Hebrew Sentences Research Articles

Context effects in the L2: Evidence for compensatory mechanisms

Aims and objectives: We examined how context is used to facilitate reading in the second language (L2) compared with the first language (L1), and how L2 availability and age modulate these context effects. Methodology: Using self-paced reading, participants read high- and low-constraint Hebrew sentences. In Experiment 1, L1 ( n = 45) and L2 ( n = 48) Hebrew readers were compared, whereas in Experiment 2, only L2 readers ( n = 131) were examined, testing modulations by L2 availability and age. Data and analysis: Reading times of target, post target, and sentence final words were analyzed using linear-mixed-effects models. Findings: In Experiment 1, L2 readers differed from L1 readers in contextual processing, as evident in the significant interaction between context type and language background on the final word measure. In Experiment 2, L2 readers with lower L2 availability scores differed from those with higher scores, and younger readers differed from older ones, in the way high- and low-constraining context affected their reading behavior in the target word and in the final word of the sentence. These differences were indicated by significant interactions between context type and L2 availability as well as between context type and age group. These findings are best understood under a compensatory processing account. Originality: By complementing L1–L2 group comparisons with in-depth examination of the L2 profile, the current study reveals a continuous effect of L2 availability, such that a lower L2 availability is associated with a greater reliance on context. Furthermore, the inclusion of older and younger adults provides converging evidence to the use of contextual support as a compensatory mechanism when lexical processing is more effortful.

Language Control and Intra-Sentential Codeswitching among Bilingual Children with and without Developmental Language Disorder

The present study investigated bilingual language control among preschool children in a sentence repetition task containing unilingual stimuli and codeswitched stimuli within prepositional phrases (PPs). Cross-language errors, that is, codeswitches that were not part of the stimulus sentences, were taken as evidence of difficulties in language control. Specifically, we investigated cross-language errors as a function of stimulus sentence type (codeswitched or unilingual), CS site within the PP, directionality (English or Hebrew stimulus sentences), and group status (children with typical language development (TLD), and children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD)). We also examined cross-language errors in terms of word class and locus in the sentence. The participants were 65 English (home language)–Hebrew (societal language) bilinguals with TLD and 13 with DLD, ages 5;5–6;10 (M = 5;11). Stimulus sentences contained five codeswitch conditions within prepositional phrases, for example, a codeswitched preposition (P) or a codeswitched preposition, determiner and noun (P+DET+N), and a ‘no switch’ condition. The stimuli were 36 English and 36 Hebrew sentences (+24 fillers) matched for semantic content and syntax. English sentences contained switches to Hebrew, and Hebrew sentences contained switches to English. The results showed more cross-language errors for codeswitched than unilingual sentence stimuli. The children with TLD showed a directionality effect, producing more cross-language errors in Hebrew sentence stimuli than in English, but the children with DLD did not. The children with DLD had more cross-language errors than their peers with TLD for English stimuli. Most cross-language errors appeared in the sentence-final, adverbial temporal phrase. Findings are discussed in terms of language co-activation and competition in order to account for the difference in performance on unilingual versus codeswitched stimuli and in light of sociopragmatic and psycholinguistic factors to account for the directionality effect among children with TLD and the lack thereof among children with DLD.

Processing emotional prosody in a foreign language: the case of German and Hebrew

This study investigated the universality of emotional prosody in perception of discrete emotions when semantics is not available. In two experiments the perception of emotional prosody in Hebrew and German by listeners who speak one of the languages but not the other was investigated. Having a parallel tool in both languages allowed to conduct controlled comparisons. In Experiment 1, 39 native German speakers with no knowledge of Hebrew and 80 native Israeli speakers rated Hebrew sentences spoken with four different emotional prosodies (anger, fear, happiness, sadness) or neutral. The Hebrew version of the Test for Rating of Emotions in Speech (T-RES) was used for this purpose. Ratings indicated participants’ agreement on how much the sentence conveyed each of four discrete emotions (anger, fear, happiness and sadness). In Experient 2, 30 native speakers of German, and 24 Israeli native speakers of Hebrew who had no knowledge of German rated sentences of the German version of the T-RES. Based only on the prosody, German-speaking participants were able to accurately identify the emotions in the Hebrew sentences and Hebrew-speaking participants were able to identify the emotions in the German sentences. In both experiments ratings between the groups were similar. These findings show that individuals are able to identify emotions in a foreign language even if they do not have access to semantics. This ability goes beyond identification of target emotion; similarities between languages exist even for “wrong” perception. This adds to accumulating evidence in the literature on the universality of emotional prosody.

