Attitudes of Norwegians towards the growing influence of English

This paper shortly outlines the present status of English in Norway, principally in relation to the growing presence of English lexical borrowings in Norwegian. Some attention will also be devoted to the views held by Norwegian linguists towards the potential threat that the English language represents, particularly in domains where it is likely to supersede the Norwegian language.

Everyday use of Spanish among bilingual teachers in New York City and their attitudes toward the language

The attitudes that bilingual teachers have toward the use of foreign languages seem to have an effect on the success of bilingual education programs. In this study, our purpose is to shed light on how often bilingual teachers in New York City use Spanish in their everyday lives, and to examine their attitudes toward the use of Spanish in the U.S. Overall, results indicate only moderate frequencies of use of Spanish in everyday life among bilingual teachers. In addition, the study shows that bilingual teachers have a favorable attitude toward the use of Spanish in the U.S. However, bilingual teachers whose first language is English seem to have a more favorable attitude than those whose first language is Spanish. Among the native Spanish speakers, those born abroad show a more favorable attitude than those born in the U.S. Although no group seems to favor the use of lexical borrowings and code-switching, bilingual native Spanish-speaking teachers born in the U.S. seem to have a less favorable attitude than native Spanish-speaking teachers born abroad. In addition, native Spanish-speaking teachers born abroad seem to have a less favorable attitude toward lexical borrowings and code-switching than U.S.-born teachers whose first language is English. Recommendations for the training of bilingual teachers are discussed in the conclusions of the study.

Language change in young Panjabi/English children: implications for bilingual language assessment

This paper reports some of the more frequent language changes in Panjabi, the first language of bilingual Panjabi/English children in the West Midlands, UK. Spontaneous spoken data were collected in schools across both languages in three formatted elicitation procedures from 50 bilingual Panjabi/English-speaking children, aged 6–7 years old. Panjabi data from the children is analysed for lexical borrowings and code-switching with English. Several changes of vocabulary and word grammar patterns in Panjabi are identified, many due to interaction with English, and some due to developmental features of Panjabi. There is also evidence of pervasive changes of word order, suggesting a shift in Panjabi word order to that of English. Lexical choice is discussed in terms of language change rather than language deficit. The implications of a normative framework for comparison are explored. A psycholinguistic model interprets grammatical changes in Panjabi.

Efficiency of lexical access in children with autism spectrum disorders : does modality matter?

The provision of visual support to individuals with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is widely recommended. We explored one mechanism underlying the use of visual supports: efficiency of language processing. Two groups of children, one with and one without an ASD, participated. The groups had comparable oral and written language skills and nonverbal cognitive abilities. In two semantic priming experiments, prime modality and prime–target relatedness were manipulated. Response time and accuracy of lexical decisions on the spoken word targets were measured. In the first uni-modal experiment, both groups demonstrated significant priming effects. In the second experiment which was cross-modal, no effect for relatedness or group was found. This result is considered in the light of the attentional capacity required for access to the lexicon via written stimuli within the developing semantic system. These preliminary findings are also considered with respect to the use of visual support for children with ASD.

Multilingual lexical resources to detect cognates in non-aligned texts

The identification of cognates between two distinct languages has recently start- ed to attract the attention of NLP re- search, but there has been little research into using semantic evidence to detect cognates. The approach presented in this paper aims to detect English-French cog- nates within monolingual texts (texts that are not accompanied by aligned translat- ed equivalents), by integrating word shape similarity approaches with word sense disambiguation techniques in order to account for context. Our implementa- tion is based on BabelNet, a semantic network that incorporates a multilingual encyclopedic dictionary. Our approach is evaluated on two manually annotated da- tasets. The first one shows that across different types of natural text, our method can identify the cognates with an overall accuracy of 80%. The second one, con- sisting of control sentences with semi- cognates acting as either true cognates or false friends, shows that our method can identify 80% of semi-cognates acting as cognates but also identifies 75% of the semi-cognates acting as false friends.

