scholarly journals PARSING AMBIGUOUS RELATIVE CLAUSES IN L2 ENGLISH

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-26
Author(s):  
Heather Goad ◽  
Natália Brambatti Guzzo ◽  
Lydia White
Keyword(s):  
Relative Clauses ◽  
Recency Effect ◽  
L1 Transfer ◽  
Spanish Speaking ◽  
Prosodic Cues ◽  
Break Points

Abstract We investigate effects of prosodic cues on interpretation of ambiguous sentences containing relative clauses (RCs) in English by Spanish-speaking learners. English and Spanish differ in default preference for RC attachment: English has a weak low attachment (LA) preference (RC modifies NP2); Spanish has a stronger high attachment (HA) preference (RC modifies NP1). We conducted an interpretation task with auditorily presented stimuli to examine whether prosodic cues determine attachment. Target items were manipulated for position of break and length of RC, NP1, and NP2. For both groups, break and length are significant. For the learners, proficiency interacts with break suggesting L1 transfer: lower proficiency learners choose HA more when break points to LA; higher proficiency learners choose HA more when break points to HA. Lower proficiency learners are more likely to choose LA overall, suggesting a recency effect. Our results confirm the importance of using aural stimuli when testing interpretation of ambiguous sentences.

Syntactic Complexity in Spanish Narratives

1994 ◽  
Vol 37 (3) ◽  
pp. 645-654 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vera F. Gutierrez-Clellen ◽  
Richard Hofstetter
Keyword(s):  
Relative Clauses ◽  
Developmental Differences ◽  
Spanish Language ◽  
School Age ◽  
Syntactic Complexity ◽  
Structural Constituent ◽  
Prepositional Phrases ◽  
Spanish Speaking ◽  
Language Groups ◽  
Nominal Clauses

Syntactic complexity in the movie retellings of 77 school-age Spanish-speaking children was examined using a structural constituent analysis. The results demonstrated developmental differences in the length of T-units, index of subordination, use of relative clauses, and prepositional phrases. There were also differences in the length of T-units, use of nominal clauses, and adverbial phrases across Spanish language groups. The analysis underscores the significance of subordination as a cohesive device and as an indicator of narrative proficiency.

Object clitics and their omission in child L2 French: The contributions of processing limitations and L1 transfer

2011 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 531-549 ◽  
Author(s):  
THERES GRÜTER ◽  
MARTHA CRAGO
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Language Production ◽  
Negative Transfer ◽  
Digit Span ◽  
Facilitative Effect ◽  
L1 Transfer ◽  
Spanish Speaking ◽  
Null Objects ◽  
Object Clitics ◽  
Better Than

This article explores the widely documented difficulty with object clitics in the acquisition of French. The study investigates the effects of L1 transfer and processing limitations on the production and comprehension of object clitics in child L2 learners of French with different L1 backgrounds (Chinese, Spanish). The Spanish-speaking learners performed better than Chinese-speaking learners on clitic-related tasks, indicating a facilitative effect of transfer when the L1 also has object clitics. Yet no evidence was found for (negative) transfer of null objects from Chinese to French, as learners consistently rejected interpretations requiring referential null objects on a receptive task. The frequency of Chinese-speaking learners’ object omissions in production was negatively correlated with an independent measure of working memory (backward digit span), consistent with the hypothesis that object clitic omission is affected by processing limitations. These findings are discussed within a psycholinguistic model of syntactic encoding during language production.

scholarly journals O PROCESSAMENTO DE ORAÇÕES RELATIVAS COM E SEM O PRONOME “THAT” POR BRASILEIROS APRENDIZES TARDIOS DE INGLÊS COMO L21

Organon ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 26 (51) ◽  
Author(s):  
Alyson Andrade Gonçalves ◽  
Márcio Martins Leitão
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Relative Clauses ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Relative Pronoun ◽  
L1 Transfer ◽  
Shallow Structure Hypothesis ◽  
Reading Experiment ◽  
The One ◽  
Shallow Structure ◽  
Object Relative

