Word Pairs Research Articles

Implicit Graphemes Learning among Poor Readers

Poor implicit learning was suggested to be associated with poor orthographic knowledge. The current study examined the differences between twenty typical (age 8.68 ±.15), and twenty poor readers (age 8.45 ±.22) in implicit learning of novel graphemes. In the first stage, each participant was passively displayed with 80 pairs of real and artificial words. The artificial words were composed from artificial symbols. After the passive learning stage, each participant was tested with a grapheme matching decision task. The results showed that the accuracy levels which were recorded among the typical readers were significantly higher than those of the poor readers. The accuracy levels which were recorded among the poor readers showed a type of chance level of performance indicating an absence of implicit learning consolidation. However, the results did not show any significant differences in the response times between the two groups. In addition, significant larger individual standard deviations were recorded for the poor group of readers, for both accuracy and the response time of performance, indicating a non-solid type of implicit learning consolidation among this group. The results were discussed considering the association between poor implicit learning capacities and poor orthographic learning.

The impact of spatial and verbal working memory load on semantic relatedness judgements.

Studies using a relatedness judgement task have found differences between prime-target word pairs that vary in the degree of semantic relatedness. However, the influence of working memory load on semantic processing in this task and the role of the type of working memory task have not yet been investigated. The present study therefore investigated for the first time the effect of working memory load (low vs. high) and working memory type (verbal vs. spatial) on semantic relatedness judgements. Semantically strongly related (e.g., hip - KNEE), weakly related (e.g., muscle - KNEE) and unrelated (e.g., office - KNEE) Polish word pairs were presented in an experiment involving a dual working memory and semantic relatedness task. The data revealed that, relative to semantically unrelated word pairs, responses were faster for strongly related pairs but slower for weakly related pairs. Importantly, the verbal working memory task decreased facilitation for strongly related pairs and increased inhibition for weakly related pairs relative to the spatial working memory task. Furthermore, working memory load impacted only weakly related pairs in the verbal but not in the spatial working memory task. These results show that working memory type and load influence semantic relatedness judgements, but the direction and size of the impact depend on the strength of semantic relations.

Brain correlates of recall of negative autobiographical memories in patients with schizophrenia

Introduction Autobiographical memory is known to be disturbed in schizophrenia. In addition, a leading theory of auditory hallucinations (AVH) is that they are intrusive – typically negative – autobiographical memories that are misinterpreted as perceptions.ObjectivesThe aim of this study was to examine the brain functional correlates of recall of negatively emotionally valanced autobiographical memories in patients with schizophrenia, with a longer term aim of comparing patients with and without AVH.Methods11 patients meeting DSM-5 criteria for schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder and 10 age, sex and estimated premorbid IQ-matched healthy controls have so far taken part.Participants underwent functional MRI in a 3T scanner while performing a task requiring them to recall autobiographical memories in response to individually tailored pairs of cue words. The cue words were based on autobiographical memories previously elicited in an interview with each patient and were designed to evoke the same memory. The cue words were presented in 10 20-second blocks interspersed with blocks where the subjects viewed cue words that did not evoke autobiographical memories. Brain activations were examined in three contrasts of interest: memory evoking words vs baseline, neutral words vs baseline and memory evoking vs neutral words.Pre-processing and analysis were carried out with the FEAT module included in the FSL software. Statistical analysis was performed by means of a General Linear Model (GLM) approach.ResultsIn the memory evoking vs baseline contrast the patients showed hypoactivation in the medial frontal cortex compared to the healthy controls (Figure 1). There were no differences in activation between the patients and the controls comparing the memory evoking and neutral cues.Image:Conclusions The finding of hypoactivation in the medial frontal cortex compared to low level baseline in patients with schizophrenia suggests dysfunction in the default mode network, which is known to activate during recall of autobiographical memories.These preliminary results suggest that recall of negative autobiographical memories in patients with schizophrenia is associated with reduced activity in the default mode network. A planned larger sample of patients and controls will be used to examine activations in patients with and without AVH.Disclosure of InterestNone Declared

