bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
The effect of bilingualism on cognitive ability: A test of the level of bilingualism hypothesis
Authors: Jarvis Lorna H. , Danks Joseph H. , Merriman William E.
Published: December 2008

Does bilingualism facilitate the development of cognitive abilities, and if so, how? According to the level of bilingualism hypothesis (Diaz, 1983), only in the early stages of second language acquisition does bilingualism foster cognitive ability. This hypothesis was tested on a sample of 3rd and 4th grade Mexican Spanish-English bilinguals with low English proficiency. Knowledge of Spanish and English in phonology, vocabulary, and syntax was measured. Nonverbal general intelligence was assessed with the Raven Colored Progressive Matrices, and verbal intelligence was assessed with a subtest of the Woodcock Language Proficiency Battery. No relationship was found between degree of bilingualism and nonverbal intelligence, contrary to the level of bilingualism hypothesis. The results suggest that the effects of bilingualism on cognitive development are not solely dependent on the level of second language proficiency.
Referential communication skills of learning disabled/language impaired children
Authors: Meline Timothy J.
Published: December 2008

Communicative behaviors used in encoding new information were examined. Eighteen learning disabled/language impaired (LD/LI) children were compared with two matched groups of normally developing children: age-mates and language-mates. Behaviors studied included measures of communicative effectiveness, communicative efficiency, verbal output, and referential strategies. LD/LI children did not differ significantly from age-mates. However, they did significantly outperform language-mates. Deficient lexicon and deficient comparison activity hypotheses are discussed in light of the results.
The effect of multilingualism on phonetic perceptual flexibility
Authors: Werker Janet F.
Published: December 2008

This research was designed to explore whether maintenance of the ability to discriminate phonetic distinctions requires specific linguistic/perceptual experience, or whether broadened but nonrelevant linguistic experience can result in generalized perceptual flexibility. To explore this question, bilingual and trilingual adult subjects were compared to monolingual English adults on their ability to discriminate phonetic distinctions that are not used in (any of) their native language(s). Results suggest that broadened, nonspecific linguistic experience does not contribute to increased perceptual flexibility.
Developmental loss of speech perception: Exposure to and experience with a first language
Authors: Burnham Denis K.
Published: December 2008

Young infants perceive a variety of speech contrasts, even those that are not relevant in their own language environment. Evidence regarding the loss of perceptual ability with phonologically irrelevant contrasts is reviewed and a theoretical distinction is advanced. It is proposed that the perception of “fragile” contrasts is lost in infancy due to lack ofexposureto particular sounds, while the perception of “robust” contrasts is lost around the onset of formal language training due to lack ofexperiencewith phonologically irrelevant contrasts. This distinction should provide a heuristic framework for future research on the development of speech perception.
Imitation of complex syntactic constructions by elderly adults
Authors: Kemper Susan
Published: December 2008

Elderly adults (70 to 89 years) and young adults (30 to 49 years) were asked to imitate complex sentences involving embedded gerunds, wh-clauses, that-clauses, and relative clauses. The young adults were able to imitate accurately or correctly paraphrase the sentences regardless of the length, position, or type of embedded clause. The elderly adults could accurately imitate or paraphrase short constructions. The elderly adults were unable to imitate or paraphrase correctly long constructions, especially those in which the embedded clause was sentence-initial. The pattern of results demonstrates an age-related decline in syntactic processing abilities due, perhaps, to the increased processing demands of the long or sentence-initial constructions.
Competition in learning language-based categories
Authors: Taraban Roman , Roark Bret
Published: December 2008

Competition is a property of cognitive processing which results from learning that is characterized by the indeterminate encoding of instances and from processing that is characterized by the mutual influence of all activated representations on one another. In the present study, non-French participants learned gender-appropriate adjectives (petit or petite) for a set of 24 French nouns. We found that learning the same set of feminine French nouns could be made more or less difficult when the nouns in the masculine category created more or less competition. One measure from the Competition Model of MacWhinney and Bates (Bates & MacWhinney, 1987, 1989; MacWhinney, 1985, 1987) – cue reliability – predicted these competition effects. We tested an alternative measure based on the encoding of the nouns in memory (termed exemplars) and found that it predicted participants' mean learning performance somewhat more accurately. In the final section of this article, we extend our exemplar-based measure to a connectionist network in order to account for competition and the time course of learning. The network provided a superior fit to the data, with an averageR2= .91.
Pseudoword reading errors of poor, dyslexic, and normally achieving readers on multisyllable pseudowords
Authors: Tal Naomi Frankel , Siegel Linda S.
Published: December 2008

