scholarly journals Working memory and lexical ambiguity resolution in Cantonese Chinese

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. e0248170
Author(s):  
Michael C. W. Yip
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Lexical Access ◽  
Underlying Mechanism ◽  
Reading Span ◽  
Memory Functions ◽  
Priming Task ◽  
Lexical Ambiguity Resolution ◽  
Ambiguous Words ◽  
Lexical Disambiguation ◽  
The Individual

The present study examined how working memory functions in the underlying mechanism of the lexical disambiguation process (in activation approach or in inhibition approach). We recruited sixty native Cantonese listeners to participate in two experimental tasks: (a) a Cantonese-version reading span task to measure their working memory (WM) capacity and (b) a standard cross-modal priming task to measure the lexical disambiguation time. The results revealed that (1) the underlying mechanism of the disambiguation process seemed favorable for an inhibition approach and (2) the frequency of the individual meanings of the ambiguous words and the numbers of their meanings might interact with the WM capacity during lexical access, particularly for the low-WM span group.

scholarly journals EXPRESS: Two Variations and One Similarity in Memory Functions Deployed by Mice and Humans to Support Foraging

2021 ◽  
pp. 174702182110105
Author(s):  
Spencer Talbot ◽  
Todor Gerdjikov ◽  
Carlo De Lillo
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Brain Function ◽  
Visual Cues ◽  
Brain Structures ◽  
Human Cognition ◽  
Foraging Efficiency ◽  
Long Term Memory ◽  
Memory Functions ◽  
Term Memory

Assessing variations in cognitive function between humans and animals is vital for understanding the idiosyncrasies of human cognition and for refining animal models of human brain function and disease. We determined memory functions deployed by mice and humans to support foraging with a search task acting as a test battery. Mice searched for food from the top of poles within an open-arena. Poles were divided into groups based on visual cues and baited according to different schedules. White and black poles were baited in alternate trials. Striped poles were never baited. The requirement of the task was to find all baits in each trial. Mice’s foraging efficiency, defined as the number of poles visited before all baits were retrieved, improved with practice. Mice learnt to avoid visiting un-baited poles across trials (Long-term memory) and revisits to poles within each trial (Working memory). Humans tested with a virtual-reality version of the task outperformed mice in foraging efficiency, working memory and exploitation of the temporal pattern of rewards across trials. Moreover, humans, but not mice, reduced the number of possible movement sequences used to search the set of poles. For these measures interspecies differences were maintained throughout three weeks of testing. By contrast, long-term-memory for never-rewarded poles was similar in mice and humans after the first week of testing. These results indicate that human cognitive functions relying upon archaic brain structures may be adequately modelled in mice. Conversely, modelling in mice fluid skills likely to have developed specifically in primates, requires caution.

Baseball fans don’t like lumpy batters: Influence of domain knowledge on the access of subordinate meanings

2018 ◽  
Vol 71 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-102 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer Wiley ◽  
Tim George ◽  
Keith Rayner
Keyword(s):  
Prior Knowledge ◽  
Lexical Access ◽  
Domain Knowledge ◽  
Negative Evidence ◽  
Word Meanings ◽  
Positive Evidence ◽  
Ambiguous Words ◽  
Baseball Fans ◽  
Evidence Condition ◽  
Access Model

Two experiments investigated the effects of domain knowledge on the resolution of ambiguous words with dominant meanings related to baseball. When placed in a sentence context that strongly biased toward the non-baseball meaning (positive evidence), or excluded the baseball meaning (negative evidence), baseball experts had more difficulty than non-experts resolving the ambiguity. Sentence contexts containing positive evidence supported earlier resolution than did the negative evidence condition for both experts and non-experts. These experiments extend prior findings, and can be seen as support for the reordered access model of lexical access, where both prior knowledge and discourse context influence the availability of word meanings.

scholarly journals Efficiency of working memory: Theoretical concept and practical application

2008 ◽  
Vol 40 (1) ◽  
pp. 84-100
Author(s):  
Dejan Lalovic
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Teaching Practice ◽  
Short Term Memory ◽  
Theoretical Concept ◽  
Pedagogical Practice ◽  
Applied Psychology ◽  
Personality Variables ◽  
Psychological Phenomena ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Individual

Efficiency of working memory is the concept which connects psychology of memory with different fields of cognitive, differential and applied psychology. In this paper, the history of interest for the assessment of the capacity of short-term memory is presented in brief, as well as the different methods used nowadays to assess the individual differences in the efficiency of working memory. What follows is the consideration of studies that indicate the existence of significant links between the efficiency of working memory and general intelligence, the ability of reasoning, personality variables, as well as some socio-psychological phenomena. Special emphasis is placed on the links between the efficiency of working memory and certain aspects of pedagogical practice: acquiring the skill of reading, learning arithmetic and shedding light on the cause of general failure in learning at school. What is also provided are the suggestions that, in the light of knowledge about the development and limitations of working memory at school age, can be useful for teaching practice.

