TY - JOUR A1 - Rabe, Maximilian Michael A1 - Chandra, Johan A1 - Krügel, André A1 - Seelig, Stefan A. A1 - Vasishth, Shravan A1 - Engbert, Ralf T1 - A bayesian approach to dynamical modeling of eye-movement control in reading of normal, mirrored, and scrambled texts JF - Psychological Review N2 - In eye-movement control during reading, advanced process-oriented models have been developed to reproduce behavioral data. So far, model complexity and large numbers of model parameters prevented rigorous statistical inference and modeling of interindividual differences. Here we propose a Bayesian approach to both problems for one representative computational model of sentence reading (SWIFT; Engbert et al., Psychological Review, 112, 2005, pp. 777-813). We used experimental data from 36 subjects who read the text in a normal and one of four manipulated text layouts (e.g., mirrored and scrambled letters). The SWIFT model was fitted to subjects and experimental conditions individually to investigate between- subject variability. Based on posterior distributions of model parameters, fixation probabilities and durations are reliably recovered from simulated data and reproduced for withheld empirical data, at both the experimental condition and subject levels. A subsequent statistical analysis of model parameters across reading conditions generates model-driven explanations for observable effects between conditions. KW - reading eye movements KW - dynamical models KW - Bayesian inference KW - oculomotor KW - control KW - individual differences Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1037/rev0000268 SN - 0033-295X SN - 1939-1471 VL - 128 IS - 5 SP - 803 EP - 823 PB - American Psychological Association CY - Washington ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Puebla, Cecilia A1 - Garcia, Juan T1 - Advocating the inclusion of older adults in digital language learning technology and research BT - some considerations JF - Bilingualism : language and cognition Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728921000742 SN - 1366-7289 SN - 1469-1841 VL - 25 IS - 3 SP - 398 EP - 399 PB - Cambridge Univ. Press CY - New York ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Korochkina, Maria A1 - Bürki-Foschini, Audrey Damaris A1 - Nickels, Lyndsey T1 - Apples and oranges BT - how does learning context affect novel word learning? JF - Journal of memory and language : JML N2 - Despite scarce empirical evidence, introducing new vocabulary in semantic categories has long been standard in second language teaching. We examined the effect of learning context on encoding, immediate recall and integration of new vocabulary into semantic memory by contrasting categorically related (novel names for familiar concepts blocked by semantic category) and unrelated (mixed semantic categories) learning contexts. Two learning sessions were conducted 24 hours apart, with each participant exposed to both contexts. Subsequently, a test phase examined picture naming, translation and picture-word interference tasks. Compared to the unrelated context, the categorically related context resulted in poorer naming accuracy in the learning phase, slower response latencies at the immediate recall tasks and greater semantic interference in the picture-word interference task (picture naming in L1 with semantically related novel word distractors). We develop a theoretical account of word learning that attributes observed differences to episodic rather than semantic memory. KW - Word learning KW - Learning context KW - Episodic memory KW - Semantic memory KW - Integration KW - Word production Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2021.104246 SN - 0749-596X SN - 1096-0821 VL - 120 PB - Elsevier CY - Amsterdam ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Schreiber, Alexander A1 - Onea Gáspár, Edgar T1 - Are narrow focus exhaustivity inferences Bayesian inferences? JF - Frontiers in psychology / Frontiers Research Foundation N2 - In successful communication, the literal meaning of linguistic utterances is often enriched by pragmatic inferences. Part of the pragmatic reasoning underlying such inferences has been successfully modeled as Bayesian goal recognition in the Rational Speech Act (RSA) framework. In this paper, we try to model the interpretation of question-answer sequences with narrow focus in the answer in the RSA framework, thereby exploring the effects of domain size and prior probabilities on interpretation. Should narrow focus exhaustivity inferences be actually based on Bayesian inference involving prior probabilities of states, RSA models should predict a dependency of exhaustivity on these