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This research evaluates a number of hybrid recurrent neural network (RNN) architectures for classifying sequential sentences in biomedical abstracts. The architectures include long short-term memory (LSTM), bidirectional LSTM (BI-LSTM), gated recurrent unit (GRU), and bidirectional GRU (BIGRU) models, all of which are combined with the universal sentence encoder (USE). The investigation assesses their efficacy in categorizing sentences into predefined classes: background, objective, method, result, and conclusion. Each RNN variant is used with the pre-trained USE as word embeddings to find complex sequential relationships in biomedical text. Results demonstrate the adaptability and effectiveness of these hybrid architectures in discerning diverse sentence functions. This research addresses the need for improved literature comprehension in biomedicine by employing automated sentence classification techniques, highlighting the significance of advanced hybrid algorithms in enhancing text classification methodologies within biomedical research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study investigated the effect of verbal working memory capacity (VWMC) on the processing of semantic information during on-line lexical ambiguity resolution of bilinguals. Seventeen Persian–English subordinate bilinguals of similar proficiency level were recruited to perform two experimental tasks: (1) a multi-load-level reading span task designed to measure their VWMC and (2) a cross-modal semantic priming task (CMPT), 24 h subsequent to the last encoding session, to assess their performance on semantic processing of L2 homographs whose subordinate readings were deemed "novel" for them. An overall 2 × 3 repeated-measures ANOVA revealed a statistically significant difference in the processing of the encoded semantic information between high and low WMC participants. The findings of the experiments lend support to the veracity of the assumptions made by Reordered Access Model in that biasing semantic context facilitates the ambiguity resolution of lexical items. Lastly, the pedagogical implications of the findings were expounded on. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BackgroundAimsMethods and proceduresOutcomes and resultsConclusionsBilingual individuals with aphasia may exhibit unique patterns of language impairment and recovery. While code-switching (CS) is a common feature of bilingual speech, pathological CS following brain damage can provide insights into the neural mechanisms controlling bilingual language processing.This study aimed to examine language impairment and recovery patterns in IZ, an unbalanced Hebrew-English bilingual with non-fluent aphasia, focusing on the unusual CS behavior observed during his subacute phase of recovery.IZ underwent language and narrative assessments in both languages during the subacute and chronic phases of recovery. Ten cognitive tests were administered to assess various domains of cognitive function. Language performance was evaluated through naming and syntactic processing tasks in L1-Hebrew and L2-English. The frequency and type of CS were analyzed using the matrix language frame model.During the subacute phase, IZ displayed significant language deficits in both L1-Hebrew and L2-English, with more severe impairment in L1-Hebrew naming and L2-English syntactic processing. He exhibited frequent involuntary CS, primarily using L1-Hebrew as the matrix language while embedding L2-English content words. Cognitive testing revealed reduced performance across multiple domains. In the chronic phase, IZ showed parallel improvements in both languages, particularly in L1-Hebrew naming and L2-English syntactic processing, along with a marked reduction in CS frequency.IZ’s case demonstrates a double dissociation between lexical and syntactic processing across L1 and L2. The results suggest that matrix language selection in bilinguals may be governed by distinct neural mechanisms for each language, with specific brain regions responsible for activating lexical representations. Damage to these regions may lead to pathological CS, as observed in this case. This study underscores the importance of understanding bilingual language control mechanisms in aphasia rehabilitation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Word-finding difficulty is prevalent but poorly understood in persons with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis (RRMS). Objective: The objective was to investigate our hypothesis that phonological processing ability is below expectations and related to word-finding difficulty in patients with RRMS. Method: Data were analyzed from patients with RRMS (n = 50) on patient-reported word-finding difficulty (PR-WFD) and objective performance on Wechsler Individual Achievement Test, Fourth Edition (WIAT-4) Phonemic Proficiency (PP; analysis of phonemes within words), Word Reading (WR; proxy of premorbid literacy and verbal ability), and Sentence Repetition (SR; auditory processing of word-level information). Results: Performance (mean (95% confidence interval)) was reliably lower than normative expectations for PP (−0.41 (−0.69, −0.13)) but not for WR (0.02 (−0.21, 0.25)) or SR (0.08 (−0.15, 0.31). Within-subjects performance was worse on PP than on both WR (t (49) = 4.00, p < 0.001, d = 0.47) and SR (t (49) =3.76, p < 0.001, d = 0.54). Worse PR-WFD was specifically related to lower PP (F 2,47 = 6.24, p = 0.004, η2 = 0.21); worse PP performance at PR-WFD Often (n = 13; −1.16 (−1.49, −0.83)) than Sometimes (n = 17; −0.14 (−0.68, 0.41)) or Rarely (n = 20; −0.16 (−0.58, 0.27). PR-WFD was unrelated to WR or SR (p s > 0.25). Conclusion: Phonological processing was below expectations and specifically linked to word-finding difficulty in RRMS. Findings are consistent with early disease-related cortical changes within the posterior superior temporal/supramarginal region. Results inform our developing model of multiple sclerosis-related word-finding difficulty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores Nigerian Pidgin English proverbs as a source of cultural conceptualisations that reflect traditional wisdom as well as the modern urban setting of West Africa. A total of 173 proverbs sourced from the BBC News Pidgin's Instagram service were analysed for recurrent lexical keywords and themes (e.g. those relating to food, eating and drinking, and animals) that can be interpreted as source domain lexical material that points to the knowledge of nature, common animals, objects and social situations. The findings suggest that Nigerian Pidgin English proverbs contain a rich inventory of variety‐ and culture‐specific lexis that encodes cultural knowledge and practice, for example knowledge of the local flora and fauna, food items, but also objects of material culture such as clothing, as well as references to social culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Narrative skills play an important role in children's reading, communication, and critical thinking. Most studies on narrative skills are based on monolingual children from middle- to upper middle-class populations and few have examined bilingual children's narratives outside of the western context. These factors may impose different sociocultural influences on children's storytelling abilities. The current study focuses on English–Mandarin bilingual children in Singapore and explores: (1) how English–Mandarin bilinguals apply their Mandarin lexical-grammatical proficiency to a given narrative task and (2) the compensatory strategies they employ in their Mandarin narratives. Data was obtained from 186 K1 pre-schoolers (85 boys and 101 girls) aged four to five. Children's Mandarin narrative skills were assessed with the Multilingual Assessment Instrument for Narratives (MAIN; Gagarina et al. in ZAS Pap Linguist 56:155–155, 2012. https://doi.org/10.21248/zaspil.56.2019.414). Their macrostructural knowledge (e.g., story grammar) was scored with the MAIN coding scheme, and their microstructural knowledge (e.g., mean length of utterance) was calculated with CLAN. Children's Mandarin lexical-grammatical proficiency (i.e., receptive vocabulary, receptive grammar, and semantic fluency) was assessed with standard tests. The results indicate that compared to children's microstructural knowledge, their macrostructural knowledge was more influenced by their Mandarin competence. Children used a variety of strategies to compensate for their limited Mandarin competence, and the most frequently used ones were generalisation (e.g., all classifiers of nouns