The purpose of this study is to investigate the linguistic processingof L2 English by a group of Brazilian native speakers. In order to achievethis goal, we analyze the processing of unambiguous object relative clauseswhich contain contrasting structures in the two languages studied here, that is, that have two structure options in English (with or without the pronoun“that”) but only one in Portuguese (containing “that”). Thus, in an onlineself-paced reading experiment, we examined the extent to which Braziliannative speakers would show advantages in processing sentences containingthe relative pronoun “that”, once this structure resembles the one found inPortuguese. Results show that basic, intermediate and advanced learnersseem to process object relative clauses more quickly when they present “that”explicitly, which is taken as an indication of the presence of L1 transfer ef-fects in language processing. Such results are discussed within the predic-tions of the Shallow Structure Hypothesis (Felser et al. 2002).

The acquisition of mood selection in Spanish relative clauses

1998 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 585-604 ◽  
Author(s):  
ANA TERESA PÉREZ-LEROUX
Keyword(s):  
Relative Clauses ◽  
False Belief ◽  
False Beliefs ◽  
False Belief Task ◽  
Spanish Speaking ◽  
Subjunctive Mood ◽  
Production Study ◽  
Spanish Subjunctive ◽  
Representational Theory Of Mind ◽  
Mood Selection

Although children acquire Spanish subjunctive morphology early in the process of language acquisition, they only master mood selection in a staged process that lasts for several years. This paper examines the possibility that the acquisition of subjunctive mood selection in particular syntactic contexts is constrained by cognitive development in the area of representational theory of mind. Acquisition of the epistemic aspects of the semantics of subjunctive are shown to be associated with the understanding of false beliefs, a landmark development in children's cognition. Twenty-two Spanish speaking children between the ages of 3;5 and 6;11 participated in an elicited production study designed to test whether children's ability to produce subjunctive relative clauses was related to their ability to pass a false belief task. Results indicate a strong correlation between children's ability to use the subjunctive mood in relative clauses and their capacity for understanding false beliefs.

Emergent Literacy in Spanish-Speaking Children With Developmental Language Disorder: Preliminary Findings of Delays in Comprehension- and Code-Related Skills

2020 ◽  
Vol 63 (12) ◽  
pp. 4193-4207
Author(s):  
Amy S. Pratt ◽  
John A. Grinstead ◽  
Rebecca J. McCauley
Keyword(s):  
Emergent Literacy ◽  
Language Disorder ◽  
Literacy Skills ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Developmental Language Disorder ◽  
Writing Ability ◽  
Transparent Orthography ◽  
Spanish Speaking ◽  
Phonological Structure ◽  
Name Writing

Purpose This exploratory study describes the emergent literacy skills of children with developmental language disorder (DLD) who speak Spanish, a language with a simple phonological structure and transparent orthography. We examine differences between children with DLD and their typically developing (TD) peers on a battery of emergent literacy measures. Method Participants included 15 monolingual Spanish-speaking children with DLD (who did not present with cognitive difficulties) and 15 TD controls matched for age, gender, and socioeconomic status, ranging in age from 3;10 to 6;6 (years;months; M age = 4;11). All children completed a battery of comprehension-related emergent literacy tasks (narrative retell, print concept knowledge) and code-related emergent literacy tasks (beginning sound, rhyming awareness, alphabet knowledge, and name-writing ability). Results On average, children with DLD performed significantly worse than TD controls on a battery of comprehension- and code-related emergent literacy measures. On all code-related skills except rhyming, children with DLD were more likely than their TD peers to score “at risk.” Conclusions The results suggest some universality in the effect of DLD on reading development. Difficulties with emergent literacy that are widely documented in English-speaking children with DLD were similarly observed in Spanish-speaking children with DLD. Future research should explore long-term reading outcomes in Spanish for children with DLD.