factors. We present experimental data that suggest that interlocutors do not act according to the predictions of the RSA model and that exhaustivity is in fact approximately constant across different domain sizes and priors. The results constitute a conceptual challenge for Bayesian accounts of the underlying pragmatic inferences. KW - pragmatics KW - Bayesian models KW - rational speech act models KW - implicatures KW - focus KW - exhaustivity Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.677223 SN - 1664-1078 VL - 12 PB - Frontiers Research Foundation CY - Lausanne ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Schäfer, Robin A1 - Stede, Manfred T1 - Argument mining on twitter BT - a survey JF - Information technology : it ; Methoden und innovative Anwendungen der Informatik und Informationstechnik ; Organ der Fachbereiche 3 und 4 der GI e.V. und des Fachbereichs 6 der ITG N2 - In the last decade, the field of argument mining has grown notably. However, only relatively few studies have investigated argumentation in social media and specifically on Twitter. Here, we provide the, to our knowledge, first critical in-depth survey of the state of the art in tweet-based argument mining. We discuss approaches to modelling the structure of arguments in the context of tweet corpus annotation, and we review current progress in the task of detecting argument components and their relations in tweets. We also survey the intersection of argument mining and stance detection, before we conclude with an outlook. KW - Argument Mining KW - Twitter KW - Stance Detection Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1515/itit-2020-0053 SN - 1611-2776 SN - 2196-7032 VL - 63 IS - 1 SP - 45 EP - 58 PB - De Gruyter CY - Berlin ER - TY - THES A1 - Fominyam, Henry Zamchang T1 - Aspects of Awing grammar and information structure N2 - This project describes the nominal, verbal and ‘truncation’ systems of Awing and explains the syntactic and semantic functions of the multifunctional l<-><-> (LE) morpheme in copular and wh-focused constructions. Awing is a Bantu Grassfields language spoken in the North West region of Cameroon. The work begins with morphological processes viz. deverbals, compounding, reduplication, borrowing and a thorough presentation of the pronominal system and takes on verbal categories viz. tense, aspect, mood, verbal extensions, negation, adverbs and triggers of a homorganic N(asal)-prefix that attaches to the verb and other verbal categories. Awing grammar also has a very unusual phenomenon whereby nouns and verbs take long and short forms. A chapter entitled truncation is dedicated to the phenomenon. It is observed that the truncation process does not apply to bare singular NPs, proper names and nouns derived via morphological processes. On the other hand, with the exception of the 1st person non-emphatic possessive determiner and the class 7 noun prefix, nouns generally take the truncated form with modifiers (i.e., articles, demonstratives and other possessives). It is concluded that nominal truncation depicts movement within the DP system (Abney 1987). Truncation of the verb occurs in three contexts: a mass/plurality conspiracy (or lattice structuring in terms of Link 1983) between the verb and its internal argument (i.e., direct object); a means to align (exhaustive) focus (in terms of Fery’s 2013), and a means to form polar questions. The second part of the work focuses on the role of the LE morpheme in copular and wh-focused clauses. Firstly, the syntax of the Awing copular clause is presented and it is shown that copular clauses in Awing have ‘subject-focus’ vs ‘topic-focus’ partitions and that the LE morpheme indirectly relates such functions. Semantically, it is shown that LE does not express contrast or exhaustivity in copular clauses. Turning to wh-constructions, the work adheres to Hamblin’s (1973) idea that the meaning of a question is the set of its possible answers and based on Rooth’s (1985) underspecified semantic notion of alternative focus, concludes that the LE morpheme is not a Focus Marker (FM) in Awing: LE does not generate or indicate the presence of alternatives (Krifka 2007); The LE morpheme can associate with wh-elements as a focus-sensitive operator with semantic import that operates on the focus alternatives by presupposing an exhaustive answer, among other notions. With focalized categories, the project further substantiates the claim in Fominyam & Šimík (2017), namely that exhaustivity is part of the semantics of the LE morpheme and not derived via contextual implicature, via a number of diagnostics. Hence, unlike in copular clauses, the LE morpheme with wh-focused