Native Speakers Of Brazilian Portuguese Research Articles

As diferenças entre gênero gramatical e gênero semântico na recuperação de antecedentes pronominais em Português Brasileiro

A correferência é uma dependência sintática em que pronomes são ligados a referentes mencionados previamente. O objetivo deste trabalho é fornecer mais informações sobre como os antecedentes pronominais são recuperados na memória, e, mais precisamente, esclarecer o papel das pistas de gênero na recuperação de antecedentes pronominais em português brasileiro, dado que seus falantes estão costumados a depender das pistas de concordância para processar a língua, uma vez que esta possui morfologia visível. Os resultados de dois experimentos de rastreamento ocular realizados com falantes nativos de português brasileiro demonstraram que tanto as restrições estruturais quanto as pistas morfológicas de gênero são igualmente importantes na recuperação dos antecedentes na memória nos estágios iniciais do processamento da correferência. Isto é evidência a favor de que as restrições estruturais não funcionam como um filtro inicial, bloqueando as influências de candidatos a antecedentes estruturalmente inaceitáveis. Além disso, os resultados indicaram que o gênero semântico e o gênero masculino parecem ter um peso maior na memória do que o gênero gramatical e o gênero feminino, já que os candidatos a antecedentes inaceitáveis estruturalmente que carregavam os primeiros tipos de gênero causaram mais efeitos de interferência.

Representação fonológica e percepção de fala: O papel da pausa

Investigamos a percepção de pausas em fronteiras de frase entonacional (IP) no Português Brasileiro (PB) e abordamos a relação entre produção e percepção da fala. Vinte sujeitos adultos, falantes nativos do PB, sem distúrbios de linguagem e sem queixas auditivas, participaram de um teste experimental de identificação de pausa. Usamos estímulos auditivos nos quais a fronteira IP foi marcada por uma combinação de pausa e variação de altura ou apenas variação de altura. Os resultados são os seguintes: (i) quando os estímulos consistiam em uma combinação de pausa com variação de altura no limite IP, as pausas foram identificadas significativamente (ii) quando os estímulos não tinham variação de altura nos limites IP, as pausas não foram identificadas significativamente, (iii) quando somente ocorreu variação de altura, sem produção de silêncio, foram identificadas pausas na fronteira testada. Esses resultados corroboram o argumento de que a percepção de fala não depende inteiramente da recuperação de um padrão acústico e evidencia a importância da representação fonológica para a percepção e organização do estímulo auditivo percebido. Com base nos resultados, argumentamos que a percepção de pausa resultaria da ilusão perceptiva marcada pela combinação de diferentes tipos de informações linguísticas, em nível fonético-acústico e representacional.

Aspectos entoacionais no desenvolvimento da fala infantil da variedade mineira do PB

Neste trabalho, analisamos o padrão entoacional da fala de 3 crianças mineiras, com idades entre 5:9 e 6:8 anos, naturais de Juiz de Fora, falantes de Português Brasileiro (PB), a partir de questionários que simulavam situações conversacionais, nos moldes metodológicos de Frota et al. (2015). O objetivo foi investigar os contornos prosódicos – padrão entoacional, proeminência e ritmo – utilizados por elas e compará-los aos padrões entoacionais de falantes adultos da variedade mineira do PB, descritos no Interactive Atlas of Romance Intonation (PRIETO et al., 2010-2014). Os resultados das análises sugerem que as crianças adquirem os padrões entoacionais de forma gradativa, assim como adquirem os segmentos, as palavras e as estruturas sintáticas da língua.

