Neural processing of Mandarin and Cantonese lexical tone alternations: implications for the nature of phonological representations

The number and type of connections involving different levels of orthographic and phonological representations differentiate between several models of spoken and visual word recognition. At the sublexical level of processing, Borowsky, Owen, and Fonos (1999) demonstrated evidence for direct processing connections from grapheme representations to phoneme representations (i.e., a sensitivity effect) over and above any bias effects, but not in the reverse direction. Neural network models of visual word recognition implement an orthography to phonology processing route that involves the same connections for processing sublexical and lexical information, and thus a similar pattern of cross-modal effects for lexical stimuli are expected by models that implement this single type of connection (i.e., orthographic lexical processing should directly affect phonological lexical processing, but not in the reverse direction). Furthermore, several models of spoken word perception predict that there should be no direct connections between orthographic representations and phonological representations, regardless of whether the connections are sublexical or lexical. The present experiments examined these predictions by measuring the influence of a cross-modal word context on word target discrimination. The results provide constraints on the types of connections that can exist between orthographic lexical representations and phonological lexical representations.

What is the Role of Audition in Literacy?

OBJETIVO: caracterizar o desempenho escolar e o processamento fonológico de escolares da 1ª e 2ª séries, segundo o sexo e grau de escolaridade e investigar a existência de correlações entre essas variáveis. MÉTODO: participaram 88 escolares (48 meninos e 40 meninas) entre cinco e oito anos de idade, sem queixas relacionadas à fala ou à aprendizagem. Foram avaliados por meio do Teste de Desempenho Escolar (Stein,1994) e pelas provas de nomeação rápida, repetição de pseudopalavras e consciência fonológica, habilidades relacionadas ao processamento fonológico. A análise estatística se deu pelo teste de Mann-Withney U e pelo coeficiente de Spearman, com intervalo de confiança de 95%. RESULTADOS: a maioria dos escolares apresentou classificação de desempenho inferior nos subtestes do Teste de Desempenho Escolar, com maior média de acertos para leitura. Não houve diferença significante entre meninos e meninas. Os escolares da 2ª série mostraram melhor desempenho em escrita, leitura e aritmética, quando comparados aos alunos da 1ª série. Ao contrário dos desempenhos em leitura, escrita, aritmética e consciência fonológica, os desempenhos em acesso lexical e memória fonológica não diferenciaram as séries. Na 1ª série, encontraram-se correlações positivas entre o acesso ao léxico mental e a consciência fonológica, entre leitura e escrita e consciência fonológica, e entre aritmética e consciência fonológica. Na 2ª série, identificaram-se correlações positivas entre escrita, leitura e aritmética e com a consciência fonológica, acesso ao léxico com memória fonológica e consciência fonológica. CONCLUSÃO: os escolares da 2ª série apresentaram melhores escores de desempenho escolar e de consciência fonológica quando comparados aos alunos 1ª, apesar da maioria ter alcançado classificação inferior à esperada para a série, definida pelo Teste. Diferentes variáveis do processamento fonológico correlacionaram-se positivamente com o desempenho escolar.

Pleiotropic Effects of a Chromosome 3 Locus on Speech-Sound Disorder and Reading

The nature of prereaders' phonological processing abilities

The aim of this book is to demonstrate that, in a representation-based model, the phonological organization of speech sounds within a word is reducible to the licensing properties of nuclei with respect to structurally defined complexities which pose varying demands on the licenser. It is assumed that the primitive licensing relation is that between a nucleus and its onset (O N). There are two main types of complexities concerning the onset position. Substantive complexity is an important aspect of phonological organisation at the melodic level, while the syllabic configurations in which the onset may be found are referred to under the heading of formal complexity. At the melodic level, complexity is defined in terms of the number of privative primes called elements. The asymmetries in the subsegmental representations of consonants and vowels are shown to play a pivotal role in understanding a number of phenomena, such as typological patterns, markedness effects, phonological processes, segmental inventories, and, what is most important, the model allows us to see a direct connection between phonological representations and processes. For example, the deletion of [g] in Welsh initial mutations is strictly related to the fact that the prime which crucially defines this object also happens to be the target of Soft Mutation. The complexity at the syllabic level is defined in terms of formal onset configurations called governing relations, of which some are easier to license than others. The formal complexity scale is not rerankable, and corresponds directly to the markedness of syllabic types. Since each formal configuration requires licensing from the following nucleus, syllable typology can be directly derived from the licensing strength of nuclei. The interaction between the higher prosodic organisation, for example, the level of the foot, and the syllabic level is also easily expressible in this model because higher prosody is built on nuclei. Therefore, prosody may tamper with the status of nuclei as licensers by deeming some of them as prosodically weaker than others, thus producing a non-rerankable scale of nuclear licensers (a " P). The inclusion of the empty nucleus as a possible licenser allows us to unify the scale of relatively marked contexts in segmental phenomena, and also to account for such problems as extrasyllabicity, complex clusters, super heavy rhymes, and other exceptional strings. The role of nuclei as licensers in unifying various levels of phonological representation   from melody to word structure   is unquestionable. There are other areas of phonological theory which can be expressed in this model. These include the role of nuclear strength scales in register switches, dialectal variation, historical development, language acquisition, and the interaction between phonology and morphology.

