Linguistic Research Research Articles

К вопросу о судебных лингвистических исследованиях и судебных лингвистических экспертизах текстов экстремистской и террористической направленности

The article is devoted to the issues of conducting forensic linguistic research and forensic linguistic examinations. The history of their origin, formation and conceptual differentiation is traced, as well as the problems that researchers (experts) have to face with extremist texts in the Russian penal system. It is proposed to create a special unit at the Federal Institution Research Institute of the Federal Penitentiary Service of Russia not only to develop forensic linguistic research and forensic linguistic examinations at the request of the structural divisions of the Federal Penitentiary Service of Russia, but also to study issues of optimizing their content and compositional basis.

Introduction: applied linguistics, ethics and aesthetics of encountering the Other

Abstract This article explains the rationale for proposing an applied linguistics of ethical encounters. It does so by extending the current reach beyond the critical and ideological commentary of unjust linguistic practices and considers how applied linguistics research might play an active role in both theorising and enabling ethical encounters. By ethical encounters we mean those that enact the political vision of an inclusive and just society in face-to-face meetings with particular others, i.e. the Other. We ground our inquiry in a relational framework, which places the subject’s responsibility at the heart of ethical relationships and as a basis for a political achievement of just society in settings of trauma, social stigma and unequal power relationships. We argue that the subject’s ethical responsibility is not merely interactionally accomplished but also aesthetically experienced in particular moments of proximity to others. We examine opportunities for an engaged applied linguistics that arise when its inquiry is pursued through the ethical and aesthetic lens.

Towards the development of an automated robotic storyteller: comparing approaches for emotional story annotation for non-verbal expression via body language

AbstractStorytelling is a long-established tradition and listening to stories is still a popular leisure activity. Caused by technization, storytelling media expands, e.g., to social robots acting as multi-modal storytellers, using different multimodal behaviours such as facial expressions or body postures. With the overarching goal to automate robotic storytelling, we have been annotating stories with emotion labels which the robot can use to automatically adapt its behavior. With it, three different approaches are compared in two studies in this paper: 1) manual labels by human annotators (MA), 2) software-based word-sensitive annotation using the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count program (LIWC), and 3) a machine learning based approach (ML). In an online study showing videos of a storytelling robot, the annotations were validated, with LIWC and MA achieving the best, and ML the worst results. In a laboratory user study, the three versions of the story were compared regarding transportation and cognitive absorption, revealing no significant differences but a positive trend towards MA. On this empirical basis, the Automated Robotic Storyteller was implemented using manual annotations. Future iterations should include other robots and modalities, fewer emotion labels and their probabilities.

Challenges of Natural Language Processing from a Linguistic Perspective

As the foundation of artificial intelligence, natural language processing is a research field with great development prospects, closely related to linguistics. Linguistic research has realized the initial natural language processing, and the development of natural language processing has raised higher requirements for linguistic research. Although natural language processing technology has achieved some results, there is still a distance from the most natural human-machine interaction. Language is the expression form of human thinking, and the fundamental purpose of artificial intelligence is to simulate human thinking with computers. To achieve this goal, it is necessary to start with simulating human natural language. This paper mainly analyzes the current challenges of natural language processing from a linguistic perspective, aiming to further improve the level of natural language processing.

Mechanisms of metaphorical formation and interpretation of zoosemisms in Russian dictionaries

