Under What Conditions Can Recursion be Learned? Effects of Starting Small in Artificial Grammar Learning of Center Embedded Structure

It has been suggested that external and/or internal limitations paradoxically may lead to superior learning, i.e., the concepts of starting small and less is more (Elman, 1993; Newport, 1990). In this paper, we explore the type of incremental ordering during training that might help learning, and what mechanism explains this facilitation. We report four artificial grammar learning experiments with human participants. In Experiments 1a and 1b we found a beneficial effect of starting small using two types of simple recursive grammars: right-branching and center-embedding, with recursive embedded clauses in fixed positions and fixed length. This effect was replicated in Experiment 2 (N=100). In Experiment 3 and 4, we used a more complex center-embedded grammar with recursive loops in variable positions, producing strings of variable length. When participants were presented an incremental ordering of training stimuli, as in natural language, they were better able to generalize their knowledge of simple units to more complex units when the training input ‘grew’ according to structural complexity, compared to when it ‘grew’ according to string length. Overall, the results suggest that starting small confers an advantage for learning complex center-embedded structures when the input is organized according to structural complexity.This research has been supported in part by a grant from the Human Frontiers Science Program (grant RGP0177/2001-B) to MHC, and by the Netherlands Organization for scientific Research (NWO) to FH

Prizes and Incentives in Elimination Tournaments

The role of rewards for maintaining performance incentives in multistage, sequential games of survival is studied. The sequential structure is a statistical design-of-experiments for selecting and ranking contestants. It promotes survival of the fittest and saves sampling costs by early elimination of weaker contenders. Analysis begins with the case where competitors' talents are common knowledge and is extended to cases where talents are unknown. It is shown that extra weight must be placed on top ranking prizes to maintain performance incentives of survivors at all stages of the game. The extra weight at the top induces competitors to aspire to higher goals independent of past achievements. In career games workers have many rungs in the hierarchical ladder to aspire to in the early stages of their careers, and this plays an important role in maintaining their enthusiasm for continuing. But the further one has climbed, the fewer the rungs left to attain. If top prizes are not large enough, those who have succeeded in attaining higher ranks rest on their laurels and slack off in their attempts to climb higher. Elevating the top prizes makes the ladder appear longer for higher ranking contestants, and in the limit makes it appear of unbounded length: no matter how far one has climbed, it looks as if there is always the same length to go. Concentrating prize money on the top ranks eliminates the no-tomorrow aspects of competition in the final stages.

Recursion in cognition: a computational investigation into the representation and processing of language

La recursividad entendida como auto-referencia se puede aplicar a varios constructos de las ciencias cognitivas, como las definiciones teóricas, los procedimientos mecánicos, los procesos de cálculo (sean éstos abstractos o concretos) o las estructuras. La recursividad es una propiedad central tanto del procedimiento mecánico que subyace a la facultad del lenguaje como de las estructuras que esta facultad genera. Sin embargo, tanto las derivaciones sintácticas de la gramática, que constituyen un proceso computacional abstracto, como las estrategias de procesamiento del parser, que son un proceso en tiempo real, proceden de forma iterativa, lo cual sugiere que la especificación recursiva de un algoritmo se implementa de forma iterativa. Además, la combinación de la recursividad con las unidades léxicas y las imposiciones de los interfaces con los que la facultad del lenguaje interactúa resulta en un conjunto de estructuras sui generis que no tienen parangón en otros dominios cognitivos.Recursion qua self-reference applies to various constructs within the cognitive sciences, such as theoretical definitions, mechanical procedures (or algorithms), (abstract or real-time) computational processes and structures. Recursion is an intrinsic property of both the mechanical procedure underlying the language faculty and the structures this faculty generates. However, the recursive nature of the generated structures and the recursive character of the processes need to be kept distinct, their study meriting individual treatment. In fact, the nature of both the syntactic derivations of the grammar (an abstract computational process) and the processing strategies of the parser (a real-time process) are iterative, which suggests that recursively-defined algorithms are implemented iteratively in linguistic cognition. Furthermore, the combination of recursion, lexical items and the impositions of the interfaces the language faculty interacts with results in a sui generis set of structures with which other domains of the mind bear the most superficial of relations

