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Bilingual children often experience difficulties with inflectional morphology. The aim of this longitudinal study was to investigate how regularity of inflection in combination with verbal short-term and working memory (VSTM, VWM) influences bilingual children’s performance. Data from 231 typically developing five- to eight-year-old children were analyzed: Dutch monolingual children (N = 45), Frisian-Dutch bilingual children (N = 106), Turkish-Dutch bilingual children (N = 31), Tarifit-Dutch bilingual children (N = 38) and Arabic-Dutch bilingual children (N = 11). Inflection was measured with an expressive morphology task. VSTM and VWM were measured with a Forward and Backward Digit Span task, respectively. The results showed that, overall, children performed more accurately at regular than irregular forms, with the smallest gap between regulars and irregulars for monolinguals. Furthermore, this gap was smaller for older children and children who scored better on a non-verbal intelligence measure. In bilingual children, higher accuracy at using (irregular) inflection was predicted by a smaller cross-linguistic distance, a larger amount of Dutch at home, and a higher level of parental education. Finally, children with better VSTM, but not VWM, were more accurate at using regular and irregular inflection.

The generation of regular and irregular inflected verb-forms has been taken as a crucial test between models of inflection in the mental lexicon, namely approaches which invoke different mechanisms for regular and irregular forms (rule-based procedures vs. recovery of whole forms stored in an associative network) and accounts which postulate a single procedure for all forms. An alternative hypothesis suggests that inflectional processes are explained by membership of words to clusters, for instance, Italian inflectional classes (conjugations). In a behavioural and a rapid event-related fMRI experiment, participants overtly generated the past participle of verbs from the three Italian conjugations. Results showed that the cognitive operations and the neural substrate underlying inflectional processes rely on specific properties of inflectional classes. Different patterns of cortical activations elicited by verbs from different conjugations were detected for the first time in the left middle frontal gyrus, left pre-supplementary motor area and left anterior cingulate cortex.

How words are recognized? How do we process word meaning? These questions have been pursued in lexical access and word recognition studies in the last half century of research in psycho-, neuro-, and linguistics. Morphological processing is an essential level of processing for information extraction during word recognition. In one extreme, full-entry models propose whole word storage in memory and post-lexical morphological processing based on paradigms; in the other extreme, decompositional models posit pre-lexical decomposition and morphemic activation based on rules; between then, dual-mechanism models consider two routes for word recognition, a whole-word associative route and a combinatorial rule-based route. In the present thesis, it was investigated the morphological processing of French inflected verbs in visual modality in five studies. Study 1 researched the mental lexicon organization in function of surface and cumulative frequencies; Study 2 explored different stem formation processes; Study 3 investigated morphological operations in the inflectional suffixes; Study 4 tested the verbal morphological processing in L2 French speakers; and Study 5 tested verbal violations coupled with electroencephalography acquisition. The results suggest that all inflected French verbs are processed by a single-mechanism model with pre-lexical morphological decomposition for lexical activation and word recognition. It is proposed different processing for the lexical and functional morphemes. Words are decomposed in atomic morphemes, morphemic representations are activated in the mental lexicon, and word constituents are recombined for word verification, Comment les mots sont-ils reconnus? Comment avons-nous accès à la signification des mots? Ces questions ont été explorées dans des études sur l'accès lexical et la reconnaissance des mots durant le demi-siècle dernier dans les domaines de la psycho-, neuro- et de la linguistique. Le traitement morphologique est un niveau essentiel de traitement pour l'extraction d'information lors de la reconnaissance de mots. A un extrême, les modèles de pleine-entrée proposent le stockage du mot entier dans la mémoire et un traitement morphologique post-lexical paradigmatiques; à l'autre extrême, les modèles décompositionnels proposent une décomposition pré-lexicale et une activation morphologique basée sur des règles; entre les deux, les modèles à double-mécanismes postulent deux voies pour la reconnaissance des mots, une route associative avec les mots entiers et une route combinatoire basée sur des règles. Dans la présente thèse, le traitement morphologique des verbes fléchis en français a été étudié en modalité visuelle dans cinq études. L'étude 1 a recherché à mettre à jour l'organisation du lexique mental en utilisant les effets de fréquences de surface et les effets de fréquences cumulée; l'étude 2 a exploré l'impact des différents processus de formation du radical verbal; l'étude 3 a étudié les opérations morphologiques au travers des suffixes flexionnels; l'étude 4 a testé le traitement morphologique verbal pour des locuteurs de français comme L2; et l'étude 5 a exploré les violations morphologiques verbales via des mesures électro-encéphalographiques. Globalement les résultats suggèrent que tous les verbes français fléchis sont traités par un mécanisme unique avec décomposition morphologique pré-lexicale pour l'accès lexical et la reconnaissance des mots. Il est proposé un traitement différent pour les morphèmes lexicaux et fonctionnels. Les mots sont décomposés en morphèmes atomiques, les représentations morphologiques sont activées dans le lexique mental, et les constituants de mots sont recombinés pour la vérification de mot