EDITORIAL article Front. Psychol., 23 July 2013Sec. Psychology of Language Volume 4 - 2013 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00471

Interaction and representational integration: Evidence from speech errors

Individual differences in abilities to form, access, and hone phonological representations of words are implicated in the development of oral and written language. This study addressed two important gaps in the literature concerning measurement of individual differences in phonological representation. First, we empirically examined the dimensionality of phonological representation abilities. Second, we empirically compared how well typical measures index various representation-related phonological processing abilities. Specifically, nine measures of accessibility to and distinctness of phonological presentations were administered to 175 3-, 4-, and 5-year-old children. Confirmatory factor analysis validated three separate but correlated phonological processing abilities, i.e., efficiency of accessing phonological codes, precision of phonological codes as reflected in speech production, and precision of phonological codes as reflected in speech perception. The named phonological processing abilities were equally good measures of a second-order phonological representation factor. While most prototypic measures were excellent indicators of first-order phonological abilities, they were only modest indicators of phonological representation.

Lexical and post-lexical phonological representations in spoken production

This study analyses the specific neuropsychological profiles of children with dyslexia and/or dyscalculia, in particular concerning phonological awareness, lexical access, working memory and numerical processing. Four groups were selected, through a screening process that used strict criteria, from 1568 7-10-year-old children: 90 with typical development, 61 with dyslexia, 13 with dyscalculia, and 14 with dyslexia + dyscalculia. Children with dyslexia show a deficit in phonological processing, lexical access, and verbal working memory, especially with alphabetic stimuli. Children with developmental dyscalculia show a deficit of phonological processing, verbal working memory with digits and visual-spatial working memory. They also show an impairment in spatial representation of numbers and in the automatic access to numerical semantics to a greater extent than those with double disturbance. Children with dyslexia + dyscalculia show a profile generally characterized by the summation of the deficits of the two disorders, although they have a lower deficit in access to numerical semantics and mental representation of numbers.

A large literature has shown that language context –mixing and switching between languages – impacts lexical access processes during bilingual speech production. Recent work has suggested parallel contextual effects of language context on the phonetic realization of speech sounds, consistent with interactions between lexical access and phonetic processes. In this pre-registered study, we directly examine the link between lexical access and phonetic processes in Spanish–English bilinguals using picture naming. Using automated acoustic analysis, we simultaneously gather measures of reaction time (indexing lexical access) and acoustic properties of the initial consonant and vowel (indexing phonetic processes) for the same speakers on the same trials. Across measures, we find consistent, robust effects of mixing and language dominance. In contrast, while switching effects are robust in reaction time measures, they are not detected in phonetic measures. These inconsistent effects suggest there are constraints on the degree of interaction between lexical access and phonetic processes.

Phonological processing skills predict early reading development, but what underlies developing phonological processing skills? Phonological representations of 140 native Cantonese-speaking Chinese children (age 4–10) were assessed with speech gating, mispronunciation detection, and nonword repetition tasks; their nonverbal IQ, reading, and phonological processing were assessed with standard tests. Results indicated that even without explicit script-sound correspondence at the phonemic level in Chinese orthography, young Chinese speakers developed representations segmented at this level, and such representations were more fine-grained for older children. Further, the quality of kindergarteners’ phonological representations (specified by sensitivity to mispronunciation in lexical judgment) significantly predicted their emergent reading abilities, and this relation was fully mediated by phonological processing skills, with rapid naming showing the strongest mediation effect. Such mediation was no longer found with the primary-school sample, suggesting plausible developmental changes in the relations between phonological representations, phonological processing, and reading during early reading development.

