada Learning in partnership with the Speech and Language Therapy Research Unit in Bristol. It aims to provide guidance for teachers, SENCos, SLTs and parents regarding: criteria for referral to speech and language therapy phonological disorders appropriate intervention approaches that can be used in the classroom and at home. Complementing the book is a CD containing downloadable resources including a picture library for the classroom and the home, as (...) well as checklists and other time-saving documents. (shrink)

In this contribution we will approach language and images in different modalities: speech and face, anticipated and imagined movements, illusions on the sound by the image. It will be the opportunity for us to revisit the Gestalt concepts which were considered obsolete since structuralism in Humanities. As instantiated by Gilbert Durand in The Anthropological Structures of the Imaginary (1999, French 1st ed. 1960), we shall recall that Gestalt is not—even implicitly—an exclusively static approach to cognition. On the contrary we will (...) emphasize that forms can emerge from movements and stabilize in memory, thence morphology. And for speech, we will consider phonology as the stabilized outcome from audible and visible gestures of the mouth—caught in the time-course of a flow of some four in six syllables by second—via the perception of motor coordinations: which is necessary to master the most common expression of language between humans. We will adopt here also for the perceptual flows of spoken language, Multimodal Scene Analysis, the ongoing legacy of Gestalt Theory, including one of our main research topics: the gestural expression of the face and the hand for Deaf people, who practise as an augment French LPC (Langue française Parlée Complétée), adapted in 1967 from Cued Speech by its originator Dr Richard Cornett. (shrink)

Computational models of child language development can help us understand the cognitive underpinnings of the language learning process, which occurs along several linguistic levels at once (e.g., prosodic and phonological). However, in light of the replication crisis, modelers face the challenge of selecting representative and consolidated infant data. Thus, it is desirable to have evaluation methodologies that could account for robust empirical reference data, across multiple infant capabilities. Moreover, there is a need for practices that can compare developmental (...) trajectories of infants to those of models as a function of language experience and development. The present study aims to take concrete steps to address these needs by introducing the concept of comparing models with large-scale cumulative empirical data from infants, as quantified by meta-analyses conducted across a large number of individual behavioral studies. We formalize the connection between measurable model and human behavior, and then present a conceptual framework for meta-analytic evaluation of computational models. We exemplify the meta-analytic model evaluation approach with two modeling experiments on infant-directed speech preference and native/non-native vowel discrimination. (shrink)

In this study we present a self-organizing connectionist model of early lexical development. We call this model DevLex-II, based on the earlier DevLex model. DevLex-II can simulate a variety of empirical patterns in children's acquisition of words. These include a clear vocabulary spurt, effects of word frequency and length on age of acquisition, and individual differences as a function of phonological short-term memory and associative capacity. Further results from lesioned models indicate developmental plasticity in the network's recovery from (...) damage, in a non-monotonic fashion. We attribute the network's abilities in accounting for lexical development to interactive dynamics in the learning process. In particular, variations displayed by the model in the rate and size of early vocabulary development are modulated by (a) input characteristics, such as word frequency and word length, (b) consolidation of lexical-semantic representation, meaning-form association, and phonological short-term memory, and (c) delayed processes due to interactions among timing, severity, and recoverability of lesion. Together, DevLex and DevLex-II provide an accurate computational account of early lexical development. (shrink)

In this study we present a self‐organizing connectionist model of early lexical development. We call this model DevLex‐II, based on the earlier DevLex model. DevLex‐II can simulate a variety of empirical patterns in children's acquisition of words. These include a clear vocabulary spurt, effects of word frequency and length on age of acquisition, and individual differences as a function of phonological short‐term memory and associative capacity. Further results from lesioned models indicate developmental plasticity in the network's recovery from (...) damage, in a non‐monotonic fashion. We attribute the network's abilities in accounting for lexical development to interactive dynamics in the learning process. In particular, variations displayed by the model in the rate and size of early vocabulary development are modulated by (a) input characteristics, such as word frequency and word length, (b) consolidation of lexical‐semantic representation, meaning‐form association, and phonological short‐term memory, and (c) delayed processes due to interactions among timing, severity, and recoverability of lesion. Together, DevLex and DevLex‐II provide an accurate computational account of early lexical development. (shrink)

Children with developmental dyslexia and at its risk have difficulties in the acquisition of foreign languages, especially non-transparent English. The problems of such pupils concern various aspects of the language system but in particular relate to the ability to read and spell. The research literature dedicated to effective preventative methods and dyslexia treatment suggests that both children with dyslexia and at its risk need phonological awareness training and multi-sensory learning. It is also known that prevention and early treatment is (...) more effective than therapeutic intervention used in older students. Experts in foreign language acquisition recommend that children have contact with longer oral texts and live language. A recently-published report on the methods of English language teaching in Polish primary schools shows that the lessons conducted there do not realise the majority of the aforementioned recommendations. As a consequence, they do not serve any pupils including those with dyslexia and at its risk. A method which meets most of the demands mentioned above is “The Good Start Method for English”. It is a new program of teaching the English language designed for five to seven-year-olds, which at the same time ensures support for the psychomotor development of children, leading to acceleration in learning progress. (shrink)

