Noun Knowledge Research Articles

Receptive Knowledge of Nouns and Collocations and the Impact on English Skill Performances

Interests in examining the roles of receptive vocabulary knowledge and collocational knowledge and competence on EFL learners’ proficiency have grown considerably; yet, the extent of how EFL learners’ receptive knowledge of noun, verb-noun collocations, and noun-preposition collocations impact their English skill performances is still insufficiently researched. To address such gaps, this study specifically explored Thai EFL learners’ receptive knowledge of nouns and collocations and its impact on English skill performances. Three types of receptive vocabulary tests were created by using high-frequency nouns taken from the Academic Vocabulary List (AVL), which became the basis of selecting verb-noun lexical collocations and noun-preposition grammatical collocations. The tests were validated by a pilot study, then distributed to the 2 nd year students ( N = 135; 28 males; 107 females) at Walailak University, Thailand. The results of the tests were analyzed by using descriptive statistics, independent t-test, ANOVA, and multiple linear regressions. It was revealed that Thai EFL learners, who participated in this study, had insufficient knowledge of noun, either in form or in meaning, and encountered complexities in identifying lexical and grammatical collocations. Receptive knowledge significantly predicted learners’ performance in reading tasks. The findings of this study indicate the urgent need to include collocations into English teaching as Thai EFL learners seem unable to acquire them on their own; besides, the insufficient knowledge of the form and meaning of nouns may imply a deeper problem in Thai EFL learners’ proficiency in grammatical structure. Therefore, it is important to emphasize that English teaching and learning materials, e.g., textbooks and modules, as well as course design and instruction at the university level in Thailand need to include explicitly integrated lessons of nouns (form and meaning) and collocations to facilitate the development of knowledge in such areas.

Non-nativelike outcome of naturalistic child L2 acquisition of Japanese: The case of noun–verb collocations

Abstract Many second language (L2) studies have shown that naturalistic L2 acquisition beginning from childhood leads to nativelike proficiency. The current study investigated whether the acquisition of such proficiency would be guaranteed, by examining a potential gap in the seemingly nativelike L2 proficiency of child L2 starters. At issue was the productive knowledge of noun–verb collocations by child L2 starters of Japanese (n=74, age 13–18) whose age of arrival (AOA) was between 0 and 11 and whose length of residence (LOR) was between 5 and 18 years. The collocation test included only items that were easy for native speakers (NSs) (n=162, age 13) age-matched for the youngest L2 participants. About one-third of the L2 participants, including the earliest arrivals, scored below the NS range on the collocation test. The current study concludes that early L2 onset does not guarantee nativelike productive knowledge of collocations, even when the collocations in question are very easy for NSs. The study also discusses pedagogical implications for child L2 starters, who are generally believed to become nativelike with ease.

A new suite: The process of knowing through poetry

This critical/creative work responds to a call from Krauth and Watkins for amore radical form of the scholarly paper. Its hybrid form presents poems written in response to events at the second Poetry on the Move festival at the University of Canberra in 2016. Key ideas about the intersections betweenpoetry and knowledge from David McCooey and William Carlos Williams areconsidered together with readings and discussions by poets Tusiata Avia and Simon Armitage. The article charts writing experiences, tracking the drafts andthe editing process for ways in which my festival-inspired poems reflect on the intersections between poetry and knowledge, knowing and unknowing. Specifically, the poems concern the topics of knowing and observing the world; knowing memory and integrating the past with the present; and knowing the body. They embrace embodiment, imagination and biography, conscious of antagonisms between memory and the present. In this article, I problematise the use of the noun knowledge as opposed to the verb knowing and demonstrate that the former is unnecessarily privileged. I argue that articulating the full scope of poetry composition from inspiration to the final stages of editing demonstrates that artistic knowledge is best defined as a process of knowing. It is my contention that poets do demonstrate the knowledge of how to make things, as identified by Aristotle (1954); and alsothat we show ‘knowing as a process of inquiry’ (Johnson 2010). In doing so, we offer readers ‘new ways of knowing and doing’ (Webb 2012, my emphasis). At the same time, our own new work, as I demonstrate here, responds to knowledge as ‘a living current’ (Williams 1923), an active state characterised by the verb ‘to know’.