were "个"), codeswitching (at both the word and sentential levels), and sentential structural transfer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cognitive problems like Dementia and Alzheimer’s are usually challenging to diagnose but can be noticed by some signs of their symptoms. The most common symptoms are confusion, trouble finding the right word, memory loss, and difficulty concentrating. This study aims to design a cognitive activity detection and tracing system that contains games and analyzes users’ performances then displays detailed statistics to the users. The proposed Cognitive Activity Detection and Tracing System (CADTS) is software that contains different kinds of games from different categories inside its body that aims to measure cognitive activity by utilizing formulations in the context of the games and give feedback to users concerning the performance analyses done. The purpose of these analyses is to catch the signs of symptoms. An insight into a possible scoring system is provided, and as our results, several descriptive statistics are shared based on the tests conducted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Participants judged whether a letter-string created a word when a single letter was added to the end indicated by a hyphen. Unique final fragments were easier to reconstruct when corresponding to the body of a word, having no onset (e.g. laugh from –augh) than when the second consonant of a two-letter onset was also included (e.g. blind from –lind). Conversely, unique initial fragments were easier to reconstruct when including the first consonant of a two-letter coda (e.g. drink from drin–) than when corresponding to an “antibody”, having no coda (e.g. claim from clai–). Such results cannot be explained by any account of orthographic processing based purely on the identity and position of the component letters while ignoring their function as an onset, coda, or vowel. Instead, the results are compatible with a model such as the proposed Subsyllabic Processing (SSP) account where subsyllabic structures are hierarchically represented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Within the field English-Spanish medical translation we encounter a noteworthy list of difficulties, arising from the fact that medical English oftentimes tends to use either a single term (or a phrase) lexicalizing each concept. Considering the increasing relevance of "stroke" nowadays, we aimed at researching the Spanish renderings (and synonyms) for this issue in order to see whether the English language provides us with more or less terms and phrases. By using institutional and professional sources, in this paper, we first delve into the etymology of "stroke" in English language, as well as the stroke types and subtypes, recording a total of 10 lexical items and phrases. Then, we research into the Spanish counterparts. By referring to computer-aided translation, as well as human translation, later on we carry out the English-Spanish contrast. Overall, the findings unveil how Spanish lexical and phrase items (n=33) triple the English ones available (n=10). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This secondary analysis study examined patterns, predictors, and outcomes of dual language learners' (DLLs') development in Spanish and English. Research Findings: Latent profile analysis identified three groups of DLLs: Balanced Bilinguals (54%), English-Dominant Bilinguals (25%), and Spanish-Dominant Bilinguals (21%). These groups had fairly comparable Spanish skills at Head Start (HS) entry but showed distinct learning patterns in English and Spanish during the 2.5 years in HS and kindergarten (K), which resulted in group differences in dual-language skills at K. When their home and classroom environments were compared, Balanced Bilinguals had more Spanish exposure than English-Dominant Bilinguals and more English exposure than Spanish-Dominant Bilinguals. Spanish-Dominant Bilinguals generally had more Spanish exposure at home and in the classroom, less English exposure at home, and had parents with lower English proficiency. English-Dominant Bilinguals had fewer home literacy materials in Spanish and had fewer opportunities for Spanish exposure in their first HS classrooms. Balanced Bilinguals presented the highest K achievement; the other two groups showed comparable skills. Practice or Policy: This study demonstrated variations in dual-language learning among DLLs in HS and indicated the need for tailored strategies that address the unique needs of diverse DLLs presenting varying proficiency in their two languages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Backgrounds: Segments and tone are important sub-syllabic units that play large roles in lexical processing in tonal languages. However, their roles in lexical processing remain unclear, and the event-related potential (ERP) technique will benefit the exploration of the cognitive mechanism in lexical processing. Methods: The high temporal resolution of ERP enables the technique to interpret rapidly changing spoken language performances. The present ERP study examined the different roles of segments and tone in Mandarin Chinese lexical processing. An auditory priming experiment was designed that included five types of priming stimuli: consonant mismatch, vowel mismatch, tone mismatch, unrelated mismatch, and identity. Participants were asked to judge whether the target of the prime-target pair was a real Mandarin disyllabic word or not. Results: Behavioral results including reaction time and response accuracy and ERP results were collected. Results were different from those of previous studies that showed the dominant role of consonants in lexical access in mainly non-tonal languages like English. Our results showed that consonants and vowels play comparable roles, whereas tone plays a less important role than do consonants and vowels in lexical processing in Mandarin. Conclusions: These results have implications for understanding the brain mechanisms in lexical processing of tonal languages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Homonyms are words with multiple, unrelated meanings that share a single form and pronunciation. These words provide valuable insights into how semantic representation is retrieved and selected independently of orthography and phonology. This study aims to investigate the temporal dynamics of lexical and semantic processing in the visual recognition of Korean words. Specifically, we examine how homonyms and unambiguous words are processed differently during a lexical decision task (LDT) with EEG recording, considering the effects of word frequency and the number of meanings (NOMs). Methods: Participants performed a lexical decision task where they were required to determine if a visually presented stimulus was a valid Korean word. We compared the behavioral responses and event-related potentials (ERPs) evoked by homonyms and unambiguous words, each possessing either high or low word frequency. Both subjective and objective NOMs were measured and manipulated, while controlling for the subjective balance of individual frequencies of meanings to control for confounding from the relatedness of meaning (ROM). For ERP analysis, a non-parametric cluster-based permutation test was employed in addition to the two time windows of interest (i.e., N400 and P600). Results: Behavioral results indicated a marginally significant interaction between word frequency and semantic ambiguity along with a main effect of word frequency, showing faster and more accurate responses for high-frequency words. An ambiguity advantage was observed only for low-frequency words, with no significant effect found for high-frequency words. ERP results revealed that lexical-semantic interactions were reflected in the modulations of the N400 and P600 components. High-frequency homonyms elicited an enhanced N400 amplitude, while low-frequency homonyms showed a reduced P600 amplitude. Discussion: The findings suggest that the activation of semantic information occurs simultaneously with lexical processing, rather than during post-lexical or decision-making processes. Furthermore, considering balanced homonyms were employed in this study, inhibitory competition may arise from the highfrequency individual meanings of high-frequency words. In contrast, in lowfrequency words, a facilitative effect may arise from gains in global semantic activation or semantic feedback to the orthographic level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BackgroundAimsMethods & ProceduresOutcomes & ResultsConclusionsThe Complexity