This study examined the pseudoword reading strategies of dyslexic readers (i.e., children whose reading was significantly lower than predicted by their IQ score) and poor readers (i.e., children whose reading scores were consistent with their lower IQ scores). The disabled readers were grouped according to their reading grade level and were compared with reading level matched, normally achieving readers. The reading performance on a test of pseudoword reading (Woodcock Word Attack Subtest) for the three groups (dyslexic, poor, and normal readers) was analyzed according to the type of error committed. The performance of dyslexic and poor readers was virtually indistinguishable at both reading grade levels 2–3 and 4–5. There was very little difference among dyslexic, poor, and normally achieving readers in the types of errors made. Nearly 50010 of all the oral reading errors of all three groups were vowel substitutions, followed by consonant substitution and deletion and insertion errors. Sequential, reversal, and word substitution errors were committed infrequently for all three reader groups. The findings failed to support the existence of a critical phonological processing difference between IQ reading- discrepant and IQ reading-nondiscrepant disabled readers and suggest that disabled readers lag behind normally achieving readers in phonological decoding skills.
Children's comprehension of intonation as a marker for discourse topic collaboration
Authors: Holdgrafer Gary , Campbell Thomas F.
Published: December 2008

Two prerecorded productions of the “What's this?” question were presented to Grade 2, 4, and 6 children and to adults over a series of trials in a referential communication task. One production contained emphatic stress on the word “this” and the other production contained equal stress on both words. For each question presentation the experimenter selected a colored picture of an object from a deck that was the match to one of two picture choices in view of the subjects. The students guessed on successive presentations whether a different picture (new topic collaboration) or the same picture (old topic collaboration) had been selected based on the presence or absence of emphatic stress in the questions. No feedback was given to the students throughout the experimental procedure. Use of intonation as a marker for topic collaboration appeared by Grade 4, which is in support of other similar research.
Knowledge of derivational morphology and spelling ability in fourth, sixth, and eighth graders
Authors: Carlisle Joanne F.
Published: December 2008

This study investigated students' knowledge of derivational morphology and the relationship between this knowledge and their ability to spell derived words. The subjects (fourth, sixth and eighth graders) were given the Wide Range Achievement Test, Spelling subtest, and experimental tests of their ability to generate base and derived forms orally, to spell the same base and derived words, and to apply suffix addition rules. The results indicate strong developmental trends in both the mastery of derivational morphology and the spelling of derived words; however, spelling performances lagged significantly behind the ability to generate the same words. Success generating and spelling derived words depended on the complexity of transformations between base and derived forms. Further, mastery of phonological and orthographic transformations most strongly distinguished the three grades in both spelling and generating derived words. Indications that the older students were using knowledge of morphemic structure in spelling derived words were found in analysis of the spelling of base and derived word pairs and the application of suffix addition rules.
The effects of age of second language learning on the production of English vowels
Authors: Munro Murray J. , Flege James Emil , Mackay Ian R. A.
Published: December 2008

This study examined the English vowel productions of 240 native speakers of Italian who had arrived in Canada at ages ranging from 2 to 23 years and 24 native English speakers from the same community. The productions of 11 vowels were rated for degree of foreign accent by 10 listeners. An increase in perceived accentedness as a function of increasing age of arrival was observed on every vowel. Not one of the vowels was observed to be produced in a consistently native-like manner by the latest-arriving learners, even though they had been living in Canada for an average of 32 years. However, high intelligibility (percent correct identification) scores were obtained for the same set of productions. This was true even for English vowels that have no counterpart in Italian.
Metalinguistic ability and early reading achievement
Authors: Bowey Judith A. , Patel Rinu K.
Published: December 2008

This study explored the conceptual status of metalinguistic ability by determining whether or not metalinguistic ability can account for variation in early reading achievement independently of more general language abilities. First-grade children were given a test battery assessing phonemic awareness, syntactic awareness, receptive vocabulary, syntactic proficiency, word decoding ability, and reading comprehension ability. Strong zero-order correlations were observed among all experimental measures. However, multiple regression analyses revealed that metalinguistic ability did not contribute to the prediction of early reading achievement when general language ability effects were statistically controlled.
Affixes and function words in the written language of deaf children
Authors: Taeschner Traute , Devescovi Antonella , Volterra Virginia
Published: December 2008

