Native Users Research Articles

Quantifying the quality difference between L1 and L2 essays: A rating procedure with bilingual raters and L1 and L2 benchmark essays

It is the consensus that, as a result of the extra constraints placed on working memory, texts written in a second language (L2) are usually of lower quality than texts written in the first language (L1) by the same writer. However, no method is currently available for quantifying the quality difference between L1 and L2 texts. In the present study, we tested a rating procedure for enabling quality judgments of L1 and L2 texts on a single scale. Two main features define this procedure: 1) raters are bilingual or near native users of both the L1 and L2; 2) ratings are performed with L1 and L2 benchmark texts. Direct comparisons of observed L1 and L2 scores are only warranted if the ratings with L1 and L2 benchmarks are parallel tests and if the ratings are reliable. Results showed that both conditions are met. Effect sizes ( Cohen’s d) indicate that, while score variances are large, there is a relatively large added L2 effect: in the investigated population, L2 text scores were much lower than L1 text scores. The tested rating procedure is a promising method for cross-national comparisons of writing proficiency.

An Experimental Analysis on the Influence of English on Hindi Language Information Retrieval

With the internet growing at an exponential rate the web is increasingly hosting web pages in different languages. Hence it becomes essential for the search engines to be able to search information stored in a specific language. The native users also tend to look for any information on web nowadays. This leads to the need of effective search mechanisms to fulfill native user's needs and provide them information in their native languages. The most preferred language for web information access is English Language but the growth and popularity of internet in countries like China, India, Russia Middle East and south Asia has lead to the importance of IR in Languages other than English. There has been a great increase in Indian content particularly Hindi on the Internet but retrieval of Hindi information is a complex task because of the various reasons such as Phonetic nature of Hindi language, morphology, word synonyms, ambiguous words etc. Influence of regional and foreign languages especially English on Hindi has been observed as a major factor hindering the performance of IR in Hindi language. The objective of the paper and present research is to study the effect of English on Hindi IR. This paper covers the comprehensive analysis of the influence of English Language on Hindi IR and its effect on performance of search engines supporting Hindi Language.

Routes to short-term memory indexing: Lessons from deaf native users of American Sign Language

Models of working memory (WM) have been instrumental in understanding foundational cognitive processes and sources of individual differences. However, current models cannot conclusively explain the consistent group differences between deaf signers and hearing speakers on a number of short-term memory (STM) tasks. Here we take the perspective that these results are not due to a temporal order-processing deficit in deaf individuals, but rather reflect different biases in how different types of memory cues are used to do a given task. We further argue that the main driving force behind the shifts in relative biasing is a consequence of language modality (sign vs. speech) and the processing they afford, and not deafness, per se.

Cortical plasticity for visuospatial processing and object recognition in deaf and hearing signers

Experience-dependent plasticity in deaf participants has been shown in a variety of studies focused on either the dorsal or ventral aspects of the visual system, but both systems have never been investigated in concert. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we investigated functional plasticity for spatial processing (a dorsal visual pathway function) and for object processing (a ventral visual pathway function) concurrently, in the context of differing sensory (auditory deprivation) and language (use of a signed language) experience. During scanning, deaf native users of American Sign Language (ASL), hearing native ASL users, and hearing participants without ASL experience attended to either the spatial arrangement of frames containing objects or the identity of the objects themselves. These two tasks revealed the expected dorsal/ventral dichotomy for spatial versus object processing in all groups. In addition, the object identity matching task contained both face and house stimuli, allowing us to examine category-selectivity in the ventral pathway in all three participant groups. When contrasting the groups we found that deaf signers differed from the two hearing groups in dorsal pathway parietal regions involved in spatial cognition, suggesting sensory experience-driven plasticity. Group differences in the object processing system indicated that responses in the face-selective right lateral fusiform gyrus and anterior superior temporal cortex were sensitive to a combination of altered sensory and language experience, whereas responses in the amygdala were more closely tied to sensory experience. By selectively engaging the dorsal and ventral visual pathways within participants in groups with different sensory and language experiences, we have demonstrated that these experiences affect the function of both of these systems, and that certain changes are more closely tied to sensory experience, while others are driven by the combination of sensory and language experience.

