@article{AdaniStegenwallnerSchutzNiesel2017, author = {Adani, Flavia and Stegenwallner-Schutz, Maja Henny Katherine and Niesel, Talea}, title = {The Peaceful Co-existence of Input Frequency and Structural Intervention Effects on the Comprehension of Complex Sentences in German-Speaking Children}, series = {Frontiers in psychology}, volume = {8}, journal = {Frontiers in psychology}, publisher = {Frontiers Research Foundation}, address = {Lausanne}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01590}, pages = {11}, year = {2017}, abstract = {The predictions of two contrasting approaches to the acquisition of transitive relative clauses were tested within the same groups of German-speaking participants aged from 3 to 5 years old. The input frequency approach predicts that object relative clauses with inanimate heads (e.g., the pullover that the man is scratching) are comprehended earlier and more accurately than those with an animate head (e.g., the man that the boy is scratching). In contrast, the structural intervention approach predicts that object relative clauses with two full NP arguments mismatching in number (e.g., the man that the boys are scratching) are comprehended earlier and more accurately than those with number-matching NPs (e.g., the man that the boy is scratching). These approaches were tested in two steps. First, we ran a corpus analysis to ensure that object relative clauses with number-mismatching NPs are not more frequent than object relative clauses with number-matching NPs in child directed speech. Next, the comprehension of these structures was tested experimentally in 3-, 4-, and 5-year-olds respectively by means of a color naming task. By comparing the predictions of the two approaches within the same participant groups, we were able to uncover that the effects predicted by the input frequency and by the structural intervention approaches co-exist and that they both influence the performance of children on transitive relative clauses, but in a manner that is modulated by age. These results reveal a sensitivity to animacy mismatch already being demonstrated by 3-year-olds and show that animacy is initially deployed more reliably than number to interpret relative clauses correctly. In all age groups, the animacy mismatch appears to explain the performance of children, thus, showing that the comprehension of frequent object relative clauses is enhanced compared to the other conditions. Starting with 4-year-olds but especially in 5-year-olds, the number mismatch supported comprehension-a facilitation that is unlikely to be driven by input frequency. Once children fine-tune their sensitivity to verb agreement information around the age of four, they are also able to deploy number marking to overcome the intervention effects. This study highlights the importance of testing experimentally contrasting theoretical approaches in order to characterize the multifaceted, developmental nature of language acquisition.}, language = {en} } @article{AdaniStegenwallnerSchuetzHaendleretal.2016, author = {Adani, Flavia and Stegenwallner-Sch{\"u}tz, Maja Henny Katherine and H{\"a}ndler, Yair and Zukowski, Andrea}, title = {Elicited production of relative clauses in German: Evidence from typically developing children and children with specific language impairment}, series = {First language}, volume = {36}, journal = {First language}, publisher = {Sage Publ.}, address = {London}, issn = {0142-7237}, doi = {10.1177/0142723716648842}, pages = {203 -- 227}, year = {2016}, abstract = {We elicited the production of various types of relative clauses in a group of German-speaking children with specific language impairment (SLI) and typically developing controls in order to test the movement optionality account of grammatical difficulty in SLI. The results show that German-speaking children with SLI are impaired in relative clause production compared to typically developing children. The alternative structures that they produce consist of simple main clauses, as well as nominal and prepositional phrases produced in isolation, sometimes contextually appropriate, and sometimes not. Crucially for evaluating the movement optionality account, children with SLI produce very few instances of embedded clauses where the relative clause head noun is pronounced in situ; in fact, such responses are more common among the typically developing child controls. These results underscore the difficulty German-speaking children with SLI have with structures involving movement, but provide no specific support for the movement optionality account.}, language = {en} } @article{AdaniStegenwallnerSchuetzNiesel2017, author = {Adani, Flavia and Stegenwallner-Sch{\"u}tz, Maja Henny Katherine and Niesel, Talea}, title = {The Peaceful Co-existence of Input Frequency and Structural Intervention Effects on the Comprehension of Complex Sentences in German-Speaking Children}, series = {Frontiers in psychology}, volume = {8}, journal = {Frontiers in psychology}, publisher = {Frontiers Research Foundation}, address = {Lausanne}, issn = {1664-1078}, doi = {10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01590}, pages = {1 -- 11}, year = {2017}, abstract = {The predictions of two contrasting approaches to the acquisition of transitive relative clauses were tested within the same groups of German-speaking participants aged from 3 to 5 years old. The input frequency approach predicts that object relative clauses with inanimate heads (e.g., the pullover that the man is scratching) are comprehended earlier and more accurately than those with an animate head (e.g., the man that the boy is scratching). In contrast, the structural intervention approach predicts that object relative clauses with two full NP arguments mismatching in number (e.g., the man that the boys are scratching) are