The goal of this article is to investigate whether the acquisition of some morpho-syntactic aspects in Italian deaf adolescents is simply delayed with respect to hearing children, or whether it follows significantly different developmental patterns. Twenty-five deaf students (age range: 11–15 years) and a group of 125 hearing controls (age range: 6–16 years) performed four tests, administered in written form, relative to different grammatical aspects: plurals, articles, and clitic pronouns. Results showed three different patterns of development depending on the grammatical aspect considered. Deaf children compared to hearing controls showed normal development in the pluralization task, delayed development in the pronoun task, and a qualitatively different pattern in the article task.
Talking with strangers: A study of bilingual children's communicative competence
Authors: Genesee Fred , Boivin Isabelle , Nicoladis Elena
Published: December 2008

An important component of the communicative competence of proficient bilinguals is the ability to use each of their languages differentially and appropriately according to relevant characteristics of the interlocutors and communicative situations. The research reported here examined the communicative competence of four young children (average age of 2;2, average MLU of 1·56) who were acquiring English and French simultaneously in the home. We observed the ways these children used their languages with monolingual strangers and with their bilingual parents. Specifically, the children's use of English-only, French-only, and mixed (English and French) utterances with the strangers during naturalistic play situations was compared with patterns of use with their parents, also during play sessions. We found that all of the children made some accommodations that could be linked to the monolingualism of the stranger; some of the children were more accommodating than others. The results are discussed in terms of young bilingual children's ability to modify their language on-line in response to the particular language characteristics of their interlocutors.
What makes a narrative memorable?
Authors: Mccabe Allyssa , Peterson Carole
Published: December 2008

The relatively unexamined question of what kinds of narratives are memorable as whole units of discourse was addressed by studying memory for 288 children's personal narratives. Each narrative was assigned a structural category in story grammar analysis and Labov's highpoint analysis. Narratives were also rated for the presence or absence of sensational content. An incidental free recall of these narratives was then requested from 116 subjects. As predicted, an analysis of variance of recall frequencies revealed a main effect of sensational content; sensational narratives were recalled more frequently than nonsensational ones. Although there was no main effect of highpoint structure, that variable did interact with sensational content; in the absence of sensational content, highpoint structural sophistication predicted enhanced recall. Contrary to prediction, there were no main effects of highpoint structure or story grammar. The study is interpreted as providing partial validation of highpoint analysis, as well as revealing the independent, dominant contribution of content to memory for others' narratives as whole units.
Efficacy of two different types of speech therapy for aphasic stroke patients
Authors: Prins R. S. , Schoonen R. , Vermeulen J.
Published: December 2008

The influence of two different types of language therapy was investigated by assigning 32 patients to three groups: 10 patients were treated with a Systematic Therapy program for Auditory Comprehension Disorders (group 1), 11 patients received conventional stimulation therapy (group 2), and the other 11 patients received no treatment at all (group 3). Language recovery in the three groups was examined with a test battery consisting of two parts: Part I consisted of 3 subtests for auditory comprehension, which were also used as practice materials in the treatment program given to the patients of group 1; Part II contained 8 tests for auditory comprehension, reading comprehension, and oral expression, the items of which were not used as practice materials in either of the two treated groups. Although the influence of age, time post onset, and severity of the receptive disorder were controlled by multiple regression analysis, it was found that the differences between the three treatment conditions were far from significant on almost all evaluation tests of Part II, as well as on the evaluation tests of Part I. On the basis of these results it was concluded that neither the Systematic Therapy program for Auditory Comprehension Disorders nor the conventional stimulation therapy had any clear effect on the recovery process of the treated patients in groups 1 and 2. Some possible reasons for the failure to demonstrate significant differences in language gains between the three therapeutic conditions are discussed.
Factors related to cross-language transfer and metaphor interpretation in bilingual children
Authors: Johnson Janice
Published: December 2008

The study examines factors underlying cross-language transfer in bilingual children; the main focus is on a measure of metaphor interpretation. Subjects were Spanish-English children ranging in age from 7 to 12 years. Measures were obtained for nonverbal mental capacity, metaphor interpretation, verbal-conceptual repertoire, and linguistic proficiency in English and Spanish. Using a previously validated procedure, subjects' metaphor interpretations were scored for cognitive complexity. In both languages, metaphor score was higher in older than in younger children. Correlational analyses indicated that level of metaphor interpretation was most strongly related to cognitive-developmental variables that are interdependent across languages, that is, nonverbal mental capacity and verbal-conceptual repertoire. Variables that measure specific proficiency in a language were less strongly related to level of metaphor interpretation, and did not exhibit cross-language correlations. This pattern was clearly seen in results of exploratory factor analyses. The role of cognitive versus linguistic factors in metaphor development is discussed, as is the issue of interdependence versus independence across first and second languages.
I pledge a legiance tothe flag: Three studies in word segmentation
Authors: Chaney Carolyn
Published: December 2008