Computer Assisted Language Learning For Spanish Oral Proficiency

ABSTRACT COMPUTER ASSISTED LANGUAGE LEARNING FOR SPANISH ORAL PROFICIENCY by MAY RITTA BLUESTEIN December 2017 Advisor: Dr. Jazlin Ebenezer Major: Curriculum and Instruction Degree: Doctor of Philosophy This three-article five-chapter dissertation is focused on improving high school students’ Spanish oral proficiency through computer assisted language learning (CALL) voice-recordings, and examining the effect of the intervention on foreign language anxiety and integrative motivation. The main goals of the study as a whole were to (1) investigate students’ CALL voice-recordings to determine students’ Spanish oral proficiency development, (2) identify significant differences between the experimental and control group in terms of Spanish oral proficiency, anxiety and integrative motivation, and (3) investigate experimental and control students’ perceptions of their Spanish oral proficiency, anxiety and integrative motivation as a result of the CALL voice-recordings and traditional oral assessments, respectively. Overall, the study employed a mixed-methods approach. Article one consisted of an intervention on fourteen Spanish level-two high school students, engaging them in eight successive CALL task voice-recordings, which were transcribed verbatim and translated. The student scores for each of the eight CALL task voice-recordings were collected to assess the development of students’ oral proficiency. A post-intervention focus group interview and self-reflective journals were used to identify the qualitatively differing ways the students perceived their experiences using the CALL curricular unit for developing their Spanish oral proficiency. Articles two and three employed a mixed methods approach, using quantitative measures such as the Foreign Language Anxiety Scale (FLCAS) and the mini-Attitude and Motivation Test Battery (AMTB) to find significant differences in anxiety and integrative motivation between the experimental and control group. FLCAS and mini-AMTB data were collected and analyzed using the Mann-Whitney U tests comparing both groups; anxiety and motivation levels. Qualitative post-focus group interviews were conducted with experimental and control students, and experimental students’ perceptions were written in a self-reflective journal post-study. In article one, the qualitative results of the CALL tasks oral recordings revealed that the students’ Spanish oral language proficiency meaningful output was high, medium, or low. Specific areas of students’ growth in verb conjugation or weakness in pronunciation, expressions and vocabulary, and grammatical structures were also identified. The qualitatively differing ways students perceived CALL task recordings were as follows: anxiety decrease, motivation and confidence increase, and speaking improvement. Friedman’s tests were run to find significant differences in the students’ oral proficiency from one to eight consecutive tasks. The p-values 0.003, 0.007, 0.002, 0.003, and 0.007 of the students’ scores on CALL tasks (2, 4, 5, 6, and 7) respectively, when compared to task 8, show a significant difference. Too, these quantitative results indicate that students’ meaningful output significantly improved by the time they reached the last task. In article two, Mann-Whitney U tests were run to find significant differences in the experimental group’s anxiety in comparison to the control group’s anxiety, both pre-and post study. Pearson correlations were run to find that a strong correlation exists between post-FLCAS scores and students’ achievement, and the results of the post-focus group interviews and self-reflective journals show a decrease in anxiety by the end of the study, corroborating the negative correlation found between anxiety and achievement. In article three, Mann-Whitney U tests were run to find significant differences in the experimental group’s integrative motivation in comparison to the control group’s integrative motivation, both pre- and post-study. Pearson correlations were run to find that a strong correlation exists between post-mini AMTB scores and students’ achievement. The results of the post-focus group interviews, and experimental students’ reflective journals, show an increase in motivation and confidence by the end of the study, corroborating the positive correlation found between integrative motivation and achievement. The results of article one imply CALL task oral recordings accompanied by self-evaluation and teacher feedback help students develop oral proficiency, archive meaningful output, monitor their own learning, and experience lower anxiety, higher motivation, and confidence towards speaking Spanish. Article two implies that increased oral communication experience leads to decreased anxiety, CALL oral tasks specifically help in decreasing anxiety towards speaking, and such decrease in anxiety leads to achievement on other assessments. Finally, article three implies that increased oral communication experience leads to increased integrative motivation, CALL oral tasks specifically help to increase motivation towards speaking, and such increase in motivation leads to achievement on other assessments

First and Second Language Acquisition of Recursive Operations: Two Studies

Linguistic theory has increasingly revolved around the notion of recursion. Most recently, many have advocated a view wherein it forms the essence of the Language Acquisition Device (LAD) purportedly contained in the human mind, while others have argued that it remains a separate and not necessarily related component of language processing. L1 Acquisition theory has suggested that appropriate recursive input is required to activate the LAD’s recursive faculties; nonetheless, L1 recursive structures may resist instruction and cause initial confusion among children. The effect that any of this may have on L2 has only begun to be studied. This dissertation attempts to fill this gap in knowledge by describing two experiments which concentrate on the interpretation of adjacent prepositional phrases (PPs). The first experiment exploits the similarity of PPs in Spanish and English by using identical prompts in both languages and with both L1 and L2 speakers, while the second experiment studies the growth of their recursivity in L1 acquisition in English. Both experiments also study the effect that unique pairs of prepositions have on this as well as the effect created by extending the chain of adjacent PPs beyond only two. The results provide a valuable insight into the interpretation of these structures. Recursive responses suggest an L2 path to acquisition which may result in L1 levels of performance. Yet Spanish and English each display their own behavior patterns, revealing dissimilarities that suggest Spanish possesses a more productive right-recursive rule than does English. Growth in L1 child English is also clearly observed in some scenarios but not in all. The important role individual prepositions clearly play is observed in both experiments, with unique pairs having unique levels of recursion. Increasing complexity of the NP based on number of PPs also entrenches recursion in interpretation. Nonetheless, certain participants resist recursion in multiple scenarios, a fact which may support an argument for targeted recursive input