Global Increase in the Consumption of Lignocellulosic Biomass as Energy Source: Necessity for Sustained Optimisation of Agroforestry Technologies

Wood and other nonwood lignocellulosic materials are renewable natural resources useful for different applications based on end users' preference. Their use for generating energy, an application that has not been outmoded, has been noted to be increasing worldwide owing to multifarious reasons. Therefore, there has been the need for studies with results targeted at sustainable ways by which they can be sourced for this and other purposes, as this source of energy is currently still relevant particularly in the developing world. Agroforestry techniques that are based on realisable concepts acceptable to stakeholders have been suggested for this purpose. These age-long techniques are adopted for different purposes with incorporated components partly dependent on native intelligence, indigenous/traditional knowledge, and/or users' perspectives and expected outputs. Since wood and other lignocellulosic biomass can be obtained using these production techniques, optimising their potentials in this regard will be beneficial. This paper was therefore focused on the increasing trend in global wood fuel consumption and studies aimed at contributing to improvement of agroforestry systems as sustainable sources of wood fuel, a renewable source of energy.

Race and native speakers in ELT: parents' perspectives in Hong Kong

English is used as an important means of international and intercultural communication around the world more than ever. Because of its widespread use in the global context, non-native speakers of English around the world outnumber native speakers by far (Crystal, 1997). According to Kachru and Nelson (1996: 79), ‘accepting even cautious estimates, there must be at least three nonnative users of English for every old-country native user’. A similar phenomenon is also observable in the English Language Teaching (ELT) profession, with the vast majority of teachers of English as a second and foreign language in the world being non-native speakers.

Sign language and pantomime production differentially engage frontal and parietal cortices

We investigated the functional organisation of neural systems supporting language production when the primary language articulators are also used for meaningful, but nonlinguistic, expression such as pantomime. Fourteen hearing nonsigners and 10 deaf native users of American Sign Language (ASL) participated in an H2 15O-positron emission tomography study in which they generated action pantomimes or ASL verbs in response to pictures of tools and manipulable objects. For pantomime generation, participants were instructed to “show how you would use the object”. For verb generation, signers were asked to “generate a verb related to the object”. The objects for this condition were selected to elicit handling verbs that resemble pantomime (e.g., TO-HAMMER, hand configuration and movement mimic the act of hammering) and nonhandling verbs that do not (e.g., POUR-SYRUP, produced with a “Y” handshape). For the baseline task, participants viewed pictures of manipulable objects and an occasional nonmanipulable object and decided whether the objects could be handled, gesturing “yes” (thumbs up) or “no” (hand wave). Relative to baseline, generation of ASL verbs engaged left inferior frontal cortex, but when nonsigners produced pantomimes for the same objects, no frontal activation was observed. Both groups recruited left parietal cortex during pantomime production. However, for deaf signers the activation was more extensive and bilateral, which may reflect a more complex and integrated neural representation of hand actions. We conclude that the production of pantomime vs. ASL verbs (even those that resemble pantomime) engages partially segregated neural systems that support praxic vs. linguistic functions.

Mobile application development

Web apps are cheaper to develop and deploy than native apps, but can they match the native user experience?

Online databases and the research experience for university students with print disabilities

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to present findings of a study which examined the searching experience of university students with a print disability and their use of screen reading software to navigate three proprietary databases.Design/methodology/approachParticipants completed a series of tasks in three different online databases using their screen‐reading software. Screen‐recording software provided video and audio documentation of the process. Survey data were collected pre‐ and post‐study as well as after each database search session.FindingsThe paper provides insights on the information‐seeking behavior of students with print disabilities as well as the barriers encountered while navigating online databases using screen‐reading software.Research limitations/implicationsThe study focuses only on a small sample of university students with print disabilities and therefore lacks a control group of non‐print‐disabled students against which the results could be measured.Practical implicationsDatabase vendors are aware of the barriers their databases pose for users of screen readers. It is in the best interest of vendors to assist libraries in promoting the accessible features that already exist in their databases. Libraries can assist students by providing database instruction tailored to users of screen readers and by assisting database vendors in usability feedback and in marketing options.Originality/valueParticipants consisted of students with learning, visual and mobility disabilities and who were native users of screen‐reading software. There is a lack of research on the intersection of databases design and its impacts on the information literacy skills of students with print disabilities. This paper provides some insights on the first step in the information‐seeking process (gathering information) by students with a print disability and the barriers encountered.