Three experimental tasks explored young children's metalinguistic awareness of word boundaries. First, preschool children recited word-by-word pieces which differed in abstractness and familiarity of vocabulary. Second, a teaching task was employed to train and then sample selected items taken from the recited pieces, representing words with cards. The data suggested that several strategies were employed: segment-by-phrase, segment-by-syllable, and segment-by-word. Children were less successful in segmenting the more abstract piece than the concrete one, and they tended to revert to a phrase strategy and/or to change abstract words into more common vocabulary. Error analysis revealed growing awareness of the functorsaandthe. In a third experiment, preschool and kindergarten children segmented phrases using the functorsa, an, my, or and phrases using phonetically similar embedded syllables (e.g., holdmynose; goldminer). Segmentation scores increased with age; even the 4½- to 5-year-olds were highly successful, segmenting with 60% accuracy, and by age 6–6½, they were correctly segmenting 75% of the phrases. Children who had begun to read performed better overall than their same-age peers who had not. Children were more successful withmy, or, and word-medialathan withanand word-initiala; embedded syllables tended to be easier than functors, especially for the younger subjects. In conclusion, the years from age 4½- to 6½ appear to be a period of vigorous development of word segmentation skills. During this period, children use increasingly complex strategies – first phrasal, then syllabic, and finally a full word strategy – and they demonstrate a growing knowledge of function words as well as content words. Functors vary in difficulty and developmental sequence due to differences in stress, amount of ambiguity with phonetically similar embedded syllables, semantic complexity, and salience of reference to the young child.
Elicitation of slips of the tongue from young children: A new method and preliminary observations
Authors: Smith Bruce L.
Published: December 2008

Although many studies of slips of the tongue have been conducted with adults, very few investigations have considered children's slips of the tongue. One reason for this is the difficulty in being able to obtain children's spontaneous slips. The present study, therefore, involved the development of a new technique for eliciting slips of the tongue from children by having them repeat short “tongue-twister” phrases. Transcriptions of the subjects' productions were made from tape recordings, and errors that they produced were examined. Durations of various segments were also measured acoustically and analyzed.
Visual preference as a test of infant word comprehension
Authors: Reznick J. Steven
Published: December 2008

Three experiments explored the usefulness of a visual preference technique for assessing word comprehension in infants. Pairs of slides were presented, and visual fixation to each recorded. The parent (in Experiments 1 and 2) or the experimenter (in Experiment 3) then prompted the child with the name of one of the slides (“Find the ——,” “Do you see the ——?”), and visual fixation to each was recorded again. Percentage fixation to the picture matching the word referent following the prompt question was compared to initial preference for that picture, providing a measure of the acceptability of the picture as a word referent, independent of its initial salience.

The first experiment demonstrated increases in comprehension from 8–14 and 14–20 months. The second experiment established longitudinal stability of comprehension from 14 to 20 months. Word comprehension scores were related to parent report of vocabulary knowledge and difficulty of words. The final experiment measured 1-week test-retest reliability of the word comprehension score at 14 and 20 months and replicated the effect of word difficulty. Methodological and theoretical implications of these results are discussed, in particular, the profound effect of stimulus salience and the lack of sex differences in word comprehension.
Repair of overlapping speech in the conversations of specifically language-impaired and normally developing children
Authors: Fujiki Martin , Brinton Bonnie , Sonnenberg Esther A.
Published: December 2008

This study examined the manner in which 10 specifically language-impaired (SLI) children and their linguistically normal chronological age (CA) and language age (LA) matched peers repaired overlapping speech. Conversational samples were elicited by an adult examiner from each subject. Instances of overlapping speech were analyzed as being either sentence initial or sentence internal (Gallagher & Craig, 1982). Both types of overlaps were then examined to determine if they required repair, and if so, how they were repaired. It was found that the proportional occurrence of both types of overlap was relatively similar across all three groups. Further, the frequency and nature of repair following sentence initial overlaps was similar across all three groups. However, SLI subjects produced a significantly greater number of unrepaired sentence internal overlaps than did either their CA or LA matched peers.
Rhyme, language, and children's reading
Authors: Bryant Peter , Maclean Morag , Bradley Lynette
Published: December 2008

