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To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2007.07.005 Byline: Fanny Meunier (a), Alix Seigneuric (b), Elsa Spinelli (c) Keywords: Lexical access; Morphology; Grammatical gender Abstract: In three experiments we explored the mental representation of morphologically complex words in French. Subjects were asked to perform a gender decision task on morphologically complex words that were of the same gender as their base or not. We found that gender decisions were made more slowly for morphologically complex words made from a base with an opposite gender compared to words for which the gender of the base matches that of the derived noun. Similar results were obtained for words that are pseudo-morphologically complex while no effect was observed for non-morphological embedded words. Our results suggest that during gender identification of derived and pseudo-derived words, morpheme and pseudo-morpheme lexical representations are activated, as well as their gender information. Also our results suggest that the noun ending predictability effect observed in previous experiments could in fact reflect decomposition into morphemes. Author Affiliation: (a) Laboratoire Dynamique du Langage, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Universite Louis Lumiere, 69 363 Lyon Cedex 07, France (b) Universite de Bourgogne, CESG, CNRS, BP 26513, 21065 Dijon Cedex, France (c) Universite Pierre Mendes France, Laboratoire de Psychologie et NeuroCognition, BP 48, 38040 Grenoble Cedex 9, France Article History: Received 2 September 2005; Revised 10 July 2007

To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2006.11.005 Byline: Fanny Meunier (a), Catherine-Marie Longtin (b) Keywords: Morphology; Visual word processing; Cross-modal priming; Pseudowords Abstract: In the present study, we looked at cross-modal priming effects produced by auditory presentation of morphologically complex pseudowords in order to investigate semantic integration during the processing of French morphologically complex items. In Experiment 1, we used as primes pseudowords consisting of a non-interpretable combination of roots and suffixes, such as [degrees]sportation, formed by the noun sport 'sport' and the suffix -ation. In Experiment 2, primes were semantically interpretable pseudowords made of the combination of a root and a suffix, such as [degrees]rapidifier 'to quickify'. In Experiment 3, we used as primes semantically interpretable pseudowords that were designed to be synonymous with existing derived words, for example [degrees]cuisineur, which, if it existed, would mean the same as cuisinier 'a cook'. Finally, in Experiment 4, we used as primes non-morphological pseudowords like [degrees]rapiduit, -uit being an existing ending of French but not a suffix. The results of the four experiments show that priming only occurs with those morphologically complex pseudowords which are interpretable (including those which are synonymous with a pre-existing derived form), providing evidence that semantic factors are taken into account when the prime is overtly presented. Our results further support the view that morphological effects come into play at at least two processing stages, a morphological decomposition based on formal properties and a semantic integration based on semantic compatibility between morphemes. Author Affiliation: (a) Laboratoire Dynamique Du Langage, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Universite Louis Lumiere, France (b) School of Physical and Occupational Therapy, McGill University, Canada Article History: Received 5 April 2006; Revised 6 September 2006 Article Note: (footnote) [star] This research was supported by the French National Research Agency (ANR) and by a research grant 'Action concertee jeunes chercheurs' from the Ministere de la recherche et de l'enseignement (France) accorded to the first author. Second author was supported by a postdoctoral fellowship from the Fonds Quebecois pour la recherche sur la societe et la culture. This project also benefited support from a Major Collaborative Research Initiative Grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (# 412-2001-1009). The second author is now a Marie Curie postdoctoral fellow at the Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit of the Medical Research Council, Cambridge, United Kingdom. We thank D. Fabre for her help in recording the auditory primes. We are also grateful to M. Davis, K. Forster, H. Giraudo, G. Powell, K. Rastle, and J. Segui for their help and comments on an earlier version of the manuscript.