텍스트마이닝을 활용한 조직핵심인재 역량에 대한 직장인들의 인식

The purpose of this study is to investigate and analyze the competencies of organizational core talents as perceived by employees. To achieve this, interviews and survey questions were created through a review of prior research, using both structured and unstructured questions. Subsequently, data from 134 employees, excluding insincere respondents, were collected through offline interviews and online surveys. The analysis utilized text mining techniques, a big data analysis method, and was conducted by converting descriptive response content into text files using R 4.3.2. The research methodology began with a keyword frequency analysis, followed by visualization through cloud analysis. Then, a keyword difference analysis between organization sizes was conducted using TF-IDF weight comparison, and meaningful word pairs were extracted and categorized through N-gram semantic network analysis, with interview content provided as examples. The results revealed that employees perceive the core competencies of core talents to include problem-solving abilities, critical thinking skills, creativity, and communication skills, recognizing their contribution to project execution and work tasks. Based on these findings, the study discusses its significance, implications, limitations, and directions for future research.

No Benefit in Memory Performance after Nocturnal Memory Reactivation Coupled with Theta-tACS.

Targeted memory reactivation (TMR) is an effective technique to enhance sleep-associated memory consolidation. The successful reactivation of memories by external reminder cues is typically accompanied by an event-related increase in theta oscillations, preceding better memory recall after sleep. However, it remains unclear whether the increase in theta oscillations is a causal factor or an epiphenomenon of successful TMR. Here, we used transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS) to examine the causal role of theta oscillations for TMR during non-rapid eye movement (non-REM) sleep. Thirty-seven healthy participants learned Dutch-German word pairs before sleep. During non-REM sleep, we applied either theta-tACS or control-tACS (23 Hz) in blocks (9 min) in a randomised order, according to a within-subject design. One group of participants received tACS coupled with TMR time-locked two seconds after the reminder cue (time-locked group). Another group received tACS in a continuous manner while TMR cues were presented (continuous group). Contrary to our predictions, we observed no frequency-specific benefit of theta-tACS coupled with TMR during sleep on memory performance, neither for continuous nor time-locked stimulation. In fact, both stimulation protocols blocked the TMR-induced memory benefits during sleep, resulting in no memory enhancement by TMR in both the theta and control conditions. No frequency-specific effect was found on the power analyses of the electroencephalogram. We conclude that tACS might have an unspecific blocking effect on memory benefits typically observed after TMR during non-REM sleep.

Enhancing Bilingual Lexicon Induction via Bi-directional Translation Pair Retrieving

Most Bilingual Lexicon Induction (BLI) methods retrieve word translation pairs by finding the closest target word for a given source word based on cross-lingual word embeddings (WEs). However, we find that solely retrieving translation from the source-to-target perspective leads to some false positive translation pairs, which significantly harm the precision of BLI. To address this problem, we propose a novel and effective method to improve translation pair retrieval in cross-lingual WEs. Specifically, we consider both source-side and target-side perspectives throughout the retrieval process to alleviate false positive word pairings that emanate from a single perspective. On a benchmark dataset of BLI, our proposed method achieves competitive performance compared to existing state-of-the-art (SOTA) methods. It demonstrates effectiveness and robustness across six experimental languages, including similar language pairs and distant language pairs, under both supervised and unsupervised settings.

What Fires Together, Wires Together: The Effect of Idiomatic Co-Occurrence on Lexical Networks

This study investigated the processing of lexical elements of idioms in isolation. Using visual word priming, spreading activation for idiomatically related word pairs (e.g., pop–question) was compared to that for semantically related (e.g., answer–question) and unrelated word pairs (e.g., trim–question) in two experiments varying in SOA (500 ms and 350 ms). In line with hybrid theories of idiom representation and processing, facilitatory priming was found in both experiments for idiomatic primes, suggesting a tight link between the words of an idiom that is mediated by a common idiom representation. While idiomatic priming was stable across SOAs, semantic priming was stronger for the short SOA, implying fast and early activation. In conclusion, one lexical element of an idiom can facilitate the processing of another, even if the elements are not presented within a phrasal context (i.e., within an idiom), and without the words being semantically related. We discuss our findings in light of theories about idiom processing, as well as current findings in the field of semantic priming.

