Post-lexical Level Research Articles

LEXICAL AND POST-LEXICAL PROSODIC DOCUMENTATION OF EMBALOH LANGUAGE

This research investigated the prosody of the Embaloh language, which has yet to be widely explored, to document and preserve the language. The method used is data collection of spontaneous and non-spontaneous speeches from 12 native speakers. Prosodic analysis was then carried out based on visualising and observing speech sound waves using the autosegmental-metrical theory (AM) framework. The results show that prominence tends to be on the right edge at both lexical and post-lexical prosodic levels. The findings show that the Embaloh language is outside the mainstream of Austronesian languages, which places word stress at the penultimate syllable. At the post-lexical level in interrogative intonation, phrases with a question word are marked by the pitch accent located at the target question word in the nuclear contour of the phrase. The pitch accent follows the position of the question word in the intonation phrase, forward or backward, with one of the following tones: H* (high), LH* (low-high), or LHL* (low-high-low). The intonation of the question is indicated by the H(high) tone at the end of the phrase. The H (high) tone also acts as a boundary tone represented by H*% (high).

Prominence marking in an edge-prominent language - the case of Drehu

This study investigates prosodic correlates of phrasing in Drehu, an Oceanic language from New Caledonia. The analysis is concerned with the demarcation of prosodic levels in the language, namely the Accentual Phrase and the Intonation Phrase. First impressionistic descriptions of Drehu state there is fixed word initial stress, however recent experimental evidence does not support this claim. Instead, it has been suggested that Drehu could be an edge-marking language which relies on right boundary marking. To determine whether the patterns recorded in the literature are borne out, the phonological and phonetic realisation of post-lexical word level prosody is investigated. An experiment was conducted to examine the extent to which fundamental frequency (F0) and duration contribute to boundary marking in Drehu. The results show that F0 cues mark the right boundary of two prosodic levels, the AP and IP, and that the strength of the boundary is related to its level in the prosodic hierarchy. Preboundary lengthening also cues IP boundaries but not AP boundaries.

EkeGusii Morphopragmatics and the Junction with Iconicity

The intersection between morphology and pragmatics in EkeGusii, a Bantu language spoken in Kenya among the natives of Kisii and Nyamira Counties, is the concern of this paper. Besides the lean evidence of previous research on EkeGusii morphopragmatics, the argument is presented in four parts. The first examines the interplay between affixation and pragmatics, especially contextually sanctioned diminution and augmentation. This happens in the revelation of attitude at the lexical, and post-lexical levels, where in the latter, vowel lengthening is an alternative way of modifying degrees of augmentation and diminution. Diminution and augmentation also relate to style as manner with language, social relations, persuasion and euphemism in clitic-like groups, and augmentative prefixation where the function of the amplifier prefix is defined. The second part posits that metaphorical compounds acquire idiosyncratic meanings supported by context. The third part presents the meanings of iconic reduplicatives as isomorphic, and dependent on context. The final part delves into the portmanteau morph, a knotty problem as evidenced in EkeGusii, arguing that it can only be described as serving pragmatic functions with greater reliance on syntax and semantics, which in turn abet covert morphological change. The portmanteau morph, from a morphopragmatic viewpoint, is more of a question to ponder than a conclusion.

Current exposure to a second language modulates bilingual visual word recognition: An EEG study

Bilingual word recognition has been the focus of much empirical work, but research on potential modulating factors, such as individual differences in L2 exposure, are limited. This study represents a first attempt to determine the impact of L2-exposure on bilingual word recognition in both languages. To this end, highly fluent bilinguals were split into two groups according to their L2-exposure, and performed a semantic categorisation task while recording their behavioural responses and electro-cortical (EEG) signal. We predicted that lower L2-exposure should produce less efficient L2 word recognition processing at the behavioural level, alongside neurophysiological changes at the early pre-lexical and lexical levels, but not at a post-lexical level. Results confirmed this hypothesis in accuracy and in the N1 component of the EEG signal. Precisely, bilinguals with lower L2-exposure appeared less accurate in determining semantic relatedness when target words were presented in L2, but this condition posed no such problem for bilinguals with higher L2-exposure. Moreover, L2-exposure modulates early processes of word recognition not only in L2 but also in L1 brain activity, thus challenging a fully non-selective access account (cf. BIA + model, Dijkstra and van Heuven, 2002). We interpret our findings with reference to the frequency-lag hypothesis (Gollan et al., 2011).