Vocabulary development in closely-related languages

Abstract This paper investigates vocabulary comprehension and production in 46 bilingual Swedish-German children age 4–6 growing up in Sweden. Using a newly developed tool, the Cross-linguistic Lexical Task (CLT, Haman, Łuniewska & Pomiechowska 2015), the children’s receptive and expressive vocabulary knowledge of nouns and verbs is assessed in both their languages, compared to each other and over age. Performance on test items of different word types (nouns/verbs; cognates/non-cognates) is also explored. There are clear vocabulary gains with age for the majority language Swedish, but not for the minority (home) language German. Overall vocabulary scores are higher in Swedish than in German, but this difference only concerns verbs, not nouns. Cognate facilitation occurs both ways in these closely-related languages, but is stronger in the minority language German. We suggest that what at first sight looks like a noun advantage on the German CLT is largely an effect of Swedish/German cognate status.

Longitudinal Changes in Semantic Concreteness in Semantic Variant Primary Progressive Aphasia (svPPA).

This study examines longitudinal changes in the concreteness of nouns produced by human patients with semantic variant primary progressive aphasia (svPPA). Cross-sectional studies show that patients with svPPA demonstrate severe loss of concrete noun knowledge linked to atrophy of the left ventral temporal lobe. It is unknown how disease spread and duration affect the magnitude of the concreteness impairment in svPPA. We evaluate longitudinal spoken production of concrete nouns in svPPA, and relate this to changes in longitudinal MRI measures of gray matter (GM). Noun concreteness in svPPA is compared to that of behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD) patients, who typically demonstrate highly concrete speech. We elicited naturalistic speech samples at two time points (time 1 and time 2) in patients with svPPA (n = 11) and bvFTD (n = 15) through descriptions of the Cookie Theft picture and evaluated each spoken noun for concreteness. Compared to bvFTD patients whose noun production remained highly concrete throughout the testing period, mixed-effects models revealed that noun concreteness significantly decreased as disease progressed in svPPA. We also measured longitudinal changes to GM in a subset of svPPA patients (n = 7), who showed significant decline in the left and right temporal and frontal regions. Regression analyses revealed that longitudinal GM atrophy in the right fusiform and parahippocampal gyri and the left superior temporal gyrus was related to decreasing noun concreteness. These results suggest that progressive atrophy of the ventral temporal lobe in svPPA contributes to declining concrete noun production over time.

Comparing Verb Fluency With Verbal Fluency in Patients With Alzheimer's Disease

Background: Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most common type of dementia. Patients with AD have impaired semantic knowledge of nouns and verbs as well as the ability to verb retrieval. Objectives: The aim of this study was to compare verbal fluency and verb fluency and to investigate the association between severity and types of fluency (verbal-verb) in patients with AD. Patients and Methods: This cross-sectional study was performed on 30 patients (14 males, 16 females) with AD. The participants were assessed using the Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) and a neurologist made the diagnosis of AD. In order to examine verb and verbal fluency, the subjects were asked to name any words that they remember in one minute. Scoring was based on the correct number of items and data analysis was performed by SPSS 16. Results: There was a significant positive correlation between letter fluency and verb fluency (P = 0.013), letter fluency and semantic fluency (P < 0.001), and verb fluency and semantic fluency (P = 0.002) in patients with AD. The results showed significant differences between letter fluency (P < 0.001), verb fluency (P = 0.034), and semantic fluency (P < 0.001) among patients with different severity of AD. In addition, the most frequently produced words in letter fluency were /a/, /s/, and /f/, consecutively. The mean ratio of semantic fluency to letter fluency was 3:5. Conclusions: In patients with AD, verb fluency was impaired more than semantic fluency was. Verb fluency task is an important criterion in diagnosis of early dementia. Therefore, the investigation of verb fluency in susceptible individuals with dementia might prevents the progression of the disorder.