Byline: Alix Seigneuric (a), Daniel Zagar (b), Fanny Meunier (c), Elsa Spinelli (d) Keywords: Language acquisition; Grammatical gender; French gender; Gender-ending regularities; Gender cues Abstract: The French language has a grammatical gender system in which all nouns are assigned either a masculine or a feminine gender. Nouns provide two types of gender cues that can potentially guide gender attribution: morphophonological cues carried by endings and semantic cues (natural gender). The first goal of this study was to describe the acquisition of the probabilistic system based on phonological oppositions on word endings by French-speaking children. The second goal was to explore the extent to which this system affects categorization. In the study, 3- to 9-year-olds assigned gender categorization to invented nouns whose endings were typically masculine, typically feminine, or neutral. Two response conditions were used. In the determiner condition, children indicated the gender class by orally providing the determiner un or une marked for gender. In the picture condition, responses were given by pointing to the picture of a Martian-like female or male person that would be best called by each spoken pseudoword. Results indicated that as young as 3years, children associated the determiner corresponding to the ending bias at greater than chance levels. Ending-consistent performance increased from 3 to 9years of age. Moreover, from 4years of age onward, sensitivity to endings affected categorization. Starting at that age, pictures were selected according to endings at greater than chance levels. This effect also increased with age. The discussion deals with the mechanisms of language acquisition and the relation between language and cognition. Author Affiliation: (a) CESG, UMR CNRS 5170, Universite de Bourgogne, Dijon, France (b) SocioPsychologie et Management du Sport (SPMS), Universite de Bourgogne, Dijon, France (c) Laboratoire Dynamique du Langage, UMR CNRS 5596, Lyon, France (d) Laboratoire de Psychologie et NeuroCognition, UMR CNRS 5105, Universite Pierre Mendes France, Grenoble, France Article History: Received 5 October 2005; Revised 15 December 2006

To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2005.02.008 Byline: Catherine-Marie Longtin (a), Fanny Meunier (b) Abstract: In this study, we looked at priming effects produced by a short presentation (47ms) of morphologically complex pseudowords in French. In Experiment 1, we used as primes semantically interpretable pseudowords made of the grammatical combination of a root and a suffix, such as rapidifier 'to quickify.' In Experiment 2, we used non-morphological pseudowords such as rapiduit, where -uit is an existing ending in French, but is not a suffix. In Experiment 3, primes were pseudowords consisting of a non-interpretable combination of roots and suffixes, such as sportation, formed by the noun sport 'sport' and the suffix -ation (-ation only attaches to verbs). Results of Experiment 1 show that morphologically complex pseudowords significantly facilitated the recognition of their roots. This priming effect was equivalent to the facilitation obtained when existing derived words were used as primes. In Experiment 2, no priming effect was obtained with non-morphological pseudowords, demonstrating that the mere occurrence of the target at the beginning of the pseudoword prime is not sufficient to produce any priming and that an orthographic account of the results is not viable. Finally, Experiment 3 shows that the semantic interpretability of the morphologically complex pseudowords does not affect priming, as facilitation effect is obtained with morphologically complex non-interpretable pseudowords. The results reveal an early morphological decomposition triggered by the morphological structure of the prime, but insensitive to its lexicality or interpretability. Author Affiliation: (a) Laboratoire de Psychologie Experimentale, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Universite Rene Descartes, France (b) Laboratoire Dynamique Du Langage, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Universite Louis Lumiere, France Article Note: (footnote) [star] This research was supported by a doctoral fellowship to the first author from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. It was also supported by a research grant 'Action concertee jeunes chercheurs' from the Ministere de la recherche et de l'enseignement (France) accorded to the second author. The first author is now a postdoctoral fellow at McGill University (Montreal, Canada). We are grateful to J. Segui and P. Halle for their comments and suggestions at various stages of this research. We thank C. Burani, M. Lange, M. Taft, A. Idrissi, and an anonymous reviewer for their helpful comments on an earlier version of this paper. N. Azevedo, M. Corley, and J. Peters were also of great help in revising the manuscript.

