汉字阅读中的字形、字音、字义及频率效应的研究

Unlike alphabetic languages, Chinese language is ideographical writing system. Each Chinese character is single-syllable and usually has a direct meaning. So Chinese characters are a kind of valuable experimental material used for research on reading and comparisons of the reading mechanism of different language. In this paper, the normal persons and the patients with semantic dementia were respectively scheduled for two parts of experimental studies on the orthographic, phonologic, semantic and frequency effects of reading of Chinese characters. The Stroop-like character-picture interference experimental paradigm was used to investigate the orthographic, phonologic, semantic and frequency effects of Chinese characters on picture naming when they were presented with pictures to normal persons. The results indicated that the orthographic facilitation effect, phonologic facilitation effect, and semantic interference effect occurred at different SOA values. The orthographic and phonologic facilitation effects were independent. It was for the first time shown that the interaction between orthographic variable and semantic variable occurred when the high-frequency Chinese characters were read. Phonologic representation was activated quicker than semantic representation, by comparison of their SOA. Generally, it means that there is reading without meaning in Chinese character among the normal persons. The orthographic, phonologic, semantic, frequency and concrete effects of Chinese characters were further investigated among the dementia patients with DAT(dementia of Alzheimer's type disease) or CVA or both. They all have an impaired semantic memory. The results showed that patients with dementia could read the names of the pictures aloud while they could not name them or match them with a right character correctly. This is reading impairment without meaning in Chinese among the dementia patients. Meanwhile, they had a selective reading impairment and more LARC(a legitimate alternative reading of components) mistakes especially when reading low-frequency irregular, low-frequency inconsistent and abstract Chinese characters. With the patients' semantic impairment developed, their ability to read the pictures names would remain whereas their ability to read low-frequency irregular and low-frequency inconsistency Chinese characters was reduced. These results indicated that low-frequency irregular Chinese characters can be read correctly only when it is supported by their semantic information. Based on the above results of reading without meaning and of reading of low-frequency irregular Chinese characters supported by their semantic information, it is reasonable to suggest that at least two routes are involved in the process of reading Chinese characters. They are direct phonologic route and indirect semantic route; moreover, the two routes are independent.

语句句法成分边界和韵律特征知觉

The research investigates the acoustic-phonetic correlates of various levels of syntactic boundaries and the perception of prosody in Mandarin Chinese, more specifically, the way speakers express the syntatic relations between sentence compounents and teh perceptual representations of prosody. The relation between phonology and syntax in Chinese language is studied by comparing the perceptual representations and syntactic structures of sentences. The results may have theoretical and practical implications for research in fields of speech perception, linguistics and psycholinguistics, and for the development of speech engineering in China.

Strikingly different penetrance of LHON in two Chinese families with primary mutation G11778A is independent of mtDNA haplogroup background and secondary mutation G13708A

The penetrance of Leber's hereditary optic neuropathy (LHON) in families with primary mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) mutations is very complex. Matrilineal and nuclear genetic background, as well as environmental factors, have been reported to be involved in d

The indel polymorphisms of the prion protein gene (PRNP ) in Chinese yak

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A homogenous nature of native Chinese duck matrilineal pool

Background: China, with around 30 unique breeds, has a diverse duck genetic pool. Currently, there is no systematic report which investigates the genetic diversity, phylogenetic relationship, and matrilineal genetic structure of these domestic breeds and

Co-occurrence of A1555G and G11778A in a Chinese family with high penetrance of Leber's hereditary optic neuropathy

Co-occurrence of double pathogenic mtDNA mutations with different claimed pathological roles in one mtDNA is infrequent. It is tentative to believe that each of these pathogenic mutations would have its own deleterious effect. Here we reported one three-g

Differing estrogen activities in the organic phase of air particulate matter collected during sunny and foggy weather in a Chinese city detected by a recombinant yeast bioassay

Total air suspended particles (PM 100) collected from an urban location near a traffic line in Wuhan, China, were examined for estrogen using a recombinant yeast bioassay. Wuhan, located at the central part of China, is the fourth biggest city in China with 7 million populations. Today, Wuhan has developed into the biggest city and the largest traveling center of central China, becoming one of the important bases of industry, education and research. Wuhan is right at the confluent point of Yangzi River, the third longest river in the world, and its largest distributary Hanjiang, with mountains and more than 100 takes in downtown area. Therefore, by its unique landscape, Wuhan has formed clear four seasons with relatively long winter and summer and short spring and autumn. Foggy weather usually happen in early spring. The yeast line used in this assay stably expresses human estrogen receptor-alpha. Weak but clear estrogenic activities were detected in the organic phase of crude extracts of air particle materials (APM) in both sunny and foggy weather by 0.19-0.79 mug E2/gPM(100) which were statistically significantly elevated relative to the blank control responding from 20% to 50% of the maximum E2 response, and the estrogenic activity was much higher in foggy weather than in sunny weather. The estrogenic activities in the sub-fractions from chromatographic separation of APM sampled in foggy days were also determined. The results indicated that the responses of the fractions were obviously higher than the crude extracts. Since there is no other large pollution source nearby, the estrogenic material was most likely from vehicle emissions, house heating sources and oil fumes of house cooking. The GC/MS analysis of the PM100 collected under foggy weather showed that there were many phenol derivatives, oxy-PAHs and resin acids which have been reported as environmental estrogens. These results of the analysis of estrogenic potency in sunny and foggy weather in a subtropical city of China indicate that further studies are required to investigate the actual risks for the associated health and atmospheric system. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.