It has been shown that there is a strong relation between children's phonological skills and the progress that they make in reading. But there is some uncertainty whether this is a specific connection or whether it is just a byproduct of variations in general language ability. We report evidence from a longitudinal study showing that the relation between children's sensitivity to rhyme and alliteration and their success in reading is highly specific and cannot be accounted for in terms of general language ability. In this study measures were taken of a group of children's linguistic and metalinguistic skills when they were 3 and 4 years old. The linguistic measures were of the children's vocabulary, their receptive and expressive use of grammar, and their ability to imitate sentences. The metalinguistic measures were of their ability to detect rhyme and alliteration and of their awareness of syntax. Two to three years later, when the children were 6;7, we measured their progress in reading and spelling. The children's rhyme and alliteration scores were related to their reading two years later even after controls for differences in linguistic skills and also for differences in intelligence and in social background. The other metalinguistic task – syntax awareness – did not predict reading after these controls. Awareness of rhyme, we argue, makes a distinctive contribution to reading by helping children to form spelling categories.
Defining language delay in young children by cognitive referencing: Are we saying more than we know?
Authors: Cole Kevin N. , Dale Philip S. , Mills Paulette E.
Published: December 2008

One current definition of language delay, on the basis of the Cognitive Hypothesis model, assumes that children who have similar levels of language and cognitive development are unlikely to gain from specific language intervention. Children who have cognitive skills developed to a greater degree than their language skills, in contrast, are identified as appropriate candidates for specific language facilitation. In order to examine this premise, the present study compares the effects of language intervention over a 1-year period for two groups of young children with delayed language: one group with cognitive skills markedly above their language level, and the other group with similar delays in cognitive and language skills. Eighteen subjects (13 boys, 5 girls, mean age 4;11) had cognitive skills developed above their language level, and 32 subjects (20 boys, 12 girls, mean age 5;3) had similar delays in language and cognition. Evaluation measures were Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-Revised (PPVT-R), MLU, Preschool Language Assessment Instrument, and Basic Language Concepts Test (BLCT). Of the four measures, only the BLCT resulted in significant gain differences favoring the students with higher cognitive than language skills. PPVT-R standard scores indicated that both groups made gains at a faster rate during intervention than prior to intervention. Clinical implications of the results are discussed.
Describing developing phonological systems: A response to Gierut
Authors: Fey Marc E.
Published: December 2008

Gierut (1986) presents a case in which a phonological intervention program is used to effect a phonemic split in a child with a highly restricted phonological system. A reanalysis of her data in this article suggests that the intervention program did not induce a phonemic split because the sounds in question were represented distinctively in the child's system prior to intervention. Three alternatives to Gierut's analysis are presented and discussed. It is argued that both relational and independent analyses of children's phonologies that include reference to perceptual skills and knowledge are necessary to reveal the structures and processes involved in phonological development.
Determinants of cue strength in adult first and second language speakers of French
Authors: McDonald Janet L. , Heilenman L. Kathy
Published: December 2008

This study investigates the determinants of adult usage of various syntactic and semantic cues in sentence interpretation. Native French speakers and advanced English/French bilinguals were tested for the strength of usage of word order, clitic pronoun agreement, verb agreement, and noun animacy cues in the assignment of the actor role in French sentences. Native speakers showed strong use of clitic pronoun agreement, followed by much weaker use of verb agreement, an even weaker use of noun animacy, and negligible use of word order. This ranking reflects the importance of these cues in naturally occurring French sentences involving conflicts among cues in conjunction with a learning-on-error model. The English/French bilinguals did not manifest English-like strategies of word order preference on the French sentences; rather, they showed a cue ranking very similar to that of native speakers, although detectability may have played a role in their use of verb agreement. The failure of English word order strategies to correctly interpret many naturally occurring French sentences may be responsible for the adaptation of strategies appropriate to the second language.
Nonword repetition, phonological memory, and vocabulary: A reply to Snowling, Chiat, and Hulme
Authors: Gathercole Susan E. , Willis Cath , Baddeley Alan D.
Published: December 2008

The opportunity taken by Snowling, Chiat, and Hulme to step into the debate concerning the nature of the relationship between nonword repetition abilities and vocabulary acquisition in young children should be welcomed. Vocabulary size is strongly associated with a range of abilities, including general intelligence scores, reading ability, reading comprehension, and school success (e.g., Anderson & Freebody, 1981) and as a consequence, vocabulary knowledge provides the major index of verbal intelligence in many standardized ability tests used with both children and adults. Given the weight attached by psychologists to vocabulary knowledge, it seems surprising that until recently the cognitive processes underpinning word learning had been largely neglected. Any progress in understanding the psychological constraints in vocabulary development, whether it takes the form of informed theoretical debate or further empirical work, should therefore be encouraged.
Babble and first words in children with focal brain injury
Authors: Marchman Virginia A. , Miller Ruth , Bates Elizabeth A.
Published: December 2008

