Phonological Processing Research Articles

What predicts word reading in Arabic?

Efficient and accurate word reading ability is critical for later reading success. As such, it is important to understand the component skills that underlie strong word reading ability. Although a growing research base points to the importance of phonological processing, morphological processing and orthographic processing for accurate and fluent word reading in Arabic, there are few studies that examine all three areas at one time to better understand their role in word reading. Additionally, it remains unclear whether the contribution of the various processes might differ across the early years when children are learning to read. 1,098 pupils in grades 1-3 participated in this study and took tests for phonological processing, morphological processing, orthographic processing, and word reading accuracy and fluency. According to the findings of regression analyses, the relative contribution of these underlying processes differed according to the method used to test word reading and the student's grade level. Regarding accuracy, several subscales of phonological processing and two measures of orthographic processing accounted for significant differences in word reading accuracy for first graders. For second grade students, nonword repetition, elision, and all three measures of orthographic processing accounted for variance. In third grade, elision and memory for digits, word creation and morpheme identification, and letter/sound identification and orthographic fluency were significant predictors of word reading accuracy. In terms of fluency, two subscales of phonological processing, two measures of orthographic processing, and two measures of morphological processing explained significant differences in word reading fluency for first graders. For second grade students, nonword repetition, elision, RAN-digits, isolation, segmenting and all the measures of orthographic processing and word creation explained unique variance in word reading fluency. In third grade, elision, RAN-letters, RAN-digits and phoneme isolation, all measures of orthographic processing and morphological processing, explained variance in word reading fluency. Implications and future directions in research are discussed.

Modeling Mandarin rhotacization with Recursive Schemes

This paper pursues a novel analysis of Mandarin rhotacization using Sonority Scale and characterizes this phonological process computationally with BOOLEAN MONADIC RECURSIVE SCHEMES (BMRSs, Chandlee & Jardine 2021). Mandarin rhotacization shows an asymmetry between high front vowels (i.e. [i, y] and high back vowels [u] vowels. Diverging from previous phonetics-based accounts to explain this asymmetry (Chao 1968; Duanmu 2007; a. o.), I propose that adjacent segments compete in terms of sonority in order to surface and present a refined, detailed sonority ranking in Mandarin. Finally, the if...then...else syntax in BMRSs elegantly formalizes the sonority competition between segments.

Auditory pseudoword rhyming effects in bilingual children reflect second language proficiency: An ERP study

This study investigated second language (L2-English) phonological processing in 31 Spanish-English bilingual, 6- to 8-year-old schoolchildren in an event-related potential (ERP) auditory pseudoword rhyming paradigm. In addition, associations between ERP effects and L2 proficiency as measured by standardized tests of receptive language and receptive vocabulary were explored. We found a classic posterior ERP rhyming effect that was more widely distributed in children with higher L2 proficiency in group analyses and was larger for children with better L2 proficiency in correlation analyses. In contrast, the amplitude of an early (75–125 ms) auditory positivity was larger in children with lower L2 proficiency. This pattern suggests differential use of early and late auditory/phonological processing resources in the pseudoword rhyme task associated with L2 proficiency, which is consistent with the predictions of the lexical restructuring model in a bilingual context.

Spatiotemporally distributed frontotemporal networks for sentence reading.