scholarly journals Working Memory Performance after Daily Caffeine Intake: Compromised Performance and Reduced Hippocampal Activity.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yu-Shiuan Lin ◽  
Janine Weibel ◽  
Hans-Peter Landolt ◽  
Francesco Santini ◽  
Helen Christina Slawik ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Memory Performance ◽  
Error Rates ◽  
Caffeine Intake ◽  
Cognitive State ◽  
Placebo Condition ◽  
Memory Functions ◽  
Acute Withdrawal ◽  
Caffeine Withdrawal ◽  
Significant Difference

Neuroprotective effects of caffeine have been frequently reported in the context of disease and cognitive dysfunction as well as in epidemiological studies in humans. However, evidence on caffeine effects on neural and memory functions during daily intake in a healthy cognitive state remains scarce. This randomized double-blind placebo-controlled crossover study investigated working memory functions by N-back tasks and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) after daily caffeine intake compared to a placebo baseline and to acute caffeine withdrawal in 20 young healthy volunteers. Each volunteer was given 3 times 150 mg caffeine for 10 days in the daily caffeine condition, 3 times 150 mg mannitol for 10 days in the placebo condition, and 9-day caffeine plus 1-day mannitol in the acute withdrawal condition. During the 10th day, participants performed 4 N-back sessions (two loads each: 0- and 3-back) under controlled laboratory conditions. During the 4th session of N-Back (i.e. at 5.5 h, 36.5 h and > 10 days after the last caffeine intake in the caffeine, withdrawal, and placebo condition, respectively) we assessed blood-oxygen-level-dependent (BOLD) activity. During the entire 10th day, in 0-back tasks, we observed longer reaction times (RTs) in the withdrawal compared to the placebo (Cohens d = 0.7) and caffeine condition (Cohens d = 0.6), but no significant effects of conditions on error rates. In contrast, in 3-back tasks (controlled for 0-back), the RTs in the caffeine condition were longer compared to placebo (Cohens d = 0.6) and withdrawal (Cohens d = 0.5). Error rates were higher during both caffeine and withdrawal conditions compared to placebo (Cohens d of both contrasts = 0.4). Whole-brain analyses on fMRI data did not reveal significant condition-dependent differences in activities between task loads. Across task loads, however, we observed a reduced hippocampal activation (Cohens d = -1.3) during the caffeine condition compared to placebo, while no significant difference in brain activities between withdrawal and placebo conditions. Taken together, the worse working memory function and the hippocampal hypoactivation implicate a potential detrimental effect of daily caffeine intake on neurocognitive functions of healthy adults. Moreover, they echo the hippocampal volumetric reduction reported previously in the same volunteers. Lastly, acute withdrawal from daily caffeine intake impairs both low-order cognitive processes and working memory performance. Taking earlier studies on acute caffeine effects into account, our findings indicate that daily caffeine intake elicits a dynamic change in cerebral activities during the course of repeated consumption, with unknown consequences in the long run.

Working Memory, Sleep, and Hearing Problems in Patients with Tinnitus and Hearing Loss Fitted with Hearing Aids

2017 ◽  
Vol 28 (02) ◽  
pp. 141-151 ◽  
Author(s):  
Reza Zarenoe ◽  
Mathias Hällgren ◽  
Gerhard Andersson ◽  
Torbjörn Ledin
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Cognitive Function ◽  
Sleep Quality ◽  
Hearing Aids ◽  
Hearing Aid ◽  
Reading Span ◽  
Full Sample ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Hearing Problems