Native and Non-Native Patterns in Conflict: Lexicon vs. Grammar in Loanword Adaptation in Brazilian Portuguese

English loanwords with /ʌ/ that are part of the Brazilian Portuguese (BP) lexicon are normally produced with [ɐ] (pub: [ˈpɐbɪ]). Although [ɐ] is the closest segment to /ʌ/ in the native inventory, it is highly constrained in BP: it is an allophone of /a/ that can only appear in nasal contexts. This paper investigates whether native speakers of BP generalize to novel loanwords the adaptation pattern of English /ʌ/ that is present in the BP lexicon. Two experiments were conducted, one with real loanwords and one with nonce loanwords. In the Real Loanword Experiment, participants consistently used [ɐ] both in oral (pub) and nasal contexts (funk), as predicted given the patterns in the lexicon. In the Nonce Loanword Experiment, participants used [ɐ] significantly more frequently in nasal contexts – in oral contexts, the most frequent adaptation was [a]. This reveals that speakers employ their native grammar to filter new loanwords: in contexts where [ɐ] is not licensed, they favor the corresponding licensed form. These results suggest that native speakers do not generalize non-native patterns that are present in the lexicon, mirroring what has been observed for the generalization of unnatural patterns in native grammars (e.g., Garcia 2017; Jarosz 2017).

O processamento de phrasal verbs figurativos

Construções fraseológicas, tais como phrasal verbs, podem ser definidas como uma sequência de palavras pré-fabricadas. Phrasal verbs apresentam verbo e partícula os quais podem ter significados literais e figurativos. No presente estudo investigamos o processamento on-line de phrasal verbs figurativos (ex. figure out) e verbos lexicais (ex. understand) por meio do registro do movimento dos olhos. Movimentos oculares de 12 falantes avançados de inglês como L2 (falantes nativos de português brasileiro) foram comparados aos de 12 falantes nativos de inglês durante a leitura de sentenças contendo phrasal verbs figurativos e verbos lexicais em inglês. Os resultados mostram que nas medidas posteriores (Total Reading Time), os falantes de inglês como L2 dispensaram mais esforço cognitivo na leitura de phrasal verbs figurativos do que verbos lexicais, em comparação com falantes nativos de inglês. Esses resultados foram interpretados como evidência de que os falantes de inglês como L2 tentaram analisar cada componente do phrasal verb figurativo (ex. look for), o que desacelerou o processamento. Os resultados são discutidos à luz das teorias sobre o processamento da linguagem figurativa e literal.

Normative nasalance scores in the production of words and syllables for Brazilian Portuguese speakers

ABSTRACTThe objective of this study was to determine normative nasalance scores for non-cleft children, adolescents and adults, native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese, during the production of words and syllables, for cross-linguistic comparisons in populations with and without cleft palate. Nasalance was assessed in 62 individuals, aged 6–10 years (n = 20), 11–17 years (n = 20) and 18–35 years (n = 22), using a nasometer II model 6450 (KayPENTAX), during production of one sequence of nine oral words (pipa, bis, burro, tatu, pilha, cuca, gui, fila, luz) and of sequences of isolated syllables (e.g. pa, pa, pa, pa, pa, pa) composed of plosive, fricative, liquid and nasal consonants with high and low vowels. In order to validate the new nasalance stimuli, nasalance scores for traditional oral and nasal stimuli were also obtained. Differences were analyzed at a significance level of 0.01. Mean nasalance scores (±SD) during the production of the sequence of words were 18 ± 5% (children), 18 ± 7% (adolescents) and 21 ± 5% (adults). Differences between age groups were not significant. During the production of syllables, adults had the highest mean nasalance scores (except for syllable /mi/); significant differences between age groups were observed only for /pa/ ,/sa/ and /la/. Nasalance scores were significantly higher in oral and nasal syllables with high vowels than with low vowels, and in nasal syllables than in oral syllables with high and low vowels. The nasalance scores obtained for the sentences were comparable to previously established norms. In conclusion, the nasalance scores defined for Brazilian Portuguese speakers, in different stimuli, may be adopted as normative values for local and cross-language comparisons in the identification of hypernasality related to conditions such as cleft palate, neurogenic disorders and syndromes.

Preliminary study about the rejection in the Brazilian and the Spanish cultures: external modifiers employed in email and private messages in Facebook

This study is part of a larger research project, aimed at analyzing and comparing rejections within a corpus of emails and private Facebook messages among three groups of informants: natives speakers of Peninsular Spanish, native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese and Brazilian students of Spanish as a foreign language. The partial results presented here correspond to the piloting data of the study, carried out with the informants of the first two groups. Specifically, we provide a taxonomy of external modifiers present in rejections with different degrees of imposition, relational power, and social distance. Likewise, we analyze the use of these modifiers by Brazilian and Spanish native informants.

