Eye movements through space interfere with visual processing of time-related words

When people make lexical decisions to words referring to the past or the future, they are faster when their manual responses are compatible with the mental timeline (MTL). That is, future words are responded to faster on the right than the left, while past words are responded to faster on the left than the right. This space-time congruency effect is interpreted to suggest that time words are represented along a spatial continuum that goes from left to right (past to future), at least in Western cultures that use reading-writing systems operating from left to right. All previous experiments used lateralized hand movements to register responses, which would evoke the directionality of writing. To evoke the directionality of reading, we investigated whether the space-time congruency effect would be replicated in a language task when responses were given using the eyes rather than the hand. Thus, participants were asked to make lateralized eye movements to indicate whether letter stimuli were real words or not (lexical decision). Eye movements were perturbed for responses incompatible with the direction of the MTL, both in terms of decision time and motor amplitude. These results confirm that time-related words are embodied through spatial movement in effector-independent motor networks and suggests that the spatial representation of time operates in a body-centered reference frame.

Students' work with foreign language texts: formation of intercultural communication skills

Актуальность статьи обусловлена определением степени успешности существования человека в условиях увеличения информационного потока на глобальном, общемировом уровне. Поскольку современный человек не ограничен пространственным континуумом, ему часто приходится работать с оригинальным контентом, подготовленным представителем другой культуры, и от правильности его понимания зависит его профессиональная востребованность и конкурентоспособность. Цель статьи заключается в определении значения обучения чтению иноязычных текстов с позиции определения их значимости для формирования межкультурной компетенции обучающихся, будущих профессионалов. Авторами раскрыта методика адаптации культурологического содержания аутентичных текстов к собственному культурному пространству, которая заключается в поэтапной организации процесса обучения обучающихся чтению. Раскрыты этапы работы с аутентичными текстами. Статья предназначена для преподавателей иностранного языка, работающих в современных вузах. The relevance of the article is due to the determination of the success degree of human existence in the conditions of increasing information flow, at the global, international level. Since a modern person is not limited by a spatial continuum, one often has to work with original content prepared by a representative of another culture, and his professional relevance and competitiveness depend on the correctness of its understanding. The purpose of the article is to determine the importance of teaching foreign language reading from the position of determining its significance for the formation of intercultural competence of students, future professionals. The authors have formulated an understanding and revealed a methodology for adapting the culturological content of authentic texts to their own cultural space, which consists in a step-by-step organization of the process of teaching students to read. The stages of working with authentic texts are revealed. The article is intended for foreign language teachers working in modern universities.

Means of Lexical Representation of Spatial Continuum in Early Stories of I. A. Bunin

The question of ways of creating a spatial continuum in the early stories of I. A. Bunin “On the wrong side”, “On the farm” and “On the Donets”, united by a single principle of nomination and included in the first book of the writer’s prose “To the end of the world” (1897) is considered in the article. The semantics of the title actualizes the spatial component of the author’s linguistic picture of the world, which determined the path of linguistic and stylistic analysis of the linguistic material of stories. The authors pay special attention to the means of lexical representation of space as one of the basic linguo-cognitive categories. The novelty of the research lies in the fact that the language material has been identified, systematized and described, which makes it possible to determine the individual author's characteristics in the creation of the spatial continuum of I. A. Bunin’s early stories. The relevance of the study is due to the appeal to the problems of cognitive linguistics. On the basis of statistical, descriptive and linguo-cognitive methods of analysis, the authors identify and describe the means of lexical representation of the spatial model created in the stories of I. A. Bunin, which is characterized by a clear structuredness and individuality of the author’s approach. In the course of the study, the authors come to conclusions that make it possible to characterize the features of the construction of space in the early stories of the writer, taking into account the individual characteristics of the author's world modeling, and also to analyze the linguistic parameters of the idiostyle of I. A. Bunin.