AzBio Sentence test in Hebrew (HeBio): development, preliminary validation, and the effect of noise

Objective The AzBio sentence test is widely used to assess speech perception pre- and post-cochlear implantation. This study created and validated a Hebrew version of AzBio (HeBio) and tested its intelligibility amidst background noise. Methods In Experiment 1, 1,000 recorded Hebrew sentences were presented via five-channel vocoder to 10 normal hearing (NH) listeners for intelligibility testing. In Experiment 2, HeBio lists were presented to 25 post-lingual cochlear implant (CI) users amidst four-talker babble noise (4TBN) or in quiet, along with one-syllable word test. In Experiment 3, 20 NH listeners were presented with eight HeBio lists in two noise conditions [4TBN, speech shaped noise (SSN)] and four SNRs (+3, 0 dB, −3 dB, −6 dB). Results HeBio lists (33) produced 82% average understanding, no inter-list intelligibility differences among NH, and equal intelligibility for CI users. One-syllable words predicted 67% of the variance in HeBio among CI users. Higher intelligibility was found for SSN than for 4TBN, and the mean speech receptive threshold (SRT) was more negative for SSN than for 4TBN. Conclusions HeBio results were similar to AzBio. Results obtained with two noise types were as expected. HeBio is recommended for evaluation of different populations in quiet and noise.

Codeswitching within prepositional phrases: Effects of switch site and directionality

Aims and Research Questions: Codeswitching (CS) was investigated among English-Hebrew bilingual preschool children in a sentence repetition task focusing on switching at different points in prepositional phrases (PPs). We asked the extent to which sentence repetition accuracy differed (1) as a function of the switch site in the PP and (2) as a function of directionality, English-to-Hebrew versus Hebrew-to-English CS. Design/Methodology: English/first language (L1)-Hebrew/second language (L2), sequential bilingual children ( N = 65), ages 5;5–6;5, participated. Thirty-six English and 36 Hebrew stimulus sentences were matched for semantic content and syntax. English stimulus sentences contained switches to Hebrew; Hebrew stimuli contained switches to English. Six ‘switch’ conditions were examined: a single codeswitched noun (N), a determiner–noun switch (DET+N), a codeswitched preposition (P), a preposition–determiner switch (P+DET), a switch of the entire PP (P+DET+N), and a no-switch condition. Data and Analysis: Audio recordings were transcribed and coded. Full sentence repetition was coded as correct/incorrect. The number of errors and the proportion of CS errors were computed. A 6 × 2 repeated-measures analysis of variance examined the effects of switch site within the PP and directionality (L1-to-L2 versus L2-to-L1). Findings/Conclusions: Accuracy was highest for the non-switched, N, and P+DET+N conditions. Accuracy was lowest for DET+N switches in English sentences, and for P switches in Hebrew sentences, and these two conditions showed the highest proportion of CS errors. The findings show evidence for a hierarchy of processing costs and directionality differences, which are interpreted in terms of contrastive typological features, particularly definiteness marking in the two languages, English by a free morpheme, and Hebrew by a bound clitic.

Resolving homography: The role of post-homograph context in reading aloud ambiguous sentences in Hebrew

AbstractThis study examined whether the context immediately succeeding a heterophonic-homographic word (ht-homographic) plays a role in ambiguity resolution during voiced reading of Hebrew. A pretest was designed to find the preferred alternatives of 12 ht-homographic words: 20 adult subjects completed truncated sentences, each ending with a homographic word, preceded by a context allowing for both of its alternatives to be read. Following the pretest, each word was embedded in four research conditions determined by post-homographic context (keeping preceding context constant): two adjacent revealing contexts, one supporting the preferred alternative and the other the un-preferred alternative; and two distant revealing contexts, one supporting the preferred alternative and the other the un-preferred alternative. Four lists of 12 sentences, each including the four conditions, were then read aloud by four groups of 20 adults. Results from a generalized linear mixed-model analysis showed that the immediately succeeding context affected the deciphering of un-preferred alternatives in voiced reading. An item analysis further showed that highly preferred alternatives were less prone to the immediately succeeding context effect than slightly preferred alternatives. We conclude that the context immediately succeeding a ht-homographic word plays a role in ambiguity resolution during voiced reading, through interactions with the word’s lexical and syntactic characteristics.