In this article, we present data from a longitudinal investigation of the development of language and communicative skills in infants suffering from focal brain injury in the pre- or perinatal period. We focus on phonological analyses of babbling and first words, and parental reports of the use of gestures for communicative purposes, word comprehension, and word production. Results indicate that all children were delayed in the number of gestures they were reported to produce, as well as in reported lexical production. Reported comprehension was also typically well below age level; however, age-appropriate comprehension was observed in one child throughout the period sampled. Phonological analyses revealed both similarities and differences between the early vocalizations of the neurologically involved children and those of the control group. Most notably, the vocalizations of the children with brain injury contained a smaller proportion of “true” consonants at the earliest session. The children who showed an increase in the proportion of consonant production by the third testing session were those who had also begun to produce words by this period. Thus, phonological and lexical developments were both observed during the period studied here, with improvement most evident in children with damage to anterior (as opposed to posterior) brain areas. Lastly, like normally developing children, children with brain injury displayed idiosyncratic patterns of consonant articulation. These tendencies were observed in all vocalizations, both babble and words, suggesting that continuity of consonant place and manner is evident even in the face of general delay in the acquisition of communicative abilities.
Letters, sounds, and symbols: Changes in children's understanding of written language
Authors: Bialystok Ellen
Published: December 2008

Children between 3–5 years who knew the alphabet but could not read were given three tasks. In the first, they decided which of two words was longer when the word pairs were presented orally, in writing, or accompanying pictures. In the second, they “read” a word when it accompanied a picture of the named object and then again when it was placed with a picture of a different object. Finally, they were given a set of plastic letters with which they could create their own words. Although all the children had explicit knowledge of letters and sounds, they lacked symbolic knowledge of how letters represent sounds. This symbolic knowledge, it is claimed, is a precondition to learning to read.
Intrusion of orthographic knowledge on phoneme awareness: Strong in normal readers, weak in dyslexic readers
Authors: Landerl Karin , Frith Uta , Wimmer Heinz
Published: December 2008

In three typical phonological awareness tasks it was found that children with normal reading development sometimes give responses that are based on orthographic rather than phonological information. In dyslexic children, the number of occurrences of such orthographic intrusions was significantly lower. This effect cannot be explained by positing a lower degree of orthographic knowledge in dyslexic children since a group of younger children who had the same spelling level as the dyslexics also showed more orthographic intrusions. A plausible explanation for this difference between normal and dyslexic readers is that, in normal readers, phonological and orthographic representations of words are so closely connected that they are usually coactivated, even if such a coactivation is misleading. In dyslexics this connection is less strong, so that orthographic representations interfere less with phonemic segmentation. The relevance of this finding with respect to recent assumptions about the importance of phonology in establishing orthographic representations is discussed.
Effects of prosodic modeling and repeated reading on poor readers' fluency and comprehension
Authors: Young Arlene R. , Bowers Patricia Greig , MacKinnon G. E.
Published: December 2008

Repeated reading of meaningful text has been shown to produce improvements in reading rate, fluency, and comprehension in readers of varying ability. The assisted repeated reading (ARR) method, which provides a fluent and expressive (i.e., prosodic) model, has been proposed as being particularly helpful in this regard. However, it is unclear which component of the ARR method (prosodic modeling or reading practice with intact text) is the most influential factor. The present study examined the effects of text practice and prosodic modeling on the reading rate, accuracy, expressiveness, and comprehension of 40 grade 5 disabled readers. Text practice and prosodic modeling were systematically varied to create four training conditions. Each subject read the first half of a set of stories three times under one of the four experimental conditions. Pretest and posttest measures of the dependent variables were analyzed for both the training passages and the second half of each story, on which no training occurred (transfer passages). While reading performance improved across all conditions, substantial additional gains were produced by the conditions that included the practice of intact text. Modeling of prosody did not produce significant additional gains. Transfer effects were limited, with only the ARR condition producing improved accuracy on the second half of the stories.
Phonological and morphological awareness in first graders
Authors: Carlisle Joanne F. , Nomanbhoy Diana M.
Published: December 2008