PRINCIPLES OF DEPICTING REALITY IN MIKHAIL KONOVALOV's NOVELS

The article considers the novels "Vuryso Bum" ("Scarface", 1933) and "Gayan" ("Gayan", 1936) by Udmurt writer Mikhail Konovalov in terms of principles used by the author to create artistic reality. From the point of view of social realism, Mikhail Konovalov is free to experiment; he introduces constructivism, romanticism, naïvism using an arsenal of realistic devices; folklore and mythological origins are realised through a subconscious appeal to the Perm animal style ("Vuryso Bum") and a fairy tale model ("Gayan"). The prose writer reveals a regional spirit (animus loci); in his texts Ural is presented both as a spatial continuum and a living organism that determines characters’ personalities. For example, the novel "Gayan" depicts Izhevsk mining metallurgical settlement in the 1770s, the novel "Vuryso Bum" shows the working routine of Izhstal Plant rolling shop: one of the characters is dreaming about a factory of the future - a glass building immersed in trees, and people flying freely to colonised Mars. In the novel "Vuryso Bum", the main character is the collective "we" which combines many different personalities. The character of Gondyr, a trickster, existing between two worlds and trying to get used to an industrial city, can be considered the writer's artistic success. The "creator vs. destroyer" conflict, traditional for the 1930s, is embodied in the characters of a rational Dubov and a hidden enemy Nushin. An invariant of Beauty and the Beast's plot can be found in the relationship between Nushin and young Lina. The main principle of the novel "Gayan" is the combination of historical-ethnographic elements and elements of adventure. Varieties of fortunes of Gayan, a beautiful Luisa, and an ugly Balyan develop around a historical background of Pugachev's Rebellion; Emelyan Pugachev, Salavat Yulaev, Alymov, the head of Izhevsk Factory, and others play a certain role in their relationship. M. Konovalov creates a vivid and unique picture of ethnic reality in both novels.

How to Quantify Urbanization When Testing for Urban Evolution?

Research in urban evolution requires that the features of cities are accurately captured for input into evolutionary models. Until recently, the evolutionary effects of cities have often been addressed using single sites, dichotomous urban–rural contrasts or, to a lesser extent, using urban gradients. However, urbanization does not produce a homogenous spatial continuum: cities are highly heterogeneous environments, with sharp and often non-linear environmental changes related to the amount of impervious surface, green vegetation, air pollution, light, noise, or contrasted temperature profiles. The comprehensive quantification of urban heterogeneity in space and time is essential for exploring the origins of organismal variation and adaptation in cities, and to best identify the strength and directionality of selective pressures and neutral processes occurring in populations of urban organisms. This chapter reviews frameworks that can be used to describe and quantify urbanization—these include classical ecological frameworks, the understudied temporal dimension of urban evolutionary biology, and the concept of replicated insight into urban-driven evolutionary processes. The chapter further discusses how axes of variation capturing the urban environment can be quantified with univariate and multivariate approaches, and presents quantitative results on how urbanization is captured in published studies of urban evolution. Finally, it discusses study design and statistical approaches of interest when testing for urban evolution: these include the question of model selection and variable fitting, spatial autocorrelation, and appropriate scale use in studies of urban evolution.

Mobile resistome of human gut and pathogen drives anthropogenic bloom of antibiotic resistance

Background The impact of human activities on the environmental resistome has been documented in many studies, but there remains the controversial question of whether the increased antibiotic resistance observed in anthropogenically impacted environments is just a result of contamination by resistant fecal microbes or is mediated by indigenous environmental organisms. Here, to determine exactly how anthropogenic influences shape the environmental resistome, we resolved the microbiome, resistome, and mobilome of the planktonic microbial communities along a single river, the Han, which spans a gradient of human activities. Results The bloom of antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) was evident in the downstream regions and distinct successional dynamics of the river resistome occurred across the spatial continuum. We identified a number of widespread ARG sequences shared between the river, human gut, and pathogenic bacteria. These human-related ARGs were largely associated with mobile genetic elements rather than particular gut taxa and mainly responsible for anthropogenically driven bloom of the downstream river resistome. Furthermore, both sequence- and phenotype-based analyses revealed environmental relatives of clinically important proteobacteria as major carriers of these ARGs. Conclusions Our results demonstrate a more nuanced view of the impact of anthropogenic activities on the river resistome: fecal contamination is present and allows the transmission of ARGs to the environmental resistome, but these mobile genes rather than resistant fecal bacteria proliferate in environmental relatives of their original hosts.