The ability to extract patterns from sensory input across time and space is thought to underlie the development and acquisition of language and literacy skills, particularly the subdomains marked by the learning of probabilistic knowledge. Thus, impairments in procedural learning are hypothesized to underlie neurodevelopmental disorders, such as dyslexia and developmental language disorder. In the present meta‐analysis, comprising 2396 participants from 39 independent studies, the continuous relationship between language, literacy, and procedural learning on the Serial Reaction Time task (SRTT) (...) was assessed across children and adults with typical development (TD), dyslexia, and Developmental Language Disorder (DLD). Despite a significant, but very small, relationship between procedural learning and overall language and literacy measures, this pattern was not observed at the group‐level when examining TD, dyslexic, and DLD groups separately. Based on the procedural/declarative model, a positive relationship was expected between procedural learning and language and literacy measures for the typically developing group; however, no such relationship was observed. This was also the case for the disordered groups (ps >.05). Also counter to expectations, the magnitude of the relationship between procedural learning and grammar and phonology did not differ between TD and DLD (ps >.05), nor between the TD and dyslexic group on reading, spelling, and phonology (ps >.05). While lending little support to the procedural/declarative model, we consider that these results may be the consequence of poor psychometric properties of the SRTT as a measure of procedural learning. (shrink)

This paper is about the first (L1) and second language (L2) skills of Turkish-German dual language learners (DLLs), the interrelatedness of the L1 and L2 skills, and their relation to other selected child and family variables. The first aim of the study was to examine L1 and L2 performance and the relation between the languages. Second, the study sought to explore the conditions in which functioning dual language development can be achieved, while trying to predict the extent to which (...) child and environmental factors are related to the DLLs’ language competencies. L1 and L2 language skills of N = 69 bilingually developing 3- to 5-year-old Turkish-German children were assessed via standardized tests. In addition, information on the children’s sociodemographic variables and home language environments was obtained by means of parental questionnaires. Correlational analyses were used to examine the interrelations between L1 and L2 skills and multiple regression analyses were conducted in order to predict the children’s language competencies. The children showed age-appropriate language skills in L1 (Turkish) and lower language skills in L2 (German). Whereas their phonological memory abilities were positively correlated with L1 and L2 skills, their expressive vocabulary in L1 was negatively correlated with L2 skills. Our findings also indicated that phonological memory was a strong predictor of language abilities. Concerning family variables, both early daycare entry and stimulating home language environment were significant predictors of better L2 skills. Lastly, balanced use of both languages at home had no negative consequences on language competencies. Although more research is needed, this study shows the benefits of using a combined language measure including both L1 and L2 skills to predict DLLs’ language competencies without disregarding either of their languages. (shrink)

Economist-philosopher Amartya Sen's writings on social and political issues have attracted wide audiences. Section 2 introduces his contributions on: how people reason as agents within society; social determinants of people's (lack of) access to goods and of the effective freedoms and agency they enjoy or lack; and associated advocacy of self-specification of identity and high expectations for ‘voice’ and reasoning democracy. Section 3 considers his relation to social theory, his tools for theorizing action in society, and his limited degree of (...) attention to work by sociologists and to capitalism and power structures. Section 4 characterizes a style marked by conceptual refinement, emphases on complexity and individuality, including personal individuality, and reformist optimism. Section 5 shows the features from Sections 3 and 4 at work in his conception of personhood that advocates freedom to make a reasoned composition of personal identity. Similarly, Section 6 addresses his conception of public reasoning and neglect of the sociology of democracy. It contrasts the ideal of a reasoning polity with features in many countries. Sen's programmes for critical autonomy in personhood and for reasoned politics play, nevertheless, a normic role, while his analytical formats help investigation of obstacles to more widespread agency, voice, and democratic participation. (shrink)

At 14 months, children appear to struggle to apply their fairly well-developed speech perception abilities to learning similar sounding words (e.g., bih/dih; Stager & Werker, 1997). However, variability in nonphonetic aspects of the training stimuli seems to aid word learning at this age. Extant theories of early word learning cannot account for this benefit of variability. We offer a simple explanation for this range of effects based on associative learning. Simulations suggest that if infants encode both noncontrastive information (e.g., cues (...) to speaker voice) and meaningful linguistic cues (e.g., place of articulation or voicing), then associative learning mechanisms predict these variability effects in early word learning. Crucially, this means that despite the importance of task variables in predicting performance, this body of work shows that phonological categories are still developing at this age, and that the structure of noninformative cues has critical influences on word learning abilities. (shrink)

Neuroconstructivism: How the Brain Constructs Cognition proposes a unifying framework for the study of cognitive development that brings together (1) constructivism (which views development as the progressive elaboration of increasingly complex structures), (2) cognitive neuroscience (which aims to understand the neural mechanisms underlying behavior), and (3) computational modeling (which proposes formal and explicit specifications of information processing). The guiding principle of our approach is context dependence, within and (in contrast to Marr [1982]) between levels of organization. We propose (...) that three mechanisms guide the emergence of representations: competition, cooperation, and chronotopy; which themselves allow for two central processes: proactivity and progressive specialization. We suggest that the main outcome of development is partial representations, distributed across distinct functional circuits. This framework is derived by examining development at the level of single neurons, brain systems, and whole organisms. We use the terms encellment, embrainment, and embodiment to describe the higher-level contextual influences that act at each of these levels of organization. To illustrate these mechanisms in operation we provide case studies in early visual perception, infant habituation, phonological development, and object representations in infancy. Three further case studies are concerned with interactions between levels of explanation: social development, atypical development and within that, developmental dyslexia. We conclude that cognitive development arises from a dynamic, contextual change in embodied neural structures leading to partial representations across multiple brain regions and timescales, in response to proactively specified physical and social environment. (shrink)

One of the clearest phonological developments of the language of Attic inscriptions of the Hellenistic period down to the end of the second century B.C. is the change . I have studied this phenomenon with particular reference to the period 323–146 B.C., taking into account also the trends before 323 and after 146 B.C. down to the end of the pre- Christian era. The object of this article is to draw attention to the fact that in only one instance, (...) the relative pronoun, is there not a marked progressive increase in the frequency of at the expense of. (shrink)