Reading a sentence entails integrating the meanings of individual words to infer more complex, higher-order meaning. This highly rapid and complex human behavior is known to engage the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) and middle temporal gyrus (MTG) in the language-dominant hemisphere, yet whether there are distinct contributions of these regions to sentence reading is still unclear. To probe these neural spatiotemporal dynamics, we used direct intracranial recordings to measure neural activity while reading sentences, meaning-deficient Jabberwocky sentences, and lists of words or pseudowords. We isolated two functionally and spatiotemporally distinct frontotemporal networks, each sensitive to distinct aspects of word and sentence composition. The first distributed network engages the IFG and MTG, with IFG activity preceding MTG. Activity in this network ramps up over the duration of a sentence and is reduced or absent during Jabberwocky and word lists, implying its role in the derivation of sentence-level meaning. The second network engages the superior temporal gyrus and the IFG, with temporal responses leading those in frontal lobe, and shows greater activation for each word in a list than those in sentences, suggesting that sentential context enables greater efficiency in the lexical and/or phonological processing of individual words. These adjacent, yet spatiotemporally dissociable neural mechanisms for word- and sentence-level processes shed light on the richly layered semantic networks that enable us to fluently read. These results imply distributed, dynamic computation across the frontotemporal language network rather than a clear dichotomy between the contributions of frontal and temporal structures.

Glottal Stop /?/ Strategy in Adaptation of Malay Loanwords in Bugis Language based on Output-Output Correspondent Analysis

Bugis are one of Malaysia's minority communities. Bugis communities use loanwords as a way of ensuring smooth communication. While the Bugis community tries to absorb all Malay loanwords into the Bugis language, a phonological process prevents the Malay lexicon from being fully absorbed. This process is called the glottal stop /?/. The fieldwork was conducted at two places in Johore state: Pontian and Pasir Gudang. The fieldwork was also conducted in the Selangor state at Pandamaran, Klang. A questionnaire containing a section on the informant's background and a word list was prepared for the interview session with 200 Bugis respondents. By using the Output-Output correspondent in Optimality theory, this study will address some of the emerging issues; Firstly, what is the intent of using glottal stop /?/ strategy in the Bugis language loanwords adaptation? Secondly, what constraints are used in the glottal stop /?/ strategy in the Bugis-language loanwords adaptation using Optimality theory (OT) and OO-Correspondence (OO-Cor). The study shows that there are two main reasons why a glottal stop occurs, firstly, as a syllable closure and secondly, as a consonant substitution. Based on TO and OO-Cor analysis, Malay loanwords must comply with *IDENTICAL LEXICAL constraint of production output in Bugis language. The results of this study have contributed to the development of the Bugis language study from a linguistic point of view using Optimality and Correspondence-OO theory.

Stem configurations, lexical items, and phonological words in Maltese

Maltese is the 'national' language of the people in the sister-islands of Malta and Gozo. Originally Arabic, Maltese vocabulary has been massively expanded by borrowings from Romance (Sicilian/Italian), and more recently English. Influential contributions in (post)generative phonology and Optimality Theory claim that Maltese phonology is based on the interaction of (Palestinian Arabic type) stress assignment with syncope, and cyclic application of rules/constraints. This approach fails in some cases for Arabic Maltese, and is inoperative for borrowed vocabulary. I argue for distributing morphological constituents in three domains. The stem-domain heads a radical base, to which a preformative morph may be incorporated, and inflectional circumfixes. The Lexical-item domain heads the stem-node to which (in)direct pronominal objects may be concatenated. Clitics are adjoined to the phonological-word domain. All exponents are mapped on the linearized segmental tier. Trochaic stems satisfying morpho-lexical constraints are built in a pre-lexical phase. Vocalism is underlyingly specified or assigned by default, including ‘reverse-imāla’. In a lexical phase, OCP and Licensing shape syllabic stem-profiles to satisfy morpho-prosodic constraints. In the post-lexical phase, surface forms are generated by application of phonological processes: stress assignment, vowel length and quality, voice alteration in obstruents. A model of 'Weak CV Phonology', distantly related to Strict CV Phonology, is drawn up. Segmental representations are analyzed in monovalent elements. Maltese has often been presented as a 'mixed' language with two strata of vocabulary and two morphologies: root-and-pattern, non-concatenative for template-bound vocabulary, concatenative for loan-words. I claim that Maltese consistently requires templatic, concatenative and word-based morphology.

Chinese Two-Character Word Orthographic Processing and Adjective-Noun Collocation Comprehension in Sentence Reading.

