Capturing the variation in language experience to understand language processing and learning

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 82-109
Author(s):  
Judith F. Kroll ◽  
Andrea Takahesu Tabori ◽  
Christian Navarro-Torres
Keyword(s):  
Early Childhood ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Marked Change ◽  
Past Research ◽  
Early Research ◽  
Neural Mechanisms ◽  
Language Experience ◽  
The Past

Abstract A goal of early research on language processing was to characterize what is universal about language. Much of the past research focused on native speakers because the native language has been considered as providing privileged truths about acquisition, comprehension, and production. Populations or circumstances that deviated from these idealized norms were of interest but not regarded as essential to our understanding of language. In the past two decades, there has been a marked change in our understanding of how variation in language experience may inform the central and enduring questions about language. There is now evidence for significant plasticity in language learning beyond early childhood, and variation in language experience has been shown to influence both language learning and processing. In this paper, we feature what we take to be the most exciting recent new discoveries suggesting that variation in language experience provides a lens into the linguistic, cognitive, and neural mechanisms that enable language processing.

The development of comprehension in interlanguage pragmatics

2002 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-39 ◽  
Author(s):  
Misty Cook ◽  
Anthony J. Liddicoat
Keyword(s):  
Speech Acts ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Past Research ◽  
Interlanguage Pragmatics ◽  
Linguistic Differences ◽  
The Past ◽  
Processing Strategies ◽  
Request Strategies ◽  
Different Levels ◽  
Pragmatic Performance

Abstract In the past, research in interlanguage pragmatics has primarily explained the differences between native speakers’ (NS) and non-native speakers’ (NNS) pragmatic performance based on cross-cultural and linguistic differences. Very few researchers have considered learners’ pragmatic performance based on second language comprehension. In this study, we will examine learners’ pragmatic performance using request strategies. The results of this study reveal that there is a proficiency effect for interpreting request speech acts at different levels of directness. We propose that learners’ processing strategies and capacities are important factors to consider when examining learners’ pragmatic performance.

scholarly journals Implicit and Explicit Second Language Training Recruit Common Neural Mechanisms for Syntactic Processing

2013 ◽  
Vol 25 (6) ◽  
pp. 936-951 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Batterink ◽  
Helen Neville
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Explicit Instruction ◽  
Neural Mechanisms ◽  
L2 Acquisition ◽  
Behavioral Measures ◽  
Learning Conditions ◽  
Grammar Rules ◽  
Implicit And Explicit

In contrast to native language acquisition, adult second-language (L2) acquisition occurs under highly variable learning conditions. Although most adults acquire their L2 at least partially through explicit instruction, as in a classroom setting, many others acquire their L2 primarily through implicit exposure, as is typical of an immersion environment. Whether these differences in acquisition environment play a role in determining the neural mechanisms that are ultimately recruited to process L2 grammar has not been well characterized. This study investigated this issue by comparing the ERP response to novel L2 syntactic rules acquired under conditions of implicit exposure and explicit instruction, using a novel laboratory language-learning paradigm. Native speakers tested on these stimuli showed a biphasic response to syntactic violations, consisting of an earlier negativity followed by a later P600 effect. After merely an hour of training, both implicitly and explicitly trained learners who were capable of detecting grammatical violations also elicited P600 effects. In contrast, learners who were unable to discriminate between grammatically correct and incorrect sentences did not show significant P600 effects. The magnitude of the P600 effect was found to correlate with learners' behavioral proficiency. Behavioral measures revealed that successful learners from both the implicit and explicit groups gained explicit, verbalizable knowledge about the L2 grammar rules. Taken together, these results indicate that late, controlled mechanisms indexed by the P600 play a crucial role in processing a late-learned L2 grammar, regardless of training condition. These findings underscore the remarkable plasticity of later, attention-dependent processes and their importance in lifelong learning.

scholarly journals Corpus-based approach to forming communication skills in the use of idioms

2021 ◽  
pp. e021044
Author(s):  
Liya F. Shangaraeva ◽  
Luiza R. Zakirova ◽  
Natalya A. Deputatova ◽  
Elina K. Kuznetsova
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Communication Skills ◽  
Corpus Linguistics ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Opportunity To Learn ◽  
Teaching Techniques ◽  
The Past ◽  
Promising Tool ◽  
National Corpus

The paper presents a corpus-based approach to forming communication skills which has been widely accepted nowadays. The methodological apparatus of corpus linguistics is a promising tool for language learning. The purpose of the present research is to study the potential of the Tatar National Corpus in forming communication skills in the use of Tatar idioms. Corpus-based approach has many applications in language learning from extending teaching techniques to arousing learners’ curiosity and improving communication skills. Traditionally, idioms are considered to be fixed expressions, which have a meaning that is not immediately obvious from looking at the meanings of the parts. It has become evident over the past decades that all sorts of creative modifications of idioms are quite frequent and can be varied. Most idioms are not totally opaque. Thus, they are open to the corpus-based approach. Moreover, idioms are typically based on metaphors, and metaphors as mental images are easily modifiable. The native speakers adapt them, combine them and can change parts of them. Undoubtedly, a corpus presents an opportunity to learn the authenticity of the idioms, used in reality without somebody’s selection or previous interpretation. Learning a foreign language on the basis of corpus data allows students to analyze lexical, grammatical and syntactical variations of idioms, to comprehend their semantics, and explore new variants of idioms, unrecorded in dictionaries yet.