Account for Treatment Efficacy (CATE) has been applied to semantic typicality in aphasia naming therapy, i.e. training atypical items of a category would improve naming of typical untrained-related items. However, most aphasia treatment studies have implemented a binary scoring system to measure response accuracy, which may not thoroughly reveal linguistic mechanisms underlying aphasia recovery.The current study investigated the evolution of error patterns following typicality-based Semantic Features Analysis (SFA) treatment in individuals with post-stroke aphasia.Thirty individuals with chronic aphasia participated in a typicality-based SFA treatment, and ten individuals with chronic aphasia served as controls. The treatment participants and controls completed a naming screener before and after either a treatment period or a no-treatment period, respectively. Responses were coded using an error coding scale and analyzed with mixed-effects models.Treatment participants demonstrated significant treatment and generalization effects, as captured by significant improvements on the error coding system for both trained and untrained items. However, the group-level analysis did not reveal significant generalization from training atypical items to untrained typical items. Subgroup analyses based on participants’ performance in treatment showed significant gains in naming untrained typical items from training atypical items in responders, but improved naming of untrained atypical items from training typical items in nonresponders.These findings suggest different linguistic mechanisms underlying aphasia recovery and highlight the importance of investigating treatment and generalization effects using a fine-grained error coding system as a complement to a binary scoring system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Timely and accurate diagnosis of the earliest manifestations of Alzheimer's disease (AD) is critically important. Cognitive challenge tests such as the Loewenstein Acevedo Scales for Semantic Interference and Learning (LASSI-L) have shown favorable diagnostic properties in a number of previous investigations using amyloid or FDG PET. However, no studies have examined LASSI-L performance against cerebrospinal fluid biomarkers of AD, which can be affected before the distribution of fibrillar amyloid and other changes that can be observed in brain neuroimaging. Therefore, we aimed to evaluate the relationship between LASSI-L scores and CSF biomarkers and the capacity of the cognitive challenge test to detect the presence of amyloid and tau deposition in patients with subjective cognitive decline and amnestic mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Methods: One hundred and seventy-nine patients consulting for memory loss without functional impairment were enrolled. Patients were examined using comprehensive neuropsychological assessment, the LASSI-L, and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) biomarkers (Aβ1-42/Aβ1-40 and ptau181). Means comparisons, correlations, effect sizes, and ROC curves were calculated. Results: LASSI-L scores were significantly associated with CSF biomarkers Aβ1-42/Aβ1-40 in patients diagnosed with MCI and subjective cognitive decline, especially those scores evaluating the capacity to recover from proactive semantic interference effects and delayed recall. A logistic regression model for the entire sample including LASSI-L and age showed an accuracy of 0.749 and an area under the curve of 0.785 to detect abnormal amyloid deposition. Conclusion: Our study supports the biological validity of the LASSI-L and its semantic interference paradigm in the context of the early stages of AD. These findings emphasize the utility and the convenience of including sensitive cognitive challenge tests in the assessment of patients with suspicion of early stages of AD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Primes that mismatch the targets on a phoneme (/ka'di/-/ka'do/) should produce responses intermediate between repeated (/ka'do/-/ka'do/) and unrelated (/bebe/-/ka'do/) primes. But what about primes and targets that mismatch on accentual cues (/kado/-/ ka'do/)? A repetition priming effect was observed on the N400 component with repeated primes eliciting less negativity than unrelated primes. A partial repetition priming effect was observed when the primes and targets mismatched on a phoneme. Phonemic mismatch primes elicited less negativity than unrelated primes, and more negativity than repeated primes. In contrast, no difference was observed between the repeated and the accentual mismatch primes. Hence, contrary to a mismatch on phonemic cues, a mismatch on accentual cues has no consequence on the magnitude of the repetition priming effect. This finding reinforces the view of an abstract lexicon in which acoustic details irrelevant for identification are stripped away before making contact with lexical representations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examined for the first time the impact of the presence of a phonological neighbour on word recognition when the target word and its neighbour co-occur in a spoken sentence. To do so, we developed a new task, the verb detection task, in which participants were instructed to respond as soon as they detected a verb in a sequence of words, thus allowing us to probe spoken word recognition processes in real time. We found that participants were faster at detecting a verb when it was phonologically related to the preceding noun than when it was phonologically unrelated. This effect was found with both correct sentences (Experiment 1) and with ungrammatical sequences of words (Experiment 2). The effect was also found in Experiment 3 where adjacent phonologically related words were included in the non-verb condition (i.e., word sequences not containing a verb), thus ruling out any strategic influences. These results suggest that activation persists across different words during spoken sentence processing such that processing of a word at position n + 1 benefits from the sublexical phonology activated during processing of the word at position n. We discuss how different models of spoken word recognition might be able (or not) to account for these findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Learning to read is a middle-distance race for children worldwide. Most of them succeed in this acquisition with "normal" difficulties that ensue from the progressive (re)structuring of the phonological and orthographic systems. Evidence accumulated on reading difficulties in children with developmental dyslexia (DYS children, henceforth) shows a pervasive phonological deficit. However, the phonological deficit may not be due to degraded phonological representations but rather due to impaired access to them. This study focused on how and to what extent phonological syllables, which are essential reading units in French, were accessible to DYS children to segment and access words. We tested the assumption that DYS children did not strictly have pervasive degraded phonological representations but also have impaired access to phonological and orthographic representations. We administered a visually adapted word-spotting paradigm, engaging both sublexical processing and lexical access, with French native-speaking DYS children (N = 25; Mage in months = 121.6, SD = 3.0) compared with chronological age-matched peers (N = 25; Mage in months = 121.8, SD = 2.7; CA peers henceforth) and reading level-matched peers (N = 25; Mage in months = 94.0, SD = 4.6; RL peers henceforth). Although DYS children were slower and less accurate than CA and RL peers, we found that they used phonological syllables to access and segment words. However, they exhibit neither the classical inhibitory syllable frequency effect nor the lexical frequency effect, which is generally observed in typically developing children. Surprisingly, DYS children did not show strictly degraded phonological representations because they demonstrated phonological syllable-based segmentation abilities, particularly with high-frequency syllables. Their difficulties are rather interpreted in terms of impaired access to orthographic and phonological representations, which could be a direct effect of difficulties in generalizing and consolidating low-frequency syllables. We discuss these results regarding reading acquisition and the specificities of the French linguistic system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transitive causative change of state (TCoS) verbs elicit scalar readings, distinguishing them between: upper-bounded verbs (e.g., dry), denoting