The subject of the study is the lexical and semantic features of Russian zoosemisms characterizing the internal signs of a person. The object of the study is Russian zoosemisms, that is, secondary names of persons motivated by animal names (zoonyms). The paper examines the relationship between the primary meanings of animals and their metaphorical zoosemic meanings; the interaction of metaphorical connections and cultural representations in language; and the potential for the development of zoosemisms in the Russian language. The author examines in detail such aspects of the topic as zoosemisms reflecting the internal characteristics of a person and directly related to the zoonyms motivating them; zoosemisms reflecting the internal features of a person and indirectly related to the zoonyms motivating them. Special attention is paid to the analysis of possible sources of zoosemisms, which are indirectly related to the zoonyms motivating them, as well as their stability in the psychological state of native Russian speakers. The following methods are used in the study: descriptive, component analysis, comparative analysis, as well as the method of continuous sampling of material. The novelty of this work lies in an in-depth analysis of a specific subgroup of zoosemisms; identification of various connections between zoonyms and zoosemisms motivated by them; as well as in highlighting the special role of zoosemisms in the linguistic picture of the world of Russian speakers. The results of the study confirm the complexity and diversity of the connections between zoonyms and the zoosemisms motivated by them, many of which are directly related to the cultural, historical and phraseological aspects of the Russian language. The zoosemisms ram, gad, beetle, fox, turkey exist as stronger cultural elements, and are steadily present in the minds of native speakers of the Russian language. The zoosemisms sparrow, goose, animal, dog, creature, chicken are in the status of dynamic development. The source of zoosemisms can be phraseologically related meanings of the corresponding animal (zoosemisms goat, sheep, donkey, rooster); metaphorical meanings of the corresponding masculine animal (zoosemisms gadina, fox/fox, donkey/donkey, bitch); metaphorical meanings associated with the species or family of the corresponding animal (zoosemisms barbosa, tigress, shiloh tail). This analysis enriches the understanding of the mechanisms of metaphor formation in the Russian language and can serve as a basis for further linguistic research, as well as methods of teaching Russian to foreign students.

Emotion language use in narratives of the 9/11 attacks predicts long-term memory.

Despite considerable cognitive neuroscience research demonstrating that emotions can influence the encoding and consolidation of memory, research has failed to demonstrate a relationship between self-reported ratings of emotions collected soon after a traumatic event and memory for the event over time. This secondary analysis of data from a multisite longitudinal study of memories of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, asked the question of whether emotional language use could predict memory over time. In the 2 weeks following the 9/11 attacks, participants (N = 691; Mage = 36.8; 72% identifying as male; 76% identifying as white) wrote narratives about how they learned of the attacks and the impact of the attacks on them. Language features of these narratives were extracted using the Linguistic Inquiry Word Count program and used to predict three types of memory: (a) event memory accuracy, (b) flashbulb memory consistency, and (c) emotion memory consistency. These outcomes were assessed at the time of writing, 1, 3, and 10 years after the 9/11 attacks. Results of linear mixed-effects models indicate that greater use of negative emotion words in narratives predicts better event memory accuracy 3 and 10 years after the attacks and worse flashbulb memory consistency 10 years after the attacks. However, emotion word use does not predict emotion memory consistency across time. We also examine whether other exploratory linguistic predictors are associated with memory over time. These findings suggest that written language may serve as a potential early indicator of memory over time. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

A Corpus-Based Study on Orthographic Errors of Russian Heritage Learners and Their Implications for Linguistic Research and Language Teaching

The challenges faced by heritage language (HL) learners in mastering spelling and orthography are well-documented. Despite these documented difficulties, this aspect of HL linguistic knowledge has received limited attention from HL researchers. Beyond instructional implications, the study of spelling and orthography in HL speakers holds significance to building a finer understanding of the nature of heritage languages, since the development of orthographic skills is intricately linked to the knowledge of phonology and morphology as well as to metalinguistic awareness in these two areas. The study presented in this paper attempts to contribute to this area of research by turning its attention to orthographic skills of Russian heritage learners with English as their dominant language. The corpus-based research presented here categorizes orthographic errors in adjectival endings in hand-written essays produced by college-age HL learners of Russian of various writing proficiency levels and attempts to provide preliminary explanations for the source of these errors. While this paper is exploratory in nature and limited in scope by focusing only on adjectival endings, our results emphasize the need for further exploration in this underrepresented area to enhance our understanding of heritage language development and improve instructional strategies.

It's not a lie … If you believe it: Narrative analysis of autobiographical memories reveals over-confidence disposition in patients who confabulate