comprehended earlier and more accurately than those with number-matching NPs (e.g., the man that the boy is scratching). These approaches were tested in two steps. First, we ran a corpus analysis to ensure that object relative clauses with number-mismatching NPs are not more frequent than object relative clauses with number-matching NPs in child directed speech. Next, the comprehension of these structures was tested experimentally in 3-, 4-, and 5-year-olds respectively by means of a color naming task. By comparing the predictions of the two approaches within the same participant groups, we were able to uncover that the effects predicted by the input frequency and by the structural intervention approaches co-exist and that they both influence the performance of children on transitive relative clauses, but in a manner that is modulated by age. These results reveal a sensitivity to animacy mismatch already being demonstrated by 3-year-olds and show that animacy is initially deployed more reliably than number to interpret relative clauses correctly. In all age groups, the animacy mismatch appears to explain the performance of children, thus, showing that the comprehension of frequent object relative clauses is enhanced compared to the other conditions. Starting with 4-year-olds but especially in 5-year-olds, the number mismatch supported comprehension—a facilitation that is unlikely to be driven by input frequency. Once children fine-tune their sensitivity to verb agreement information around the age of four, they are also able to deploy number marking to overcome the intervention effects. This study highlights the importance of testing experimentally contrasting theoretical approaches in order to characterize the multifaceted, developmental nature of language acquisition.}, language = {en} } @article{BhataraBollAvetisyanAgusetal.2016, author = {Bhatara, Anjali and Boll-Avetisyan, Natalie and Agus, Trevor and H{\"o}hle, Barbara and Nazzi, Thierry}, title = {Language Experience Affects Grouping of Musical Instrument Sounds}, series = {Cognitive science : a multidisciplinary journal of anthropology, artificial intelligence, education, linguistics, neuroscience, philosophy, psychology ; journal of the Cognitive Science Society}, volume = {40}, journal = {Cognitive science : a multidisciplinary journal of anthropology, artificial intelligence, education, linguistics, neuroscience, philosophy, psychology ; journal of the Cognitive Science Society}, publisher = {Wiley-Blackwell}, address = {Hoboken}, issn = {0364-0213}, doi = {10.1111/cogs.12300}, pages = {1816 -- 1830}, year = {2016}, language = {en} } @article{BollAvetisyanBhataraHoehle2017, author = {Boll-Avetisyan, Natalie and Bhatara, Anjali and H{\"o}hle, Barbara}, title = {Effects of musicality on the perception of rhythmic structure in speech}, series = {Laboratory phonology}, volume = {8}, journal = {Laboratory phonology}, number = {1}, publisher = {Ubiquity Press}, address = {London}, issn = {1868-6346}, doi = {10.5334/labphon.91}, pages = {16}, year = {2017}, abstract = {Language and music share many rhythmic properties, such as variations in intensity and duration leading to repeating patterns. Perception of rhythmic properties may rely on cognitive networks that are shared between the two domains. If so, then variability in speech rhythm perception may relate to individual differences in musicality. To examine this possibility, the present study focuses on rhythmic grouping, which is assumed to be guided by a domain-general principle, the Iambic/Trochaic law, stating that sounds alternating in intensity are grouped as strong-weak, and sounds alternating in duration are grouped as weak-strong. German listeners completed a grouping task: They heard streams of syllables alternating in intensity, duration, or neither, and had to indicate whether they perceived a strong-weak or weak-strong pattern. Moreover, their music perception abilities were measured, and they filled out a questionnaire reporting their productive musical experience. Results showed that better musical rhythm perception - ability was associated with more consistent rhythmic grouping of speech, while melody perception - ability and productive musical experience were not. This suggests shared cognitive procedures in the perception of rhythm in music and speech. Also, the results highlight the relevance of - considering individual differences in musicality when aiming to explain variability in prosody perception.}, language = {en} } @article{BoschDeCesareDemskeetal.2023, author = {Bosch, Sina and De Cesare, Ilaria and Demske, Ulrike and Felser, Claudia}, title = {Word-order variation and coherence in German infinitival complementation}, series = {The journal of comparative Germanic linguistics}, volume = {26}, journal = {The journal of comparative Germanic linguistics}, number = {1}, publisher = {Springer}, address = {New York}, issn = {1572-8552}, doi = {10.1007/s10828-023-09140-8}, pages = {43}, year = {2023}, abstract = {This study provides a synthesis of corpus-based and experimental investigations of word-order preferences in German infinitival complementation. We carried out a systematic analysis of present-day German corpora to establish frequency distributions of different word-order options: extraposition, intraposition, and 'third construction'. We then examined, firstly, whether and to what extent corpus frequencies and processing economy constraints can predict the acceptability of these three word-order variants, and whether subject raising and subject control verbs form clearly distinguishable subclasses of infinitive-embedding verbs in terms of their word-order behaviour. Secondly, our study looks into the issue of coherence by comparing acceptability ratings for monoclausal coherent and biclausal incoherent construals