Improving linear orthogonal mapping based cross-lingual representation using ridge regression and graph centrality

Orthogonal linear mapping is a commonly used approach for generating cross-lingual embedding between two monolingual corpora that uses a word frequency-based seed dictionary alignment approach. While this approach is found to be effective for isomorphic language pairs, they do not perform well for distant language pairs with different sentence structures and morphological properties. For a distance language pair, the existing frequency-aligned orthogonal mapping methods suffer from two problems - (i)the frequency of source and target word are not comparable, and (ii)different word pairs in the seed dictionary may have different contribution. Motivated by the above two concerns, this paper proposes a novel centrality-aligned ridge regression-based orthogonal mapping. The proposed method uses centrality-based alignment for seed dictionary selection and ridge regression framework for incorporating influential weights of different word pairs in the seed dictionary. From various experimental observations over five language pairs (both isomorphic and distant languages), it is evident that the proposed method outperforms baseline methods in the Bilingual Dictionary Induction(BDI) task, Sentence Retrieval Task(SRT), and Machine Translation. Further, several analyses are also included to support the proposed method.

‘Following the Straight Path’: Egypt Political Regime’s Quest for Political Legitimacy

The study aims to investigate the sources of the Egyptian regime’s legitimacy after the removal of Mohammed Morsi from office in 2013. The ruling elite, in particular President alSisi, has recently shown a growing inclination towards adopting Islam in the political discourse. As a result, there is a need to examine the factors that have contributed to this trend. The central hypothesis of the research is that the government, lacking institutional legitimacy, is compelled to reinforce the Islamic values in political communication to overcome internal political divisions and establish a sense of social connection between the authorities and citizens. To test this hypothesis, the study employs a qualitative content analysis of speeches made by President alSisi to the nation between 2014 and 2023. The analysis identifies four techniques for legitimation (mobilization, national identity consolidation, construction of a common past, and construction of a common future) and examines the functional role of Islam in each of them. The findings of the study suggest that Islamic norms and values are most actively appealed to in segments of texts devoted to national identity consolidation and constructing a common future. Both approaches involve a similar strategy of invoking Islam by associating and transferring attributes within pairs of words (religious context - secular context): nation - the Ummah; state - Islamic world; citizen - a Muslim. By using this rhetorical strategy, the government is shaping a narrative that places the contemporary Egyptian state within a religious and historical framework, as depicted in the Qur’an. This approach is aimed at establishing a set of values that can unite the nation and foster loyalty among citizens towards the government’s vision for Egypt’s future. However, there are almost no semantic sections dedicated to mobilizing citizens in the texts. This can be attributed to a pragmatic effort to steer clear of politicizing the electorate.

Performance evaluation of automated scoring for the descriptive similarity response task

We examined whether a machine-learning-based automated scoring system can mimic the human similarity task performance. We trained a bidirectional encoder representations from transformer-model based on the semantic similarity test (SST), which presented participants with a word pair and asked them to write about how the two concepts were similar. In Experiment 1, based on the fivefold cross validation, we showed the model trained on the combination of the responses (N = 1600) and classification criteria (which is the rubric of the SST; N = 616) scored the correct labels with 83% accuracy. In Experiment 2, using the test data obtained from different participants in different timing from Experiment 1, we showed the models trained on the responses alone and the combination of responses and classification criteria scored the correct labels in 80% accuracy. In addition, human–model scoring showed inter-rater reliability of 0.63, which was almost the same as that of human–human scoring (0.67 to 0.72). These results suggest that the machine learning model can reach human-level performance in scoring the Japanese version of the SST.