Conceptual Representation of Actions in Sign Language

The idea that knowledge of events entails a universal spatial component, that is conceiving agents left of patients, was put to test by investigating native users of German sign language and native users of spoken German. Participants heard or saw event descriptions and had to illustrate the meaning of these events by means of drawing or arranging toys. Two types of verbs were tested, differing in the way they are signed. Verbs with a horizontal transient are typically signed with a left-to-right directionality, from the addressee's point of view. In contrast, verbs with sagittal transients display transitions moving toward or away from speaker. Signers showed a direct mapping preference for verbs with horizontal transients, by putting agents at the same position in space as in the signed message (i.e., mirroring signing space). No such effect was found for verbs with sagittal transients. In all, the data fit with the idea that interpretations of signed or spoken languages are modulated by task and culture as well as language-related factors and constraints.

Speaking Sovereignty and Communicating Change: Rhetorical Sovereignty and the Inaugural Exhibits at the NMAI

Speaking Sovereignty and Communicating Change:Rhetorical Sovereignty and the Inaugural Exhibits at the NMAI Lisa King (bio) The National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) has attracted a great deal of attention from museum visitors and scholars alike since its opening in 2004, and with that attention has come a multitude of critiques. From the initial reviewers from major newspapers who criticized the museum for its perceived lack of scholarship and structure, to Native critics who worried that the exhibits lacked enough (or the most appropriate) historical context, from reviewers who praised the example set by the NMAI in its collaborative model, to Native visitors who found a great deal of satisfaction in seeing their stories told, reactions to the NMAI have run the gamut.1 What is generally recognized among scholars is that the NMAI provides a unique model for museum practice and that never before has the Smithsonian been willing to collaborate on this scale with Native peoples. As such, the NMAI offers one of the most public platforms for Native peoples to address an audience of non-Native visitors. Using Beverly Singer's term "cultural sovereignty," Amanda J. Cobb asserts the extraordinary Native influence on the site, in that "every aspect of the museum, including its very purpose and function, had to be filtered through Native core cultural values and adapted accordingly. . . . [In] the case of the NMAI, that means integrating the old ways and core cultural values and traditions into the very concept of what a museum is and can be."2 The recognition of cultural sovereignty is arguably one of the main functions, if not the primary function, of the NMAI. However, the act of communicating cultural sovereignty in a museum involves more than simply asserting it. The NMAI is situated in the heart of the US capital and the Smithsonian Institution, and, given [End Page 75] this location, it must simultaneously navigate the diverse audiences that visit and the influence of the "museum" as an institutionalized communicative structure. Tribally owned and operated museums and cultural centers are able to fully prioritize their Native audiences in whatever way the local tribal community sees fit; conversely, the NMAI is largely obligated to reflect the Smithsonian's values and work with the majority non-Native audience. The NMAI is thus a balancing act that works in a weighted framework between asserting the sovereignty of the Native audiences and saying something so foreign that a non-Native audience does not understand. Rhetoricians generally acknowledge the advantage of identifying with one's audience to build one's ethos, but Ernest Stromberg points out that the particular issue for Native peoples using identification as a rhetorical tool is "to bridge communication divisions while maintaining an insistence of difference."3 Likewise, even the communicative framework itself can pose a problem. As Simon Ortiz has said of the English language in general, Native users of adapted colonial languages must always consciously work to avoid accidentally speaking what they do not mean through a language that carries colonial baggage.4 I would argue that the same applies to the communication that takes place within museums. The great advantage to adapting museum structures to Native uses is that those structures are a far-reaching communicative venue with a wide audience; yet the problem with the same is that the museum communicative structure and its audiences already have expectations of Native peoples and what museum exhibits should say. I argue in this article that if the NMAI wishes to make a communicable assertion of cultural sovereignty that avoids speaking something not intended to its audiences, then the very act of communication—the rhetorical frame itself—must be examined. This is not to argue for pandering to non-Native audiences; as Cobb writes, "To do so would be tantamount to calling the entire project—a project so significant to cultural sovereignty and continuance—a failure."5 But in order to learn from, refine, and strengthen this highly rhetorical and sovereign endeavor, the NMAI bears reexamination in those terms. With this in mind, I use Scott Richard Lyons's sense of "rhetorical sovereignty" to analyze the NMAI's three inaugural exhibits in order to reveal in sharper...