Mediated phonological-semantic priming in spoken word production: Evidence for cascaded processing from picture-word interference.

The cognitive architecture that allows humans to retrieve words from the mental lexicon has been investigated for decades. While there is consensus regarding a two-step architecture involving lexical-conceptual and phonological word-form levels of processing, accounts of how activation spreads between them (e.g., in a serial, cascaded, or interactive fashion) remain contentious. In addition, production models differ with respect to whether selection occurs at lexical or postlexical levels. The purpose of this study was to examine whether mediated phonological-semantic relations (e.g., drip is phonologically related to drill that is semantically related to hammer) influence production in adults as predicted by models implementing cascaded processing and feedback between levels. Two experiments using the picture-word interference (PWI) paradigm were conducted using auditory (Exp. 1) and written (Exp. 2) distractors. We hypothesised that a mediated semantic interference effect would be observable in the former with the involvement of both spoken word production and recognition, and in the latter if lexical representations are shared between written and spoken words in English, as assumed by some production accounts. Furthermore, we hypothesised a mediated semantic interference effect would be inconsistent with a postlexical selection account as the distractors do not constitute a relevant response for the target picture (e.g., drip-HAMMER). We observed mediated semantic interference only from auditory distractors, while observing the standard semantic interference effect from both auditory and written distractors. The current findings represent the first chronometric evidence involving spoken word production and recognition in support of cascaded processing during lexical retrieval in adults and present a significant challenge for the postlexical selection account.

Element Iteration Respecification Unstressed Word-Final [u] in Portuguese

This study assumes that the internal structure of vowels consists of the combination of elements which can be iterated. According to previous research, it is also assumed that element iteration in Portuguese provides vowels with inherent weight; word-finally, such vowels are stress-attractors. Notwithstanding, Portuguese has a great amount of words with unstressed final [u] (i.e., a vowel consisting of the iteration of {U}), as it is the case of inflected forms of nouns and adjectives. After analysing diachronic and morphological data, it is proposed that element iteration can have different representations at the lexical and the post-lexical levels. On the basis of this observation, it is proposed that element iteration functions as a weight- and stress-assigner only when lexically specified

중국수어 단어형성에 관한 기술적 연구: 형태·음운론적 특성을 중심으로

This paper aims at investigating morpho-phonological structure on the modality-specific word formation of Chinese Sign Language (CSL) in terms of their modulations in the context of Movement-Position hold interaction. The three major goals are as follows: First, to demonstrate the internal structure of syllables and the existence of morphemes; second, to illustrate the characteristics of six different syllable types; third, to give a description of the phonological processes that occur in morphologically complex words. The results show that most signs that occur in six types of syllables in the CSL data are both monosyllabic and monomorphemic. However, polysyllabic monomorphemic signs and polymorphemic monosyllabic signs also exist in CSL. Finally, an array of phonological processes, including assimilation, coalescence, metathesis, and deletion is observed either on the lexical level or on the post-lexical level in connected signing.

Fonologia do português: quando duas variedades divergem

Vigário apresenta diferenças fonológicas entre o português brasileiro (PB) e o europeu (PE) na forma de dez tópicos relacionados a processos nos níveis lexical e pós-lexical. De modo geral, a autora mostra que o português europeu apresenta processos produtivos nos níveis mais altos da hierarquia prosódica, e não em constituintes menores, como o segmento ou a sílaba. Por esse motivo, temos um grande número de reduções vocálicas em posições átonas, por exemplo. Enquanto isso, os processos do português brasileiro ocupam-se, em geral, com os níveis mais baixos da hierarquia, os quais são puramente fonológicos. Exemplos são o preenchimento de posições vazias para boa-formação silábica ou o menor número de reduções vocálicas em relação ao PE. Embora as duas variedades apresentem semelhanças em relação à fonologia lexical, em níveis mais precoces, elas exibem perfis fonológicos distintos em relação à fonologia pós-lexical.