Top-down influences on lexical selection during spoken word production: A 4T fMRI investigation of refractory effects in picture naming

Spoken word production is assumed to involve stages of processing in which activation spreads through layers of units comprising lexical-conceptual knowledge and their corresponding phonological word forms. Using high-field (4T) functional magnetic resonance imagine (fMRI), we assessed whether the relationship between these stages is strictly serial or involves cascaded-interactive processing, and whether central (decision/control) processing mechanisms are involved in lexical selection. Participants performed the competitor priming paradigm in which distractor words, named from a definition and semantically related to a subsequently presented target picture, slow picture-naming latency compared to that with unrelated words. The paradigm intersperses two trials between the definition and the picture to be named, temporally separating activation in the word perception and production networks. Priming semantic competitors of target picture names significantly increased activation in the left posterior temporal cortex, and to a lesser extent the left middle temporal cortex, consistent with the predictions of cascaded-interactive models of lexical access. In addition, extensive activation was detected in the anterior cingulate and pars orbitalis of the inferior frontal gyrus. The findings indicate that lexical selection during competitor priming is biased by top-down mechanisms to reverse associations between primed distractor words and target pictures to select words that meet the current goal of speech.

Perfusion fMRI evidence for priming of shared feature-to-lexical connections during cumulative semantic interference in spoken word production

The speed at which target pictures are named increases monotonically as a function of prior retrieval of other exemplars of the same semantic category and is unaffected by the number of intervening items. This cumulative semantic interference effect is generally attributed to three mechanisms: shared feature activation, priming and lexical-level selection. However, at least two additional mechanisms have been proposed: (1) a 'booster' to amplify lexical-level activation and (2) retrieval-induced forgetting (RIF). In a perfusion functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) experiment, we tested hypotheses concerning the involvement of all five mechanisms. Our results demonstrate that the cumulative interference effect is associated with perfusion signal changes in the left perirhinal and middle temporal cortices that increase monotonically according to the ordinal position of exemplars being named. The left inferior frontal gyrus (LIFG) also showed significant perfusion signal changes across ordinal presentations; however, these responses did not conform to a monotonically increasing function. None of the cerebral regions linked with RIF in prior neuroimaging and modelling studies showed significant effects. This might be due to methodological differences between the RIF paradigm and continuous naming as the latter does not involve practicing particular information. We interpret the results as indicating priming of shared features and lexical-level selection mechanisms contribute to the cumulative interference effect, while adding noise to a booster mechanism could account for the pattern of responses observed in the LIFG.

Independent distractor frequency and age-of-acquisition dffects in picture-word interference: FMRI evidence for post-lexical and lexical accounts according to distractor type

In two fMRI experiments, participants named pictures with superimposed distractors that were high or low in frequency or varied in terms of age of acquisition. Pictures superimposed with low-frequency words were named more slowly than those superimposed with high-frequency words, and late-acquired words interfered with picture naming to a greater extent than early-acquired words. The distractor frequency effect (Experiment 1) was associated with increased activity in left premotor and posterior superior temporal cortices, consistent with the operation of an articulatory response buffer and verbal selfmonitoring system. Conversely, the distractor age-of-acquisition effect (Experiment 2) was associated with increased activity in the left middle and posterior middle temporal cortex, consistent with the operation of lexical level processes such as lemma and phonological word form retrieval. The spatially dissociated patterns of activity across the two experiments indicate that distractor effects in picture-word interference may occur at lexical or postlexical levels of processing in speech production.