Reading can be regarded as a combination of lexical decoding and linguistic comprehension (Hoover and Gough in Read Writ Interdiscip J 2:127-160, 1990). In Chinese sentence reading, skilled readers' difficulties in phonological processing significantly enhance the 'wrap-up' effect (Li and Lin in J Deaf Stud Deaf Educ 25(4):505-516, 2020). To examine how orthographic processing in Chinese two-character word recognition might interact with adjective-noun collocation (ANC) comprehension before the wrap-up effect, two experiments were conducted in the same paradigm as used by Li and Lin (J Deaf Stud Deaf Educ 25(4):505-516, 2020). The sentences contained ANCs or semantically inappropriate combinations of adjectives and nouns (nANCs), the adjectives (Experiment 1) or the nouns (Experiment 2) of which were two-character words or corresponding transposed nonwords (T-nonwords). Similar results were obtained in both experiments: difficulties in T-nonword processing and in nANC comprehension collectively lengthened the reading times of the words immediately following. In conclusion, sentence reading likely contains interactions between orthographic processing and linguistic comprehension. As an indication of psycholinguistic significance, skilled readers have to use extra resources to suspend the cognitive vigilance that arises from unexpected demand in lexical decoding, in addition to their main focus of linguistic comprehension.

Accuracy of Naming Error Profiles Elicited From Adaptive Short Forms of the Philadelphia Naming Test.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether a short-form computerized adaptive testing (CAT) version of the Philadelphia Naming Test (PNT) provides error profiles and model-based estimates of semantic and phonological processing that agree with the full test. Twenty-four persons with aphasia took the PNT-CAT and the full version of the PNT (hereinafter referred to as the "full PNT") at least 2 weeks apart. The PNT-CAT proceeded in two stages: (a) the PNT-CAT30, in which 30 items were selected to match the evolving ability estimate with the goal of producing a 50% error rate, and (b) the PNT-CAT60, in which an additional 30 items were selected to produce a 75% error rate. Agreement was evaluated in terms of the root-mean-square deviation of the response-type proportions and, for individual response types, in terms of agreement coefficients and bias. We also evaluated agreement and bias for estimates of semantic and phonological processing derived from the semantic-phonological interactive two-step model (SP model) of word production. The results suggested that agreement was poorest for semantic, formal, mixed, and unrelated errors, all of which were underestimated by the short forms. Better agreement was observed for correct and nonword responses. SP model weights estimated by the short forms demonstrated no substantial bias but generally inadequate agreement with the full PNT, which itself showed acceptable test-retest reliability for SP model weights and all response types except for formal errors. Results suggest that the PNT-CAT30 and the PNT-CAT60 are generally inadequate for generating naming error profiles or model-derived estimates of semantic and phonological processing ability. Post hoc analyses suggested that increasing the number of stimuli available in the CAT item bank may improve the utility of adaptive short forms for generating error profiles, but the underlying theory also suggests that there are limitations to this approach based on a unidimensional measurement model. https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.22320814.