a culminating change of state, and lower-bounded verbs (e.g., wrinkle), denoting a change from a zero to a non-zero value (or from one value to another) regarding the property described by the semantic core of the verb. In their eventive reading, transitive experiencer object (TEO) verbs (e.g., calm down, delight) also denote causative eventualities able to yield scalar inferences. This study investigates whether TEO verbs are also associated with a minimum or maximum standard degree, proposing a similar subdivision of TEO verbs into lower-bounded items (delight) and upper-bounded items (calm down). In a forced-choice selection experiment we tested the impact of the standard degree (bound) of the semantic core of Spanish TEO verbs on the availability of lower-bounded or upper-bounded readings comparing them to TCoS verbs. Results revealed that the factor bound was significant to the extent that both lower-bounded TEO and TCoS predicates yielded the response compatible with a lower-bounded reading significantly more often than predicates that possess a maximum degree, supporting the distinction between lower and upper bounded items. Further, a significant effect of verb type was also observed, differentiating a change of state on the mental (TEO) versus the physical (TCoS) levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examined the extent to which cognate facilitation effects occurred in simultaneous bilingual children's production and comprehension and how these were modulated by language dominance and language context. Bilingual Dutch-German children, ranging from Dutch-dominant to German-dominant, performed picture naming and auditory lexical decision tasks in single-language and dual-language contexts. Language context was manipulated with respect to the language of communication (with the experimenter and in instructional videos) and by means of proficiency tasks. Cognate facilitation effects emerged in both production and comprehension and interacted with both dominance and context. In a single-language context, stronger cognate facilitation effects were found for picture naming in children's less dominant language, in line with previous studies on individual differences in lexical activation. In the dual-language context, this pattern was reversed, suggesting inhibition of the dominant language at the decision level. Similar effects were observed in lexical decision. These findings provide evidence for an integrated bilingual lexicon in simultaneous bilingual children and shed more light on the complex interplay between lexicon-internal and lexicon-external factors modulating the extent of lexical cross-linguistic influence more generally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the importance of understanding language processing in bilingual children and highlights the need for online techniques, such as eye-tracking and self-paced listening experiments, to gain more direct insights into the processes involved. The article addresses key questions about bilingual language development, including the comparison of online comprehension to offline comprehension and production, the extent to which bilingual children predict upcoming sentence information, the evidence for language co-activation during processing, and the role of individual differences in bilingual language processing. The article also summarizes existing knowledge on online comprehension versus production, predictive processing, and lexical and syntactic co-activation in bilingual children. However, there are still gaps in our understanding, and more research is needed to explore new linguistic properties, language combinations, and individual differences in bilingual language processing. The article concludes by introducing a special issue that presents empirical findings from different contexts and linguistic phenomena, aiming to contribute to our understanding of real-time language processing in bilingual children. [Extracted from the article]

Language experiments have a long tradition in the field of dialectology to investigate phonological, lexical and syntactic variation. Methodologically, the repertoire ranges from written test procedures to standardized language production tests and interviews whereby different types of tasks (e. g. translation, picture-naming, evaluation tasks) are used. In order to investigate the variation and perception of morpho(phono)logical phenomena (e. g. the variation of the superlative dat schéinst/dat schéinsten/dat schéinstent Meedchen ‘the most beautiful girl’) in Luxembourgish, I developed a new test procedure, which is based on test procedures and tasks already used in other dialectological and variationist projects (e. g. Syntax Hessischer Dialekte (SyHD), cf. Fleischer/Lenz/Weiß 2015, Sprachvariation in Norddeutschland (SiN); cf. Elmentaler et al. 2015)). The development of a new method was indispensable, since firstly, it must be adapted to the analysis of morpho(phono)logical phenomena that are not linked to regional variation and secondly this test aims to analyse salience and pertinence, two relevant concepts within the scope of language perception and evaluation (cf. Purschke 2011), separately. This paper thus presents an experiment that aims to investigate the perception of morpho(phono)logical variation and its variants in Luxembourgish. The individual test procedures, a salience test, a specific form of scale-based test, a translation task and a supplementary questionnaire are described, contextualized and discussed in detail. The focus also lies on the special design of the test, which is able to ascertain the salience and pertinence of certain variants and to correlate them directly with the production of the variants and the self-evaluation of the individual participants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In two speech production studies conducted in Italian, we investigated the impact of phonological neighbourhood properties such as the neighbourhood density and the mean frequency of the neighbours on speech processing. Two populations of healthy (Study 1) and neurologically impaired (Study 2) individuals were tested. We employed multi-regression methods to analyse naming latencies in Study 1 and accuracy rates in Study 2 while controlling for various psycholinguistic predictors. In Study 1, pictures with words from high-density neighbourhoods were named faster than those from low-density neighbourhoods. Additionally, words with high-frequency neighbours were named faster in Study 1 and yielded higher accuracy rates in Study 2. The results suggest facilitatory effects of both the phonological neighbourhood density and frequency neighbourhood variables. Furthermore, we observed interactions between these two phonological neighbourhood variables and name agreement and repetition. Specifically, the facilitation effect was more pronounced for pictures with lower name agreement and during the initial presentation of the pictures. These findings are discussed in the context of previous literature and within the framework of interactive models of speech production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Cognitive control processes have been extensively studied in spoken word production, however, relevant investigations of written word production are scarce. Using data from a group of post-stroke individuals we studied, for the first time, the neural substrates of cognitive control in written word production. We addressed three questions: Are control mechanisms: (1) shared by language and non-language domains; (2) shared by lexical and segmental levels of word production within the word production system; (3) related to both interference and facilitation effect types? Methods: To address these questions, for each participant we calculated cognitive control indices that reflected the interference and facilitation effects observed in written Blocked Cyclic Naming (written language production) and Simon (visuo-spatial processing) tasks. These behavioral cognitive control indices were studied both on their own, as well as in relation to the distribution of structural (gray matter) lesions. Results: For Question 1, we provide strong evidence of domain-specific control mechanisms used in written word production, as, among other findings, distinct regions within Broca’s Area were associated with control in written word production vs. control in visuo-spatial processing. For Question 2, our results provide no strong evidence of shared control mechanisms for lexical and segmental levels of written word production, while they highlight the role of BA45 