Disambiguation of Isolated Manipuri Tonal Contrast Word Pairs Using Acoustic Features

Manipuri is a low-resource, Tibeto-Burman tonal language spoken mainly in Manipur, a northeastern state of India. Tone identification is crucial to speech comprehension for tonal languages, where tone defines the word’s meaning. Automatic Speech Recognition for those languages can perform better by including tonal information from a powerful tone detection system. While significant research has been conducted on tonal languages like Mandarin, Thai, Cantonese, and Vietnamese, a notable gap exists in exploring Manipuri within this context. To address this gap, this work expands our previously developed handcrafted speech corpus, ManiTo, which comprises isolated Manipuri tonal contrast word pairs to study the tones of Manipuri. This extension includes contributions from 20 native speakers. Preliminary findings have confirmed that Manipuri has two unique tones, Falling and Level. The study then conducts a comprehensive acoustic feature analysis. Two sets of features based on Pitch contours, Jitter, and Shimmer measurements are investigated to distinguish the two tones of Manipuri. Support Vector Machine, Long Short-term Memory, Random Forest, and k-Nearest Neighbors are the classifiers adopted to validate the selected feature sets. The results indicate that the second set of features consistently outperformed the first set, demonstrating higher accuracy, particularly when utilizing the Random Forest classifier, which provides valuable insights for further advancements in speech recognition technology for low-resource tonal language Manipuri.

Bilingual proficiency effects in paired-associate learning of vocabulary in an unfamiliar language

Abstract We investigated three aspects of paired associate learning of vocabulary in an unfamiliar language: monolingual-bilingual differences, effects of dominance and language proficiency, and the possible role of associative strategies. Spanish–English bilinguals (48 English-dominant and 48 Spanish-dominant) and English-speaking monolinguals (n = 48) learned Swahili–English and Swahili-Spanish word pairs. Learning was assessed using cued recall (Swahili cue or Swahili response) and associative recognition tests. English-dominant bilinguals did not outperform English monolinguals on any learning measure. Cued recall accuracy was higher when learning through the dominant language than through the non-dominant language, whether the Swahili words were cues or responses. Proficiency scores in the known language were positively correlated with cued recall accuracy, whether the cue or the response was in Swahili, indicating that proficiency effects occurred not in retrievability of known words but in learning of associations. Bilingual and monolingual participants did not differ in their reported use of associative strategies.

The interplay of semantic and syntactic processing across hemispheres

The current study investigated the hemispheric dynamics underlying semantic and syntactic priming in lexical decision tasks. Utilizing primed-lateralized paradigms, we observed a distinct pattern of semantic priming contingent on the priming hemisphere. The right hemisphere (RH) exhibited robust semantic priming irrespective of syntactic congruency between prime and target, underscoring its proclivity for semantic processing. Conversely, the left hemisphere (LH) demonstrated slower response times for semantically congruent yet syntactically incongruent word pairs, highlighting its syntactic processing specialization. Additionally, nonword data revealed a hemispheric divergence in syntactic processing, with the LH showing significant intrahemispheric syntactic priming. These findings illuminate the intrinsic hemispheric specializations for semantic and syntactic processing, offering empirical support for serial processing models. The study advances our understanding of the complex interplay between semantic and syntactic factors in hemispheric interactions.

The role of mediators for the pretesting effect

ABSTRACT Taking a pretest (e.g., smoke – ?) before material is studied (smoke – fog) can improve later recall of that material, compared to material which was initially only studied. The goal of the present study was to evaluate for this pretesting effect the potential role of semantic mediators, i.e., of unstudied information that is semantically related to the study material. In all three experiments, subjects studied weakly associated word pairs (e.g., smoke – fog), half of which received a pretest. Subjects then either completed a recognition test (Experiment 1) or a cued-recall test (Experiments 2 and 3), during which they were presented with both the original study material and never-before-seen semantic mediators that were strongly related to the cue item of a pair (e.g., cigarette). Strikingly, presenting semantic mediators as lures led to higher false alarm rates for mediators following initial pretesting than study only (Experiment 1), and presenting semantic mediators as retrieval cues led to better recall of target items following pretesting than study only (Experiments 2 and 3). We argue that these findings support the elaboration account of the pretesting effect but are difficult to reconcile with other prominent accounts of the effect.