Automatic Opinion Extraction from Short Hebrew Texts using Machine Learning Techniques

Sentiment analysis deals with classifying written texts according to their polarity. Previous research in this topic has been conducted mostly for Latin languages, and no research has been done for Hebrew. This is important because it turns out that the task of text classification is extremely language-dependent. Furthermore, the work on sentiment analysis for English texts was mostly performed on relatively long documents. In this work, we focus specifically on classifying Modern Hebrew sentences according to their polarity. We compare various Machine Learning algorithms and techniques of classification. We added optimizations and methods that have not previously been used, and adjusted commonly used techniques so they would suit a Hebrew corpus. We elaborate on the differences in classifying short texts versus long ones and about the uniqueness of working specifically with Hebrew. Finally, our model achieved nearly 93% accuracy, which is higher than accuracies achieved previously in this field.

Making Sense of the Divine Name in Exodus: From Etymology to Literary Onomastics

Making Sense of the Divine Name in Exodus: From Etymology to Literary Onomastics

Morphosyntactic abilities of toddlers with hearing impairment and normal hearing: evidence from a sentence-repetition task.

While considerable research exists on morphosyntax of school-age children with hearing impairment (HI), little is known about development of morphosyntax at younger ages. Some studies show that young children with HI have a delay in language abilities compared with children with normal hearing (NH); conversely, other studies show evidence that they achieve age-appropriate language development. To investigate whether characteristics of morphosyntactic development displayed by young children with HI are unique or whether they are similar to those of NH children. Fifty-four Hebrew-speaking children (15 with HI and 39 with NH), aged 22-40 months, completed a novel Hebrew sentence repetition (SRep) task designed to evaluate morphosyntactic abilities. Accuracy on the total correct structure, repetition of content and function words, and repetition of specific morphemes were compared across groups. At the earliest stages of combining words to sentences, toddlers in both groups showed a large variation in morphosyntactic development, with no significant difference between the two groups. Children with HI and NH showed similar results for the acquisition of morphemes and various syntactic structures. In the group of children with HI, hearing capability accounted for 28% of the variance of the SRep task. The findings suggest typical morphosyntax capacity at the onset of language development among of children with HI who are diagnosed early and receive intensive intervention.

A Comparison of Two Treatment Approaches for Agrammatic Broca's Aphasia: Script Therapy vs. Verb Network Strengthening Treatment

A Comparison of Two Treatment Approaches for Agrammatic Broca's Aphasia: Script Therapy vs. Verb Network Strengthening Treatment

Is susceptibility to cross-language interference domain specific?

The ability to overcome interference from the first-language (L1) is a source of variability in second language (L2) achievement, which has to date been explored mainly in same-script bilinguals. Such interference management, and bilingual language control more generally, have recently been linked to domain general executive functions (EF). In the current study, we examined L2 proficiency and executive functions as possible predictors of susceptibility to L1 interference during L2 processing, in bilinguals whose languages do not share an orthographic system. Seventy Arabic-Hebrew bilingual university students performed two tasks indexing cross-language interference (from L1 to L2). Lexical interference was assessed using a cross-modal semantic similarity judgment task in Hebrew, with false-cognates as critical items. Syntactic interference was assessed using a self-paced reading paradigm and grammaticality judgments on Hebrew sentences whose syntactic structures differed from those of Arabic. EFs were examined using spatial and numerical Stroop tasks, to index inhibitory control, and a task switching paradigm, to index shifting abilities. We found significant L1 interference across the lexical and syntactic domains, even in proficient different-script bilinguals. However, these interference effects were not correlated, and neither type of interference was related to domain general EF abilities. Finally, offline susceptibility to syntactic interference, but not lexical interference, was reduced with greater L2 proficiency. These results suggest at least partially independent mechanisms for managing interference in the two language domains, and raise questions regarding the degree to which domain general control abilities are recruited for managing L1 interference.

