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Cognitive control is applied in situations that require override of a habitual and automatic response. The conflict monitoring hypothesis posits a control system responsible for detecting conflicting occasions and adapting to them. In contrast, the strength model of self-control argues that control resources are limited and can be depleted. However, depletion findings are unstable and have been forcefully challenged. Here, we argue that methodological choices such as dual tasks and neutral conditions may have contributed to the controversy. Adopting an alternative methodology evaluating within-task performance, we compared the classical multi-item version of the Stroop task and its single-item counterpart in adults and children. Our results indicated a performance decline only in the multi-item version of the task, in both incongruent and neutral conditions, consistent with the strength model of self-control, due to the need for continuous effort and lack of rest intervals, leading to depletion. Our results challenge the conflict monitoring hypothesis and its recent extension, and they also raise substantial concerns regarding the calculation and use of indices of interference based on the commonly used multi-item version of the Stroop task.

Previous research in Greek aphasia has indicated that functional categories related to verb inflection are differentially impacted, with Aspect most severely affected, Agreement least affected, and Tense occupying an intermediate position. However, research materials were not controlled for overall length or position of the verb within the sentence, confounding functional category with processing load. Using balanced materials, here we tested ten persons with aphasia and ten matched control participants on grammaticality judgment and sentence completion in three functional categories (agreement, tense, and aspect) using ten verbs spanning a range of familiarity. Production results indicated no difference in errors of either lexeme or inflectional morpheme selection. In grammaticality judgment acceptance of incorrect sentences was lower for Agreement but this pattern was mirrored in the control group as well. The results provide no basis to support a specific linguistic deficit in the representation of functional categories in Greek persons with aphasia.

Background In languages with lexical stress, reading aloud must include stress assignment. Stress information sources across languages include word-final letter sequences. Here, we examine whether such sequences account for stress assignment in Greek and whether this is attributable to absolute rules involving accenting morphemes or to probabilistic lexical information. Methods Pseudowords were constructed to not resemble particular words and were suffixed with derivational morphemes associated with specific stress patterns, to be read aloud, presented either without a stress diacritic or with a diacritic congruent or incongruent with the suffix. Morphemes differed in whether or not there were stress competitors ending in the same letter sequences. Results Stress was assigned consistent with the suffix in the absence of the diacritic, more so when there were no stress competitors in the lexicon. Conclusions Results suggest a lexically based probabilistic mechanism taking into account pattern distributions rather than absolute rules based on the morphological accenting. This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: Derivational suffixes as cues to stress position in reading Greek, which has been published in final form at http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1467-9817.12092. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Self-Archiving.

Learning nonnative speech contrasts in adulthood has proven difficult. Standard training methods have achieved moderate effects using explicit instructions and performance feedback. In this study, the authors question preexisting assumptions by demonstrating a superiority of implicit training procedures. They trained 3 groups of Greek adults on a difficult Hindi contrast (a) explicitly, with feedback (Experiment I), or (b) implicitly, unaware of the phoneme distinctions, with (Experiment 2) or without (Experiment 3) feedback. Stimuli were natural recordings of consonant-vowel syllables with retroflex and dental unvoiced stops by a native Hindi speaker. On each trial, participants heard pairs of tokens from both categories and had to identify the retroflex sounds (explicit condition) or the sounds differing in intensity (implicit condition). Unbeknownst to participants, in the implicit conditions, target sounds were always retroflex, and distractor sounds were always dental. Post-training identification and discrimination tests showed improved performance of all groups, compared with a baseline of untrained Greek listeners. Learning was most robust for implicit training without feedback. It remains to be investigated whether implicitly trained skills can generalize to linguistically relevant phonetic categories when appropriate variability is introduced. These findings challenge traditional accounts on the role of feedback in phonetic training and highlight the importance of implicit, reward-based mechanisms.