Aramaic: A History of the First World Language by Holger Gzella

Reviewed by: Aramaic: A History of the First World Language by Holger Gzella Jessie Degrado holger gzella, Aramaic: A History of the First World Language (trans. Benjamin D. Suchard; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2021). Pp. xii + 359. $70. Aramaic: A History of the First World Language is the recent translation with updated bibliography of a volume first published in Dutch in 2017. In the work, Gzella sets himself a monumental task: to present the history of Aramaic over three thousand years without presuming prior knowledge of any Semitic language. Since the work is a popularization of G.'s A Cultural Atlas of Aramaic (HdO 111; Leiden: Brill, 2015), readers with a background in Semitic languages may prefer to consult that volume and, especially, important reviews by Charles Häberl (JAOS 139 [2019] 714–17) and Steven Kaufman ("Notes on A Cultural History of Aramaic" [Aramaic Studies Today, 2017, https://blog.huc.edu/cal/a-culturalhistory-of-aramaic/]). Given the popular focus of the work, this review will focus primarily on its conceptual and historical claims. In chap. 1, G. provides an overview of the history of academic Aramaic studies and some basic features of early Aramaic. In this section, the difficulty of writing a popular history of Aramaic becomes clear: readers with no background in Aramaic will likely struggle to parse the technical details. On the other hand, more experienced readers may be frustrated by the lack of support for several claims, such as the assertion that the lowering of the short vowel i to e obtains in all Aramaic dialects. In fact, the Aramaic name Māti'-'il is consistently written as {ma-ti-' -dingir} (with ti rather than te) in a ninth-century treaty (SAA 2 2), indicating that this phonological process likely postdates Old Aramaic. The next two chapters trace the development and uses of Aramaic in the first millennium b.c.e. Chapter 2 covers the initial phases of the written language, Old Aramaic (OA)—first attested in monumental inscriptions from Syrian kingdoms in the ninth and eighth centuries b.c.e. Chapter 3 outlines the use of Aramaic by first-millennium empires, from its role as a lingua franca in the Neo-Assyrian and Babylonian periods to the development of Imperial Aramaic, a standardized dialect with its own orthographic conventions, employed as the administrative language of the Achaemenid empire. These two chapters highlight an important trend in the history of Aramaic, namely, processes that lead to standardization of dialects in writing. G. gives the impression that this was a highly organized and agentive process, attributable to the reign of a single ruler or even a specific year. For OA, G.'s reconstruction requires sidelining texts that do not adhere to the alleged standardization (Neirab stelae, Deir Alla, and Tell Fekheriye). In addition, Sam'alian, a dialect from Zincirli, is not considered Aramaic (cf. the more recent treatment in Federico Giusfredi and Valerio Pisaniello, "The Population, the Language and the History of Yadiya/Sam'al," in Beyond All Boundaries: Anatolia in the 1st Millennium BC [OBO 295; Leuven: Peeters, 2021] 189–223). In other words, OA appears homogeneous only when all texts attesting to its heterogeneity have been dismissed as anomalous or reclassified as not Aramaic. The next two chapters on Aramaic in late antiquity illustrate the reverse process of linguistic standardization, that is, the movement toward recording the diversity of vernacular speech. G. covers the use of Aramaic in the southern Levant (biblical texts and Qumran), and the development of distinct dialects including Palmyrene, Hatran, and Arascid Aramaic. A substantial portion of chap. 4 is devoted to the assertion that Hebrew was no longer spoken as a vernacular after 400 b.c.e. and had lost all communicative function by the second [End Page 337] century c.e. This requires special pleading, given corpora such as the Bar Kokhba letters and tomb inscriptions from Bet Shearim and Jaffa, which indicate that Hebrew was likely spoken through the second century and used in inscriptions through the fourth century (see Y. Elitzur, "Epigraphic Hebrew: Roman and Byzantine Period," in Encyclopedia of Hebrew Language and Linguistics [ed. Geoffrey Khan; 4 vols.; Leiden: Brill, 2003] 1:843–51). More significantly...

Phonological Processes of the Kikuyu Dialectical Words: A Distinctive Features Approach

Kikuyu language is a highly agglutinative language with an S-V-O sentence structure. This study aims to find out the phonological processes of the Kikuyu dialectical words and determine the phonological rules. A limited number of studies have been done in the Kikuyu language concerning the phonological processes. Therefore, this study is justifiable because it will not only give more lexical units which are subject to phonological processes in the Kikuyu language, which may be inadequate in the previous studies but also create awareness among the scholars of the various Kikuyu lexicons which undergo the phonological processes. The data for analysis is presented using phonetic transcription, and it was collected from the native, resourceful speakers of the Kikuyu language and from selected Kikuyu texts like Phonetics and Tonal Systems of Kikuyu (Lilias Armstrong, 2017) and Modern Gikuyu Dictionary: Gikuyu-English, English-Gikuyu (Kasahorow, 2014). The Distinctive Features theory is used in the phonological analysis of the data. The results of the study showed that different Kikuyu words undergo phonological processes evident in this study, like assimilation, consonant strengthening, glide formation, nasal coalescence, consonant coalescence, insertion, and vowel deletion.