Computing the index of non-isometric k-ary words with Hamming and Lee distance

Isometric words are those words whose occurrence as a factor in a transformation of a word u in a word v can be avoided, while preserving the minimal length of the transformation. Such minimal length refers to a distance between u and v. In the literature, isometric words have been considered with respect to the Hamming distance and the Lee distance; the former especially for binary words, while the latter for k-ary words, with k ⩾ 2. Ham- and Lee- isometric words have been characterized in terms of their overlaps with errors. In this paper, we give algorithms to decide whether a word f, of length n, is Ham- or Lee-isometric and provide evidence of the possible non-isometricity by returning a pair of words of minimal length whose transformation cannot avoid the factor f. Such a pair of words is called a pair of witnesses and the minimal length of the witnesses is called the index of f. The algorithms run in O ( n ) time with a preprocessing of O ( n ) time and space to construct a data structure that allows answering LCA queries on the suffix tree of f in constant time. The correctness of the algorithms lies on some theoretical results on the index and the witnesses of a word that are here presented. The investigation on the index is completed by the characterization of words with minimum/maximum index. All the results are shown referring to both Hamming and Lee distance.

Individual differences in talker discrimination among adult cochlear implant users

Real-world speech communication involves interacting with talkers with diverse voices and accents. Adult cochlear implant (CI) users often demonstrate poor discrimination of talkers’ voices relative to their normal-hearing peers, which may contribute to difficulties in understanding speech produced by multiple talkers. However, the factors underlying poor talker discrimination ability are not well understood. The current study examined auditory and cognitive-linguistic factors that support talker discrimination, and explored the association between talker discrimination and sentence recognition across CI users. In an AX talker discrimination task, 25 adult CI users indicated whether word pairs were produced by the same talker or by two different talkers. Participants also completed measures of spectrotemporal processing, cognitive-linguistic skills, including fluid intelligence, working memory capacity, inhibitory control, and phonological processing, and sentence recognition. Results showed that talker discrimination scores (accuracy, sensitivity) were moderately to strongly correlated with spectrotemporal processing, fluid intelligence, inhibitory control, and phonological processing. Talker discrimination scores were also related to sentence recognition accuracy scores across CI users. These preliminary findings suggest that both auditory and cognitive-linguistic processes support talker discrimination, and, furthermore, may underlie the relationship between talker discrimination and sentence recognition in adult CI users.

Listening effort mitigates rollover effects on speech-in-noise perception

Increasing the sound intensity may lead to worse speech understanding, especially in noise. This is known as the “Rollover” phenomenon. There is mounting evidence that listening effort plays an important role in challenging listening conditions and can be directly quantified with objective measures such as pupil dilation. However, there is limited understanding of how listening effort relates to rollover in speech understanding. We hypothesized that listening effort plays an essential role in mitigating rollover effects to differential extents across age and hearing status. We recruited across the adult lifespan (N = 50, 20–83 years) with different hearing statuses in acoustic listeners and cochlear implant users to perform a speech discrimination task. Minimal word pairs were presented both in quiet and in 0 dB SNR babble noise, ranging from 35–85 dB SPL. Pupil area was tracked simultaneously with behavioral responses during the task. We found that normal-hearing listeners are fully able to utilize effort contributions to minimize rollover effects between in quiet and in noise conditions, with diminishing benefit as a function of age and increased hearing loss. The results of this project could broadly influence how to design future hearing devices and interventions that maximize hearing abilities for those affected by hearing loss.

