Institutional Efficiency in Independent Central Banking: A Communicative Matter?

Political economists have traditionally been indifferent to the communicative construction of money and central banking in the public sphere. It does not matter to them whether monetary affairs are rendered as a rational game over the preservation of the value of the currency or, for example, as a morality play. In this paper I will suggest that the very political economy of central bank independence requires a departure from such a practice. I will argue that the communicative articulation of the monetary game is relevant to understand how independent central banks can achieve institutional efficiency, and why they face no tradeoff between institutional efficiency and democratic legitimacy. In particular, I will suggest than an institutionally efficient central bank cannot but act as an agent of communicative empowerment of the audiences that make up its local context of operation.

THE EFFECTIVENESS OF USING COMMUNICATION-CENTERED INTERVENTION TO FACILITATE PHONOLOGICAL LEARNING IN YOUNG CHILDREN

A phonological disorder is a communication disorder of the speech sound system characterized by an impaired ability to use developmentally expected speech sounds and sound patterns to communicate with others (Bauman-Waengler, 2004). This impairment affects the clarity of a child\u27s speech and how easily a child\u27s speech can be understood. As stated in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) (American Psychiatric Association, 1994), difficulties with speech sound production may interfere with academic achievement, social communication, or future occupational achievement. Children with phonological impairments are generally viewed as being at risk for reading difficulties (American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, 2001).Clinicians and researchers in speech-language pathology agree that efficient treatment of children who have moderate to severe phonological disorders is critical. Although imitation and structured practice are primary strategies employed by speech- language pathologists for practicing speech production, using communicative tasks to facilitate generalization during phonological intervention has been suggested in the literature.The purpose of this study was to determine if communication-centered phonological intervention would be effective in improving speech production in preschool children with moderate to severe phonological disorders. A single subject multiple probe across subjects research design (Horner andamp; Baer, 1978) was used to assess the effectiveness of communication-centered phonological intervention with three preschool children. The communication-centered phonological intervention in this investigation consisted of the combined application of focused stimulation of key words during joint storybook reading and interactive practice of key words using communicative feedback.All three subjects demonstrated some type of phonological improvement following the communication-centered intervention. Two out of the three subjects demonstrated improvement in the use of the target phonological patterns during theintervention sessions with one of these participants demonstrating generalization of the target phonological pattern to conversational speech. Although the third subject did not demonstrate improvement during the intervention period, follow-up testing revealed some system-wide changes in his phonology that may be attributed to the intervention. Further investigation of communication-centered phonological intervention is warranted

The Structure of Names in Memory:Deviations from Uniform Entropy Impair Memory for Linguistic Sequences

Human languages can be seen as socially evolved systems thathave been structured to optimize information flow incommunication. Communication appears to proceed both moreefficiently and more fluently when information is distributedevenly across the linguistic signal. In previous work (Ramscaret al., 2013), we used tools from information theory to examinehow naming systems evolved to meet this requirementhistorically, and how, over the past several hundred years,social legislation and rapid population growth have disruptednaming practices in the West, making names ever harder toprocess and remember. In support of these observations, wepresent findings from three experiments investigating namefluency, recognition, and recall. These results provideconverging empirical evidence for an optimal solution to namedesign, and offer a more nuanced understanding of how socialengineering has impaired the structure of names in memory

A Review of Research on the Chinese EFL Learners’ Production of Linguistic Prosody in Turn Organization

Prosody features play crucial roles in the management and organization of conversations, among which turn-taking plays crucial roles in conversation organization. The appropriate use of prosodic features is an indispensable part of conversation strategies or skills, but the interaction between linguistic prosody and turn-taking is difficult to be acquired for EFL learners. This paper reviews the theoretical and empirical studies of interrelation between prosody and turn-taking, and the EFL learners’ acquisition of prosody in conversation organization in order to supply references for future studies in the similar fields

