Sentence Fragments Research Articles

Structural Priming and the Placement of Focus-Sensitive Particles

The German focus-sensitive particle auch (‘too’) can associate with different constituents (ACs) in an utterance. In terms of position, it can precede or follow its AC. There is a strong preference for using preceding auch when the AC is the object. In three sentence fragment arrangement tasks, we investigated whether speakers are structurally primed by the context. To that end, we used context sentences as part of short dialogues with different particles: nur (‘only’), kein(e)(‘no’), both of which precede their AC, and nicht (‘not’), which follows its AC. The results show that the established preference for preceding auch is affected by the position of the particle in the context (following auch occurred more often when the context contained following nicht). Follow-up experiments rule out an explanation based on intonation (Experiment 2) or on the underlying syntactic structure (Experiment 3). We found clear surface structural priming effects for function words with effect sizes similar to those found in studies of structural priming for content words. Furthermore, the findings for sentences used in isolation can be extended to sentences that are part of short dialogues.

Suicidal ideation recognition based on sentence completion test via coding- and topic-enhanced model

Suicidal ideation refers to the thoughts related to suicide, including but not limited to specific plans for death and desires for suicide. Its recognition is of great significance in preventing individuals from suicide. In the context of large-scale screening on suicide ideation, self-report scale is the most used approach, but the subjects are easy to conceal real information. Though some automated methods based on social media platforms are put forward, they are difficult to cover all the populations that need to be tested. To this challenge, in this paper, a new perspective on suicidal ideation recognition via sentence completion test (SCT) is provided. SCT contains some sentence fragments and requires subjects to complete them, having implicitness and being suitable for large-scale screening, but its use depends on automated scoring method. Therefore, based on a self-developed SCT, a dataset is collected, containing 1,399 individuals’ responses on both the SCT and one classical self-report scale about suicidal ideation. To support the prediction with reasonable evidences for such a psychometric task, considering that individual suicidal ideation may be reflected by the different response patterns of each item or the general topic contained in all items, a coding- and topic-enhanced model for suicidal ideation recognition is proposed. The strategies of contrastive learning and focal loss are leveraged to establish different representations of different response patterns in the SCT and solve the class-imbalanced problem. To verify the effectiveness, extensive experiments are conducted, demonstrating that the proposed method achieves a feasible and practical performance.

Heritage language development in Spanish-English-speaking preschoolers: Influences on growth and challenges in the first year of English-only instruction.

This study investigates the changes in the Spanish lexical and grammatical skills of 26 Spanish-English dual language learners during their first year of preschool. We also explore the impact of age, gender, and maternal cultural orientation on children's language outcomes over time. The results show that, despite one year of English-only instruction, the children's Spanish productions became more intelligible, lexically diverse, and grammatical between 3;7 and 4;7. However, Spanish productions were mostly limited to sentence fragments and contained errors in grammatical gender, verb morphology, object clitic pronouns, and prepositions. Girls had an advantage over boys, as attested by the higher lexical diversity, mean length of utterance, and grammaticality of their Spanish productions. Both maternal enculturation and acculturation predicted the grammaticality of children's utterances, suggesting that mothers with high levels of orientation to both Latinx and American culture may be the most successful at promoting Spanish in the United States.

Error Analysis of Grammatical Features in Saudi Undergraduate EFL Writing

Mastery of English grammatical accuracy is paramount for developing proficiency as a foreign language. However, research examining tendencies among Saudi undergraduate writers remains limited. This study aimed to address such gaps through a comprehensive identification and categorization of errors present in student essays. A rigorous mixed-methods approach analyzed over 350 grammatical mistakes across 50 female students' writing samples. Errors were systematically coded and categorized to reveal frequency data through quantitative analysis. Findings demonstrated spelling, subject-verb agreement, and capitalization as the most prevalent issue areas, collectively accounting for over 75% of errors. Examples uncovered specific challenges involving verb tense, sentence fragments, and article usage. While outcomes aligned with previous literature, linguistic influences on persistent spelling difficulties were explored to broaden understandings. Recommendations for targeted exercises strengthening weaker domains like phonics rules and irregular verbs were provided. Continuing periodic error analyses can optimally inform evolving pedagogy tailored to emerging needs over time. Significantly, this novel diagnostic approach begins addressing critical literature gaps through data-driven insights that meaningfully inform curriculum development to better support the still under-researched Saudi EFL student population.