Neural responses to meaningless pseudosigns: Evidence for sign-based phonetic processing in superior temporal cortex

To identify neural regions that automatically respond to linguistically structured, but meaningless manual gestures, 14 deaf native users of American Sign Language (ASL) and 14 hearing non-signers passively viewed pseudosigns (possible but non-existent ASL signs) and non-iconic ASL signs, in addition to a fixation baseline. For the contrast between pseudosigns and baseline, greater activation was observed in left posterior superior temporal sulcus (STS), but not in left inferior frontal gyrus (BA 44/45), for deaf signers compared to hearing non-signers, based on VOI analyses. We hypothesize that left STS is more engaged for signers because this region becomes tuned to human body movements that conform the phonological constraints of sign language. For deaf signers, the contrast between pseudosigns and known ASL signs revealed increased activation for pseudosigns in left posterior superior temporal gyrus (STG) and in left inferior frontal cortex, but no regions were found to be more engaged for known signs than for pseudosigns. This contrast revealed no significant differences in activation for hearing non-signers. We hypothesize that left STG is involved in recognizing linguistic phonetic units within a dynamic visual or auditory signal, such that less familiar structural combinations produce increased neural activation in this region for both pseudosigns and pseudowords.

The formation of the perceptual vowel space in monolinguals and simultaneous bilinguals: Insights from a model.

Recent reports on perception and production of speech segments in simultaneous bilinguals, who acquired both of their languages at the same time‐frame (from birth), suggest that they do not always exhibit abilities similar to those of the native monolinguals of the same languages [i.e., Guion (2003); Molnar et al. (2009); Sundara and Polka (2008)] despite the fact that simultaneous bilinguals are native users of both of their languages as well. As opposed to the second language users, who often assimilate the acoustically similar non‐native phonetic categories to their native ones, simultaneous bilinguals rather tend to dissimilate the phonetically similar sounds that occur across both languages. In order to understand the mechanism underlying the phonemic category formation of simultaneous bilingual language users across their two languages, an unsupervised formation of the phonetic perceptual space of English‐French bilinguals was modeled by training self‐organizing maps (SOMs) with vowels from both languages at the same time. The formation of phonetic categories in monolinguals by training SOMs with vowels from French or English only was modeled as well. Differences in the perception of speech segments in the bilingual SOMs with respect to the monolingual SOMs will be discussed and compared to experimental findings.

Modelo de apropriação de tecnologia: caso da indústria de cerâmica vermelha

O ritmo acelerado das inovações tecnológicas, nos últimos anos, tem causado impacto social, político, cultural, ecológico e econômico nas nações. Nos anos 1980/1990, uma comissão da ONU teve a responsabilidade de levantar os problemas que o Homem teria nas décadas vindouras, o que subsidiou a Conferência das Nações Unidas sobre Meio Ambiente e Desenvolvimento - ECO-1992. Neste encontro, 179 países assinaram uma agenda de compromissos para o século XXI, a Agenda XXI, e apresentaram a proposta de ecoeficiência para auxiliar as empresas no planejamento ambiental, abordando uma nova dimensão de competitividade: produzir com eficiência, utilizando menos insumos e gerando menos rejeitos. Além desta necessidade de conservação ambiental, o ser humano está exigindo que as empresas se apropriem das altas tecnologias - high tech - existentes em outros países. Contudo, dependendo do nível de desenvolvimento dos países, os empresários devem ter o cuidado para que os nativos usuários estejam preparados para absorver estas inovações. Este trabalho apresenta um modelo que investiga os caminhos necessários à apropriação de tecnologia e define uma metodologia de cálculo do nível tecnológico nas tomadas de decisão quanto à apropriação de inovação. O estudo de caso aplicado é da apropriação da tecnologia alemã de fabricação de tijolos estruturais de cerâmica vermelha de alta porosidade no Brasil. São identificadas lacunas - gaps - existentes entre a expectativa do cliente e a sua percepção em relação ao produto ofertado; estas lacunas delineiam o perfil tecnológico do produto. A experiência testa que, na Alemanha, o desenvolvimento da indústria cerâmica ocorreu pautado em base de sustentabilidade, enquanto, no Brasil, tal desenvolvimento ainda é tímido, se forem considerados os requisitos ambientais, principalmente no que diz respeito à equidade entre gerações quanto à eficiência energética. O teste do modelo demonstra que o processo de apropriação de inovação nas organizações deve ser implantado a partir de um processo de planejamento estratégico, que considere os ciclos de vida de tecnologia e futuras inovações, inferindo desta forma que a modelagem proposta auxilia o empresário quanto à apropriação de inovações tecnológicas de um ambiente sustentável.