The roles of shared vs. Distinctive conceptual features in lexical access

Contemporary models of spoken word production assume conceptual feature sharing determines the speed with which objects are named in categorically-related contexts. However, statistical models of concept representation have also identified a role for feature distinctiveness, i.e., features that identify a single concept and serve to distinguish it quickly from other similar concepts. In three experiments we investigated whether distinctive features might explain reports of counter-intuitive semantic facilitation effects in the picture word interference (PWI) paradigm. In Experiment 1, categorically-related distractors matched in terms of semantic similarity ratings (e.g., zebra and pony) and manipulated with respect to feature distinctiveness (e.g., a zebra has stripes unlike other equine species) elicited interference effects of comparable magnitude. Experiments 2 and 3 investigated the role of feature distinctiveness with respect to reports of facilitated naming with part-whole distractor-target relations (e.g., a hump is a distinguishing part of a CAMEL, whereas knee is not, vs. an unrelated part such as plug). Related part distractors did not influence target picture naming latencies significantly when the part denoted by the related distractor was not visible in the target picture (whether distinctive or not; Experiment 2). When the part denoted by the related distractor was visible in the target picture, non-distinctive part distractors slowed target naming significantly at SOA of -150 ms (Experiment 3). Thus, our results show that semantic interference does occur for part-whole distractor-target relations in PWI, but only when distractors denote features shared with the target and other category exemplars. We discuss the implications of these results for some recently developed, novel accounts of lexical access in spoken word production.

Feature overlap slows lexical selection: Evidence from the picture–word interference paradigm

How does the presence of a categorically related word influence picture naming latencies? In order to test competitive and noncompetitive accounts of lexical selection in spoken word production, we employed the picture–word interference (PWI) paradigm to investigate how conceptual feature overlap influences naming latencies when distractors are category coordinates of the target picture. Mahon et al. (2007. Lexical selection is not by competition: A reinterpretation of semantic interference and facilitation effects in the picture-word interference paradigm. Journal of Experimental Psychology. Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 33(3), 503–535. doi:10.1037/0278-7393.33.3.503) reported that semantically close distractors (e.g., zebra) facilitated target picture naming latencies (e.g., HORSE) compared to far distractors (e.g., whale). We failed to replicate a facilitation effect for within-category close versus far target–distractor pairings using near-identical materials based on feature production norms, instead obtaining reliably larger interference effects (Experiments 1 and 2). The interference effect did not show a monotonic increase across multiple levels of within-category semantic distance, although there was evidence of a linear trend when unrelated distractors were included in analyses (Experiment 2). Our results show that semantic interference in PWI is greater for semantically close than for far category coordinate relations, reflecting the extent of conceptual feature overlap between target and distractor. These findings are consistent with the assumptions of prominent competitive lexical selection models of speech production.

The influences of Bislama on lexical choices in children's written English: A case study in Vanuatu

In Vanuatu, there have been concerns that Bislama (the national language of Vanuatu and a creole with an adapted English vocabulary) hinders English language learning. Consequently, previous language policy restricted the use of Bislama in schools. The findings from this study offer significant insights and implications that may assist teachers with using Bislama in their classrooms in a way that furthers English language and literacy development. This research is timely because the Vanuatu Government have recently implemented a new language policy that allows the vernacular island languages and Bislama to be used as a linguistic resource in schools.

A cross-linguistic study of lexical iconicity and its manifestation in bird names

Abstract This dissertation is a cross-linguistic study of lexical iconicity. The study is based on a genealogically stratified sample of 237 languages. The aim is to contribute with an empirical study to the growing dialogue focusing on different forms of lexical iconicity. The conceptual framework of the present study is based on an analysis of types and means of lexical iconicity in the sample languages. Archaeological and cultural evidence are used to tie lexical iconicity to its context. Phenomena related to lexical iconicity are studied both cross-linguistically and language-specifically. The cognitive difference between imitation and symbolism is essential. Lexical iconicity is not only about the iconic relationship between form and referents, but also about how certain iconic properties may become conventional, means used to create sound symbolism. All the sample languages show some evidence of lexical iconicity, demonstrating that it is a universal feature. Nine comparisons of onomatopoeic verbs and nouns, with samples varying between six and 141 languages, show that typologically highly different languages use similar means for creating words based on sound imitation. Two cross-linguistic comparisons of bird names demonstrate that a vast majority of the Eurasian names of the common cuckoo and the world-wide names of crow and raven of the 141 genera are onomatopoeic.