A aceitabilidade do singular nu pré-verbal em Português Brasileiro

Nossa pesquisa investiga o julgamento de falantes nativos de Português Brasileiro (PB) com relação ao singular nu pré-verbal, dada a proposta de que a aceitabilidade de construções com esse nominal pode melhorar diante de fatores pragmáticos tais como o foco contrastivo. Em uma Tarefa de Julgamento de Aceitabilidade, falantes nativos de PB julgaram sentenças: i) genéricas; ii) com predicados-de-espécie; iii) com predicados-de-estágio. Nossos resultados sugerem que a presença do foco contrastivo pode interferir na aceitabilidade de construções com o singular nu pré-verbal, e que construções com predicados-de-espécie são gramaticais na língua. As sentenças com predicados-de-estágio apresentaram taxas baixas de aceitação.

Effect of proficiency on perception of English nasal stops by native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese

Brazilian Portuguese (BP) does not contrast /m/ and /n/ in coda position, leading to perceptual difficulties with minimal pairs like lime/line in L2 English. This study examined the effect of acoustic-phonetic and semantic enhancements on word recognition in noise for native English (n = 26) and L1 BP/L2 English (n = 21) listeners. They heard 120 high- and low-predictability sentences produced in clear and conversational speaking styles and mixed with speech-shaped noise. They typed the last word ending in either /m/ or /n/. The L2 listeners were separated into high- and low-proficiency (HP and LP) groups based on the perceived accentedness ratings of speech samples they provided. The results showed that native listeners benefited more from semantic than acoustic-phonetic enhancements alone, and the accuracy was highest when both enhancements were combined. The HP L2 listeners recognized more target words overall than the LP group, and their benefit from semantic over acoustic-phonetic enhancements mirrored that of the native listeners. In contrast, LP listeners could not utilize the higher-level semantic information to the same degree in the absence of signal clarity. These findings show that L2 listeners benefited from acoustic-phonetic, semantic, and combined enhancements when recognizing /m/-/n/ coda pairs, but this effect was mediated by proficiency.

Semantic priming effects and lexical access in English as L3

We report an experiment using a picture-naming task within the masked priming paradigm to examine lexical access in English as a third language. Participants were assigned to one of three groups: a control group, consisting of native speakers of English, and two experimental groups, one consisting of speakers of English as L2 and the other consisting of speakers of German as L2 and English as L3. Participants of the two experimental groups were native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese. All participants performed a picture-naming task in English in which pictures were preceded by a masked prime word in the target language (English), in the native language (Brazilian Portuguese) or in the second language (German). The results indicate some interference from the participants’ second language in the production of their third language (English), favoring the view that lexical access of multilinguals is qualitatively different from that of bilinguals and monolinguals.---Article in English. ---DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.22409/gragoata.2018n46a1133

Semantic priming effects and lexical access in English as L3

We report an experiment using a picture-naming task within the masked priming paradigm to examine lexical access in English as a third language. Participants were assigned to one of three groups: a control group, consisting of native speakers of English, and two experimental groups, one consisting of speakers of English as L2 and the other consisting of speakers of German as L2 and English as L3. Participants of the two experimental groups were native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese. All participants performed a picture-naming task in English in which pictures were preceded by a masked prime word in the target language (English), in the native language (Brazilian Portuguese) or in the second language (German). The results indicate some interference from the participants’ second language in the production of their third language (English), favoring the view that lexical access of multilinguals is qualitatively different from that of bilinguals and monolinguals.------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Efeitos de priming semântico e acesso lexical em inglês como L3Reporta-se, neste artigo, os resultados de um experimento que investigou o acesso lexical em inglês como terceira língua por meio de uma tarefa de nomeação de figuras no paradigma de priming mascarado. Os participantes foram organizados em três grupos: um grupo controle, formado por falantes nativos de inglês, e dois grupos experimentais, sendo um formado por falantes de inglês como L2 e o outro, por falantes de inglês como L2 e de alemão como L3. Todos os participantes desempenharam uma tarefa de nomeação de figuras em que estas eram precedidas por palavras prime em inglês (a língua alvo), português brasileiro (a língua nativa), ou alemão (a segunda língua). Os resultados indicam alguma interferência da segunda língua desses participantes na produção da terceira língua e favorecem a visão de que o acesso lexical de multilíngues é qualitativamente diferente daquele de bilíngues e monolíngues.---Artigo em inglês.