Relația dintre procesarea fonologică și fluența în citire la elevii din ciclul primar

This paper aims to investigate the relationship between phonological processing and fluency in reading, in primary school students, on the following sub-dimensions: words, pseudowords and text. This study evaluates children from the fourth grade, because important progresses în reading accuracy and speed have been registered in these grades (Vaessen& Blomert, 2010) or between the age levels of 8 and 10 year olds (Van den Bos et al., 2002).

Mispronunciation Problems of Affricate Sounds by Iraqi EFL Learners: An Empirical Study in Face-to-Face learning and E-learning

Iraqi EFL learners often mispronounce the two affricate sounds in English: the unvoiced affricate /tʃ/ and the voiced affricate /dʒ/ owing to a lack of exposure to English as a foreign language. In this paper, the researcher investigates two problems, which are vital to discuss mispronunciation problems of affricates in Iraqi colleges of arts. The first problem is why Iraqi undergraduates mispronounce English affricates in face-to-face training and e-learning and the second problem is what phonological process occurs in the mispronunciation of these two sounds in both types of teachings. The study relates phonetic and phonological approaches to the analysis of the formulation of such a mispronunciation. Firstly, the writer uses a questionnaire to find out the differences and the similarities among Iraqi EFL learners in two colleges of arts relating to affricates. Secondly, the writer measures what affricate sounds Iraqi EFL learners mispronounce when they produce the given words. The results reveal that in face-to-face teaching there are three positions for committing mispronunciation of these two sounds: initial position, medial position and final position. In the pronunciation of the sound /tʃ/, the highest percentage for mispronunciation happens when it occurs finally. However, when/ tʃ/ sound occurs medially, the percentage was inconsequential. On the other hand, the highest percentage for /dʒ/ takes place when it occurs initially and the least percentage when it comes about medially. In e-learning, has negative impact on learning.

USE OF SCRIBING TECHNOLOGY IN THE SPEECH THERAPIST’S CORRECTIVE WORK WITH CHILDREN WITH SSD

Severe speech disorders (SSD) are persistent specific deviations in the formation of the components of the speech system (vocabulary, lexical and grammatical structure of speech, phonemic processes, sound production, prosodic organization of the sound stream), which are found in children with preserved hearing and normal intelligence [1]. Oral speech in children with SSD is characterized by a strict limitation of the active vocabulary, persistent agrammatisms, lack of coherent speech skills formation. The peculiarities of speech development of this category of children affect formation of the child’s personality, as well as all mental processes and educational activities. The above-mentioned peculiarities in the development of children with SSD cannot be overcome spontaneously. They require teachers to carry out specially organized corrective work using innovative techniques, as these techniques help specialists increase the effectiveness of classes on the development of speech and other mental processes [1].