Die Judenbuche and the “Judens‐buch”: Hermeneutic Hindrance and Scriptural Reading in Droste‐Hülshoff's Crime Novella

The article presents Annette von Droste‐Hülshoff's Die Judenbuche as a reaction to the disjunction between textual interpretation and confessional belonging in modernity. I argue that the epicenter of this critique is the insertion of a Hebrew sentence that embodies both in its language and in its content—talion law—the word of the Bible as a legal authority. Appearing in the midst of the novella, the biblical language creates a “hermeneutical hindrance,” and signals the reliance of interpretation on religious training of scriptural reading. Die Judenbuche thus alerts to the codependence of hermeneutical practices and moral codes. The article concludes that in the novella, the adherence of the village's Jews to the language of the Bible hints that confessional difference may subtend diverging cultures of interpretation and perpetuate the distinct moral codes that they convey.

Morphological activation in sentence context: when the root prevails over the meaning

Two experiments explore the extent of morphological root-based spreading activation in adult skilled readers of Hebrew. Participants performed semantic judgements on sentences in Hebrew, half of which included sentence-final incongruent targets. Critical targets were morphologically related but semantically unrelated to an expected but non-presented congruent sentence completion, and control items had no such morphological relation. Participants were slower and more error-prone in correctly rejecting critical targets than controls, due to the morphological relation with the congruent completion. These results demonstrate that prediction-based lexical activation in the absence of form exposure can support morphologically based spreading activation in Hebrew. Furthermore, semantic constraints do not completely eliminate activation of morphologically related but semantically incongruous lexical candidates, similar to patterns found for ambiguous lexical items in other languages. Taken together, these results support and extend the central role of the morphological root in shaping lexical organisation and dynamics of lexical access in Hebrew.

Word order and discourse functions in spoken Hebrew

In this article we discuss the discourse functions of the alternative linearizations of Spoken Hebrew sentences, as reflected in the possessive sentence pattern. We begin by presenting the available variants of possessive sentences in Hebrew. Next, we address the issue of markedness in our discussion of the discourse functions of the different word orders. The discourse functions demonstrated are contrast, parallelism, side-sequencing, emotive and argumentative discourse. The study is based on corpora of naturally occurring speech. Previous studies of possessive sentences in Hebrew have focused mainly on grammatical issues. These studies have not addressed the field of discourse functions, nor have they used naturally occurring speech. The current study fills this gap.

Procedural versus narrative cross-language priming and bilingual children's reading and sentence sequencing of same genre and opposite genre text in the other language

How bilingual children represent procedural versus narrative text is important for both pedagogical and theoretical reasons. To examine this issue, bilingual children and children learning English as a Second Language (ESL) read Hebrew sentences comprising either a procedural (i.e., “how to”) or a narrative text (i.e., description of “doing”) and reading times were measured. Half the children were primed with the same text, in English, in either the same genre or the opposite genre. Text sentences were then randomly sequenced and sentence sequencing mistakes and correct sentence sequencing times were assessed. Irrespective of genre, primed children read the Hebrew test text more quickly, and they read it as quickly as the English prime text. The priming effect was only evident on the last five sentences of each task. Primed children made fewer sentence sequencing mistakes than unprimed children, except when they were primed and tested with procedural text. With text reading times covaried, time for correct sequencing of the sentences showed only a main effect for genre. These data indicate that procedural genre material is harder to process than narrative genre material for bilingual children but that they are not aware of this greater difficulty. The data have important implications for our understanding of the way bilinguals construct mental models.

"Hearing Jeremiah": Perception and Cognition in Jeremiah 1:1-2:2

This study engages with information structure concepts to explore the pragmatic function(s) of fronted deictic terms in Jeremiah 1:1-2:2. Accounting for deictic terms within the pre-verbal field of Biblical Hebrew sentences is important because like the spoken word, the written text is linear representation of thought that involves deliberate sequencing of constituents. Since the initial constituent in a sentence or paragraph exhibits the "privilege of primacy," an author or speaker may choose to exploit the initial position for various reasons. Deixis, or the "act of pointing out or indicating elements of a situation by gesture or linguistic expression," is a primary feature of human communication that occurs in both speech acts and in written text. In speech contexts, deictic expressions help to orient the speaker and the addressee in space and time, and provide a deictic center for the communication event. In written texts, an author may use deictic terms to direct the reader forward or backward through the text. Because both discourse level and text level deictic terms require contextual interpretation, such terms exhibit pragmatic function. This study is concerned with identifying specific pragmatic functions for fronted terms. In other words, which deictic terms does an author place in a privileged position, and why?

