Despite substantial research on the brain mechanisms of L1 and L2 processing in bilinguals, it is still unknown whether language modality (i.e., visual vs. auditory) plays a role in determining ...whether L1 and L2 are processed similarly. Therefore, we examined the neural representational similarity in neural networks between L1 and L2 in spoken and written word processing in Korean–English–Chinese trilinguals. Participants performed both visual and auditory rhyming judgments in the three languages: Korean, English, and Chinese. The results showed greater similarity among the three languages in the auditory modality than in the visual modality, suggesting more differentiated networks for written word processing in the three languages than spoken word processing. In addition, there was less similarity between spoken and written word processing in L1 than the L2s, suggesting a more specialized network for each modality in L1 than L2s. Finally, the similarity between the two L2s (i.e., Chinese and English) was greater than that between each L2 and L1 after task performance was regressed out, especially in the visual modality, suggesting that L2s are processed similarly. These findings provide important insights about spoken and written language processing in the bilingual brain.
Korean–Chinese–English trilinguals showed more differentiated brain network for written word processing than spoken word processing. A more specialized network for auditory and visual modalities in L1 than in L2s. L2s are processed more similarly than L1 and each of L2s, especially in the visual modality.
Readers sometimes fail to notice word transposition errors, reporting a sentence with two transposed words to be grammatical (the
transposed-word effect
). It has been suggested that this effect ...implicates parallel word processing during sentence reading. The current study directly assessed the role of parallel word processing in failure to notice word transposition errors, by comparing error detection under normal sentence presentation conditions and when words are presented serially at 250 ms/word. Extending recent results obtained with serial presentation of Chinese sentences (Liu, Li, Cutter, Paterson, & Wang, Cognition 218: 104922, 2022), in Experiment 1 we found a transposed-word effect with serial presentation of English sentences. In Experiment 2, we replicated this finding with task instructions that allowed responding at any time during the presentation of the sentence; this result indicates that the transposed-word effect that appears with serial word presentation is not due to a late process of reconstruction of short-term memory. Thus, parallel word processing is not necessary for a transposed-word effect in English. Like Liu et al. (2022), we did find that the transposed-word effect was statistically larger with parallel presentation than with serial presentation; we consider several explanations as to why this is so.
The anatomy of language has been investigated with PET or fMRI for more than 20years. Here I attempt to provide an overview of the brain areas associated with heard speech, speech production and ...reading. The conclusions of many hundreds of studies were considered, grouped according to the type of processing, and reported in the order that they were published. Many findings have been replicated time and time again leading to some consistent and undisputable conclusions. These are summarised in an anatomical model that indicates the location of the language areas and the most consistent functions that have been assigned to them. The implications for cognitive models of language processing are also considered. In particular, a distinction can be made between processes that are localized to specific structures (e.g. sensory and motor processing) and processes where specialisation arises in the distributed pattern of activation over many different areas that each participate in multiple functions. For example, phonological processing of heard speech is supported by the functional integration of auditory processing and articulation; and orthographic processing is supported by the functional integration of visual processing, articulation and semantics. Future studies will undoubtedly be able to improve the spatial precision with which functional regions can be dissociated but the greatest challenge will be to understand how different brain regions interact with one another in their attempts to comprehend and produce language.
A sentence superiority effect was investigated using post-cued word-in-sequence identification with the rapid parallel visual presentation (RPVP) of four horizontally aligned words. The four words ...were presented for 200ms followed by a post-mask and cue for partial report. They could form a grammatically correct sentence or were formed of the same words in a scrambled agrammatical sequence. Word identification was higher in the syntactically correct sequences, and crucially, this sentence superiority effect did not vary as a function of the target’s position in the sequence. Cloze probability measures for words at the final, arguably most predictable position, revealed overall low values that did not interact with the effects of sentence context, suggesting that these effects were not driven by word predictability. The results point to a level of parallel processing across multiple words that enables rapid extraction of their syntactic categories. These generate a sentence-level representation that constrains the recognition process for individual words, thus facilitating parallel word processing when the sequence is grammatically sound.
Finite-State Text Processing De Santo, Aniello
Computational Linguistics,
03/2023, Letnik:
49, Številka:
1
Journal Article, Book Review
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Finite-State Text Processing by Kyle Gorman and Richard Sproat ( Graduate Center, City University of New York & Google LLC). Morgan & Claypool (Synthesis Lectures on Synthesis Lectures on Human ...Language Technologies, edited by Graeme Hirst, volume 50), 2021, xvii+140 pp; paperback, ISBN: 9781636391137; ebook, ISBN: 9781636391144; hardcover, ISBN: 9781636391151, doi: 10.2200/S01086ED1V01Y202104HLT050.
How compound words are processed remains a central question in research on Chinese reading. The Chinese reading model assumes that all possible words sharing characters are activated during word ...processing and these activated words compete for a winner (Li & Pollatsek, 2020). The present studies aimed to examine whether embedded component words compete with whole compound words in Chinese reading. In Study 1, we analyzed two existing lexical decision databases and revealed inhibitory effects of component-word frequency and facilitative effects of character frequency on the first components. In Study 2, we conducted two factorial experiments to further examine the effects of first component-word frequency, with character frequencies controlled. The results consistently indicated significant inhibitory effects of component-word frequency. Collectively, these findings support the theoretical proposition that both component words and compound words are activated and engage in competition during word processing. This provides a new approach to compound word processing in Chinese reading and a possible solution to mixed results of character frequency effects reported in the literature.
Public Significance Statement
This study demonstrated that Chinese compound words were processed in a competitive way between whole word and embedded component words. In addition to robust whole-word frequency effects, the component words have inhibitory effects because of competition.
According to an obligatory decomposition account of polymorphemic word recognition, a nonword that is composed of a real word plus derivational affix (e.g.,
) should prime its stem (
) to the same ...extent that a truly suffixed word does (e.g.,
). The stem will be activated in both cases after the suffix is removed prior to the lexical status of the letter-string being of relevance. Importantly, disruption to the stem and suffix through letter transposition should have the same impact on the nonwords and words, with
and
equally priming
. However, an experiment by Diependaele, Morris, Serota, Bertrand, and Grainger (2013) found that the equivalent priming for nonwords and words only occurred when they were intact. When letters were transposed, only the truly derived words showed priming. Since such a result cannot be handled by an obligatory decomposition account, it is important to replicate it. Therefore, the present study repeated the conditions of Diependaele et al. (2013), along with a nonword condition where the stem was followed by a non-suffix (e.g.,
or
). It was found that priming was maintained across all conditions regardless of letter transposition, hence maintaining obligatory decomposition as a viable account. However, the findings with the non-suffixed nonwords led to the conclusion that morphological structure does not control decomposition, but rather, has its impact after form-based components of the letter-string have been activated.
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