The Processing of Grammatical Gender Agreement in Brazilian Portuguese: ERP Evidence in Favor of a Single Route.

The present study used event-related potentials to investigate whether the processing of grammatical gender agreement involving gender regular and irregular forms recruit the same or distinct neurocognitive mechanisms and whether different grammatical gender agreement conditions elicit the same or diverse ERP signals. Native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese read sentences containing congruent and incongruent grammatical gender agreement between a determiner and a regular or an irregular form (condition1) and between a regular or an irregular form and an adjective (condition2). However, in condition 2, trials with incongruent regular forms elicited more positive ongoing waveforms than trial with incongruent irregular forms. We found a biphasic LAN/P600 effect for gender agreement violation involving regular and irregular forms in both conditions. Our findings suggest that gender agreement between determiner and nouns recruits the same neurocognitive mechanisms regardless of the nouns' form and that, depending on the grammatical class of the words involved in gender agreement, differences in ERP signals can emerge.

Performance of Brazilian Portuguese speakers in the Test of Narrative Language (TNL).

Investigate the performance of native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese in the Test of Narrative Language (TNL) and correlate their performance in its oral narration and narrative comprehension subtests. Participants were 140 individuals with typical language development aged 5-0 to 11-11 (years-months) divided according to age group. Statistically significant difference was observed between the 5-year-old group and all the other age groups and between the 6-year-old group and the 8-, 9-, 10- and 11-year-old groups. The 7-year-old group did not differ from the 6- and 8-year-old groups. Half of the 7-year-old group was in 1st grade of Elementary School and the other half was in 2nd grade, which may have contributed to the non-differentiation between this group and its border-age groups. No statistically significant difference was found between groups as of the age of eight years. Positive correlation was observed between performance in the narrative comprehension and oral narration subtests of the TNL in the 5-, 6- and 7-year-old groups, which did not occur for the other age groups. The Test of Narrative Language differentiated the 5-, 6- and 7-year-old groups, but did not differentiate groups as of the age of eight years. No correlation was found between performance in the oral narration and narrative comprehension subtests of the TNL as of the age of eight years, which suggests mastery of both skills from this age.

O ESTUDO DO ADVÉRBIO NAS SENTENÇAS DO PORTUGUÊS BRASILEIRO

A presente pesquisa pretende demonstrar que o posicionamento do advérbio na sentença não é livre, conforme já afirmam alguns autores como Cinque (1999) e Rocha e Lopes (2015). Ancorada na Teoria Gerativa, esta pesquisa postula que o advérbio se posiciona fixamente em posições determinadas, na maioria das vezes. Cinque (1999) demonstra que determinados advérbios se mantêm em posições fixas, pois como são, em algumas circunstâncias, traços de tempo, eles não poderiam ocupar posições à direita em representações arbóreas. Para indicar tempo e aspecto em uma sentença, os advérbios precisam ocupar posições à esquerda nos sintagmas para que ocorram movimentos no momento da derivação. Essa pesquisa, por meio de análise de transcrição de falas reais, analisou e tabulou 548 advérbios presentes em diálogos de falantes nativos do português brasileiro e classificou dezoito tipos de advérbios e suas posições. O corpus foi construído a partir de gravações de aulas de uma escola privada, em Belo Horizonte, e trazido para esta investigação em uma abordagem qualitativa e quantitativa. O trabalho demonstrou que os advérbios, tidos como termos acessórios da oração, podendo aparecer em diversas posições na sentença, nem sempre são livres e que determinados tipos de advérbios só se encontram em posições fixas. Isso nos leva a afirmar que, no momento da derivação da sentença, em nosso módulo mental, de acordo com os pressupostos da Teoria Gerativa, o advérbio ocupa a posição de especificadores de projeções máximas e que cada tipo de advérbio se posiciona em especificadores de sintagmas funcionais já determinados.