of intraposed infinitives, and by examining whether a biclausal incoherent analysis gives rise to local and/or global processing difficulty. Taken together, our results revealed that (i) whilst the extraposition pattern consistently wins out over all other word-order variants for control verbs, neither frequency nor processing-based approaches to word-order variation can account for the acceptability of low-frequency variants, (ii) there is considerable verb-specific variation regarding word-order preferences both between and within the two sets of raising and control verbs under investigation, and (iii) although monoclausal coherent intraposition is rated above biclausal incoherent intraposition, the latter is not any more difficult to process than the former. Our findings indicate that frequency of occurrence and processing-related constraints interact with idiosyncratic lexical properties of individual verbs in determining German speakers' structural preferences.}, language = {en} } @article{BrandtKobeleHoehle2014, author = {Brandt-Kobele, Oda-Christina and H{\"o}hle, Barbara}, title = {The detection of subject-verb agreement violations by German-speaking children: An eye-tracking study}, series = {Lingua : international review of general linguistics}, volume = {144}, journal = {Lingua : international review of general linguistics}, publisher = {Elsevier}, address = {Amsterdam}, issn = {0024-3841}, doi = {10.1016/j.lingua.2013.12.008}, pages = {7 -- 20}, year = {2014}, abstract = {This study examines the processing of sentences with and without subject verb agreement violations in German-speaking children at three and five years of age. An eye-tracking experiment was conducted to measure whether children's looking behavior was influenced by the grammaticality of the test sentences. The older group of children turned their gaze faster towards a target picture and looked longer at it when the object noun referring to the target was presented in a grammatical sentence with subject verb agreement compared to when the object noun was presented in a sentence in which an agreement violation occurred. The younger group of children displayed less conclusive results, with a tendency to look longer but not faster towards the target picture in the grammatical compared to the ungrammatical condition. This is the first experimental evidence that German-speaking five-year old children are sensitive to subject verb agreement and violations thereof. Our results additionally substantiate that the eye-tracking paradigm is suitable to examine children's sensitivity to subtle grammatical violations.}, language = {en} } @article{ClahsenJessen2020, author = {Clahsen, Harald and Jessen, Anna}, title = {Variability and its limits in bilingual word recognition}, series = {The mental lexicon}, volume = {15}, journal = {The mental lexicon}, number = {2}, publisher = {John Benjamins Publishing Co.}, address = {Amsterdam}, issn = {1871-1340}, doi = {10.1075/ml.20013.cla}, pages = {295 -- 329}, year = {2020}, abstract = {This study examines the processing of morphologically complex words focusing on how morphological (in addition to orthographic and semantic) factors affect bilingual word recognition. We report findings from a large experimental study with groups of bilingual (Turkish/German) speakers using the visual masked-priming technique. We found morphologically mediated effects on the response speed and the inter-individual variability within the bilingual participant group. We conclude that the grammar (qua morphological parsing) not only enhances speed of processing in bilingual language processing but also yields more uniform performance and thereby constrains variability within a group of otherwise heterogeneous individuals.}, language = {en} } @article{ClahsenRothweilerSterneretal.2014, author = {Clahsen, Harald and Rothweiler, Monika and Sterner, Franziska and Chilla, Solveig}, title = {Linguistic markers of specific language impairment in bilingual children: the case of verb morphology}, series = {Clinical linguistics \& phonetics}, volume = {28}, journal = {Clinical linguistics \& phonetics}, number = {9}, publisher = {Taylor \& Francis Group}, address = {London}, issn = {0269-9206}, doi = {10.3109/02699206.2014.886726}, pages = {709 -- 721}, year = {2014}, language = {en} } @article{CzypionkaSpalekWartenburgeretal.2017, author = {Czypionka, Anna and Spalek, Katharina and Wartenburger, Isabell and Krifka, Manfred}, title = {On the interplay of object animacy and verb type during sentence comprehension in German: ERP evidence from the processing of transitive dative and accusative constructions}, series = {Linguistics : an interdisciplinary journal of the language sciences}, volume = {55}, journal = {Linguistics : an interdisciplinary journal of the language sciences}, publisher = {De Gruyter Mouton}, address = {Berlin}, issn = {0024-3949}, doi = {10.1515/ling-2017-0031}, pages = {1383 -- 1433}, year = {2017}, abstract = {Comprehension of transitive sentences relies on different kinds of information, like word order, case marking, and animacy contrasts between arguments. When no formal cues like case marking or number congruency are available, a contrast in animacy helps the parser to decide which argument is the grammatical subject and which the object. Processing costs are enhanced when neither formal cues nor animacy contrasts are available in a transitive sentence. We present an ERP study on the comprehension of grammatical transitive German sentences, manipulating animacy contrasts between subjects and objects as well as the verbal case marking pattern. Our study shows strong object animacy effects even in the absence of violations, and in addition suggests that this effect of object animacy is modulated by the verbal case marking pattern.}, language = {en} }