Effects of noun–verb conceptual/phonological relatedness on verb production changes in Broca's aphasia

Background: Individuals with Broca's aphasia show better performance on nouns than on verbs, but the distinction between nouns and verbs is not always clear; some verbs are conceptually and/or phonologically related to nouns, while others are not. Inconsistent results on effects of noun–verb relatedness on verb production have been reported in the literature. Aims: We investigated (1) whether verb instrumentality (a conceptual relationship to nouns) or homonymy (a phonological relationship to nouns) would affect verb production in individuals with Broca's aphasia and (2) whether conceptual/phonological noun–verb relationship would affect responsiveness to aphasia therapy that focused on verb production. Methods & Procedures: Three English-speaking individuals with Broca's aphasia produced 96 verbs in sentences in response to picture stimuli. The target verbs included those that use an instrument and those that do not (e.g., to hammer vs. to yawn) and verbs that are phonologically identical to a related noun (e.g., to comb vs. a comb), morpho-phonologically related to a noun (e.g., to grind vs. a grinder) and those that are not morphologically related to a noun (e.g., to lean). The participants’ verb retrieval ability was assessed before and after a 4-week period of aphasia therapy. Outcomes & Results: The participants produced more accurate instrumental than non-instrumental verbs both pre- and post-treatment. They also produced more verbs correctly that are homonyms with nouns than verbs that are phonologically related or unrelated to nouns before treatment. However, the effect of homonymy was not observed following treatment. Conclusion: Individuals with Broca's aphasia were more accurate in their production of verbs that were conceptually and phonologically related to nouns than on verbs that were not. The performance of verb production improved significantly after therapy. We interpret the results to indicate that, whereas prior to treatment, the participants relied on phonologically related nouns to retrieve the target verbs, this reliance on knowledge of nouns decreased following therapy that was designed to improve verb production.

A common mechanism in verb and noun naming deficits in Alzheimer’s patients

We tested the ability of Alzheimer’s patients and elderly controls to name living and non-living nouns, and manner and instrument verbs. Patients’ error patterns and relative performance with different categories showed evidence of graceful degradation for both nouns and verbs, with particular domain-specific impairments for living nouns and instrument verbs. Our results support feature-based, semantic representations for nouns and verbs and support the role of inter-correlated features in noun impairment, and the role of noun knowledge in instrument verb impairment.

Infants' Developing Appreciation of Similarities Between Model Objects and Their Real‐World Referents

Previous research suggests that model competence does not emerge until relatively late in infancy (20-26 months). Development was systematically analyzed within 3 key areas--count noun learning, dual representation, and categorization-hypothesized to support the emergence of model competence in the second year. In an object-handling preferential looking task, 21- to 26-month-olds matched model objects to referents only when count noun knowledge was high. When dual representation demands were reduced through the use of pictures in place of model objects, 20-month-olds with low count noun vocabularies succeeded in relating symbols to referents. Finally, change in infants' construal of a model object as a member of a category was documented between 14 and 20 months of age.