COVERT SIMULTANEOUS POST-EDITING IN ONLINE ASSESSMENT OF STUDENTS’ SIGHT TRANSLATION

This first attempt aims to determine the extent of students’ covert use of machine translation (MT) in the online assessment of their sight translation, the strategies of such use, and its signs. The study is based on the analysis of target texts (TT) of specialised online sight translation from Ukrainian into English by 13 BA and 10 MA students. The procedure involved the comparison of the students' TTs with their MT counterparts. Signs of covert MT were found in 46% of the BA and 30% of the MA students’ translations. The main method of this covert MT use is "simultaneous post-editing", i.e., the immediate oral post-editing of the MT text generated by the students on their screens and hidden from the assessor, while they deliver their supposedly original TTs. Simultaneous post-editing strategies range from replacing individual lexemes with their synonyms, adding and deleting elements, changing the syntactic functions of words or phrases, rearranging sentence fragments, transforming their structure, to applying several of these strategies simultaneously. Other methods of concealment include alternating MT systems in translating the same source text, as well as artificially slowing down the process of reading the TT from the screen, accompanied by pauses in the relevant text fragments to perform certain mental operations. In order to increase objectivity, the author recommends a delayed assessment of students' online interpreting recordings. The research perspective is to study the didactic potential of simultaneous post-editing as a procedure for developing general interpreting skills.

On analysing fragments: the case of No?

Abstract This paper addresses the analysis of sentence fragments, specifically the English negative polar response item no. Two main types of synchronic analysis have been proposed for present-day English – one in which yes and no are syntactically inert particles which substitute for a clause, the other in which they are the initial element of an elided clause. Using diachronic data from 15th- to 17th-century English, we argue that the emergence of a novel other-speaker question pattern involving no demonstrates that speakers of early English analysed interrogative polar no as the initial element of a clause with TP-ellipsis. This novel pattern has received little attention in the literature, yet this grammatical innovation is interesting because its emergence demonstrates how diachronic change can be used as a diagnostic for underlying grammatical structure.

Error Analysis and Implications of Chinese Students' English Writing Based on Computer Scoring System

This study aims to detect and analyze the errors made by Chinese vocational college students with the help of a computer scoring system. Under the theoretical framework of interlanguage theory and error analysis theory, errors are classified into three categories and five sub-categories, namely: 1. substance errors: orthography; 2. text errors: morphology and syntax; 3. discourse errors: coherence and pragmatics. 90 compositions with a total number of 11,761 words were screened and detected by computational and manual means. A total of 1652 errors were found and given detailed analysis and explanation. The study concludes that the most common errors occurred in orthography, such as spelling, capitalization, and punctuation, and syntax, such as sentence fragment/ sentence redundancy. Analyzing the causes of the errors provides implications for English teachers and researchers of the computer scoring system.

Makna Konseptual dan Makna Asosiatif Pada Serial Musikal Nurbaya dan Relevansinya Pada Keterampilan Mementaskan Drama

This research aims to describe the conceptual meaning and associative meaning of the Nurbaya Musical Series on the Indonesia Kaya youtube channel, The results of the research will be relevant to drama learning at class XI high school level, the research method used in this research is qualitative descriptive research using a literature study approach. The data used in this research consists of words and sentence fragments that contain conceptual meaning and associative meaning. The data source that is the focus of this research is the Nurbaya Musical Series on the Indonesia Kaya youtube channel. The data collection technique in this research uses library study techniques, listening, phrase, and taking notes. Data analysis techniques are descriptive qualitative. The results of research analyzing conceptual meaning and associative meaning in the Nurbaya Musical Series which consists of six episodes, found conceptual meaning and associative meaning. The type of associative meaning in this research are collocative meaning and connotative meaning. The results of this research can be relevant in drama learning at class XI high school level, in learning objective 3.18 Identify the story line, act by act, and conflict in the drama you read or watch. As well as learning objective 4.18 Demonstrate one of the characters in a drama that is read or watched orally

The language of Nigerian stand-up comedy

Nigeria is complexly multilingual. Arising from this, Nigerian stand–up comedians employ a variety of linguistic strategies to communicate with the audience. This research investigates the peculiarities of language use in Nigerian stand-up comedy by analysing patterns of code choices in the comic performances of four comedians. Because the stand-up comedy industry is predominant in the Southern part of Nigeria, the comedians chosen for this study are representative of the three geopolitical zones of southern Nigeria. The analysis of the data indicates that (1) although Nigerian stand-up comedians primarily use Nigerian Pidgin (NP) they also employ language alternation and code-switch between NP, English, and a variety of indigenous languages. (2) NP is mainly used in the oral medium. Consequently, features of orality: repetition, parallel structures, anaphora, lexical cushioning, semantic extension, metaphor imagery, sentence fragments, and rhetorical devices, are other dominant features of Nigerian stand-up comedy.