Background: Tinnitus is a common condition and there is a need to evaluate effects of tinnitus management in relation to moderating factors such as degree of hearing loss. As it is possible that tinnitus influences concentration, and thus is likely to disturb cognitive processing, the role of cognitive functioning also needs to be investigated. Purpose: To compare a group of patients with sensorineural hearing loss and tinnitus to a control group with only sensorineural hearing loss (and no tinnitus). To investigate working memory, sleep, and hearing problems measured before and after hearing rehabilitation. Research Design: A prospective study. Study Sample: The sample consisted of 100 patients, 50 with hearing loss and tinnitus, and 50 controls with hearing loss but no tinnitus. All patients were between 40 and 82 yr old and had a pure-tone average (PTA; average of 0.5, 1, 2, and 4 kHz) <70 dB HL. Intervention: Patients were tested before and after rehabilitation with hearing aids with regard to their working memory capacity, sleep quality, hearing problems, speech recognition, and tinnitus annoyance. Data Collection and Analysis: Eight patients dropped out of the study. Thus, a total of 92 patients were included for analysis, with 46 in each group. As a consequence of unplanned age and PTA differences between the groups, an age-matched subsample (n = 30 + 30) was selected for further analysis. Tests including the Reading Span, Hearing-in-Noise Test (HINT), Tinnitus Handicap Inventory (THI), Hearing Handicap Inventory for the Elderly (HHIE), and Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) were administered before and after hearing aid rehabilitation. Results: There were no between-group differences at baseline in the full sample (n = 92), with the exception of the THI (p < 0.001) and the PSQI (p < 0.002), on which the hearing loss and tinnitus group had significantly higher scores. Pre/post changes were significant for both groups on the Reading Span, and HHIE. However, these improvements were significantly larger for the patients in the hearing loss and tinnitus group on the Reading Span test (p < 0.001) and the PSQI (p < 0.001). Patients with tinnitus and hearing loss also exhibited significantly improved THI scores at follow-up, compared to baseline (p < 0.001).We conducted the same analyses for the age-matched subsample (n = 30 + 30). For the baseline data, only the THI (p < 0.001) and the PSQI (p < 0.015) difference remained significant. With regard to the pre/post changes, we found the same differences in improvement in Reading Span (p < 0.001) and the PSQI (p < 0.015) as in the full sample. Conclusions: Patients with tinnitus benefited from hearing aid rehabilitation. The observed differences in cognitive function were unexpected, and there were larger score improvements on the Reading Span test in the hearing loss and tinnitus group than in the hearing loss group. Patients with tinnitus and hearing loss may receive extra benefit in terms of cognitive function following hearing aid rehabilitation.

Лексическая неоднозначность в экспериментальных исследованиях: метаанализ

2020 ◽  
pp. 43-51
Author(s):  
Анжелика Дубасова
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Ambiguity Resolution ◽  
Experimental Studies ◽  
Lexical Ambiguity ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Lexical Ambiguity Resolution ◽  
Ambiguous Words ◽  
Main Factors ◽  
The Difference ◽  
The Right

The article analyses experimental studies of lexical ambiguity (polysemy and homonymy). In total, 42 papers published between 1981 and 2017 were selected for analysis. Selected works were analyzed from the point of view of a) interaction of the main factors of lexical ambiguity resolution (meaning dominance and context), b) modularity/interactivity of language systems. The choice of these issues was caused by the fact that, despite a significant number of papers addressing them, a common theoretical model of lexical ambiguity resolution is still missing. The analysis concluded that none of the existing models could be chosen as the only true one. I believe that it is more promising to combine all models into one; in this case, we should not talk about “models” but about “algorithms” or “strategies”. This merge is compatible with the results of studies of hemispheric asymmetry, which showed that the right and left hemispheres differently process ambiguous words. This difference is projected on the difference between the two main points of view on language processing, interactive and modular. Also, as a result of the analysis, the properties of meaning dominance and context as the main factors influencing the perception of ambiguity are summarized, and the ways and possibilities of their interaction are determined. These factors can participate in the process of resolving ambiguity autonomously or together, with different functions, speed, and levels of perception.

Effects of a secondary task and working memory load on multisensory hand position

2012 ◽  
Vol 25 (0) ◽  
pp. 58
Author(s):  
Katrina Quinn ◽  
Francia Acosta-Saltos ◽  
Jan W. de Fockert ◽  
Charles Spence ◽  
Andrew J. Bremner
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Visual Information ◽  
Secondary Task ◽  
Memory Load ◽  
Memory Task ◽  
Hand Position ◽  
Working Memory Load ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Task Conditions ◽  
Relative Weighting

Information about where our hands are arises from different sensory modalities; chiefly proprioception and vision. These inputs differ in variability from situation to situation (or task to task). According to the idea of ‘optimal integration’, the information provided by different sources is combined in proportion to their relative reliabilities, thus maximizing the reliability of the combined estimate. It is uncertain whether optimal multisensory integration of multisensory contributions to limb position requires executive resources. If so, then it should be possible to observe effects of secondary task performance and/or working memory load (WML) on the relative weighting of the senses under conditions of crossmodal sensory conflict. Alternatively, an integrated signal may be affected by upstream influences of WML or a secondary task on the reliabilities of the individual sensory inputs. We examine these possibilities in two experiments which examine effects of WML on reaching tasks in which bisensory visual-proprioceptive (Exp. 1), and unisensory proprioceptive (Exp. 2) cues to hand position are provided. WML increased visual capture under conditions of visual-proprioceptive conflict, regardless of the direction of visual-proprioceptive conflict, and the degree of load imposed. This indicates that task-switching (rather than WML load) leads to an increased reliance on visual information regardless of its task-specific reliability (Exp. 1). This could not be explained due to an increase in the variability of proprioception under secondary working memory task conditions (Exp. 2). We conclude that executive resources are involved in the relative weighting of visual and proprioceptive cues to hand position.

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