This article presents the methods used and results obtained for the creation of a lexicon of inflected word forms for Alsatian. The dialects from Alsace are low resourced languages: few computational tools and resources are available. When creating such resources, many difficulties have to be addressed, usually related to variability issues in the absence of standard spelling and the lack of inflected forms in the few existing resources. We used several tools for the automatic generation of graphical variants and the creation of inflected forms (morphological and inflection graphs of Unitex). The method was evaluated in terms of coverage of the verbal forms encountered in texts., Cet article présente les méthodes mises en oeuvre et les résultats obtenus pour la création d’un lexique de formes fléchies de l’alsacien. Les dialectes d’Alsace font partie des langues peu dotées : rares sont les outils et ressources informatisées les concernant. Plusieurs difficultés doivent être prises en compte afin de générer des ressources pour ces langues, généralement liées à la variabilité en l’absence de norme graphique, et au manque de formes fléchies dans les quelques ressources existantes. Nous avons pour ce faire utilisé plusieurs outils permettant la génération automatique de variantes graphiques et la création de formes fléchies (graphes morphologiques et de flexion d’Unitex). Les résultats en termes de couverture des formes rencontrées dans des textes ont permis l’évaluation de la méthode.

Background: Reference to an event's time frame can be accomplished through verb inflection. In agrammatic aphasia, a deficit in past time reference has been identified by Bastiaanse and colleagues (2011). In fluent aphasia, specific problems with this time frame (expressed by the past tense) have been found as well (Dragoy & Bastiaanse, 2013; Jonkers & de Bruin, 2009). However, time reference does not always coincide with tense; in languages such as Dutch and English, reference to the past can be established by using past tense (e.g., "he wrote a letter") or a present tense auxiliary in combination with a participle, i.e., the present perfect (e.g., "he has written a letter").Aims: The goal of this study is twofold. First, it aims to untangle tense problems from problems with past time reference through verb morphology in people with aphasia. Second, this study aims to compare the production of time reference inflection by people with agrammatic and fluent aphasia.Methods & Procedures: A sentence completion task was used to elicit reference to the non-past and past in Dutch. Reference to the past was tested through (1) a simple verb in past tense and (2) a verb complex with an auxiliary in present tense + participle (the present perfect). Reference to the non-past was tested through a simple verb in present tense. Fourteen agrammatic aphasic speakers, sixteen fluent aphasic speakers, and twenty non-brain-damaged speakers (NBDs) took part in this study. Data were analysed quantitatively and qualitatively.Outcomes & Results: NBDs scored at ceiling and significantly higher than the aphasic participants. Agrammatic speakers performed worse than fluent speakers, but the pattern of performance in both aphasic groups was similar. Reference to the past through past tense and [present tense auxiliary + participle] was more impaired than reference to the non-past. An error analysis revealed differences between the two groups.Conclusions: People with agrammatic and fluent aphasia experience problems with expressing reference to the past through verb inflection. This past time reference deficit is irrespective of the tense employed. The error patterns between the two groups reveal different underlying problems.

Thèse numérisée par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.