Word retrieval following mild TBI: Implications for categorical deficits

Background: Theories on the organisation and structure of semantic knowledge of nouns and verbs have been based on findings with aphasic patients with focal lesions. Populations with diffuse lesions, such as mild traumatic brain injury (MTBI), may offer additional information relative to lexical access of nouns and verbs. Aims: The purpose of this study was to investigate possible dissociation between noun and verb retrieval after MTBI using the Test of Adolescent Adult Word Finding (TAWF). Methods & Procedures: Two groups, 10 MTBI and 10 non‐brain‐damaged (NBD) persons, who had normal vision and hearing, and no history of developmental disabilities, previous head injury, or substance abuse, were participants. Criteria for MTBI included: loss of consciousness <30 minutes and/or PTA<24 hours, GCS 13–15, and negative CT scan. The experimental task was the TAWF, focusing on differences in accuracy and response time for noun and verb naming. Outcomes & Results: Paired sample t‐tests comparing nouns and verbs on accuracy and response time revealed no significant differences for the MTBI group; for the NBD group, there were significant differences for response time only. One‐tailed independent sample t‐tests revealed significant group differences for accuracy and response time on combined nouns and only response time for verbs. Paired sample t‐tests revealed significant differences for naming living and nonliving items only for the MTBI group. Conclusions: No significant accuracy differences were found for either group between nouns and verbs. However, the NBD group named nouns significantly faster than verbs, whereas the MTBI group showed no significant difference. The MTBI group was significantly slower and less accurate than the NBD group for noun naming but only significantly slower for verbs. The MTBI group exhibited higher accuracy in naming living items as compared to nonliving. Therefore, response times appeared to be more sensitive than accuracy in identifying group differences.

Cortical signatures of noun and verb production.

Categories like "noun" and "verb" represent the basic units of grammar in all human languages, and the retrieval of categorical information associated with words is an essential step in the production of grammatical speech. Studies of brain-damaged patients suggest that knowledge of nouns and verbs can be spared or impaired selectively; however, the neuroanatomical correlates of this dissociation are not well understood. We used event-related functional MRI to identify cortical regions that were active when English-speaking subjects produced nouns or verbs in the context of short phrases. Two regions, in the left prefrontal cortex and left superior parietal lobule, were selectively activated for verb trials compared with noun trials; one region in the left inferior temporal lobe was more active during noun production than verb production. We propose that these regions are involved in representing core conceptual properties of nouns and verbs.

Semantic anomaly judgement in individuals with probable Alzheimer's disease

Background: Research has shown that individuals with probable Alzheimer's disease (PrAD) show impaired semantic knowledge of nouns. More specifically, while they demonstrate preserved superordinate category information, information regarding specific semantic attributes associated with subordinates appears to be disrupted. Results of some recent studies suggest that PrAD participants may also be impaired in processing semantic information associated with verbs.Aims: Provided that a parallel exists between PrAD participants' noun and verb impairment, it is plausible that the semantic deficits observed in the breakdown of their noun lexicon may also exist in their knowledge of verb‐related information. This experiment examined PrAD participants' knowledge of the semantic restrictions associated with the complements of verbs.Methods & Procedures: Fourteen PrAD participants were asked to judge the semantic plausibility of 44 auditorily presented sentences. To examine their knowledge of the selection restriction of verbs, each verb was paired with two plausible complements that fully met the restriction, an implausible complement that violated the specific attributes required but belonged to the correct semantic category, and an implausible complement that violated the semantic category requirement.Outcomes & Results: Results showed that PrAD participants' errors were primarily on anomalous sentences that contained implausible complements that belonged to the correct semantic category.Conclusions: This finding confirms our hypothesis and suggests that a parallel pattern exists in PrAD participants' breakdown in noun and verb knowledge.

Derivative Word Forms: What Do Learners Know?

Some teachers and researchers may assume that when a learner knows one member of a word family (e.g., stimulate), the other members (e.g., stimulant, stimulative) are relatively easy to learn. Although knowing one member of a word family undoubtedly facilitates receptive mastery of the other members, the small amount of previous research has suggested that L2 learners often have problems producing the various derivative forms within a word family. This study examined the ability of 106 graduate and undergraduate nonnative-English-speaking students to produce appropriate derivatives in the four major word classes (i.e., noun, verb, adjective, and adverb) for 16 prompt words. The results indicated that it was relatively uncommon for subjects to know either all of the four word forms or none of them. Subjects usually had partial knowledge of the derivatives, with productive knowledge of two or three forms being typical. In a comparison of derivational mastery and knowledge of the prompt words on a four-stage developmental scale, the subjects showed increasing knowledge of noun and verb derivatives at each stage, but adjective and adverb forms appeared to be more difficult for them. The results may imply a need for more direct attention to the teaching of derivative forms.