Lexical Access in Naming and Reading: Spatiotemporal Localization of Semantic Facilitation and Interference Using MEG

Naming an object involves quick retrieval of a target word from long-term memory. Research using the semantic interference paradigm has shown that objects take longer to name when they are preceded by primes in the same semantic category. This has been interpreted as reflecting either competition during lexical selection or as an interference effect at a later, postlexical level. Since the behavioral finding has been a core argument for the existence of competition during lexical selection in naming, understanding its processing level is important for models of language production. We used MEG to determine the spatiotemporal localization of the interference effect. We also compared its neural signature to the effect of semantic relatedness in reading, in which relatedness is expected to speed up behavioral responses and reduce activity in the left superior temporal cortex at around 200–300 ms. This is exactly what we found. However, in naming, we observed a more complex pattern for our semantically related targets. First, the angular gyrus showed a facilitory pattern at 300–400 ms, likely reflecting aspects of lexical access. This was followed by a broadly distributed and sustained interference pattern that lasted until articulatory stages. More transient interference effects were also observed at 395–485 ms in the left STG and at ∼100–200 ms before articulation in the parietal cortex. Thus, our findings suggest that the semantic interference effect originates from both early and late sources, which may explain its varying localizations in previous literature.

The Perception of Tone and Focus in Mandarin by Indonesian Learners: A Case Study

In a tone language, the interface between tone, intonation, and focus will affect the pitch height and contour of tones. Previous perceptual studies revealed the potential conflicts in perceiving pitch variations at lexical and post-lexical levels that were experienced by either native listeners or listeners who speak Mandarin language as a second or foreign language. Rarely we find research in Indonesia that provides evidence for Mandarin language learners’ perceptual ability at a post-lexical level. This paper investigated how well learners with distinct first language (L1) background identify tones that are affected by the realization of focus and the presence and location of focus in distinct intonation types. Perceptual experiments were conducted towards two groups of listeners: Mandarin learners with Indonesian L1 and learners with a tone language L1 background (Hakka or Hokkien). Their identification accuracy (IA) rate in recognizing the tone type for the last syllable with a narrow focus was compared with their IA in identifying the location of the focus. In general, identifying tone type was easier than identifying focus position for both groups. However, the Mean from each group showed that learners with a tone language L1 were slightly better than the other group. Results exhibited more similarities between the two groups of the listener, which indicates that L1 background only has a mild effect on the perceptual ability of Indonesian learners of Mandarin as a foreign language.

Syncope in Makkan Arabic Fast Speech: A Stratal-OT Analysis

Syncope is a pervasive phenomenon in Arabic, in general. In Makkan Arabic in particular, syncope occurs both in careful speech as well as in fast speech. This paper examines syncope in fast speech where it applies to initial syllables in words giving rise to syllables that contain complex onsets which are otherwise prohibited in the language. It further examines the phonotactic constraints that play a role in the application of syncope as well as the constraints that can block syncope in the same environments. Other Arabic dialects that manifest the same behavior of syncope in fast speech are considered. The analysis of the Makkan data is done within the framework of Stratal-Optimality theory. The paper lends evidence to the fact that postlexical level includes the level of careful speech and that of fast speech each with its own ranking of constraints.

Buckeye corpus에 나타난 탄설음화 현상 분석

This paper presents an acoustic and phonological study of the alveolar flaps in American English. Based on the Buckeye Corpus, the flapping tokens produced by twenty men are analyzed at both lexical and post-lexical levels. The data, analyzed with Pratt speech analysis, include duration, F2 and F3 in voicing during the flap, as well as duration, F1, F2, F3, and f0 in the adjacent vowels. The results provide evidence on two issues: (1) The different ways in which voiced and voiceless alveolar stops give rise to neutralized flapping stops by following lexical and post-lexical levels, (2) The extent to which the vowel features (height, frontness, and tenseness) affect flapping sounds. The results show that flaps are affected by pre-consonantal vowel features at the lexical as well as post-lexical levels. Unlike previous studies, this study uses the Praat method to distinguish flapped from unflapped tokens in the Buckeye Corpus and examines connections between the lexical and post-lexical levels.