Reliability of Hypernasality Rating: Comparison of 3 Different Methods for Perceptual Assessment.

To compare reliability in auditory-perceptual assessment of hypernasality for 3 different methods and to explore the influence of language background. Comparative methodological study. Audio recordings of 5-year-old Swedish-speaking children with repaired cleft lip and palate consisting of 73 stimuli of 9 nonnasal single-word strings in 3 different randomized orders. Four experienced speech-language pathologists (2 native speakers of Brazilian-Portuguese and 2 native speakers of Swedish) participated as listeners. After individual training, each listener performed the hypernasality rating task. Each order of stimuli was analyzed individually using the 2-step, VISOR and Borg centiMax scale methods. Comparison of intra- and inter-rater reliability, and consistency for each method within language of the listener and between listener languages (Swedish and Brazilian-Portuguese). Good to excellent intra-rater reliability was found within each listener for all methods, 2-step: κ = 0.59-0.93; VISOR: intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) = 0.80-0.99; Borg centiMax (cM) scale: ICC = 0.80-1.00. The highest inter-rater reliability was demonstrated for VISOR (ICC = 0.60-0.90) and Borg cM-scale (ICC = 0.40-0.80). High consistency within each method was found with the highest for the Borg cM scale (ICC = 0.89-0.91). There was a significant difference in the ratings between the Swedish and the Brazilian listeners for all methods. The category-ratio scale Borg cM was considered most reliable in the assessment of hypernasality. Language background of Brazilian-Portuguese listeners influenced the perceptual ratings of hypernasality in Swedish speech samples, despite their experience in perceptual assessment of cleft palate speech disorders.

A influência da reflexividade verbal no processamento anáfora se

A pesquisa elaborada neste estudo investiga a reflexividade verbal e seu papel no processamento da anáfora se. No intuito de verificar quais verbos são considerados mais aceitáveis na leitura de sentenças contendo a anáfora se, realizamos um teste offline de julgamento de aceitabilidade com falantes nativos do português brasileiro. Utilizamo-nos da noção de reflexividade proposta por Reinhart e Reuland (1993), os quais predizem que a reflexividade é uma propriedade dos predicados, bem como dos trabalhos de Christiano (1991) e Mello (2008), pois estes estabeleceram uma classificação mais categórica para os verbos com características mais reflexivas, dividindo-os em três níveis: primário – penteou, secundário – sentou, e terciário – acusou, de acordo com o grau de reflexividade. De modo geral, os resultados encontrados evidenciaram que a propriedade da reflexividade pode estar presente tanto na anáfora como no predicado, assim como afirmam Reinhart e Reuland (1993).

Processing of literal phrasal verbs by non-native and native speakers of English: an eye movement study

*O processamento de phrasal verbs literais por falantes não-nativos e nativos de inglês: um estudo do movimento dos olhos*Estudos recentes sobre aprendizagem de phrasal verbs por aprendizes de inglês como segunda língua (L2) ainda apresentam uma lacuna na discussão acerca da natureza do processamento desse tipo de verbo no curso da aprendizagem. O principal objetivo do presente estudo foi investigar o processamento online de phrasal verbs por aprendizes de inglês como L2, de nível avançado, falantes nativos de português brasileiro (PB). Dezesseis voluntários (8 falantes nativos de PB e 8 falantes nativos de inglês) participaram de um experimento em que foi verificado se houve diferenças entre o processamento de phrasal verbs literais e verbos lexicais. Para esta verificação, foi registrado o movimento dos olhos dos participantes enquanto liam sentenças que continham um dos dois tipos de verbos. As medidas de tempo de primeira leitura e tempo total de leitura na região de interesse mostraram que os aprendizes de inglês como L2 dedicaram mais atenção aos phrasal verbs do que aos verbos lexicais, o que interpretamos como evidência de um custo maior no processamento de sentenças com phrasal verbs do que naquelas com verbos lexicais. Os resultados são discutidos à luz de hipóteses sobre o processamento de phrasal verbs.