Common syntactic errors in the writing skills of the 3rd year students at Van Lang University

This study aimed to analyze common syntactic errors found in the argumentative essays of third-year English major students at the Faculty of Foreign Languages, Van Lang University, Vietnam. Quantitative and qualitative methods were used to obtain data in this study. The quantitative approach involved counting and calculating the frequency, percentage, and ranking of syntactic errors, while the qualitative method was adopted to explain these errors. The instrument for collecting data was argumentative essays written by 37 third-year English majors enrolling in Writing-5 at Van Lang University. Microsoft Word was used to collect and analyze syntactic errors and sentence structures, while Microsoft Excel was employed to calculate the frequency and rank of these errors and structures. The results found that the five most frequent errors in their essays were at the noun phrase and sentence levels. These errors included run-on sentences, preposition errors, article errors, sentence fragments, and pronoun errors. Through error analysis, it was indicated that the majority of errors made by students were due to the negative transfer from their first language and the literal translation. Based on the findings, language teachers and syllabus designers could use these results as guidance to design appropriate teaching methods and materials.

Mengonsep Sintesis Sains Dan Al-Qur’an (SSQ) Sebagai Teknik Pengintegrasian Ilmu Ekonomi Melalui Pendekatan Maqashid Syariah (Studi Analisis Konten)

This research aims to conceptualize the synthesis of science and the Koran as a strategy to integrate economics with the Koran. The research method uses content analysis on the research objects of Management Accounting books and synthetic thinking books. The results of this research show that 1) The synthesis of science and the Qur'an is carried out by combining economic messages contained in management accounting books with economic sentences in the Qur'an. Like the science of ushul fiqh which uses sentence fragments in verses of the Koran as a basis for study in determining Islamic economic law. 2) the Management Accounting book by Mulyadi contains elements of maqasid sharia in the form of reason and assets which are characterized by the presence of concrete sentences in the form of thoughts (reason) and the use of numbers.

Univerbation is a problematic way of word formation in German language

The article analyzes derivational univerbation as one of the forms of compression functioning in word formation. Univerbation is a merging, pulling together of a free or stable word combination, a sentence or a sentence fragment into one verbal whole. The new word-forming construction in its form corresponds with one word, and in its semantics with the whole word combination. It is not uncommon for a new word to “absorb” the meaning of the context. The activity of universalization is closely connected with the need for “economical” nominations of new concepts, as well as with the need for stylistic variation of the name. This way of word formation allows creating compact, economical, concise and succinct forms of expressing thoughts without special speech efforts. The problematic character of this derivational model is that there is an extended interpretation of the essence of word formation methods.

Information entropy facilitates (not impedes) lexical processing during language comprehension.

It is well known that contextual predictability facilitates word identification, but it is less clear whether the uncertainty associated with the current context (i.e., its lexical entropy) influences sentence processing. On the one hand, high entropy contexts may lead to interference due to greater number of lexical competitors. On the other hand, predicting multiple lexical competitors may facilitate processing through the preactivation of shared semantic features. In this study, we examined whether entropy measured at the trial level (i.e., for each participant, for each item) corresponds to facilitatory or inhibitory effects. Trial-level entropy captures each individual's knowledge about specific contexts and is therefore a more valid and sensitive measure of entropy (relative to the commonly employed item-level entropy). Participants (N = 112) completed two experimental sessions (with counterbalanced orders) that were separated by a 3- to 14-day interval. In one session, they produced up to 10 completions for sentence fragments (N = 647). In another session, they read the same sentences including a target word (whose entropy value was calculated based on the produced completions) while reading times were measured. We observed a facilitatory (not inhibitory) effect of trial-level entropy on lexical processing over and above item-level measures of lexical predictability (including cloze probability, surprisal, and semantic constraint). Extra analyses revealed that greater semantic overlap between the target and the produced responses facilitated target processing. Thus, the results lend support to theories of lexical prediction maintaining that prediction involves broad activation of semantic features rather than activation of full lexical forms.