Structure-Function Interactions in the Hippocampus and Prefrontal Cortex Are Associated with Episodic Memory in Healthy Aging.

Aging comes with declines in episodic memory. Memory decline is accompanied by structural and functional alterations within key brain regions, including the hippocampus and lateral prefrontal cortex, as well as their affiliated default and frontoparietal control networks. Most studies have examined how structural or functional differences relate to memory independently. Here we implemented a multimodal, multivariate approach to investigate how interactions between individual differences in structural integrity and functional connectivity relate to episodic memory performance in healthy aging. In a sample of younger (N = 111; mean age, 22.11 years) and older (N = 78; mean age, 67.29 years) adults, we analyzed structural MRI and multiecho resting-state fMRI data. Participants completed measures of list recall (free recall of words from a list), associative memory (cued recall of paired words), and source memory (cued recall of the trial type, or the sensory modality in which a word was presented). The findings revealed that greater structural integrity of the posterior hippocampus and middle frontal gyrus were linked with a pattern of increased within-network connectivity, which together were related to better associative and source memory in older adulthood. Critically, older adults displayed better memory performance in the context of decreased hippocampal volumes when structural differences were accompanied by functional reorganization. This functional reorganization was characterized by a pruning of connections between the hippocampus and the limbic and frontoparietal control networks. Our work provides insight into the neural mechanisms that underlie age-related compensation, revealing that the functional architecture associated with better memory performance in healthy aging is tied to the structural integrity of the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex.

MATHEMATICAL MODEL OF FUZZY DEFINITION OF SUBJECTS OF SCIENTIFIC ARTICLES USING SYNTACTICALLY RELATED WORDS

Mathematical methods are widely used to formalize the solution of problems of automatic text processing, including text classification. To classify texts, a “naive” Bayes classifier, methods of -nearest neighbors, decision trees, support vector machines, distribution of letter combinations (character -grams), logistic regression, and approaches based on artificial neural networks are used. These methods are used by modern computational linguistics. Classical computational linguistics considers text as a carrier of meaning. The purpose of the study is to formalize the definition of the topics of scientific articles using syntactically related words by a mathematical model, and therefore classical computer linguistics. We propose an abstract mathematical model of fuzzy classification based on common objects. The model assumes that some objects belong to only one class and are class identifiers. The result of a fuzzy classification can be one or more classes. For each class a degree of membership is determined. We propose a specification of the model with in which the common objects are syntactically related pairs of words. We conclude syntactically related words are more promising in research than verbal bigrams determined by sentence order. We propose the model in our international study. The study involve the creation of a corpus of scientific articles and their distribution by topic. The corpus will be used to classify scientific articles by topic.

Conveyance of feature gradation semantics in modern Turkish

The aim of the article is to study the Turkish adjective from the point of view of a complex and systematic description of the means that serve to indicate the semantics of feature gradation. Having analyzed the works of Ukrainian Turkologists and representatives of various grammar schools in Turkey and in European countries, which focus on the adjective, we determined that most of them study certain features of the adjective structure or functioning in modern Turkish. Besides, means of denoting the feature manifestation intensity, particularly those having diminutive semantics, especially word-forming affixes that realize this meaning, also became the subject of the scientists’ research. At the same time, we did not record any work that deals with a holisticdescription of linguistic (grammatical, word-forming) means as a system that serves to denote the semantics of feature gradation, which determines the relevance of our research. In the present work, we set the task to carry out such a systematic description of these means and determine the features of their interaction within this system. Along with this, the paper discusses the general problems of qualification of the adjective as part of speech in the Turkish language and differentiation of its lexical and semantic classes. Within the framework of the study, we offer the description of the degrees of comparison of adjectives, the intensive adjective forms, the polyfunctional affix -ca/-ce, the word-forming affixes with diminutive and augmentative semantics as well as the pair words (lexical repetitions) and syntactic models of the implementation of feature gradation semantics. The methodological prerequisite of the study is the functional and semantic approach.