Humans perceive their personal memories as fundamentally true, and although memory is prone to inaccuracies, flagrant memory errors are rare. Some patients with damage to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) recall and act upon patently erroneous memories (spontaneous confabulations). Clinical observations suggest these memories carry a strong sense of confidence, a function ascribed to vmPFC in studies of memory and decision making. However, most studies of the underlying mechanisms of memory overconfidence do not directly probe personal recollections and resort instead to laboratory-based tasks and contrived rating scales. We analyzed naturalistic word use of patients with focal vmPFC damage (N = 18) and matched healthy controls (N = 23) while they recalled autobiographical memories using the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) method. We found that patients with spontaneous confabulation (N = 7) tended to over-use words related to the categories of ‘certainty’ and of ‘swearwords’ compared to both non-confabulating vmPFC patients (N = 11) and control participants. Certainty related expressions among confabulating patients were at normal levels during erroneous memories and were over-expressed during accurate memories, contrary to our predictions. We found no elevation in expressions of affect (positive or negative), temporality or drive as would be predicted by some models of confabulation. Thus, erroneous memories may be associated with subjectively lower certainty, but still exceed patients' report criterion because of a global proclivity for overconfidence. This may be compounded by disinhibition reflected by elevated use of swearwords. These findings demonstrate that analysis of naturalistic expressions of memory content can illuminate global meta-mnemonic contributions to memory accuracy complementing indirect laboratory-based correlates of behavior. Memory accuracy is the result of complex interactions among multiple meta-mnemonic processes such as monitoring, report criteria, and control processes which may be shared across decision-making domains.

Linguistic Forensic Analysis On Car Rental Agreement At Private Car Rental Agency

Linguistic forensics can be seen as an applied linguistic science because forensic linguistics uses the application of language analysis that can include phonetics, phonology, lexigramatika, semantic discourse, and other linguistic elements for the benefit of legal processes. In its increasingly dynamic development, language analysis in forensic linguistics has a unique dimension that requires special study. This research aims to discuss aspects in the dimension of language analysis used for forensic linguistics with the main variety of writing. The discussion of the variety is associated with the language used in the lease agreement as well as the context implied in it. The discussion is also enriched with references to several studies to display the potential that can be explored more deeply. The method used in this study is the qualitative descriptive method because this research focuses on the dimensions of language analysis that are typical in forensic linguistics i.e. comparative dimension, differentiator, and gauge. It is expected that this article can contribute insight into the development of forensic linguistics research.

English Lexical Borrowing in Filipino: Morphophonological Adaptation of English Lexemes and Loanwords

English has profoundly influenced the Philippine language through the assimilation of source language words into the recipient language. This linguistic exchange, influenced by historical and cultural contacts, has resulted in a notable transformation of linguistic aspects in the Philippines. Over time, English has seamlessly been incorporated into the Filipino language, highlighting a notable process of linguistic exchange. This study specifically delved into the morphological and phonological adaptations of English loanwords in Filipino, examining nuances and shifts in linguistic structure and meaning during the borrowing process through purposive sampling. Qualitative research methods and content analysis were employed, focusing on loanwords extracted from Bob Ong’s novels as a linguistic corpus, delving into the process of incorporating English loanwords into the Filipino language, exploring how this integration instigates a transformation to align with the grammatical and linguistic structure of the target language, and revealing notable morphophonological adaptations and semantic shifts that occur during the borrowing process. Inflections of English lexemes, complemented with Filipino morphemes, were observed, along with modifications to phonological rules, phonotactic constraints, morphemes, and shifts in semantic meaning. The analysis revealed an overall change in the morphophonological structure of phrases and sentences within the corpus. This research underscores the impact of cultural and contextual factors on the adaptation of English loanwords into Filipino, emphasizing specific patterns or structures in the vocabulary borrowing process tailored to the target language. This study contributes valuable insights for linguistic researchers, educators, and language enthusiasts interested in tracing language development and evolution through borrowing and adaptation.

Actual Problems of Cognitive Linguistics at the Present Stage

This article is devoted to the study of the historical and scientific prerequisites for the formation of a young, developing, and at the same time controversial and controversial scientific branch of linguistics - cognitive linguistics. The goals, object and subject of research in this field of knowledge are determined by theoretical and methodological principles that are formed on the basis of the cognitive-oriented work of Kazakh and foreign linguists. The continuation of the research traditions of cognitive linguistics, which is gaining popularity among Kazakh researchers, is noted. The theoretical and scientific basis of the research are such linguistic areas as frame and conceptual semantics, prototypical semantics, the theory of relevance (or linguistic emphasis), the theory of cognitive models and cognitive metaphor, the theory of mental spaces. Special attention is paid to the problems of the English language in comparison with other language groups, which creates difficulties in linguists relying on traditional approaches to the study of the language system. The identified specific features in the use of English prepositions, modal verbs, the use of participles, the category of voice, tense, aspect, mood, as well as some difficulties in coordinating tenses lead researchers to the need to use linguo-cognitive methods of cognition. The establishment of a close and complex relationship between language and the process of thinking, cognition is accepted as an evidence-based advantage of the study. The data obtained as a result of the analysis are based on logical, deductive, comparative linguistic research methods. The tools used to assess the current problems of modern cognitive linguistics can be of applied significance and be used in international scientific communities to improve approaches to language learning. The scientific and practical significance of this study lies in the search for possible ways and implementation of identification opportunities, as well as a comprehensive study of the most pressing problems, reflecting the urgent need for further development of this scientific field.