Analysis of Social Values and Characteristics in the Short Story Tupai Si Never Give Up Written SDN 13 Kolo Kota Bima

This study aims to examine the social values and characteristics contained in the short story 'Tupai Si Pantang Surrender' written by SDN 13 KOLO BIMA. The theory used is the theory of humanism put forward by Abraham Maslow with a sociology of literature approach. The method used in this research is a descriptive method with a qualitative research form. The subject of this research is the short story Tupai Si Unyielding' which was written by SDN 13 KOLO BIMA. The research data is in the form of paragraph excerpts and sentence fragments that contain elements of social values. The results of the study show that the social values contained are, 1) unyielding attitude, 2) compassion, 3) respect not demeaning, 4) persistence and hard work produce results according to what we use, 5) struggle, 6) admiration, 7) Regret. This study delves into the analysis of social values and characteristics embedded in the short story titled "Tupai Si Never Give Up," authored by SDN 13 Kolo Kota Bima. The research aims to uncover the narrative's underlying themes, socio-cultural reflections, and character dynamics. Employing a qualitative approach, the analysis focuses on the portrayal of social values such as perseverance, resilience, and community bonds, as well as the depiction of various characteristics exhibited by the story's protagonists. Through a close examination of the narrative elements, the study seeks to contribute to a deeper understanding of the cultural and social nuances presented in the short story, shedding light on the author's intent and the broader societal context in which the narrative unfolds.

Predictive Brain Activity Shows Congruent Semantic Specificity in Language Comprehension and Production.

Sentence fragments strongly predicting a specific subsequent meaningful word elicit larger preword slow waves, prediction potentials (PPs), than unpredictive contexts. To test the current predictive processing models, 128-channel EEG data were collected from both sexes to examine whether (1) different semantic PPs are elicited in language comprehension and production and (2) whether these PPs originate from the same specific "prediction area(s)" or rather from widely distributed category-specific neuronal circuits reflecting the meaning of the predicted item. Slow waves larger after predictable than unpredictable contexts were present both before subjects heard the sentence-final word in the comprehension experiment and before they pronounced the sentence-final word in the production experiment. Crucially, cortical sources underlying the semantic PP were distributed across several cortical areas and differed between the semantic categories of the expected words. In both production and comprehension, the anticipation of animal words was reflected by sources in posterior visual areas, whereas predictable tool words were preceded by sources in the frontocentral sensorimotor cortex. For both modalities, PP size increased with higher cloze probability, thus further confirming that it reflects semantic prediction, and with shorter latencies with which participants completed sentence fragments. These results sit well with theories viewing distributed semantic category-specific circuits as the mechanistic basis of semantic prediction in the two modalities.

Morphosyntactic skills in Arabic-speaking children with autism spectrum disorder: Evidence from error patterns in the sentence repetition task.

Although autism spectrum disorder (ASD) has not traditionally been associated with morphosyntactic impairments, some children with ASD manifest significant difficulties in this domain. Sentence Repetition (SRep) tasks are highly reliable tools for detecting morphosyntactic impairment in different languages and across various populations, including children with ASD. This study is among the first to evaluate morphosyntactic abilities of Palestinian-Arabic (PA) speaking children using a PA SRep task. A total of 142 PA-speaking children, aged 5-11, participated in the study: 75 children with typical language development (TLD) and 67 children with ASD. The PA SRep task targeted morphosyntactic structures of varying complexity (simple subject-verb-object [SVO] sentences, biclausal sentences, wh-questions, relative clauses). Children's accuracy scores were assessed across these structures and error patterns encompassing morphosyntactic and pragmatic aspects were analyzed. Two subgroups of ASD emerged: 43% showed age-appropriate language skills (ASD + NL) pairing up with TLD peers, while 57% showed signs of morphosyntactic impairment (ASD + LI). Children in both groups exhibited a higher frequency of morphosyntactic errors than pragmatic ones. Children with ASD + LI showed difficulties with producing complex morphosyntactic structures, such as relative clauses and object wh-questions. Error analysis revealed that children in the ASD + LI group produced sentence fragments and simplified constructions when complex structures were targeted. The current study extends the cross-linguistic evidence of the heterogeneity of morphosyntactic profiles in children with ASD to Arabic-speaking children. Error analysis indicates that poor morphosyntax, rather than pragmatics, challenges children's performance on the SRep task. Our results emphasize the importance of comprehensive language assessment in children with ASD and underscore the need for tailored intervention plans targeting impaired morphosyntactic structures in some children with ASD.