Dyslexia is a language-based neurodevelopmental disorder. It is characterized as a persistent deficit in reading and spelling. These difficulties have been shown to result from an underlying impairment of the phonological component of language, possibly also affecting speech perception. Although there is little evidence for such a deficit under optimal, quiet listening conditions, speech perception difficulties in adults with dyslexia are often reported under more challenging conditions, such as when speech is masked by noise. Previous studies have shown that these difficulties are more pronounced when the background noise is speech and when little spatial information is available to facilitate differentiation between target and background sound sources. In this study, we investigated the neuroimaging correlates of speech-in-speech perception in typical readers and participants with dyslexia, focusing on the effects of different listening configurations. Fourteen adults with dyslexia and 14 matched typical readers performed a subjective intelligibility rating test with single words presented against concurrent speech during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanning. Target words were always presented with a four-talker background in one of three listening configurations: Dichotic, Binaural or Monaural. The results showed that in the Monaural configuration, in which no spatial information was available and energetic masking was maximal, intelligibility was severely decreased in all participants, and this effect was particularly strong in participants with dyslexia. Functional imaging revealed that in this configuration, participants partially compensate for their poorer listening abilities by recruiting several areas in the cerebral networks engaged in speech perception. In the Binaural configuration, participants with dyslexia achieved the same performance level as typical readers, suggesting that they were able to use spatial information when available. This result was, however, associated with increased activation in the right superior temporal gyrus, suggesting the need to reallocate neural resources to overcome speech-in-speech difficulties. Taken together, these results provide further understanding of the speech-in-speech perception deficit observed in dyslexia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies the role of surface and cumulative word frequency in the processing and representation of morphologically complex suffixed words. Auditory lexical decision times; Cumulative root frequency effect for high- and low-surface-frequency suffixed words; Suffixed words' competition with one another.

Abstract: Developmental dyslexia is associated with impaired speech-in-noise perception. The goal of the present research was to further characterize this deficit in dyslexic adults. In order to specify the mechanisms and processing strategies used by adults with dyslexia during speech-in-noise perception, we explored the influence of background type, presenting single target-words against backgrounds made of cocktail party sounds, modulated speech-derived noise or stationary noise. We also evaluated the effect of three listening configurations differing in terms of the amount of spatial processing required. In a monaural condition, signal and noise were presented to the same ear while in a dichotic situation, target and concurrent sound were presented to two different ears, finally in a spatialised configuration, target and competing signals were presented as if they originated from slightly differing positions in the auditory scene. Our results confirm the presence of a speech-in-noise perception deficit in dyslexic adults, in particular when the competing signal is also speech, and when both signals are presented to the same ear, an observation potentially relating to phonological accounts of dyslexia. However, adult dyslexics demonstrated better levels of spatial release of masking than normal reading controls when the background was speech, suggesting that they are well able to rely on denoising strategies based on spatial auditory scene analysis strategies. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Native listeners process and understand homophones, such as la locution 'the phrase' vs. l'allocution 'the speech', both [lalɔkysjɔ̃], without much semantical ambiguity in connected speech. Yet, behavioral experiments show that disambiguation is partial under intra-speaker variability without semantical context. To investigate electrophysiological correlates of perception of non-contrastive subphonemic features in French homophonous sequences, we examined the event-related potential Mismatch Negativity (MMN) using a multitoken stimuli oddball paradigm. Stimuli were taken from multiple natural productions of nominal homophonous utterances. In the first experiment, we used the first syllables, while in the second experiment, the whole utterances. The homophonous sequence elicited an MMN response in both experiments. This suggests that non-contrastive acoustic features that differentiate homophones, such as pitch and duration, are robust enough despite intra-speaker variability to allow listeners to automatically extract regularities associated with each utterance. This ability of the perception system might contribute to correct segmentation and comprehension of ambiguous utterances. • The speech perception system can distinguish between homophones differing in non-contrastive acoustic cues. • No focused attention to the stimuli is needed to this processing. • This effect is shown in natural language despite intra-speaker variability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]