Phonological awareness is thought to be related to children's success in learning to read because it indicates an awareness of the internal structure of words. Morphological awareness, which has been found to be related to reading achievement for older students, may offer a more comprehensive measure of linguistic sensitivity because it entails not only phonological awareness, but also other aspects of linguistic knowledge. The research study reported herein was designed to investigate the extent to which phonological awareness contributes to the morphological awareness of first graders and to determine the extent to which phonological and morphological awareness account for variance in word reading. Two tasks of morphological awareness were used, one assessing judgments of morphological relations and the other assessing the production of inflected and derived forms.
A comparison of comprehension and production abilities of good and poor readers
Authors: Bar-Shalom Eva G. , Crain Stephen , Shankweiler Donald
Published: December 2008

Research from several sources indicates that reading disability is often associated with difficulty in comprehending some complex spoken sentences, including those with relative clauses. The present study exploits a new methodology, elicited production, to identify the source of comprehension difficulties of poor readers. Both the elicited production task and a conventional act-out task were employed in a study of 30 children (aged 7-8), who were selected for reading ability. On the act-out task, the poor readers displayed a high error rate on two relative clause structures (SO and OO relatives), as had been found by Mann, Shankweiler, and Smith (1984), but these structures were elicited from the poor readers as successfully as from the good readers (on more than 80% of trials).
How German-speaking first graders read and spell: Doubts on the importance of the logographic stage
Authors: Wimmer Heinz , Hummer Peter
Published: December 2008

The logographic stage assumption in recent models of reading acquisition was examined by studying how German-speaking first graders read and spelled familiar words and matched pseudowords. Reading acquisition by German-speaking children provides an interesting case because the German writing system, in contrast to the English one, is phonologically rather transparent. To further test whether the transition from the logographic to the alphabetic stage poses a major obstacle at the beginning of reading, normally progressing first graders were contrasted with children who experienced serious difficulties at the beginning of reading and writing. In contrast to studies with American and British first graders, it was found that both normally progressing and delayed children relied on alphabetic strategies for both reading and writing, (a) Most children were able to read and - to a lesser extent - to spell completely unfamiliar pseudowords. (b) Reading of pseudowords correlated highly with reading of familiar words, and the same correlation was observed in the case of spelling, (c) Reading errors consisted mainly of nonwords beginning with the first letter(s) of the target, and most spelling errors consisted of spellings that were at least partially phonologically correct, (d) Reading performance was influenced by word exposure time, (e) Both reading performance and spelling performance were strongly predicted by knowledge of grapheme-phoneme correspondences. These findings support the conclusion that a logographic strategy is of limited importance when the writing system is phonologically rather transparent and when the instructional approach does not withhold information about grapheme-phoneme correspondences.
Outcome of toddlers with specific expressive language delay
Authors: Rescorla Leslie , Schwartz Ellen
Published: December 2008

This article describes a follow-up of 25 boys diagnosed as having specific expressive language delay (SELD) in the 24- to 31-month age period. At the time of diagnosis, all subjects had Bayley MDI scores above 85, Reynell Receptive Language Age scores within 4 months of their chronological age, and Reynell Expressive Language Age scores at least 5 months below chronological age; most had vocabularies of fewer than 50 words and few if any word combinations. At follow-up, 16 boys were 3 years old, 7 were 3½, and 2 were 4 years of age. When seen for follow-up, half the 25 boys still had very poor expressive language. These boys were speaking at best in short, telegraphic sentences, and many had moderately severe articulation disorders with quite poor intelligibility. The 12 boys with better outcome had a range of language skills. All spoke in sentences to some extent, and each displayed some mastery of early morphemes (prepositions, plurals, articles, progressive tense, and possessives). However, few if any of the children spoke in completely fluent, syntactically complex, and morphologically correct language. Problems with copula and auxiliary verbs, with past tense inflections, and with pronouns seemed especially common. This research suggests that children with SELD at 24 to 30 months are at considerable risk for continuing language problems.
Cognition and the verb lexicon in early lexical development
Authors: Smith Cheryl A. , Sachs Jacqueline
Published: December 2008

The focus of this study is the cognitive/conceptual basis for the emergence of verbs in early lexical development. Twenty-four 12–19-month-old children were studied through (a) observation and maternal report of their acquisition of verbs in comprehension and production and (b) observation of nonverbal behavior reflected in play. There is substantive growth in the comprehension of verbs during this period, with a rapid increase between 14–16 months in the total number of verbs and decontextualized verbs comprehended, but no similar surge in production. Children's ability to consider others in the role of actor during play with objects was linked to the comprehension of verbs during this period; also, the ability to engage in symbolic action sequences on objects in play correlated with the decontextualized comprehension of verbs. These results suggest that underlying cognitive development in event representation may be related to the increased comprehension of verbs across contexts.
Metalinguistic awareness in young deaf children: A preliminary study
Authors: Zorfass Judith M.
Published: December 2008