Proverb Comprehension as a Function of Reading Proficiency in Preadolescents.

Proverb comprehension through reading was examined in 42 preadolescents (mean age=12:2 [years:months]) attending a rural public middle school. The study was designed to learn about individual differences with respect to reading, word knowledge, and analogical reasoning skills. The 42 students were assigned to subgroups of proficient and less proficient readers based on their scores on a school-administered achievement test. Reading tasks were presented to examine their comprehension of unfamiliar concrete (e.g., every bird must hatch its own eggs) and abstract (e.g., gratitude is a heavy burden) proverbs, and their knowledge of nouns contained in the expressions. A nonverbal analogical reasoning task also was administered. Proverb comprehension was found to be associated with reading proficiency, word knowledge, and analogical reasoning. Although all students were considered by their school to be typical achievers, they demonstrated wide individual differences in their ability to interpret unfamiliar concrete and abstract proverbs. Proficient readers outperformed less proficient readers on comprehension of both types of proverbs, knowledge of abstract nouns contained in proverbs, and analogical reasoning. They did not differ, however, on knowledge of concrete nouns, with both subgroups having mastered those words. Educational Implications: The results support the view that reading is an important language modality in older children, significantly related to their understanding of words and figurative expressions. Implications for instruction in proverb comprehension as part of a language arts curriculum are offered for speech-language pathologists working collaboratively with classroom teachers. These guidelines reflect the view that multiple factors (i.e., reading, word knowledge, analogical reasoning) promote proverb comprehension in youth.

Pode-se considerar o verbo uma unidade lexical especializada? Descrição de verbos especializados do português

Os discursos de especialidade utilizam certas categorias gramaticais que não são tratadas ou que não são adequadamente tratadas pela terminologia. Entre elas está o verbo, apresentado neste artigo. Discutimos as limitações da terminologia para tratar das unidades verbais e propomos uma descrição dessas unidades, que chamamos unidades especializadas, no âmbito do modelo “Lexicologia Explicativa e Combinatória” (Mel’cuk &lt;em&gt;et al&lt;/em&gt;. 1995). Por meio de exemplos extraídos de textos da micro-informática redigidos em português, mostramos que o conhecimento das unidades verbais é tão necessário quanto o conhecimento das unidades nominais (termos) para a tradução e redação especializadas.

Human simulations of vocabulary learning

The work reported here experimentally investigates a striking generalization about vocabulary acquisition: Noun learning is superior to verb learning in the earliest moments of child language development. The dominant explanation of this phenomenon in the literature invokes differing conceptual requirements for items in these lexical categories: Verbs are cognitively more complex than nouns and so their acquisition must await certain mental developments in the infant. In the present work, we investigate an alternative hypothesis; namely, that it is the information requirements of verb learning, not the conceptual requirements, that crucially determine the acquisition order. Efficient verb learning requires access to structural features of the exposure language and thus cannot take place until a scaffolding of noun knowledge enables the acquisition of clause-level syntax. More generally, we experimentally investigate the hypothesis that vocabulary acquisition takes place via an incremental constraint-satisfaction procedure that bootstraps itself into successively more sophisticated linguistic representations which, in turn, enable new kinds of vocabulary learning. If the experimental subjects were young children, it would be difficult to distinguish between this information-centered hypothesis and the conceptual change hypothesis. Therefore the experimental “learners” are adults. The items to be “acquired” in the experiments were the 24 most frequent nouns and 24 most frequent verbs from a sample of maternal speech to 18–24-month-old infants. The various experiments ask about the kinds of information that will support identification of these words as they occur in mother-to-child discourse. Both the proportion correctly identified and the type of word that is identifiable changes significantly as a function of information type. We discuss these results as consistent with the incremental construction of a highly lexicalized grammar by cognitively and pragmatically sophisticated human infants, but inconsistent with a procedure in which lexical acquisition is independent of and antecedent to syntax acquisition.