Linguistic and Extralinguistic Factors of Brand Name Formation in Kazakhstan

The current research considers the basics of the formation of brand names from linguistic and extralinguistic aspects. The material of the study was the brand names of Kazakh manufacturers. The interpretation of the term brand as an object of linguistic research is presented, the functions of brand names as a type of commercial nomination are identified and considered as nominative, informative, differentiating, aesthetic, influential and attractive. At the same time, special attention is paid to the types of brand names: by structure, by degree of expression, by origin, by degree of formality and by degree of motivation. The analysis of lexical material made it possible to differentiate linguistic factors that have a decisive influence on the process of brand name formation, including phonetic, graphic, lexical, stylistic, semantic and morphological aspects. Among the extra-linguistic factors, the cultural context, competitive environment, target audience, features of the national character, purpose and pragmatics were identified. The methods of name formation were studied, among which the most frequent were nomination according to the anthropological criterion, as well as the use of Kazakh vocabulary, neologisms and foreign words. The analysis and interpretation of the factual material from the sociolinguistic aspect made it possible to identify language units that represent the processes that take place in modern society: the revival of public interest in national culture and language, the strengthening of the position of the state language and the involvement of Kazakhstani society in the processes of globalization.

A Contrastive Analysis of Rhetorical Structures of English and Vietnamese Linguistic Research Articles

A Contrastive Analysis of Rhetorical Structures of English and Vietnamese Linguistic Research Articles

Who’s Really Got the Right Moves? Analyzing Recommendations for Writing American Judicial Opinions

There is little linguistic research on the structure of judicial opinions from a discourse analysis perspective. There are, however, many professional resources about writing judicial opinions. This paper contributes to genre theory and linguistics of languages for specific purposes by proposing a role for professional writing advice. We also construct a typology of macrostructures proposed by professionals and compare them to the move structure of authentic judicial opinions. Our results show that, in terms of large discourse units, professional resources and move analysis seem to converge. Professional resources, however, do not describe the variation that may be observed in authentic documents. In this way, corpora of professional advice may contribute to a deeper understanding of how a discourse community represents its own genres.

Tracking collective emotions in 16 countries during COVID-19: a novel methodology for identifying major emotional events using Twitter.

Using messages posted on Twitter, this study develops a new approach to estimating collective emotions (CEs) within countries. It applies time series methodology to develop and demonstrate a novel application of CEs to identify emotional events that are significant at the societal level. The study analyzes over 200 million words from over 10 million Twitter messages posted in 16 countries during the first 120 days of the COVID-19 pandemic. Daily levels of collective anxiety and positive emotions were estimated using Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count's (LIWC) psychologically validated lexicon. The time series estimates of the two collective emotions were analyzed for structural breaks, which mark a significant change in a series due to an external shock. External shocks to collective emotions come from events that are of shared emotional relevance, and this study develops a new approach to identifying them. In the COVID-19 Twitter posts used in the study, analysis of structural breaks showed that in all 16 countries, a reduction in collective anxiety and an increase in positive emotions followed the WHO's declaration of COVID-19 as a global pandemic. Announcements of economic support packages and social restrictions also had similar impacts in some countries. This indicates that the reduction of uncertainty around the evolving COVID-19 situation had a positive emotional impact on people in all the countries in the study. The study contributes to the field of CEs and applied research in collective psychological phenomena.