categories is analysed as a morphological exponent of a functional head Exh corresponding to Horvath's (2010) EI (Exhaustive Identification). The work ends with the syntax of verb focus and negation and modifies the idea in Fominyam & Šimík (2017), namely that the focalized verb that associates with the exhaustive (LE) particle is a lower copy of the finite verb that has been moved to Agr. It is argued that the LE-focused verb ‘cluster’ is an instantiation of adjunction. The conclusion is that verb doubling with verb focus in Awing is neither a realization of two copies of one and the same verb (Fominyam and Šimík 2017), nor a result of a copy triggered by a focus marker (Aboh and Dyakonova 2009). Rather, the focalized copy is said to be merged directly as the complement of LE forming a type of adjoining cluster. N2 - Diese Arbeit beschreibt die nominalen und verbalen Systeme sowie die 'Verkürzungs-Systeme' in Awing und erklärt die syntaktischen und semantischen Funktionen des multifunktionalen Morphems l<-><-> (LE), sowohl in Kopula- als auch in wh-fokussierten Konstruktionen. Bei Awing handelt es sich um eine Sprache der Bantu Grassfields Familie und die im Nord-Westen Kameruns gesprochen wird. In der vorliegenden Arbeit werden zuerst morphologische Prozesse wie Deverbale, Compounding, Reduplikation und Borrowing dargestellt. Darüber hinaus wird das pronominale System der Sprache und die verbalen Kategorien wie Tempus, Aspekt, Modus, verbale Extensionen, Negation und Adverbien ausführlich präsentiert. Weiterhin wird auf die Auslöser eines homorganischen N(asalen)-Präfixes eingegangen, das sich an das Verb und an andere verbale Kategorien bindet. Die Grammatik des Awing zeigt außerdem ein sehr ungewöhnliches Phänomen, nämlich die Existenz von sowohl langen als auch kurzen Formen von Substantiven und Verben. Diese Besonderheit wird im Kapitel 'truncation' thematisiert. Darüber hinaus haben Beobachtungen jedoch gezeigt, dass dieser Verkürzungsprozess nicht bei Singular-NPs, Namen und durch morphologische Prozesse abgeleitete Substantive angewendet werden kann. Im Kontrast dazu muss wiederum festgehalten werden, dass Substantive im Regelfall nur in ihrer verkürzten Form mit Modifizierern (z.B. Artikel, Demonstrative und andere Possessive) auftreten. Davon ausgenommen sind nur nicht-emphatische Possessiv-Determinierer in der ersten Person sowie das Nominal-Präfix der Klasse 7. Zusammenfassend wird dargelegt, dass nominale Verkürzung Bewegung innerhalb des DP-Systems anzeigt (Abney 1987). Die Verkürzung von Verben tritt in drei verschiedenen Kontexten auf: in einer Masse/Plural (‚lattice structure‘ Link 1983) Konspiration zwischen dem Verb und dem direkten Objekt, Fokus auszurichten (nach Féry 2013), und um polare Fragen zu bilden. Der zweite Teil dieser Arbeit konzentriert sich auf die Rolle der LE Morpheme in Kopula- und wh-fokussierten Sätzen. Zuerst wird die Syntax des Kopula-Satzes in Awing präsentiert und es wird herausgestellt, dass Kopula-Sätze in Awing zwischen 'Subjekt-Fokus' und 'thematischem Fokus' unterschieden werden. Außerdem wird dargelegt, dass das LE Morphem solche Funktionen indirekt miteinander in Verbindung bringt. Von semantischer Seite aus wird gezeigt, dass LE weder Kontrast noch Vollständigkeit in Kopula-Sätzen ausdrückt. Bezüglich wh-Konstruktionen hält die Arbeit an der Idee von Hamblin (1973) fest, dass die Bedeutung einer Frage die Menge ihrer möglichen Antworten ist. Außerdem basiert die Arbeit auf Rooth's (1985) unterspezifizierten semantischer Auffassung von alternativem Fokus. Es wird zusammenfassend herausgestellt, dass es sich bei dem LE Morphem nicht um eine Fokus-Markierung handelt: durch LE werden keine Alternativen generiert und auch deren Präsenz nicht angezeigt (Krifka 2007); das LE Morphem kann sich mit wh-Elementen zu einem Fokus-sensitiven Operator mit semantischer Bedeutung verbinden. Dieser wird auf die Fokus-Alternativen angewendet, indem, neben anderen Ansichten, eine vollständige Antwort presupponiert wird. Unter der Annahmen von mit Fokus markierten Kategorien konkretisiert dieses Projekt mithilfe verschiedenen Untersuchungsmethoden weiterhin die Aussage in Fominyam & Šimík (2017), nämlich, dass Vollständigkeit einen Teil der Semantik des LE Morphems darstellt und nicht durch kontextuelle Implikaturen abgeleitet werden kann. Anders als in Kopula-Sätzen wird das LE Morphem mit wh-fokussierten Kategorien daher als ein morphologischer Exponent eines funktionellen Kopfes Exh analysiert– in Übereinstimmung mit Horvath's (2010) EI (Exhaustive Identification). Die Arbeit endet mit der Struktur und Syntax von verbalem Fokus und Negation. Darüber hinaus wird die