Relative language exposure, processing efficiency and vocabulary in Spanish–English bilingual toddlers

2013 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 189-202 ◽  
Author(s):  
NEREYDA HURTADO ◽  
THERES GRÜTER ◽  
VIRGINIA A. MARCHMAN ◽  
ANNE FERNALD
Keyword(s):  
Language Learning ◽  
Real Time ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Receptive Vocabulary ◽  
Cognitive Outcomes ◽  
Bilingual Children ◽  
Language Experience ◽  
Vocabulary Size ◽  
Processing Efficiency ◽  
English Bilingual

Research with monolingual children has shown that early efficiency in real-time word recognition predicts later language and cognitive outcomes. In parallel research with young bilingual children, processing ability and vocabulary size are closely related within each language, although not across the two languages. For children in dual-language environments, one source of variation in patterns of language learning is differences in the degree to which they are exposed to each of their languages. In a longitudinal study of Spanish/English bilingual children observed at 30 and 36 months, we asked whether the relative amount of exposure to Spanish vs. English in daily interactions predicts children's relative efficiency in real-time language processing in each language. Moreover, to what extent does early exposure and speed of lexical comprehension predict later expressive and receptive vocabulary outcomes in Spanish vs. English? Results suggest that processing skill and language experience each promote vocabulary development, but also that experience with a particular language provides opportunities for practice in real-time comprehension in that language, sharpening processing skills that are critical for learning.

scholarly journals Learning a Second Language in Adulthood Changes Subcortical Neural Encoding

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 ◽  
pp. 1-9
Author(s):  
Dongxin Liu ◽  
Shuo Wang ◽  
Qi Gao ◽  
Ruijuan Dong ◽  
Xinxing Fu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Second Language Learning ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Neural Encoding ◽  
Language Experience ◽  
Frequency Following Response ◽  
L2 Learners ◽  
L2 Learning ◽  
The Central Nervous System

Second language learning has been shown to impact and reshape the central nervous system, anatomically and functionally. Most of the studies on second language learning and neuroplasticity have been focused on cortical areas, whereas the subcortical neural encoding mechanism and its relationship with L2 learning have not been examined extensively. The purpose of this study was to utilize frequency-following response (FFR) to examine if and how learning a tonal language in adulthood changes the subcortical neural encoding in hearing adults. Three groups of subjects were recruited: native speakers of Mandarin Chinese (native speakers (NS)), learners of the language (L2 learners), and those with no experience (native speakers of foreign languages (NSFL)). It is hypothesized that differences would exist in FFRs obtained from the three language experience groups. Results revealed that FFRs obtained from L2 learners were found to be more robust than the NSFL group, yet not on a par with the NS group. Such results may suggest that in human adulthood, subcortical neural encoding ability may be trainable with the acquisition of a new language and that neuroplasticity at the brainstem level can indeed be influenced by L2 learning.

Exploring the Boundaries of the Number–Temporal Order Association

2015 ◽  
Vol 62 (3) ◽  
pp. 198-205 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dana Ganor-Stern
Keyword(s):  
Embodied Cognition ◽  
Mental Representation ◽  
Temporal Order ◽  
Past Research ◽  
Numerical Comparison ◽  
Negative Number ◽  
Comparison Task ◽  
Negative Numbers ◽  
The Past

Past research has shown that numbers are associated with order in time such that performance in a numerical comparison task is enhanced when number pairs appear in ascending order, when the larger number follows the smaller one. This was found in the past for the integers 1–9 ( Ben-Meir, Ganor-Stern, & Tzelgov, 2013 ; Müller & Schwarz, 2008 ). In the present study we explored whether the advantage for processing numbers in ascending order exists also for fractions and negative numbers. The results demonstrate this advantage for fraction pairs and for integer-fraction pairs. However, the opposite advantage for descending order was found for negative numbers and for positive-negative number pairs. These findings are interpreted in the context of embodied cognition approaches and current theories on the mental representation of fractions and negative numbers.