Postscript: Gallaudet Protests of 2006 and the Myths of In/Exclusion

ON OCTOBER 13, 2006, the Washington, D. C, Metropolitan Police Department arrested 133 Gallaudet University students, staff, and alumni, the largest number of university arrests in the United States since the 1960s. The arrests occurred amid weeks of building and campus lockdowns, hunger strikes, a sprawling tent city, rallies, and a two thousand-person march to the Capitol. At a time when many university faculty across the nation lament apathy on campus, Gallaudet University students orchestrated a massive protest that garnered national media attention and forced the Board of Trustees to meet their demand that the president-designate be removed before taking office. What could possibly have sparked such widespread activism? The very causes of the protest were themselves a principle site of vigorous debate. Unlike the 1988 President Now (DPN) movement, which rallied behind the well-defined issue of selecting a deaf president for a deaf university, the 2006 protests were far more complicated and overdetermined. The Gallaudet Protest of 2006 could only be fully explained through a feature-length documentary film or booklength analysis with writers from all perspectives engaged in a critical collaboration with the issues. Such a volume would be able to lay out the escalation of events from the initial protests in May to the campus lockdown in October and the Board's capitulation. Such a volume would also describe the relevance of the protest in this particular historical moment. What do the protests say about political fife in 2006 and beyond? While it is still early to define the legacy of the 2006 protests, they do clearly dramatize issues simmering throughout the pages of Open Your Eyes. In fact, many of the contributors to this volume were deeply involved in the protest - on both sides. Some were members (and even president) of the Board of Trustees, while others were Gallaudet faculty members who played significant roles in the coalition of protesters, the Faculty Student Staff and Alumni (FSSA) coalition. What's more, the figure at the center of the controversy, then-Provost Jane Fernandes, provided financial support for, and participated in, the Studies Think Tank that gave rise to this volume. Given that many of the debates and issues in this volume were dramatized before a national authence when the manuscript had already been delivered to the publisher, it seems only fitting that a postscript be added - not to advocate for one side or the other, not to delve into the minutiae of this or that event, but to take a wide-angle lens on the protest, to place it in a historical, cultural, and political context. One of the most striking and relevant issues is the widespread disagreement on the very reasons for protest in the first place. The University administration asserted that the protest erupted out of a deep cultural anxiety about radical changes wrought by medical and technological advances, such as cochlear implants, that offer deaf people opportunities to become immersed into the hearing world rather than in the separate culture revolving around American Sign Language (ASL). Dr. Jane Fernandes, who is deaf though she grew up speaking and did not learn ASL until the age of twenty-three, symbolized a future that her critics were resisting. According to this fine of reasoning she was not culturally Deaf enough to be the public face of Gallaudet University. Protesters denied these claims, citing the fact that 82 percent of the faculty asked for the president-designate 's resignation or removal from office, which is especially significant given the fact that only 3 8 percent of the faculty are deaf, out of which only a small portion are native users of ASL. Instead, the protesters' grievances included a long list of concerns: the lack of diversity among the finalists, the Board of Trustees' lack of responsiveness to students of color, the persistence of audism on campus, and the appearance of an unfair search process that led to the appointment of a widely unpopular, internal candidate. …

Literary Usage in English as a Second Language in Nigeria: A Study ofIcheokuandMasquerade

This paper studies the challenges involved in the nonlit-eral use of English in nonnative settings as exemplified and parodied in two Nigerian mass-media comedies, Icheoku and Masquerade . It draws attention, first to the nonstandardness observed in the use of English idiomatic expressions, tropes, maxims, and African proverbs, and second, to the problems involved in comprehending and interpreting the contextual imports of these metaphorical uses by incompetent (but pre-tentious) users of English in Nigeria and probably other soci-eties in which English is a second language. It underlines the fact that literary use of language in nonnative settings in everyday communication, either among nonnative speakers of English or between native users and nonnative users of English, is often fraught with misunderstanding, difficulty in communication, and dislocation of the structure of figura-tive expressions, either out of ignorance of the structure and meaning of the expressions, or out of sheer linguistic audacity.