Prediction in SVO and SOV languages: processing and typological considerations

Abstract In this study, we tested the possibility that different word orders engender different processing preferences. Our key hypothesis was that a head-initial language like English (SVO) allows more prediction compared to a head-final language like Japanese (SOV). In Experiment 1, English and Japanese native speakers completed a cloze task in which they heard a sentence fragment (SV_ in English and SO_ in Japanese) and had to complete it with the word they thought best. We assessed cloze probability of the words produced and voice onset times. Experiment 2 examined written completions in English, in which we compared the cloze probabilities in SV_ fragments versus OS_ fragments. Following the central hypothesis, this experiment allowed us to determine (within language) whether there is more prediction from a noun and verb compared to two nouns. Finally, in Experiment 3, we compared written completions in English and Japanese, in which the stimuli given to participants were identical (SV_ in English and S_V in Japanese). Results across all three experiments were consistent with greater prediction in English. We argue that prediction is one important factor in processing, that it is relied on more in English than in Japanese, and that prediction will be especially favored in languages like English in which the verb regularly precedes its direct object.

Contrasting contrastive-topicalization strategies

This paper offers a comparison and preliminary analysis of ‘topicalization’ strategies in German, Basque, and English. I argue that Basque and English topics at the left periphery are dislocated elements resumed by pronominal correlates, a configuration more directly evidenced in German. I propose an analysis of left-peripheral topics in Basque and English that capitalizes on parallels with left-dislocated XPs in German. Despite superficial differences, left-dislocation configurations in the three languages can be distinguished from inversion constructions and are united in their contrastive character. I argue that dislocated XPs are parenthetical sentence fragments, building on analogous proposals for German and other languages. The analysis is shown to be flexible enough to account for relevant surface differences between the languages while also providing a principled explanation for the contrastive import of left-peripheral topics.

The Impact of Collaborative Documentation on Person-Centered Care: Textual Analysis of Clinical Notes.

Collaborative documentation (CD) is a behavioral health practice involving shared writing of clinic visit notes by providers and consumers. Despite widespread dissemination of CD, research on its effectiveness or impact on person-centered care (PCC) has been limited. Principles of PCC planning, a recovery-based approach to service planning that operationalizes PCC, can inform the measurement of person-centeredness within clinical documentation. This study aims to use the clinical informatics approach of natural language processing (NLP) to examine the impact of CD on person-centeredness in clinic visit notes. Using a dictionary-based approach, this study conducts a textual analysis of clinic notes from a community mental health center before and after staff were trained in CD. This study used visit notes (n=1981) from 10 providers in a community mental health center 6 months before and after training in CD. LIWC-22 was used to assess all notes using the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) dictionary, which categorizes over 5000 linguistic and psychological words. Twelve LIWC categories were selected and mapped onto PCC planning principles through the consensus of 3 domain experts. The LIWC-22 contextualizer was used to extract sentence fragments from notes corresponding to LIWC categories. Then, fixed-effects modeling was used to identify differences in notes before and after CD training while accounting for nesting within the provider. Sentence fragments identified by the contextualizing process illustrated how visit notes demonstrated PCC. The fixed effects analysis found a significant positive shift toward person-centeredness; this was observed in 6 of the selected LIWC categories post CD. Specifically, there was a notable increase in words associated with achievement (β=.774, P<.001), power (β=.831, P<.001), money (β=.204, P<.001), physical health (β=.427, P=.03), while leisure words decreased (β=-.166, P=.002). By using a dictionary-based approach, the study identified how CD might influence the integration of PCC principles within clinical notes. Although the results were mixed, the findings highlight the potential effectiveness of CD in enhancing person-centeredness in clinic notes. By leveraging NLP techniques, this research illuminated the value of narrative clinical notes in assessing the quality of care in behavioral health contexts. These findings underscore the promise of NLP for quality assurance in health care settings and emphasize the need for refining algorithms to more accurately measure PCC.

Sentence Problem pada Penulisan Essay Mahasiswa Program Studi Sastra Inggris

Essay writing is a skill that must be mastered by students, especially English Literature Study Program students. Writing essays in English is a challenge in itself which of course has a lot of problems in the process. In writing essays in English, of course, you have to follow the correct writing rules. Mastery of several important aspects of writing including grammar, vocabulary, content, mechanism and organization is very important to be able to create good and easy-to-understand writing. Besides that. there are several things that need to be considered to create accuracy in writing such as sentence structure, cohesive devices in writing, and so on. In this study, the focus is on the problem of writing sentences. This study investigates sentence writing problems such as sentence fragments, run-on sentences, parallel structures, comma connections, and so on which are often encountered. This study involved semester student essays 6 English Literature study programs. The reason for selecting sixth semester students for the English Literature study program is because at this level students have already taken Writing and Grammar courses. This study aims to explain the phenomena of the sentence problems. This research is expected to contribute to the academic field. The contribution in question is a contribution in improving learning strategies related to writing. Therefore the author chose the research title "Sentence Problem in essay writing for students of the English Literature study program, Pamulang University".