Individuals with Alzheimer's disease (AD) are often reported to have reduced verbal short-term memory capacity, typically attributed to their attention/executive deficits. However, these individuals also tend to show progressive impairment of semantic, lexical, and phonological processing which may underlie their low short-term memory capacity. The goals of this study were to assess the contribution of each level of representation (phonological, lexical, and semantic) to immediate serial recall performance in 18 individuals with AD, and to examine how these linguistic effects on short-term memory were modulated by their reduced capacity to manipulate information in short-term memory associated with executive dysfunction. Results showed that individuals with AD had difficulty recalling items that relied on phonological representations, which led to increased lexicality effects relative to the control group. This finding suggests that patients have a greater reliance on lexical/semantic information than controls, possibly to make up for deficits in retention and processing of phonological material. This lexical/semantic effect was not found to be significantly correlated with patients’ capacity to manipulate verbal material in short-term memory, indicating that language processing and executive deficits may independently contribute to reducing verbal short-term memory capacity in AD.

908 LANGUAGE, VOLUME 73, NUMBER 4 (1997) praise-oratory as commodity examines the economic value of language. Commodification of language is also at issue in Michael Silverstein's discussion of the U.S. ideology of monolingual Standard English. Silverstein's critique of the LSA's resolution against the Official English movement may cause some linguists to open—and others to roll—their eyes. Finally , Jane Hill's study of Mexicano and Spanish use in Mexico's Malinche region indicates that ideologies oflinguistic purity may co-exist with and even be formulated within 'impure' mixed codes. With its broad scope and useful introductory essays , the book fills a gap between textbooks and edited volumes for scholarly use. It will anchor courses in linguistic anthropology, sociolinguistics, and discourse analysis and will also serve as a useful reference for researchers. [Mary Bucholtz, University of California, Berkeley.] Phonology and phonetic evidence: Papers in laboratory phonology IV. Ed. by Bruce Connell and Amalia Arvaniti. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995. Pp. xiii, 403. This book is a selection of papers from the Fourth Conference in Laboratory Phonology held in Oxford in August 1993. Following the pattern ofthe previous LabPhon books and conferences, this book contains both papers and commentaries on those papers. The commentaries provide a second, and sometimes contrary , perspective on the data and issues discussed in the papers. In this, the fourth book in the LabPhon series, some issues fromthe previous books are revisited , demonstrating that laboratory phonology is an emerging research paradigm which has revealed new issues for investigation. The book is organized into three parts. Part I, 'Features and perception' (7-92), contains chapters on the nature of features and their place in phonology. John Kingston and Randy Diehl (discussed by Terrance Nearey) examine the status of features in perception and conclude that features represent intermediate perceptual categories, not acoustic events. John Ohala and Manjari Ohala (discussed by James McQueen) investigate underspecification in lexical access in Hindi, following up work by William Marslen-Wilson and Aditi Lahiri ('Lexical processing and phonological representation '. Gesture, segment, prosody: Papers in laboratory phonology II. ed. by Gerard Docherty and D. Robert Ladd, 229-54. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992). Kenneth de Jong presents an articulatory study of redundant features and shows that speakers use a variety of articulatory strategies to implement a phonological contrast. Part II, 'Prosody' (95-201), contains chapters on suprasegmental structure. Esther Grabe and Paul Warren and Irene Vogel, H. Timothy Bunnell, and Steven Hoskins (both discussed by Stefanie Shattuck-Hufnagel) present acoustic and perceptual studies of stress shift in the English rhythm rule. Haruo Kuobonzo (discussed by Mary Beckman) presents perceptual evidence for the mora in Japanese . Kathleen Hubbard (discussed by Bernard Tranel) examines acoustic evidence for moraic timing in Bantu. Part III, 'Articulatory organization' (205-392), contains chapters concerned primarily with articulatory phonology, a theoretical framework which is closely tied to the laboratory phonology paradigm. Caroline Smith (discussed by Richard Ogden) tests models of gestural coordination for Italian and Japanese. Sun-Ah Jun (discussed by Gerard Docherty ) presents a gestural analysis of stop voicing in Korean that makes crucial use of prosodically conditioned gestural overlap. Elizabeth Zgisa (discussed by James Scobbie); Tara Holst and Francis Nolan (discussed by Catherine Browman); and Daniel Recasens, Jordi Fontdevila, and Maria Dolors Pallares consider differences between the phonological and articulatory representations ofpalatal and palatalized consonants. Sook-Hyang Lee (discussed by Francis Nolan) examines the relationship between jaw movement and consonant place of articulation in oral and guttural consonants. Didier Demolin (discussed by Louis Goldstein) presents an aerodynamic and acoustic study of implosive consonants in Lendu. [Stefan Frisch, Indiana University .] ...