Phonological facilitation in picture naming: When and where? A tDCS study

Phonological facilitation (PF) refers to a reduction of naming latencies when a phonologically related word is presented concurrently with the target picture, as compared to the presentation of phonologically unrelated words. According to spread of activation models of word production, this effect arises after lexical selection, during phonetic encoding, and is due to the co-activation of the phonemes shared by the target word and the distracter. Conversely, semantic interference (SI) is characterized by longer naming latencies when semantically related distracters are concurrently presented with the target picture. This effect seems to arise before lexical selection. However, alternative hypotheses postulate that PF and SI both arise at a post lexical level. In this study, we aim to shed light on this debate by investigating the neural correlates of the PF and by comparing these results with those of previous studies on SI. In two experiments, we applied anodal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) over the left superior temporal gyrus (LSTG) and left inferior frontal gyrus (LIFG) before a picture-word interference task in which auditory distracters, which could be phonologically related or unrelated, were presented at a SOA of 150ms or 300ms. While stimulating the LSTG significantly reduced the PF by decreasing RTs in phonologically unrelated trials, anodal tDCS over the LIFG did not affect PF. In line with previous results, our findings support the “activation by competition” model, pointing to inhibition between target and distracters nodes as the mechanism involved in the occurrence of PF and SI.

Bilingual and Monolingual Idiom Processing Is Cut from the Same Cloth: The Role of the L1 in Literal and Figurative Meaning Activation.

The present study examines non-native (L2) and native (L1) listeners' access to figurative idiomatic meaning and literal constituent meaning in two cross-modal priming experiments. Proficient German learners of English (L2) and native speakers of American English (L1) responded to English target words preceded by English idioms embedded in non-biasing prime sentences in a lexical decision task. English idioms differed in levels of translatability: Lexical level idioms had word-for-word translation equivalents in German, while post-lexical level idioms had matching idiomatic concepts in German but could not be translated word for word. Target words either related to the figurative meaning of the idiom or related to the literal meaning of the final constituent word of the idiom (e.g., to pull someone's leg, literal target: walk, figurative target: joke). Both L1 and L2 listeners showed facilitatory priming for literally- and figuratively-related target words compared to unrelated control target words, with only marginal differences between the listener groups. No effect of translatability was found; that is, the existence of word-for-word translation equivalents in German neither facilitated nor hindered meaning activation for German L2 listeners. The results are interpreted in the context of L1 and L2 models of idiom processing as well as further relevant translation studies.

Semantic Interference in a Delayed Naming Task : Evidence for Competition-by-Activation Hypothesis

In recent years, Janssen, Schirm, Mahon, and Caramazza (2008) observed a significant semantic interference effect in the task-switching version of the picture-word delayed naming paradigm. They argued that the semantic effect originates from the post-lexical level of speech processing. The present study conducted two experiments to test the reliability of such a finding using the pictureword delayed naming paradigm. In Experiment 1, a standard delayed naming task was used where participants engaged in the delayed naming of the picture regardless of the distractor word that appeared after the picture. In Experiment 2, a task-switching version of the same task was used where participants engaged in the delayed naming according to the color of the distractor word. The results of both Experiment 1 and 2 revealed no significant semantic interference effect, which supports the claim that the semantic effect originates from lexical competition rather than post-lexical level processing during speech production.

Single URs vs. Allomorphy: The case of Babanki Coda Consonant Deletion

The purpose of this paper is to account for a number of phonological alternations that occur on nouns, verbs, deverbal adjectives, and pronouns at the postlexical level in Babanki, a Grassfields Bantu language spoken in Cameroon. The alternation involves the deletion of certain coda consonants between two underlying vowels. This can be illustrated by the deletion of /ŋ/ which is accompanied by the raising of /a/ and /o/ to [o] and [u] respectively (Mutaka & Phubon 2006):

Coalescence as a hiatus resolution strategy in chiKaranga – a dialect of chiShona