Syntax with oscillators and energy levels

This book presents a new approach to studying the syntax of human language, one which emphasizes how we think about time. Tilsen argues that many current theories are unsatisfactory because those theories conceptualize syntactic patterns with spatially arranged structures of objects. These object-structures are atemporal and do not lend well to reasoning about time. The book develops an alternative conceptual model in which oscillatory systems of various types interact with each other through coupling forces, and in which the relative energies of those systems are organized in particular ways. Tilsen emphasizes that the two primary mechanisms of the approach – oscillators and energy levels – require alternative ways of thinking about time. Furthermore, his theory leads to a new way of thinking about grammaticality and the recursive nature of language. The theory is applied to a variety of syntactic phenomena: word order, phrase structure, morphosyntax, constituency, case systems, ellipsis, anaphora, and islands. The book also presents a general program for the study of language in which the construction of linguistic theories is itself an object of theoretical analysis. Reviewed by John Goldsmith, Mark Gibson and an anonymous reviewer. Signed reports are openly available in the downloads session

Syntax with oscillators and energy levels

This book presents a new approach to studying the syntax of human language, one which emphasizes how we think about time. Tilsen argues that many current theories are unsatisfactory because those theories conceptualize syntactic patterns with spatially arranged structures of objects. These object-structures are atemporal and do not lend well to reasoning about time. The book develops an alternative conceptual model in which oscillatory systems of various types interact with each other through coupling forces, and in which the relative energies of those systems are organized in particular ways. Tilsen emphasizes that the two primary mechanisms of the approach – oscillators and energy levels – require alternative ways of thinking about time. Furthermore, his theory leads to a new way of thinking about grammaticality and the recursive nature of language. The theory is applied to a variety of syntactic phenomena: word order, phrase structure, morphosyntax, constituency, case systems, ellipsis, anaphora, and islands. The book also presents a general program for the study of language in which the construction of linguistic theories is itself an object of theoretical analysis. Reviewed by John Goldsmith, Mark Gibson and an anonymous reviewer. Signed reports are openly available in the downloads session

Syntax with oscillators and energy levels

This book presents a new approach to studying the syntax of human language, one which emphasizes how we think about time. Tilsen argues that many current theories are unsatisfactory because those theories conceptualize syntactic patterns with spatially arranged structures of objects. These object-structures are atemporal and do not lend well to reasoning about time. The book develops an alternative conceptual model in which oscillatory systems of various types interact with each other through coupling forces, and in which the relative energies of those systems are organized in particular ways. Tilsen emphasizes that the two primary mechanisms of the approach – oscillators and energy levels – require alternative ways of thinking about time. Furthermore, his theory leads to a new way of thinking about grammaticality and the recursive nature of language. The theory is applied to a variety of syntactic phenomena: word order, phrase structure, morphosyntax, constituency, case systems, ellipsis, anaphora, and islands. The book also presents a general program for the study of language in which the construction of linguistic theories is itself an object of theoretical analysis. Reviewed by John Goldsmith, Mark Gibson and an anonymous reviewer. Signed reports are openly available in the downloads session

Syntax with oscillators and energy levels

This book presents a new approach to studying the syntax of human language, one which emphasizes how we think about time. Tilsen argues that many current theories are unsatisfactory because those theories conceptualize syntactic patterns with spatially arranged structures of objects. These object-structures are atemporal and do not lend well to reasoning about time. The book develops an alternative conceptual model in which oscillatory systems of various types interact with each other through coupling forces, and in which the relative energies of those systems are organized in particular ways. Tilsen emphasizes that the two primary mechanisms of the approach – oscillators and energy levels – require alternative ways of thinking about time. Furthermore, his theory leads to a new way of thinking about grammaticality and the recursive nature of language. The theory is applied to a variety of syntactic phenomena: word order, phrase structure, morphosyntax, constituency, case systems, ellipsis, anaphora, and islands. The book also presents a general program for the study of language in which the construction of linguistic theories is itself an object of theoretical analysis. Reviewed by John Goldsmith, Mark Gibson and an anonymous reviewer. Signed reports are openly available in the downloads session