Multisyllabic word production by Jordanian Arabic speaking children

ABSTRACT This study examined multisyllabic words in the speech of Jordanian Arabic-speaking children (JASC) regarding syllable structure, notable phonological processes, and stress assignment. Multisyllabic word productions were collected from 48 participants in the following four age groups: 3–3;6, 3;7–4, 4;1–4;6, and 4;7–5 with 12 participants in each age group. Data were collected using recorded spontaneous speech and picture naming. They were transcribed and analysed in terms of syllable structure, frequencies of syllable types, and phonological processes. Phonological processes were analysed and linked to syllable structure drawing on aspects of the metrical theory including extrametricality, extrasyllabicity, End Rule Right (ERR), and degenerate foot to account for the impact of phonological processes on stress assignment. The variability and complexity of children’s syllable structures were found to increase with age. Further, the CVC syllable structure was the most frequent across the four age groups, whereas CCVC, CCVV, and CVCC were the least frequent. Phonological processes affected antepenultimate, heavy, and closed syllables most. The most notable phonological processes were assimilation and syllable deletion in the younger two age groups. In addition, word-initial weak syllables were more frequently omitted than word-medial weak syllables. Thus, JASC start using phonological processes early to manage the complexity of syllable structures and later start to approximate adult speech as observed in age group 4;7–5 years who showed no phonological processes. These findings may help clinicians in diagnosing children with speech sound disorders (SSDs) and in selecting therapy targets within a developmental hierarchy.

Characteristics of Second Language Reading Processing

Several studies mostly focus on a specific area of research, the current paper’s aim is to bring together the various research in a single volume, indicating their particularities as well as demonstrate their inter-relations. Phonological, lexical and syntactic processing Second Language Processing (SLP) are discussed as SLP is a cognitive form of acquisition, and is debated o be bottom-up processes, up-down processes, or a combination of both resulting in integrated interactive processes. SLP faces more complicated issues and involves more factors in comparison with L1 processing as L2 reading comprehension observes the effect of higher-order processes and chances of crosslinguistic transfer in relation to the reader’s L2 linguistic knowledge, L2 proficiency levels, or other language-general reading processes. Furthermore, the major reading process models are mentioned in categories of word identification, syntactic parsing and discourse processing, as well as text and reader related variables are reviewed. Finally, some of the main pedagogical associations with teaching reading comprehension are examined.

Quantitative Acoustic versus Deep Learning Metrics of Lenition

Spanish voiced stops /b, d, ɡ/ surfaced as fricatives [β, ð, ɣ] in intervocalic position due to a phonological process known as spirantization or, more broadly, lenition. However, conditioned by various factors such as stress, place of articulation, flanking vowel quality, and speaking rate, phonetic studies reveal a great deal of variation and gradience of these surface forms, ranging from fricative-like to approximant-like [β⊤, ð⊤, ɣ⊤]. Several acoustic measurements have been used to quantify the degree of lenition, but none is standard. In this study, the posterior probabilities of sonorant and continuant phonological features in a corpus of Argentinian Spanish estimated by a deep learning Phonet model as measures of lenition were compared to traditional acoustic measurements of intensity, duration, and periodicity. When evaluated against known lenition factors: stress, place of articulation, surrounding vowel quality, word status, and speaking rate, the results show that sonorant and continuant posterior probabilities predict lenition patterns that are similar to those predicted by relative acoustic intensity measures and are in the direction expected by the effort-based view of lenition and previous findings. These results suggest that Phonet is a reliable alternative or additional approach to investigate the degree of lenition.

The Broken Plural in Arabic

This paper aims to examine types and patterns of the broken plural in Arabic and the impact of phonological rules and ascending and descending diphthongs on the formation of the broken plural in Arabic. It also highlights particular phonological processes such as assimilation, dissimilation, and ascending and descending diphthongs so that it appears that these diphthongs have been phonetically changed by virtue of sound elision, sometimes accomplished by compensation (sound replacement) and sometimes without compensation; on the other hand, the diphthong may remain unchanged since it maintains the clarity and easiness of the linguistic form. Based on what I have so far studied in Arabic grammar, ancient Arabic grammarians explained these patterns alongside the linguistic changes that occur whilst contemporary Arabic scholars used creative and innovative ways to explain them more precisely and accurately. It could be argued that phonetic transcription has played a key role in that. Therefore, this paper is an academic endeavor to study the linguistic aspects of the broken plural in Arabic, with a particular focus on their syntax, phonetics and phonology.