This study explores the metalinguistic abilities of prelingually deaf children aged 4–7, who are users of Signed English, with regard to their explicit segmentation of Signed English sentences into words. Subjects exhibited varying metalinguistic abilities that generally increased with age and that were similar to the developmental pattern found in hearing populations. Based upon performance with respect to four factors (i.e., explicit segmentation, omissions of function words, content words, and inflectional morphemes), subjects were grouped into four classes. In Class 1, sentences or groups of words were not segmented. in Class 2, major constituents of the sentences were segmented. In Class 3, major constituents and some function words were segmented. In Class 4, the entire sentence was segmented. Patterns of omissions found throughout the classes for function words and inflectional morphemes are discussed. Also addressed are implicit segmentation skills found to develop prior to the development of explicit abilities.
Categorical perception of English /r/ and /l/ by Japanese bilinguals
Authors: MacKain Kristine S. , Best Catherine T. , Strange Winifred
Published: December 2008

Categorical perception of a synthetic /r/-/l/ continuum was investigated with Japanese bilinguals at two levels of English language experience. The inexperienced Japanese group, referred to as Not-experienced, had had little or no previous training in English conversation. The Experienced Japanese group had had intensive training in English conversation by native American-English speakers. The tasks used were absolute identification, AXB discrimination, and oddity discrimination. Results showed classic Categorical perception by an American-English control group. The Not-experienced Japanese showed near-chance performance on all tasks, with performance no better for stimuli that straddled the /r/-/l/ boundary than for stimuli that fell in either category. The Experienced Japanese group, however, perceived /r/ and /l/ categorically. Their identification performance did not differ from the American-English controls, but their overall performance levels on the discrimination tests were somewhat lower than for the Americans. We conclude that native Japanese adults learning English as a second language are capable of Categorical perception of /r/ and /l/. Implications for perceptual training of phonemic contrasts are discussed.
The influence of orthography on readers' conceptualization of the phonemic structure of words
Authors: Ehri Linnea C. , Wilce Lee S.
Published: December 2008

This study was designed to determine whether children's conceptualization of the component sounds in words is influenced by their knowledge of the words' spellings. For example, the spelling of pitch may lead learners to discover the phonetic element [t] in its pronunciation and to conceptualize this as a separate phoneme, whereas the spelling of rich should not. Positive results were obtained in a phonemic segmentation task with real and made-up words taught to fourth graders. Findings are interpreted to show that phonemic segmentation skill may be a consequence of as much as a prerequisite to learning to read words. Results are consistent with a theory of printed word learning in which visual spellings are retained in memory through a sound symbolization process.
Word recognition from acoustic onsets and acoustic offsets: Effects of cohort size and syllabic stress
Authors: Wingfield Arthur , Goodglass Harold , Lindfield Kimberly C.
Published: December 2008

In the traditional gating technique, subjects hear increasing amounts of word-onset information from spoken words until the words can be correctly identified. The experiment reported here contrasted word-onset gating with results when words were gated from their word endings. A significant recognition advantage for words gated from their onsets was demonstrated. This effect was eliminated, however, when we took into account the number of word possibilities that shared overlapping phonology and the same stress pattern as the target words at their recognition points. These results support the position that the perceptual advantage of word-initial information can be understood within a general goodness-of-fit model of spoken word recognition.
Effects of word length and wordlikeness on pseudoword repetition by poor and normal readers
Authors: Van Bon Wim H. J. , Van Der Pijl Judith M. L.
Published: December 2008

This Study investigated whether the pseudoword repetition difference between poor and normal readers could be explained by differences in memory for verbal materials or in familiarity with the composition of verbal materials. Dutch second graders and poor readers scoring in the same range on a word-reading test repeated pseudowords that varied in length and wordlikeness. The pseudoword repetition deficit of poor readers reported in the literature was replicated. Although the repetition scores were influenced by pseudoword length and wordlikeness, no interaction with reader group was found, thus indicating that neither variable represented a causal factor in the poor readers' repetition deficit. Statistical correction for reader group differences on a phoneme detection task and an auditory discrimination task made the pseudoword repetition difference disappear. We conclude that the basic problem is unlikely to be with subvocal rehearsal, and that the cause of the repetition deficit is already operative in early, perceptual stages of processing.