Idee von Fominyam & Šimík (2017) weiterhin modifiziert, indem herausgestellt wird, dass das mit Fokus markierte Verb, welches sich mit dem vollständigen (LE) Partikel verbindet, eine tieferliegende Kopie des nach Agr bewegten, finiten Verbes ist. Es wird argumentiert, dass das LE-fokussierte Verb-Cluster eine Form von Adjunktion ist. Die Schlussfolgerung ist, dass Verb-Verdopplung mit verbalem Fokus in Awing weder eine Realisierung zweier Kopien von ein und demselben Verb (Fominyam & Šimík 2017), noch das Ergebnis einer von einer Fokus-Markierung hervorgerufenen Kopie ist (Aboh and Dyakonova 2009). Viel eher wird angenommen, dass die Fokus-markierte Kopie direkt als das Komplement von LE generiert wird und dadurch eine Art Adjunktions-Cluster bildet. KW - Awing Grammar KW - Nominal morphology KW - Verbal morphology KW - Truncation KW - Copular clauses KW - Verb focus and negation KW - Information Structure KW - Awing Grammatik KW - Nominale Morphologie KW - Trunkation/Verkürzung KW - Kopula-Sätze KW - Verbaler Fokus und Negation Y1 - 2021 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-518068 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Jeong, Hye-In A1 - van den Hoven, Emiel A1 - Madec, Sylvain A1 - Bürki-Foschini, Audrey Damaris T1 - Behavioral and Brain Responses Highlight the Role of Usage in the Preparation of Multiword Utterances for Production JF - Journal of cognitive neuroscience N2 - Usage-based theories assume that all aspects of language processing are shaped by the distributional properties of the language. The frequency not only of words but also of larger chunks plays a major role in language processing. These theories predict that the frequency of phrases influences the time needed to prepare these phrases for production and their acoustic duration. By contrast, dominant psycholinguistic models of utterance production predict no such effects. In these models, the system keeps track of the frequency of individual words but not of co-occurrences. This study investigates the extent to which the frequency of phrases impacts naming latencies and acoustic duration with a balanced design, where the same words are recombined to build high- and low-frequency phrases. The brain signal of participants is recorded so as to obtain information on the electrophysiological bases and functional locus of frequency effects. Forty-seven participants named pictures using high- and low-frequency adjective-noun phrases. Naming latencies were shorter for high-frequency than low-frequency phrases. There was no evidence that phrase frequency impacted acoustic duration. The electrophysiological signal differed between high- and low-frequency phrases in time windows that do not overlap with conceptualization or articulation processes. These findings suggest that phrase frequency influences the preparation of phrases for production, irrespective of the lexical properties of the constituents, and that this effect originates at least partly when speakers access and encode linguistic representations. Moreover, this study provides information on how the brain signal recorded during the preparation of utterances changes with the frequency of word combinations. Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1162/jocn_a_01757 SN - 0898-929X SN - 1530-8898 VL - 33 IS - 11 SP - 2231 EP - 2264 PB - MIT Press CY - Cambridge ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Krasotkina, Anna A1 - Götz, Antonia A1 - Höhle, Barbara A1 - Schwarzer, Gudrun T1 - Bimodal familiarization re-sensitizes 12-month-old infants to other-race faces JF - Infant behavior & development : an international and interdisciplinary journal N2 - Perceptual narrowing in the domain of face perception typically begins to reduce infants' sensitivity to differences distinguishing other-race faces from approximately 6 months of age. The present study investigated whether it is possible to re-sensitize Caucasian 12-month-old infants to other-race Asian faces through statistical learning by familiarizing them with different statistical distributions of these faces. The familiarization faces were created by generating a morphed continuum from one Asian face identity to another. In the unimodal condition, infants were familiarized with a frequency distribution wherein they saw the midpoint face of the morphed continuum the most frequently. In the bimodal condition, infants were familiarized with a frequency distribution wherein they saw faces closer to the endpoints of the morphed continuum the most frequently. After familiarization, infants were tested on their discrimination of the two original Asian faces. The infants' looking times