Salvaging the Mother Tongue in Exile

2017 ◽  
Vol 14 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 187-204
Author(s):  
Tomás Espino Barrera
Keyword(s):  
Native Speakers ◽  
Mother Tongue ◽  
First Language ◽  
Language Attrition ◽  
The Past ◽  
Progressive Loss ◽  
First Language Attrition ◽  
Lost In Translation ◽  
Deliberate Effort ◽  
Deep Sense

The dramatic increase in the number of exiles and refugees in the past 100 years has generated a substantial amount of literature written in a second language as well as a heightened sensibility towards the progressive loss of fluency in the mother tongue. Confronted by what modern linguistics has termed ‘first-language attrition’, the writings of numerous exilic translingual authors exhibit a deep sense of trauma which is often expressed through metaphors of illness and death. At the same time, most of these writers make a deliberate effort to preserve what is left from the mother tongue by attempting to increase their exposure to poems, dictionaries or native speakers of the ‘dying’ language. The present paper examines a range of attitudes towards translingualism and first language attrition through the testimonies of several exilic authors and thinkers from different countries (Vladimir Nabokov's Speak, Memory, Hannah Arendt's interviews, Jorge Semprún's Quel beau dimanche! and Autobiografía de Federico Sánchez, and Eva Hoffman's Lost in Translation, among others). Special attention will be paid to the historical frameworks that encourage most of their salvaging operations by infusing the mother tongue with categories of affect and kinship.

Learning Zulu

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Sanders
Keyword(s):  
Language Learning ◽  
Cultural History ◽  
South African ◽  
Press Coverage ◽  
African History ◽  
African Culture ◽  
The Past ◽  
Correct Form ◽  
Linguistic Purism

When this book's author began studying Zulu, he was often questioned why he was learning it. This book places the author's endeavors within a wider context to uncover how, in the past 150 years of South African history, Zulu became a battleground for issues of property, possession, and deprivation. The book combines elements of analysis and memoir to explore a complex cultural history. Perceiving that colonial learners of Zulu saw themselves as repairing harm done to Africans by Europeans, the book reveals deeper motives at work in the development of Zulu-language learning—from the emergence of the pidgin Fanagalo among missionaries and traders in the nineteenth century to widespread efforts, in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, to teach a correct form of Zulu. The book looks at the white appropriation of Zulu language, music, and dance in South African culture, and at the association of Zulu with a martial masculinity. In exploring how Zulu has come to represent what is most properly and powerfully African, the book examines differences in English- and Zulu-language press coverage of an important trial, as well as the role of linguistic purism in xenophobic violence in South Africa. Through one person's efforts to learn the Zulu language, the book explores how a language's history and politics influence all individuals in a multilingual society.

The Involvement of Native Speakers in Teaching and Learning Japanese Language at UiTM

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 14
Author(s):  
Choong Pow Yean ◽  
Sarinah Bt Sharif ◽  
Normah Bt Ahmad
Keyword(s):  
Language Learning ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Native Speaker ◽  
Japanese Culture ◽  
Japanese Language ◽  
Foreign Language Learners ◽  
Lexical Density

The Nihongo Partner Program or “Japanese Language Partner” is a program that sends native speakers to support the teaching and learning of Japanese overseas. The program is fully sponsored by The Japan Foundation. The aim of this program is to create an environment that motivates the students to learn Japanese. This study is based on a survey of the Nihongo Partner Program conducted on students and language lecturers at UiTM, Shah Alam. This study aims to investigate if there is a necessity for native speakers to be involved in the teaching and learning of Japanese among foreign language learners. Analysis of the results showed that both students and lecturers are in dire need of the Nihongo Partner Program to navigate the learning of the Japanese language through a variety of language learning activities. The involvement of native speaker increases students’ confidence and motivation to converse in Japanese. The program also provides opportunities for students to increase their Japanese language proficiency and lexical density. In addition, with the opportunity to interact with the native speakers, students and lecturers will have a better understanding of Japanese culture as they are able to observe and ask the native speakers. Involvement of native speakers is essential in teaching and learning of Japanese in UiTM.

scholarly journals Predictive processes during simultaneous interpreting from German into English

Interpreting ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-20 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ena Hodzik ◽  
John N. Williams
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
English Language ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Transitional Probability ◽  
Semantic Cues ◽  
Simultaneous Interpreting ◽  
Spoken Language Processing ◽  
Advanced Students ◽  
Native Speakers Of English ◽  
Predictive Processes

We report a study on prediction in shadowing and simultaneous interpreting (SI), both considered as forms of real-time, ‘online’ spoken language processing. The study comprised two experiments, focusing on: (i) shadowing of German head-final sentences by 20 advanced students of German, all native speakers of English; (ii) SI of the same sentences into English head-initial sentences by 22 advanced students of German, again native English speakers, and also by 11 trainee and practising interpreters. Latency times for input and production of the target verbs were measured. Drawing on studies of prediction in English-language reading production, we examined two cues to prediction in both experiments: contextual constraints (semantic cues in the context) and transitional probability (the statistical likelihood of words occurring together in the language concerned). While context affected prediction during both shadowing and SI, transitional probability appeared to favour prediction during shadowing but not during SI. This suggests that the two cues operate on different levels of language processing in SI.

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