Brain systems mediating semantic and syntactic processing in deaf native signers: Biological invariance and modality specificity

Studies of written and spoken language suggest that nonidentical brain networks support semantic and syntactic processing. Event-related brain potential (ERP) studies of spoken and written languages show that semantic anomalies elicit a posterior bilateral N400, whereas syntactic anomalies elicit a left anterior negativity, followed by a broadly distributed late positivity. The present study assessed whether these ERP indicators index the activity of language systems specific for the processing of aural-oral language or if they index neural systems underlying any natural language, including sign language. The syntax of a signed language is mediated through space. Thus the question arises of whether the comprehension of a signed language requires neural systems specific for this kind of code. Deaf native users of American Sign Language (ASL) were presented signed sentences that were either correct or that contained either a semantic or a syntactic error (1 of 2 types of verb agreement errors). ASL sentences were presented at the natural rate of signing, while the electroencephalogram was recorded. As predicted on the basis of earlier studies, an N400 was elicited by semantic violations. In addition, signed syntactic violations elicited an early frontal negativity and a later posterior positivity. Crucially, the distribution of the anterior negativity varied as a function of the type of syntactic violation, suggesting a unique involvement of spatial processing in signed syntax. Together, these findings suggest that biological constraints and experience shape the development of neural systems important for language.

Inmigración y salud: necesidades y utilización de los servicios de atención primaria por parte de la población inmigrante en la región sanitaria Girona

At the end of 1998, foreign population in Spain supposed a 1.60% of the total population. Nowadays, this percentage rises at 13.01%. This change in the population socio-demographic structure means an alteration of the use of public services in our country. For this reason, this paper aims to analyze, for the Health Region Girona (RSG), the attended morbidity, the needs and the uses of primary health care services by immigrant population, compared with native users considering sex, age, ethnicity and sociodemographic conditions. The data on morbidity and on health care services utilization comes from medical records of the Catalan Health Institute (ICS); socio-economic information comes from a questionnaire administered to a sample of 645 users of primary health care services selected, using a non proportional stratified sampling method, from a previous population identification process. Data was analyzed with complex samples module of SPSSv15, through non-parametric and parametric contrasts. The results show an immigrant population healthier than the native (50.1% of visits compared to 61.2%, 50% of drug consumption versus 66.7% and 29.6% of chronic disorders versus 51.4%) although they persist in worst socio-economic conditions (9.4% unemployed compared to 5.6%, 38% are illiterate compared to 17.4%, or 53.5% of homes in rent versus 15%). Adjusting by these variables, frequentation rates do not differ by patients origin. Realized contrasts allow affirming that are, mainly, these socio-demographic conditions, and not uniquely the origin of the patient, those that determine the population needs and the population uses of health care services.

Co-speech gesture in bimodal bilinguals

The effects of knowledge of sign language on co-speech gesture were investigated by comparing the spontaneous gestures of bimodal bilinguals (native users of American Sign Language and English; n=13) and non-signing native English speakers (n=12). Each participant viewed and re-told the Canary Row cartoon to a non-signer whom they did not know. Nine of the thirteen bimodal bilinguals produced at least one ASL sign, which we hypothesise resulted from a failure to inhibit ASL. Compared with non-signers, bimodal bilinguals produced more iconic gestures, fewer beat gestures, and more gestures from a character viewpoint. The gestures of bimodal bilinguals also exhibited a greater variety of handshape types and more frequent use of unmarked handshapes. We hypothesise that these semantic and form differences arise from an interaction between the ASL language production system and the co-speech gesture system.

Morphology of the Insula in Relation to Hearing Status and Sign Language Experience

We investigated whether auditory deprivation and/or sign language exposure during development alters the macroscopic neuroanatomy of the human insula. Volumetric analyses were based on MRI data from 25 congenitally deaf subjects who were native users of American Sign Language (ASL), 25 hearing subjects with no knowledge of ASL, and 16 hearing subjects who grew up in deaf families and were native ASL signers. Significant variation in insula volume was associated with both hearing status and sign language experience. Compared with both hearing groups, deaf subjects exhibited a significant increase in the amount of gray matter in the left posterior insular lobule, which we hypothesize may be related to the dependence on lip-reading and articulatory-based (rather than auditory-based) representations of speech for deaf individuals. Both deaf and hearing signers exhibited an increased volume of white matter in the right insula compared with hearing nonsigners. We hypothesize that the distinct morphology of the right insula for ASL signers may arise from enhanced connectivity resulting from an increased reliance on cross-modal sensory integration in sign language compared with spoken language.