during the test indicated that infants in the bimodal condition could discriminate between the two faces, while infants in the unimodal condition could not. These findings therefore suggest that 12-month-old Caucasian infants could be re-sensitized to Asian faces by familiarizing them with a bimodal frequency distribution of such faces. KW - Bimodal KW - Unimodal KW - Familiarization KW - Statistical learning KW - Infant KW - Face KW - discrimination Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infbeh.2020.101502 SN - 0163-6383 SN - 1879-0453 VL - 62 PB - Elsevier CY - Amsterdam ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Hohaus, Vera A1 - Zimmermann, Malte T1 - Comparisons of equality with German so ... wie, and the relationship between degrees and properties JF - Journal of semantics N2 - We present a compositionally transparent, unified semantic analysis of two kinds of so ... wie-equative constructions in German, namely degree equatives and property equatives in the domain of individuals or events. Unlike in English and many other European languages (Haspelmath & Buchholz 1998, Rett 2013), both equative types in German feature the parameter marker so, suggesting a unified analysis. We show that the parallel formal expression of German degree and property equatives is accompanied by a parallel syntactic distribution (in predicative, attributive, and adverbial position), and by identical semantic properties: Both equative types allow for scope ambiguities, show negative island effects out of context, and license the negative polarity item uberhaupt 'at all' in the complement clause. As the same properties are also shared by German comparatives, we adopt the influential quantificational analysis of comparatives in von Stechow (1984ab), Heim (1985, 2001, 2007), and Beck (2011), and treat both German equative types in a uniform manner as expressing universal quantification over sets of degrees or over sets of properties (of individuals or events). Conceptually, the uniform marking of degree-related and property-related meanings is expected given that the abstract semantic category degree (type ) can be reconstructed in terms of equivalence classes, i.e., ontologically simpler sets of individuals (type ) or events (type ). These are found in any language, showing that whether or not a language makes explicit reference to degrees (by means of gradable adjectives, degree question words, degree-only equatives) does not follow on general conceptual or semantic grounds, but is determined by the grammar of that language. Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1093/jos/ffaa011 SN - 0167-5133 SN - 1477-4593 VL - 38 IS - 1 SP - 95 EP - 143 PB - Oxford Univ. Press CY - Oxford ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Felser, Claudia A1 - Jessen, Anna T1 - Correlative coordination and variable subject-verb agreement in German JF - Languages : open access journal N2 - Coordinated subjects often show variable number agreement with the finite verb, but linguistic approaches to this phenomenon have rarely been informed by systematically collected data. We report the results from three experiments investigating German speakers' agreement preferences with complex subjects joined by the correlative conjunctions sowohl horizontal ellipsis als auch ('both horizontal ellipsis and'), weder horizontal ellipsis noch ('neither horizontal ellipsis nor') or entweder horizontal ellipsis oder ('either horizontal ellipsis or'). We examine to what extent conjunction type and a conjunct's relative proximity to the verb affect the acceptability and processibility of singular vs. plural agreement. Experiment 1 was an untimed acceptability rating task, Experiment 2 a timed sentence completion task, and Experiment 3 was a self-paced reading task. Taken together, our results show that number agreement with correlative coordination in German is primarily determined by a default constraint triggering plural agreement, which interacts with linear order and semantic factors. Semantic differences between conjunctions only affected speakers' agreement preferences in the absence of processing pressure but not their initial agreement computation. The combined results from our offline and online experimental measures of German speakers' agreement preferences suggest that the constraints under investigation do not only differ in their relative weighting but also in their relative timing during agreement computation. KW - correlative coordination KW - subject– verb agreement KW - German Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.3390/languages6020067 SN - 2226-471X VL - 6 IS - 2 PB - MDPI CY - Basel ER -