Stance expressions in applied linguistics research articles: A corpus-based contrastive study

Stance, a crucial aspect of academic writing, is complex and vital for both beginner and advanced writers. However, L2 English learners and experienced writers frequently struggle with using stance markers effectively. Currently, there remains a scarcity of research comparing the utilisation of stance markers in applied linguistics research articles between native English professional writers and L1 Indonesian speakers. This study aims to fill this gap by investigating similarities and differences in the deployment of stance markers in applied linguistics research articles by authors with L1 Indonesian and L1 English backgrounds and discussing the educational implications derived from the analysis results. The analysis involves two corpora: the Indonesian academic corpus (IAC), comprising articles authored by L1 Indonesians, and the English academic corpus (EAC), consisting of articles by native English speakers. The study investigates various types of stance markers and their distribution across the corpora, revealing significant differences in their usage. L2 English authors employ more boosters and attitude markers, while L1 English writers use more hedges and self-mentions, with the most notable disparities observed in the usage of self-references. These findings underscore the necessity for educators, particularly within the Indonesian context, to sensitise learners to the discursive norms surrounding the use of stance markers in applied linguistics research articles and provide targeted instruction to enhance English learners’ proficiency in employing stance markers effectively.

Слово о языке и культуре

The article presents the author’s position on the prospects of linguistic research related to the study of the interaction of language with culture, theology, axiology, philosophy and other scientific paradigms. It is shown that the integrative approach makes it possible to comprehend the deep meanings fixed in the culture of the people, their faith and worldview.

The Role of the Motor System in L1 and L2 Action Verb Processing for Chinese Learners of English: Evidence from Mu Rhythm Desynchronization.

The nature of semantic representation has long been a key question in linguistic research. The Embodied Cognition theory challenges the traditional view of language representation, stating that semantic information stems from the sensory-motor cortex, which is activated automatically during semantic processing. However, most of the evidence comes from monolingual studies; it remains unclear whether second-language (L2) comprehension involves different semantic representations or mirrors the pattern seen in first-language (L1) processing. Therefore, the present study investigated the role of the sensory-motor system in language processing via making Electroencephalography (EEG) recordings during the processing of L1 and L2 action verbs. The results showed that L1 (Chinese) action verbs generated higher mu-event-related desynchronization (ERD) than L1 abstract verbs in the early processing stage (250 ms after verb presentation), and the same phenomenon was also observed for L2 (English). The results also indicated that language modulated the processing of action verbs, with L1 action verbs eliciting stronger ERD than L2 action verbs. These results demonstrate that the sensory-motor cortex plays a crucial role in comprehending both L1 and L2 action verbs.

Word association task responses prime associations in subsequent trials.

The word association task has been used extensively in psychological and linguistic research as a way of measuring connections between words in the mental lexicon. Interpretation of word association data has assumed that responses represent the strongest association between cue word and response, but there is evidence that participant behaviour can be affected by task instructions and design. This study investigated whether word association responses can be primed by the participants' own response to the preceding cue-that is, whether the order in which cues are presented alters the responses that are generated. Results showed that the proportion of participants who provide a particular association (e.g., acid-RAIN) is greater when their response to the previous cue in the list is also associated with rain (e.g., parasol-UMBRELLA). The same is not true when the two cues are presented non-consecutively. Word association tasks should be administered such that the order in which cues are presented is random for every participant so as to avoid unintentional contamination of associative strength data.

Data Augmented Graph Neural Networks for Personality Detection

Personality detection is a fundamental task for user psychology research. One of the biggest challenges in personality detection lies in the quantitative limitation of labeled data collected by completing the personality questionnaire, which is very time-consuming and labor-intensive. Most of the existing works are mainly devoted to learning the rich representations of posts based on labeled data. However, they still suffer from the inherent weakness of the amount limitation of labels, which potentially restricts the capability of the model to deal with unseen data. In this paper, we construct a heterogeneous personality graph for each labeled and unlabeled user and develop a novel psycholinguistic augmented graph neural network to detect personality in a semi-supervised manner, namely Semi-PerGCN. Specifically, our model first explores a supervised Personality Graph Neural Network (PGNN) to refine labeled user representation on the heterogeneous graph. For the remaining massive unlabeled users, we utilize the empirical psychological knowledge of the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) lexicon for multi-view graph augmentation and perform unsupervised graph consistent constraints on the parameters shared PGNN. During the learning process of finite labeled users, noise-invariant learning on a large scale of unlabeled users is combined to enhance the generalization ability. Extensive experiments on three real-world datasets, Youtube, PAN2015, and MyPersonality demonstrate the effectiveness of our Semi-PerGCN in personality detection, especially in scenarios with limited labeled users.