Learning vocabulary communicatively in EFL classes trough sitcom

https://www.ester.ee/record=b5377844*es

Creating Structure-Based Communication Tasks for Second Language Development

Task based language teaching has gained favor among both second language teachers and researchers over the last decade. Arguments for the value of a "focus on fonn" and attention to forms in input have also been made by several SLA researchers, thus pointing to a role for grammar instruction in classroom SLA. It is suggested here that the use of communicative and meaningful classroom tasks can focus learners' attention on grammatical forms in input and, thus, facilitate their acquisition This proposal differs from other recent treatments of communicative grammar instruction in its emphasis on the following areas: 1) "closed" rather than "()pen" tasks; 2) comprehension-based before production-based tasks; 3) grammatical targets which have clear form-meaning relationships. Thus, while the proposal is more narrow in scope than some other treatments, it is much more specific: i.e., it proposes tasks in which communicative outcomes can be predicted and manipulated in advance by the designer and in which grammatical form and meaning are tightly linked. Such tasks are similar to those used to test learners' language processing capabilities in psycholinguistic research, though here they are used for pedagogical purposes. Examples include tasks covering a wide range of syntactic categories and functions. ln conclusion, we argue for an approach to designing tasks which incorporates: 1) a cognitive perspective on SLA and language processing, 2) insights from research on communicative task design from second language research, and 3) methods of measuring language development from psycholinguistics and inter1anguage variation studies. By combining these with language teachers' careful observations of their students' problems in comprehending and being comprehended, meaning and communicative tasks for grammar pedagogy can be designed

Efficacy of aphasia group conversation treatment via telepractice on language and social measures

Conversation treatment for persons with aphasia (PwA) can lead to significant changes on measures of language impairment and quality of life. The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in greater use of telepractice treatment delivery; however little evidence exists regarding efficacy of a telepractice conversation group. The present study investigated the effects of telepractice group conversation treatment on standardized measures of language function and social oriented/patient-reported outcomes, as compared to in-person, and no-treatment control data. Eight PwA were recruited for inclusion in a telepractice conversation group treatment using a delayed, within-subjects design. Participants were compared to data taken from a larger RCT conducted previously (seven in-person participants and eight no-treatment control group participants). Results of evaluations conducted at baseline, pre-treatment, and post-treatment intervals revealed significant improvement from pre to post treatment on repetition and picture description tasks for the telepractice group. Compared to in-person group and no-treatment group data, results suggest superior benefits for in-person delivery of conversation group treatment compared to telepractice delivery. However, both in-person and telepractice treatment are superior to a no-treatment paradigm. Overall, results prompt further research regarding telepractice group conversation treatment for PwA

Proceedings ICPW'07: 2nd International Conference on the Pragmatic Web, 22-23 Oct. 2007, Tilburg: NL

Proceedings ICPW'07: 2nd International Conference on the Pragmatic Web, 22-23 Oct. 2007, Tilburg: N

Lexical profiles of comprehensible second language speech: the role of appropriateness, fluency, variation, sophistication, abstractness and sense relations

This study examined contributions of lexical factors to native-speaking raters’ assessments of comprehensibility (ease of understanding) of second language (L2) speech. Extemporaneous oral narratives elicited from 40 French speakers of L2 English were transcribed and evaluated for comprehensibility by 10 raters. Subsequently, the samples were analyzed for 12 lexical variables targeting diverse domains of lexical usage (appropriateness, fluency, variation, sophistication, abstractness, and sense relations). For beginner-to-intermediate speakers, comprehensibility was related to basic uses of L2 vocabulary (fluent and accurate use of concrete words). For intermediate-to-advanced speakers, comprehensibility was linked to sophisticated uses of L2 lexis (morphologically accurate use of complex, less familiar, polysemous words). These findings, which highlight complex associations between lexical variables and L2 comprehensibility, suggest that improving comprehensibility requires attention to multiple lexical domains of L2 performance

Communicative focus on second language phonetic form: Teaching Japanese learners to perceive and produce English /ɹ/ without explicit instruction

The current study examines in depth how two types of form-focused instruction (FFI)—FFI with and without corrective feedback (CF)—can facilitate L2 speech perception and production of /ɹ/ by 49 Japanese learners in EFL settings. FFI effectiveness was assessed via three outcome measures (perception, controlled production, spontaneous production) and also according to two lexical contexts (trained, untrained items). Two experimental groups received four hours of FFI treatment to notice and practice the target feature of /ɹ/ (but without any explicit instruction) in meaningful discourse. A control group (n = 14) received comparable instruction in the absence of FFI. During FFI, the instructors provided CF only to students in the FFI+CF group (n = 18) by recasting their mispronunciations of /ɹ/, while no CF was provided to those in the FFI-only group (n = 17). Analyses of pre- and post-tests showed that (a) FFI itself can sufficiently promote the development of speech perception and production of /ɹ/, and (b) the acquisitional value of CF in L2 speech learning remains unclear. The results suggest that the beginner learners without much phonetic knowledge on how to repair their mispronunciation of /ɹ/ should be encouraged to learn the target sound only through FFI in a receptive mode without much pressure for modified output