This article focuses on how chiKaranga resolves vowel hiatus through coalescence. ChiKaranga has an absolute ban on vowel hiatus and it employs five strategies, namely, glide formation, secondary articulation, elision, spreading and coalescence to resolve it. These strategies occur in phonologically and morphosyntactically determined complementary distribution. Glide formation, secondary articulation, elision and spreading operate within a Prosodic Word (Lexical Level). Glide formation, secondary articulation and elision have a unique relationship; they occur in nominals at the prefix-stem boundary. Spreading occurs in verbs at the Prosodic Stem boundary. Coalescence is the preferred strategy across a Prosodic Word boundary, precisely across a host-clitic boundary (Postlexical Level), and it involves the elision of V1 with the preservation of the feature [open] that is passed onto the following vowel. In chiKaranga, coalescence occurs when the clitic is minimally a CV syllable. When the clitic is monosegmental, coalescence is blocked and spreading, which preserves the identity of the monosegmental clitic operates.

Oroch vowel harmony

In this paper I examine vowel harmony in Oroch, a recently extinct Manchu-Tungusic language. Oroch vowels are subject to the interplay of retracted tongue root (RTR) harmony and rounding harmony. The two kinds of harmony have contrasting effects on neutral vowels. The front vowels /i/ and / æ/ are transparent to RTR harmony, while the vowels /i/, /æ/ and /u/ are opaque to rounding harmony. Crucially, if the root contains only neutral vowels /i/ and /æ/, the RTR feature of the suffix is unpredictable.This paper puts forth a Stratal OT analysis of Oroch vowel harmony, along the lines of Kiparsky (2000). The neutral vowels are assumed to be subject to RTR harmony at the word level, where the most harmonic candidate wins, but at the postlexical level there is a constraint against [i] bearing [+RTR] feature and against [æ] bearing [−RTR] feature; so on the surface the effect of RTR harmony is undone on transparent vowels. Thus, the transparency of the neutral vowels is predicted, as well as the distribution of suffixes with neutral roots, the underlying RTR specification of which spreads onto suffixes at the word level.In addition, the Stratal OT approach derives the transparency vs. opacity effects of the two harmonies while obeying strict locality, i.e. spreading is restricted to adjacent segments. This allows a more economic account of Oroch vowel harmony in terms of a small set of constraints predicting the transparency with respect to RTR harmony, opacity with respect to rounding harmony, and suffix variation with the neutral roots.

Syllable, accent, rhythm: typological and methodological considerations for teaching Spanish as a foreign language

Rhythm is a speech property related to the temporal organization of sounds in terms of grouping. Segmentation units are language-specific and emerge from phonological properties such as syllable structure, phonotactics, and prosodic contrasts at the lexical and postlexical level. Rhythmic differences across languages pose problems for second language acquisition, given the intricate combination of acoustic cues, the perceptual difficulties caused by phonological deafness, and the interferences with the organization of segmental contrasts and with lexical access. This paper provides a typological comparison that includes descriptions of the attested rhythm classes (syllable-timed, stress-timed, and mora-timed), as well as of word prosody systems (tone, pitch-accent, and stress languages). This analysis yields predictions regarding typical errors for learners of Spanish from different linguistic backgrounds. Additionally, Spanish syllable structure and stress system are described and some strategies are suggested to practice these in class.

Emotion, Etmnooi, or Emitoon? – Faster lexical access to emotional than to neutral words during reading

Cortical processing of emotional words differs from that of neutral words. Using EEG event-related potentials (ERPs), the present study examines the functional stage(s) of this differentiation. Positive, negative, and neutral nouns were randomly mixed with pseudowords and letter strings derived from words within each valence and presented for reading while participants’ EEG was recorded. Results indicated emotion effects in the N1 (110–140ms), early posterior negativity (EPN, 216–320) and late positive potential (LPP, 432–500ms) time windows. Across valence, orthographic word-form effects occurred from about 180ms after stimulus presentation. Crucially, in emotional words, lexicality effects (real words versus pseudowords) were identified from 216ms, words being more negative over posterior cortex, coinciding with EPN effects, whereas neutral words differed from pseudowords only after 320ms. Emotional content affects word processing at pre-lexical, lexical and post-lexical levels, but remarkably lexical access to emotional words is faster than access to neutral words.