in instantiating control mechanisms that are specific to the two levels. For Question 3, we found evidence that BA45 supports distinct mechanisms associated with facilitation and interference, while orbital frontal cortex supports control process(es) associated with both. Discussion: These findings significantly advance our understanding of the cognitive control mechanisms involved in written language production, as well as of the role of Broca’s Area in cognitive control and language production more generally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates how postlexical phonological processes are acquired in multilingual speech, namely, how learners cope with conflicting demands in the production and perception of the voicing patterns in their non-native languages, what impact lexical knowledge has on learner behavior, and to what extent existing speech learningmodels can account for it. To investigate this, 14 Hungarian native speakers, proficient sequential learners of Spanish and English, took part in two types of experiment. The production experiments examined regressive voicing assimilation between obstruents and when the trigger was a sonorant consonant (presonorant voicing) word-internally and across word-boundary. At word level, we compared various lexical groups: non-cognates, double cognates and triple cognates (inhibitory, facilitative, and cognates with conflicting information). The perception experiments aimed to find out whether learners notice the voicing assimilations mentioned. The results showed that participants failed to learn presonorant voicing and failed to block regressive voicing assimilation despite perceiving the latter as linguistically relevant. Data also revealed that there is no direct link between perception and production, and that cognate status had a limited effect, but in triple cognates the primacy of the native language was dominant. Thus, it is concluded that in laryngeal postlexical processes the native language plays the primary role, neither the other non-native language, nor linguistic proximity seems to be decisive. Our data can be best accounted for by the Scalpel Model extended to phonological acquisition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Thus far, glossing studies have remained at the level of individual words rather than including their lexical environment. To fill this gap, the present study explored if different glossing conditions would have a distinct impact on L2 reading comprehension and incidental lexical and collocational learning. Sixty-three first language (L1) Cantonese speakers read two English stories that contained 12 adjective-pseudonoun collocations. The participants were placed in one of the three conditions, i.e., unglossed, single-word glossed, and collocation glossed. Participants' reading comprehension was measured with twelve true-or-false statements for each story, and their lexical and collocational learning was assessed using unannounced recognition and recall tests. The results revealed that collocational glossing promoted reading comprehension significantly compared to the other two reading conditions. In addition, while both glossing conditions promoted lexical and collocational knowledge in the immediate posttest, collocational glossing demonstrated a more durable facilitative impact in the delayed posttest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the status of lexical stress in the processing system of heritage speakers of Spanish and whether or not it is influenced by their experience with English. Participants completed an ABX matching task with auditory stimuli differing in the location of stress or in one consonantal sound. Findings reveal that heritage speakers are more accurate in consonant-based trials than in stress-based ones, but only when matching stimuli were non-adjacent, which suggests that their stress-processing strategies pattern more closely with those of native English speakers. Furthermore, dominance and knowledge of Spanish appear to be associated with increased phonological sensibility to stress contrasts. Pedagogical implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims and objectives: This study examines how social information is utilized in processes of bilingual speech perception. Specifically, we investigate whether racialized expectations of native language background trigger language-specific processing strategies in early or simultaneous Spanish–English bilinguals. Methodology: We coupled a visually-primed phoneme categorization task with a social evaluation questionnaire to test whether Spanish–English bilingual adults living in the United States (n = 30) drew on racialized ideologies about what speakers of certain languages look like during speech perception. We predicted that, if participants drew on these ideologies during the phoneme categorization task, they would cue an expectation of what language was being spoken and, consequently, a shift in the identification boundary. Data and analysis: Mixed logistic regression was used to investigate the effects of photograph (the visual prime) and voice on how participants categorized the continua while paired, two-tailed t -tests were used to compare how participants socially evaluated the two speakers. Findings: Raciolinguistic evaluations appeared to influence bilingual speech perception, significantly affecting how the continua were categorized, but they did not work the same way for every voice. Originality: Prior work has posited that interactional context influences bilingual language control (e.g., Grosjean, 2001); the ideological nature of this context has, however, been understudied. This paper offers insight into how ideologies related to race may shape language perception and use in bilinguals. Implications: The findings provide evidence for the role of social information in bilingual speech perception, suggest that multiple cues (acoustic and social) integrate to determine the interactional context, and indicate that the influence of raciolinguistic ideologies is neither straightforward nor homogeneous but rather contingent on complex aspects of the perceived speaker. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims/Objectives: According to Multilink, words from the first (L1) and (L2) second languages share a common store and their access is non-selective. Thus, the presentation of a target word activates in parallel lexical candidates from both languages that share form and semantic overlap. The degree of words' activation also depends on their resting levels of activation (words that are more used have a higher resting levels of activation). Since non-cognate translations and synonyms share meaning, they may be seen as qualitatively similar lexical representations, and consequently subject to similar processing if their frequency levels are matched. However, whereas masked priming lexical decision studies with synonyms failed to find reliable masked priming effects, the majority of those with non-cognate translations (especially in the forward direction, i.e., from L1 to L2) showed significant effects. The present study extends those findings by directly comparing the processing of synonyms and translations in bilinguals. Design/methodology: A masked priming lexical decision task (targets were preceded by a related 50-ms word [an L1 translation or an L2 synonym] or by a 50-ms unrelated word) was conducted. Lexical frequency of usage was higher for primes than for targets. Data and analysis: Reaction times and accuracy from 24 sequential (highly proficient) European Portuguese-English bilinguals were analyzed with linear mixed effects models. Findings/conclusions: Results showed priming effects for translations, but not for synonyms, indicating a differential processing of synonyms and non-cognate translations. Originality: This is the first empirical work that directly compares the processing of synonyms and translations in bilinguals by using the same targets words for both prime types. Significance/implications: The findings contradict the Multilink model, since they index a differential representational nature of lexico-semantic links for translations and synonyms. Modifications in the model are needed to account for the data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims and Objectives: Bilingual speakers that speak a null subject (Spanish) and a non-null subject language (English) may show some indeterminacy in referential choice in their nondominant language in comparison to monolingual speakers. The present study tests the production of referring expressions in the two languages