Processing syntactic functions of words in normal and dyslexic readers.

Readers with dyslexia were compared with normal readers for the ability to identify the grammatical function of words in the course of sentence processing by means of electrophysiological measures along with behavior measures. Participants were 18 dyslexic and 18 normally reading, native Hebrew-speaking male university students, aged 18 to 27 years. Obtained results confirmed the hypothesis (Leikin & Breznitz, 1999) that Hebrew readers used lexical-morphological properties of words to identify their grammatical roles. However, the morphologically based strategy acquired full expression only in the presence of the verb, which in the Hebrew sentence fulfills the central role. Seemingly, readers use a few different procedures to identify the grammatical roles of words. Selection of a particular strategy seems to be influenced by diverse factors, including syntactic and lexical-morphological characteristics of the stimuli and level of reading skills. In addition, the results showed significant differences in sentence processing between normal and dyslexic readers, as reflected by ERP measures. These results are in line with the hypothesis, suggesting the existence of a syntactic processing 'wsteakness" in readers with dyslexia.

Syntactic and Semantic Factors in Processing Gender Agreement in Hebrew: Evidence from ERPs and Eye Movements

The interrelation between syntactic analysis of agreement and semantic processing was examined by recording eye movements and event-related potentials. Subject-predicate gender agreement was manipulated within Hebrew sentences. The subject was either animate or inanimate, with conceptual gender denoted by the subject's morphological structure. First-pass reading time was found to be longer for incongruent predicates than of congruent predicates but only if the predicate's gender was morphologically marked. Furthermore, this effect was larger in the animate than in the inanimate condition. Second-pass reading time was also prolonged by gender incongruity but this effect was not affected by either markedness or animacy. Gender incongruity enhanced the amplitude of an early negative potential (ostensibly ELAN), of a later negative potential (N400), and of a positive potential (P600). Like first-pass reading time, the congruity effect on the syntactically modulated P600 was significant only for marked predicates, but it did not interact with animacy. In contrast, the congruity effect on the semantically modulated N400 was significant only in the animate condition. The N400 was not affected by markedness. The congruity effect on the early negativity did not interact with either animacy or markedness. The interaction between semantic and syntactic processing and its time course are discussed within the framework set by interactive, constraint-based models for online sentence processing.

Kicking over the Traces: A Note in Response to Zurif and Piñango (1999)

Zurif and Piñango (1999) claimed that they excluded the four agrammatic patients reported by Druks and Marshall (1991) from their review article because two of the patients were nonnative speakers of Hebrew and because the Hebrew sentences we used in our investigations were ungrammatical. In Druks and Marshall (1991) we have shown that the presence or the absence of a trace in two types of Hebrew passives had no effect on the patients' performance. Two patients, without comprehension deficits, performed equally well on both types of passives and two patients, with comprehension deficits, were equally impaired on both types. We remind Zurif and Piñango of our previous response to the claims of ungrammaticality of our materials (Druks & Marshall, 1992) and argue that there were no justifiable reasons for excluding these cases from the review. We also comment on Zurif and Piñango's (1999) and Grodzinsky's (2000) new proposal that the association of agrammatic comprehension should be with Broca's aphasia and not with agrammatism.

Syntactic Processing of Hebrew Sentences in Normal and Dyslexic Readers: Electrophysiological Evidence

The authors examined differences in brain activity as measured by amplitudes and latencies of event-related potential (ERP) components in Hebrew-speaking adult dyslexic and normal readers. The participants were measured while processing words' syntactic functions during reading of sentences with subject-verb-object syntactic order. The results suggested that among dyslexic and normal readers, N100 and P300 ERP components were sensitive to certain constituents of syntactic analysis for target words in accordance with their grammatical roles. The findings further demonstrated significant differences in ERP measures between dyslexic and normal readers. Compared with normal readers, dyslexic readers exhibited consistently higher amplitudes and longer latencies in both ERP components for the subject of the sentence. Significant, though less consistent, ERP variations were observed for other sentence elements. In addition, dyslexic readers differed from normal readers in their processing strategies. For normal readers, the verb-oriented, morphologically based strategy was found to be the most efficient for sentence processing in Hebrew, whereas the dyslexic readers demonstrated a more primitive mode of identification of words' grammatical roles, namely, the word-order strategy. The results support the hypothesis that there is a syntactic processing “weakness” in dyslexics.