On the Directionality of Cross-Linguistic Effects in Bidialectal Bilingualism.

This study explores the interpretation of null and overt object pronouns by Brazilian Portuguese (BP) and European Portuguese (EP) bidialectal bilinguals. Object pronouns are a particularly good domain to examine, given that, particularly with respect to null objects, the underlying syntax as well as the semantic and discourse constraints that regulate their distributions in the two varieties are superficially different but inherently similar. We test the extent to which native BP speakers who moved to Portugal in adulthood and have lived there for a considerable time display cross-linguistic influence in either direction. Each subject is tested twice, once in BP mode and once in EP mode, which allows us not only to test if they have acquired the EP target structure but also to test the extent to which acquisition of EP might have consequences for the same domain in BP. Our results show that the high degree of typological proximity between the L1 and the L2 may contribute to L1 attrition and hinder target-like performance (i.e., processing) of L2 properties. We relate the findings to key theoretical questions and debates within the context of the larger field of bilingual studies, particularly with respect to L1 attrition and L2 acquisition.

Verbal Fluency Fruits as a Predictor of Alzheimer’s Disease Progression in Brazilian Portuguese Speakers

Objective: Verbal Fluencies (VF) animals (VFa) and VF fruits (VFf) have previously been described to be similarly effective in discriminating normal participants from patients with Alzheimer disease (AD). Both tasks were less accurate in discriminating AD-stages for unknown reasons. Based on semantic clustering scores in VFa, a literacy depending pattern has been revealed across cultures; however, no previous analysis has been performed for VFf. Methods: Three-hundred-fourteen native Brazilian Portuguese speakers were divided in four groups: a Control Group (CG) and Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI), Mild Alzheimer’s Disease (MAD) and Moderate Alzheimer’s Disease (ModAD) groups. A quantitative (total score - TE) and a qualitative (clusters – Cf) analysis were conducted for VFf and were compared to other cognitive tasks. As no semantic setting was found, a non-arbitrary classification of fruits based on Sub Categorical items (Cf), according to the articulatory point of Brazilian Portuguese was performed. The words were grouped as follows: 1) bilabial, 2) velars, 3) open vowels, 4) closed vowels, 5) lateral dental/ alveolar, 6) dental /alveolar, and 7) labio-dentals. Clustering strategies (Cf) in the AD Groups differed from those of the CG. Cf revealed differences beyond groups depending on which articulatory point was emitted. Results: MCI had a 73% lower chance of attaining an NV than did the CG and with AD groups presented odds ratios of using the Cf /k/, /g/ velars feature 85% lower than those of the CG. Participants who used Cf bilabial had 2.04 times higher VFTE scores than those who did not. Younger subjects had a higher probability to perform better on the task. Participants with >9 years of education had a higher probability of higher performance with respect to the VFf TS. Conclusion: Articulatory deterioration occurred in AD since the early stages. VFf seems to be a suitable task for MCI evaluation.

Perception of height and categorization of Brazilian Portuguese front vowels

ABSTRACT Cross-linguistic typological observations and theoretical models in phonology suggest that certain speech sound distinctions are more complex then others. One such example is the opposition between mid-high and mid-low vowels, usually thought to be more complex than the opposition between high and mid vowels. The present study provides experimental evidence on speech sound perception which supports this notion. Native Brazilian Portuguese speakers performed vowel classification tasks involving either the distinction between the front high mid /e/ and the front high /i/, or the distinction between the front high mid /e/ and the front low mid /ε/ vowel. Measures of response time and discriminability (d') at the vowel category boundaries were obtained. Participants showed significantly slower responses and lower d' values in the "e-ε" as compared to the "i-e" classification task. Results indicate that perceptually distinguishing /e/ from /ı/ requires more processing time and resources, and involves more complex information than distinguishing /e/ from /i/.