of bilingual speakers (Spanish and English) to assess attainment at the discourse level and explore the role of language dominance on referential choice. Methodology: A group of 49 Spanish–English bilinguals participated in a picture description task in English and Spanish measuring referential choice in contexts of reference maintenance and topic-shift. Data and Analysis: The results of our study show that at a group level, bilingual speakers produced more underspecified references in maintenance contexts than English monolingual speakers and produced more overspecified references in topic-maintenance and topic-shift contexts than Spanish monolingual speakers. The results further show that language dominance in the target language is associated with more monolingual-like referential choice. Conclusions: We discuss the role of language dominance in the development of bilingual referential choice patterns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accurate estimation of public opinion in diverse countries requires survey questions that operate similarly across languages. We leverage 3,026 bilingual Latinos across four studies to investigate how language-of-administration affects the measurement properties of political science scales. We randomly assign bilinguals to English and Spanish survey forms and uncover item bias, also known as differential item functioning (DIF), across items measuring identity, attitudes, and political knowledge. We examine whether translation errors are the culprit, yet find that perceived translation quality does not predict the magnitude of DIF and questions with minimal text exhibit item bias. Our findings suggest otherwise similar Latinos may be estimated to possess different levels of knowledge, attitude strength, and group identification due to survey language selection. We discuss the implications of our findings on the design of multilingual surveys and the study of racial and ethnic politics more broadly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper highlights a small selection of cases where cross-linguistic insights have been important to big questions in the theory of semantics and the syntax/semantics interface. The selection includes (i) the role and representation of Speaker and Addressee in the grammar; (ii) mismatches between form and interpretation motivating high-placed silent operators for functional elements; and (iii) the explanation of semantic universals, including universals pertaining to inventories, in terms of learnability and the trade-off between informativeness and simplicity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Repetition has often been argued to be a semiotic device that iconically signifies 'more content', such as intensity and plurality. However, through multimodal interaction analysis of materials in English, Estonian, and Swedish, this paper demonstrates how self-repetition is used to coordinate actions across participants and temporally organize the ongoing activity. The data are taken from infant mealtimes, pilates classes, dance training, boardgames, rock climbing, and opera rehearsals. Repetition of both lexical and non-lexical tokens can prolong, postpone, and generally organize segments of action as well as co-create rhythms and moves in a moment-by-moment reflexive relationship with other (non-vocalizing) participants. A crucial feature of repetitions is that they can be flexibly extended to fit the other's public performance, its launching, continuation, and projectable completion. We argue that the iconicity of repetition emerges through its indexical relationship to other bodies, as a real-time jointly achieved phenomenon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study explored bilingual coactivation during natural monolingual sentence-reading comprehension. Native Chinese readers who had learned Japanese as a second language and those who had not learned it at all were tested. The results showed that unrelated Chinese word pairs that shared a common Japanese translation could parafoveally prime each other. Critically, this translation-related preview effect was modulated by the readers' language-learning experiences. It was found only among the late Chinese–Japanese bilinguals, but not among the monolingual Chinese readers. By setting a novel step, which was testing bilingual coactivation of semantic knowledge in a natural reading scenario without an explicit presentation of L2 words, our results suggest that bilingual word processing can be automatic, unconscious and nonselective. The study reveals an L2-to-L1 influence on readers' lexical activation during natural sentence reading in an exclusively native context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we conducted an eye-tracking experiment to investigate the effects of sentence context and tonal information on spoken word recognition processes in Cantonese Chinese. We recruited 60 native Cantonese listeners to participate in the eye-tracking experiment. The target words (phonologically similar words) were manipulated to either (1) a congruent context or (2) an incongruent context in the experiment. The resulting eye-movement patterns in the incongruent context condition clearly revealed that (1) sentence context produced a garden-path effect in the initial stage of the spoken word recognition processes and then (2) the lexical tone of the word (bottom-up information) overrode the contextual effects to help listeners to discriminate between different similar-sounding words during lexical access. In conclusion, the patterns of eye-tracking data show the interactive processes between the lexical tone (an acoustic cue within a Cantonese word) and sentence context played in different phases to the spoken word recognition of Cantonese Chinese. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the past decade, research on bilingual visual word recognition has given rise to a new line of study focusing on a sublexical orthographic variable referred to as orthographic markedness, derived from the comparison of the two orthotactic distributions known by a bilingual reader. Orthographic markers have been shown to speed up language decisions but also, to some extent, to modulate language nonselectivity during lexical access (i.e., the degree of co-activation of lexical representations of the two languages). In this review, we (1) describe the results available in the literature about orthographic markedness on language membership detection and lexical access and discuss the locus of these effects, which leads us to (2) present theoretical extensions to the bilingual interactive activation models and discuss their respective adequacy to the data, finally leading us to (3) propose future research directions in the study of orthographic markedness, such as extension to different reading tasks and contexts as well as considering developmental and learning dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Certain foreign words have been translated from different languages into Turkish, and after these words have been used for a long time, they have been tried to be replaced by finding their equivalents in the mother tongue. In general, although the aim of the studies conducted in this field is to ensure the Turkishization of foreign terms and to help the problem of Turkish terms, in some cases, the word in question has continued to be used with its foreign language equivalent, and in some cases, no Turkish equivalent could be found for the word in question or its Turkish equivalent could not give the desired meaning and was not accepted. One of these words is the concept of "didactic". In order to clarify this concept and to clarify the existing confusion, this study will examine the concept of "didactic". In doing so, it is necessary to look at which terms in Turkish are included under the concept of didactics and at the same time to examine the definitions and information given under these terms in dictionaries or encyclopedias. The aim of this study is to compare six dictionaries and encyclopedias used in the general and educational fields in terms of certain characteristics of the concepts within the scope of the study, to examine the dimensions in which they deal with the concepts and to provide clarity in this sense. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Part-set cuing facilitation and impairment effects are rarely found in spatial memory, which is a challenge to the theories of part-set cuing effects based on lexical stimulus. This study aims to investigate whether there part-set cuing facilitation and impairment effects are present in spatial memory by constructing two types of memory scenes with high and low degrees of interitem associations, achieved by manipulating the presentation of miniatures. This study examined the effects of different part-set cues on free recall, recognition, and reconstruction tasks. The results of two experiments revealed that matrix cues impaired the performance of three recall tasks in memory scenes with a high degree of interitem associations, and scene cues facilitated the reconstruction performance (Experiment 1). Conversely, in memory scenes with a low degree of interitem associations, the impairment effect of matrix cues was not observed in the three recall tasks, but scene cues still facilitated the reconstruction performance (Experiment 2). These findings supported the retrieval strategy disruption hypothesis, the two-mechanism and the multi-mechanism accounts, demonstrating the significance of interitem associations in spatial memory. Furthermore, the results provided direct evidence for the importance of the encoding-retrieval strategy matching principle in spatial memory tasks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To comprehend speech, listeners must resolve competition between potential candidate words. In second-language (L2) listening such competition may be inflated by spurious activation; the onsets of “reggae” and “legacy” may both activate “leg” for Japanese listeners, or the rhymes of “adapt” and “adept” may activate “apt” for Dutch listeners, while only one in each pair triggers competition for L1 listeners. Using eyetracking with L2-dominant bilingual emigrants, we directly compared within-language L1 and L2 lexical activation and competition in the same individuals. For these listeners, activation patterns did not differ across languages. Unexpectedly, however, we observed onset competition in both languages but rhyme competition in the L2 only (although the same stimuli elicited rhyme competition for control listeners in both languages). This suggests that L1 rhyme competition may disappear after long-time immersion in an L2 environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Memory for who said what can help native and non-native listeners identify critical information for use in conversations. In two experiments, source memory for object-speaker associations was tested for listeners varying in language proficiency. Native and non-native participants of English first heard speakers name objects with prototypical color (e.g., broccoli) before they had to indicate who had previously named each object. Speakers either consistently named objects of one color, or they randomly named objects of different colors. While both listener groups associated objects with speakers successfully, in Experiment 1, with black and white images, native listeners showed an advantage in source memory in the color consistent condition over the random condition, while non-native listeners had no such advantage. The finding for non-native listeners was replicated in Experiment 2 with color images. The results confirm the role of source memory representations in communication, but also suggest that encoding object-speaker association in L2 may be less sensitive to consistent patterns in the input. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Negation as a universal feature of human language is used effortlessly in everyday communication. However, experimental research has shown that the comprehension of negated sentences seems to require additional cognitive resources compared to affirmative sentences. Many studies investigating the processing of negation report longer reading and reaction times for negative compared to affirmative sentences and many studies report a Polarity by Truth interaction: false affirmative sentences lead to longer response times and larger N400 event-related potentials (ERPs) than true affirmative sentences, whereas the pattern is reversed for negative sentences where it is the true sentence that elicits longer reaction times and higher N400 ERPs compared to false negative sentences. These interactions have been discussed in the light of lexical associations, predictability, and the need to construct two subsequent mental representations. Furthermore, recent studies have shown that the comprehension of negated sentences seems to make use of neural resources that are typically involved in cognitive control and inhibitory mechanisms. As both processes have been associated with two different and temporally overlapping ERP components (the N400 and the P300), we focus on studies with high temporal resolution. We discuss linguistic aspects of negation, such as semantic similarity and contextual invariance of negation. We furthermore discuss the role of the verb as well as the position of the negative marker with respect to the verb, and their respective relevance for predictive and inhibitory mechanisms in negated sentences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the collaborative process that two Korean–English and one Spanish–English bilingual Early Head Start family childcare educators, two instructional coaches, and the author engaged in as they co-created intentional bilingual pedagogical approaches to support young emergent bilinguals and co-develop critical (trans)languaging awareness. Data included participant and non-participant observations; field notes; debriefing sessions between the teachers and the author, and instructional coaches and the author; informal interviews with teachers; and two Saturday meet-ups with all participants and the author. Data were analyzed using thematic analysis to identify salient themes in the creation and implementation of practices and pedagogies that leveraged both teachers' and children's languaging practices as we deepened our critical language awareness. The design-based collaborative approach that involved co-learning, co-planning, and co-shifting supported our focus on critical language use, trial of different (trans)languaging practices that transgressed English hegemony, and decision-making around how to best leverage everyone's linguistic strengths in support of children's developing bilingualism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines whether Differential Object Marking (DOM) realization and word order in relative clauses (RCs) in Spanish affect processing and interpretation among monolinguals and highly proficient Catalan–Spanish bilinguals. RCs are parallel in Catalan and Spanish, but DOM is much more restricted in Catalan than in Spanish, and, interestingly, the distinction between subject and object RCs relies mainly on the presence/absence of DOM. To examine DOM optionality, we concentrate on the top portion of the animacy scale and test the human/non-human contrast. Exploring these two populations allows us to test whether they resort to different strategies for the following three reasons: (1) bilingualism places an increased burden on memory processes); (2) the partial overlap between both DOM systems might lead to the influence from Catalan into Spanish); and (3) optionality has been proposed to characterize bilingual grammars). Findings from a word-by-word non-cumulative self-paced reading task showed that DOM modulates RC processing. With [+human] obligatorily marked objects, both monolinguals and bilinguals read subject RCs faster than object RCs, suggesting a strategy favoring subject RCs. However, monolinguals solved the interpretation early while processing but bilinguals, despite the more restricted DOM character of Catalan, are sensitive to DOM albeit displaying delayed spill-over effects. With [−human] optionally marked objects, bilinguals performed faster than monolinguals. We suggest that the uneven experience with DOM in Catalan, particularly with the non-standard variety that frequently displays DOM and that our bilinguals also speak in everyday conversations, facilitates bilinguals' adaptation to the optional marking of non-human objects in Spanish, much in the same manner that they accommodate the presence or absence of DOM with both human and non-human objects in other native language. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For decades, linguists have been working to formulate an objective means of distinguishing dialects from languages, but dialect recognition has largely remained a subjective enterprise. Only recently have some studies proposed a processing-based psycholinguistic approach toward dialect recognition. These studies argued that dialect words are stored as a co-dependent representation, not as an independent representation of the words of bilingual speakers. Based on these studies, we investigated the lexical selection and processing mechanisms of bilingual and bidialectal speakers of two understudied languages, Oromo and Amharic, using the picture–word interference paradigm. We found independent lexical representations for both the bilingual and the bidialectal groups, which implies the involvement of the same cognitive mechanisms in both language and dialect processing. Thus, we argue that bidialectal speakers have flexible lexical representation and selection mechanisms that are dependent on the speakers' previous language experience. Here, we propose a dynamic lexical selection model that accommodates diverse dialect ecologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spelling difficulties are commonly associated primarily with spelling errors. However, it is not uncommon for spelling challenges to transform the whole writing process into a formidable struggle. This paper delves into the exploration of whether and to what extent analyses of children's writing processes can enhance our understanding of their difficulties, potentially contributing to the assessment of spelling challenges. We focused particularly on the degree of hesitation within words and the ability to detect and correct spelling errors among children with and without reading and spelling difficulties, as well as how these processes impact the quality and lexical diversity of their texts. Additionally, we sought to contribute to disentangling the influence of spelling and decoding abilities on these processes. A cohort of 47 children, aged 10–13, participated in the study, comprising 16 typically developing children, 16 with predominantly spelling difficulties, and 15 with both reading and spelling difficulties. Our analysis encompassed their spelling performance in both standardized tests and task-oriented writing samples, as well as an examination of their pausing and revision behaviour. As expected, we found robust correlations between the children's spelling test scores and the proportions of spelling errors in their texts. Furthermore, our findings indicated that children encountering spelling difficulties exhibited a reduced ability to detect and correct errors compared to their peers without such challenges. Additionally, they displayed a slightly higher tendency to experience word-internal interruptions, aligning with prior research. The children who also had reading difficulties produced fewer words and processed words more slowly compared to children in both the other groups. Intriguingly, process data did not reliably predict text characteristics, suggesting that dysfluent writing may not significantly detriment the overall quality of the text, contrary to our initial expectations based on prevailing writing development models. Nevertheless, the study revealed considerable individual variation, with some participants demonstrating a high degree of struggling and dysfluency, resulting in poorer text outcomes, but also others whose struggling processes led to better outcomes. We posit that the crucial aspect lies in identifying these individuals within a classroom context and gaining insights into their processes to provide them with appropriate, formative feedback and adequate writing tools to facilitate their writing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lexical polysemous words are often misidentified as homophones, i.e., words that have same pronunciation but different semantic interpretation. However, lexical polysemy words are not homophones. Lexical polysemy refers to one constituent having multiple readings or usages with closely related sense. Lexical polysemy was observed in multiple fields of studies like semantics, psycholinguistics and cognitive linguistics. Sweetser's (1988) cognitive semantic view states that when a word is polysemous, the core sense of the word is shared with all its entries. Therefore, in lexical polysemic words, there is no shift from core semantic schema of the word. If the core semantic interpretation is not observed in its entries, then those entries are homophones of the word. This cross-sectional study focuses on the emergence and development of polysemous verb veyyi in Teluguspeaking children and whether the verb veyyi--to throw--is used containing the core meaning of the word or is evidence of homophones. Veyyi has multiple meanings, which can be misinterpreted as homophone in Telugu; however, it is evidence of lexical polysemy, in other words, semantic extension of the word. The study also observes how children acquire lexical polysemy in early stages of their acquisition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Metadiscourse (MD) allows instructors to organize classroom discourse and reflect their own style while delivering the content. MD has been studied for years, especially with a focus on written contexts even though the number of studies conducted on spoken contexts in different educational settings has a tendency to increase. With the increasing spread of English medium instruction (EMI) across the world, the role of MD in EMI classroom discourse has become a field of research that is worth investigating. Concerning the Turkish context, MD has recently been a popular research area, but there are limited number of studies conducted the examination of MD in spoken interactions in the Turkish context. To this end, the current study aims to investigate the distribution and lexicogrammatical realizations of metadiscourse markers employed by the lecturers in the spoken discourse of different EMI courses. A corpus-based discourse analysis was carried out by referring to Ädel's (2010) framework of metadiscourse. The qualitative and quantitative analyses of the corpus collected from 36 hours of lesson observation have revealed some variations in both the distribution and realization of metadiscursive categories in different EMI courses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: This paper examines the productive vocabulary skills of five groups of English-Hebrew bilinguals in Israel and the United States. The juxtaposition of these five groups allows us to simultaneously compare performance across dominance profiles, acquisition contexts (L2 learned in school, HL maintained at home, immigration and immersion), and countries (Israel and the USA). Methods: A total of 185 participants took part in study: Hebrew-dominant heritage English speakers, Hebrew-dominant L2-English speakers, Englishdominant heritage Hebrew speakers, and English-dominant L2-Hebrew speakers in the US and in Israel. They were all administered the MINT assessment in both languages, as well as background questionnaires. We then employ network modeling based on a secondary data analysis of background questionnaires to consider how each group's lexical proficiency ties in to reported input factors. Results and Discussion: The MINT results indicate clear language dominance in all the groups except Hebrew-dominant heritage English speakers, who show balanced proficiency in both their languages. The network models indicate key distinctions between the groups as a function of linguistic context, and we assess our findings in the context of recent work on quantifying the bilingual experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mandarin qián and English forward are semantically equivalent in the domain of Space, but could be semantically opposite in the domain of Time. In other words, equivalent spatial lexical items could convey opposite temporal concepts. What temporal concepts conveyed by qián and forward would be retrieved by Mandarin-English (M-E) bilinguals with different language proficiencies? Drawing a sample from college students in Mainland China, this study examines how LI and L2 proficiencies would affect M-E bilinguals' retrieval of temporal concepts by examining their interpretation of the Mandarin temporal metaphor of qián and the English temporal metaphors of forward. The results show that LI temporal concepts would be retrieved more frequently than L2 temporal concepts regardless of the testing languages, that LI and L2 proficiencies were not predictors for the way of interpretation, and that the higher L2 proficiency group could retrieve temporal concepts in line with the testing languages with higher accuracy than the lower L2 proficiency group. The findings suggest that bilinguals with higher L2 proficiency may be able to represent temporal concepts with language tags or may have an attentional and/or inhibitory control advantage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]