The impact of phonological processing on number transcoding

Number transcoding describes the ability to make conversions between verbal and digital-Arabic numerical notations and was found to be a significant predictor of later math achievement. Therefore, it is important to better understand predictors of number transcoding performance. In this context, the present study focused on further investigating the predictive power of three phonological processing abilities (i.e., phonological working memory, phonemic awareness, and lexical access) for children’s number transcoding performance. In particular, we were interested in potentially selective associations of phonological processing abilities with specific number transcoding error types (i.e., lexical and syntactic errors). In total, 386 3rd and 4th graders aged 7–11 years were assessed. Results demonstrated that above and beyond age, sex, non-verbal reasoning, and visual-spatial working memory overall number transcoding performance were predicted by phonemic awareness and lexical access. Furthermore, selective associations were observed in that lexical errors were predicted by phonemic awareness and lexical access, whereas syntactic errors were predicted by visual-spatial working memory specifically. Taken together, these results corroborate and further specify the contribution of phonological processing abilities for number transcoding by providing evidence for shared cognitive mechanisms for the acquisition of mathematical and language skills.

The impact of phonological relatedness on semantic congruency judgements in readers with dyslexia: Evidence from behavioural judgements, event related potentials and pupillometry

Readers with developmental dyslexia are known to be impaired in representing and accessing phonology, but their ability to process meaning is generally considered to be intact. However, neurocognitive studies show evidence of a subtle semantic processing deficit in dyslexic readers, relative to their typically-developing peers. Here, we compared dyslexic and typical adult readers on their ability to judge semantic congruency (congruent vs. inconcongruent) in short, two-word phrases, which were further manipulated for phonological relatedness (alliterating vs. non-alliterating); “dazzling-diamond”; “sparkling-diamond”; “dangerous-diamond”; and “creepy-diamond”. At the level of behavioural judgement, all readers were less accurate when evaluating incongruent alliterating items compared with incongruent non-aliterating, suggesting that phonological patterning creates the illusion of semantic congruency (as per Egan et al., 2020). Dyslexic readers showed a similar propensity for this form-meaning relationship despite a phonological processing impairment as evidenced in the cognitive and literacy indicative assessments. Dyslexic readers also showed an overall reduction in the ability to accurately judge semantic congruency, suggestive of a subtle semantic impairment. Whilst no group differences emerged in the electrophysiological measures, our pupil dilation measurements revealed a global tendency for dyslexic readers to manifest a reduced attentional response to these word stimuli, compared with typical readers. Our results show a broad manifestation of neurocognitive differences in adult dyslexic and typical readers’ processing of print, at the level of autonomic arousal as well as in higher level semantic judgements.

Top-down modulation of brain responses in spelling error recognition

The task being undertaken can influence orthographic, phonological and semantic processes. In linguistic research, two tasks are most often used: a task requiring a decision in relation to the presented word and a passive reading task which does not require a decision regarding the presented word. The results of studies using these different tasks are not always consistent. This study aimed to explore brain responses associated with the process of recognition of spelling errors, as well as the influence of the task on this process. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded in 40 adults during an orthographic decision task to determine correctly spelled words and words written with errors that did not change the phonology and during the passive reading. During spelling recognition, the early stages up to 100 ms after the stimulus were automatic and did not depend on the requirements of the task. The amplitude of the N1 component (90–160 ms) was greater in the orthographic decision task, but did not depend on the correct spelling of the word. Late word recognition after 350–500 ms was task dependent, but spelling effects were similar across the two tasks: misspelled words evoked an increase in the amplitude of the N400 component related to lexical and semantic processing regardless of the task. In addition, the orthographic decision task modulated spelling effects, this was reflected in an increase in the amplitude of the P2 component (180–260 ms) for correctly spelled words compared with misspelled words. Thus, our results show that spelling recognition involves general lexico-semantic processes independent of the task. Simultaneously, the orthographic decision task modulates the spelling-specific processes necessary to quickly detect conflicts between orthographic and phonological representations of words in memory.