This paper aims to discuss the morphophonological status of future tenses verbal forms in Archaic Portuguese. From the viewpoint of word formation, these verbal forms can be interpreted as the result of the regular inflexion of the base, or as compounds, formed by the main verb infinitive followed by an inflected auxiliary verb. Evidences are provided mainly by their prosodic behaviour, in comparison to other verbs. Although future forms are traditionally considered as simple verbal forms, their prosodic behaviour suggests that they are in fact compounds. Arguments that support this position are: the possibility of collocation of the clitic pronoun only in the middle future verbs; the variation with auxiliary initial verbal expressions (viverey or ey a viver, viveria or ia a viver), and the coordination of two verbs with only one future “mark”.KEYWORDS: Archaic Portuguese. Verbs. Compounds. Prosod. Stress., O objetivo do presente artigo é discutir o status morfofonológico das formas verbais de futuro em Português Arcaico, a partir de evidências provindas de seu comportamento prosódico: se formas simples, constituídas a partir da flexão regular da base, ou se formas compostas, constituídas a partir da junção do infinitivo com um auxiliar flexionado. Apesar de tradicionalmente as formas verbaisde futuro serem consideradas como simples, a sua pauta prosódica sugere que se trata de compostos. Também sustenta a consideração de sua natureza como composta o fato de somente os tempos futuros aceitarem mesóclise, variação com formas com o auxiliar no início – viverey ou ey a viver, viveria ou ia a viver – e “coordenação” de dois verbos, a partir de uma só “terminação”.PALAVRAS-CHAVE: Fonologia. Português Arcaico. Verbos. Compostos. Prosódia. Acento.ABSTRACTThis paper aims to discuss the morphophonological status of future tenses verbal forms in Archaic Portuguese. From the viewpoint of word formation, these verbal forms can be interpreted as the result of the regular inflexion of the base, or as compounds, formed by the main verb infinitive followed by an inflected auxiliary verb. Evidences are provided mainly by their prosodic behaviour, in comparison to other verbs. Although future forms are traditionally considered as simple verbal forms, their prosodic behaviour suggests that they are in fact compounds. Arguments that support this position are: the possibility of collocation of the clitic pronoun only in the middle future verbs; the variation with auxiliary initial verbal expressions (viverey or ey a viver, viveria or ia a viver), and the coordination of two verbs with only one future “mark”.KEYWORDS: Archaic Portuguese. Verbs. Compounds. Prosod. Stress.

Diese Arbeit ist erstmals 1992 als Druckpublikation beim Verlag Otto Sagner, München (jetzt: Peter Lang, Bern) erschienen. Diese Arbeit bietet eine umfassende Untersuchung zum mittelbulgarischen Flexionsakzent auf der Grundlage der bislang unveröffentlichten Handschrift Evangelie 1139 (NBKM), eines bulgarisch-kirchenslavischen Tetraevangeliums vom Ende des 14. Jahrhunderts und damit eines der ältesten slavischen akzentuierten Sprachdenkmäler überhaupt. Sie besteht aus zwei Bänden: Die Akzentgrammatik (Bd. I) beschreibt das Akzentverhalten in der Nominal- und Verbalflexion aus synchroner Perspektive und gibt zu den jeweiligen Flexionsklassen einen kurzen historisch-sprachvergleichenden Kommentar. Das Akzentwörterbuch (Bd. II) bietet ein vollständiges Wort- und Formenverzeichnis des Evangelientextes erster Hand (fol. 4-41, 44-175, 179-207) sowie eines Addendums (fol. 157v22-25), die die Grundlage für die Untersuchung bildeten. This work provides a comprehensive investigation of Middle Bulgarian inflectional accent on the basis of the yet unpublished manuscript Evangelie 1139 (NBKM) – a Bulgarian-Church Slavonic tetraevangelion which dates back to the end of the 14th century and hence constitutes one of the oldest transmitted Slavic accentuated texts. The present work consists of two volumes: The Akzentgrammatik (Vol. 1) describes the synchronic patterns of accentuation in nominal and verbal inflection. It also provides a short commentary on each inflectional class from a historical-comparative point of view. The Akzentwörterbuch (Vol. II) consists of a complete index of word forms of that part of the evangelion which was composed by the first scribal hand (fol. 4-41, 44-175, 179-207), and of an addendum (fol. 157v22-25), which both together formed the source text of the investigation.