Special Considerations for Evaluation and Treatment of Spanish-Speaking Patients with Cleft Palate

2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (5) ◽  
pp. 41-49
Author(s):  
Ellen Moore
Keyword(s):  
Cleft Palate ◽  
The United States ◽  
Culturally Competent ◽  
Speech Language Pathology ◽  
Spanish Speaking ◽  
Appropriate Treatment ◽  
Oral Pressure ◽  
Language Pathology ◽  
History Of ◽  
Spanish Speaking Population

As the Spanish-speaking population in the United States continues to grow, there is increasing need for culturally competent and linguistically appropriate treatment across the field of speech-language pathology. This paper reviews information relevant to the evaluation and treatment of Spanish-speaking and Spanish-English bilingual children with a history of cleft palate. The phonetics and phonology of Spanish are reviewed and contrasted with English, with a focus on oral pressure consonants. Cultural factors and bilingualism are discussed briefly. Finally, practical strategies for evaluation and treatment are presented. Information is presented for monolingual and bilingual speech-language pathologists, both in the community and on cleft palate teams.

Bilingualism in the Spanish-Speaking World

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer Austin ◽  
Maria Blume ◽  
Liliana Sanchez
Keyword(s):  
Spanish Speaking

Investigating the Multimodal Nature of Human Communication

2009 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 63-76 ◽  
Author(s):  
Silke Paulmann ◽  
Sarah Jessen ◽  
Sonja A. Kotz
Keyword(s):  
Visual Information ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Physical Property ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Accurate Information ◽  
Human Communication ◽  
Channel Condition ◽  
Prosodic Cues ◽  
Early Processing ◽  
Related Potentials

The multimodal nature of human communication has been well established. Yet few empirical studies have systematically examined the widely held belief that this form of perception is facilitated in comparison to unimodal or bimodal perception. In the current experiment we first explored the processing of unimodally presented facial expressions. Furthermore, auditory (prosodic and/or lexical-semantic) information was presented together with the visual information to investigate the processing of bimodal (facial and prosodic cues) and multimodal (facial, lexic, and prosodic cues) human communication. Participants engaged in an identity identification task, while event-related potentials (ERPs) were being recorded to examine early processing mechanisms as reflected in the P200 and N300 component. While the former component has repeatedly been linked to physical property stimulus processing, the latter has been linked to more evaluative “meaning-related” processing. A direct relationship between P200 and N300 amplitude and the number of information channels present was found. The multimodal-channel condition elicited the smallest amplitude in the P200 and N300 components, followed by an increased amplitude in each component for the bimodal-channel condition. The largest amplitude was observed for the unimodal condition. These data suggest that multimodal information induces clear facilitation in comparison to unimodal or bimodal information. The advantage of multimodal perception as reflected in the P200 and N300 components may thus reflect one of the mechanisms allowing for fast and accurate information processing in human communication.

Validating the Factor Structure of the Stigma of Suicide Scale–Short Form Spanish Version Among Healthcare Students

Crisis ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 1-5
Author(s):  
Ruthmarie Hernández-Torres ◽  
Paola Carminelli-Corretjer ◽  
Nelmit Tollinchi-Natali ◽  
Ernesto Rosario-Hernández ◽  
Yovanska Duarté-Vélez ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Factor Structure ◽  
Structural Equation ◽  
Short Form ◽  
Small Sample Size ◽  
Small Sample ◽  
Spanish Version ◽  
Equation Modeling ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Healthcare Students ◽  
Spanish Speaking

Abstract. Background: Suicide is a leading cause of death among Spanish-speaking individuals. Suicide stigma can be a risk factor for suicide. A widely used measure is the Stigma of Suicide Scale-Short Form (SOSS-SF; Batterham, Calear, & Christensen, 2013 ). Although the SOSS-SF has established psychometric properties and factor structure in other languages and cultural contexts, no evidence is available from Spanish-speaking populations. Aim: This study aims to validate a Spanish translation of the SOSS-SF among a sample of Spanish-speaking healthcare students ( N = 277). Method: We implemented a cross-sectional design with quantitative techniques. Results: Following a structural equation modeling approach, a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) supported the three-factor model proposed by Batterham and colleagues (2013) . Limitations: The study was limited by the small sample size and recruitment by availability. Conclusion: Findings suggest that the Spanish version of the SOSS-SF is a valid and reliable tool with which to examine suicide stigma among Spanish-speaking populations.

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