INSTRUCTIONAL METHODS FOR PROMOTING THE DEVELOPMENT OF ORTHOGRAPHIC AND PHONOLOGICAL KNOWLEDGE IN SECOND LANGUAGE LEARNERS OF INDIC LANGUAGES

In three experiments, I test whether the application of particular instructional principles improves the teaching of the orthographic and phonological systems of Indic languages to second language learners. In Experiment 1, I developed a mobile game that teaches 4th grade children Hindi decoding skills, with an emphasis on complex akshara. There were two versions of the game that varied in terms of stimuli spacing (narrow and wide). I found that the game improved participants’ akshara recognition and their ability to read and spell words that contain complex akshara. Both versions of the game yielded equivalent levels of improvement, but participants played the narrow spacing version faster. Analysis of the game data revealed interesting patterns of common mistakes. Children struggled with akshara that were non-linear and opaque. When spelling words, children struggled when the complex akshara crossed a syllabic boundary and they often made phonological errors. In Experiment 2, I examined whether motor encoding and testing benefit orthographic learning. I found that motor encoding benefits orthographic learning when tasks require pure orthographic knowledge or the production of an orthographic form when given a phonological form. Testing does not benefit beginning learners. In Experiment 3, I tested whether pedagogical differences or individual differences affect the learning of non-native phonemic contrasts. I found that learning of the difficult dental/retroflex contrast can be improved by increasing the voice onset times of the dental sounds. Both English phonological skills and rise time discrimination positively predict learning the non-native contrasts. Furthermore, pairing phonemes with English transliterations impairs discrimination learning, likely because of interference from the English pronunciation. Orthographic support helps people remember which phonemes are in words. Therefore, the use of akshara can benefit second language learners because the graphs are not already associated with phonological referents and the graphs help people remember which phonemes are in vocabulary words. When considered together, these three experiments suggest that multisensory encoding and reducing interference benefit second language learners

The Effect of Orthographic Neighborhood Size on the Extent of Priming

Mentor: Bradley Schlagger From the Washington University Undergraduate Research Digest: WUURD, Volume 6, Issue 2, Spring 2011. Published by the Office of Undergraduate Research, Joy Zalis Kiefer Director of Undergraduate Research and Assistant Dean in the College of Arts & Sciences; Kristin Sobotka, Editor

The Effect of Orthographic Neighborhood Size on the Extent of Priming

From the Washington University Senior Honors Thesis Abstracts (WUSHTA), Volume 3, Spring 2011. Published by the Office of Undergraduate Research. Henry Biggs, Director, Office of Undergraduate Research / Associate Dean, College of Arts & Sciences; Joy Zalis Kiefer, Office of Undergraduate Research / Assistant Dean in the College of Arts & Sciences; E. Holly Tasker, Editor; Kristin Sobotka, Undergraduate Research Coordinator. Mentor: Bradley Schlagge

The Effect of Orthographic Neighborhood Size on the Extent of Priming

A balance between efficient and accurate reading may be achieved by having tighter coding for words with high neighborhood densities (N) (where many words can be formed by changing one letter in the target word) and looser coding for low N words. Masked priming paradigms in adults (Castles, 1999; Forster et al., 1987) have shown facilitation on lexical decision tasks when low N word targets are preceded by form primes (e.g., ebey-OBEY), but form priming is not seen for high N targets. This finding suggests competition between orthographic neighbors and the target. In contrast, children up to grade 6 showed form priming for low N (i.e., \u3c 4 neighbors) and high N (i.e., \u3e 4 neighbors) words (Castles, 1999). However, it is unclear whether comparable form priming for high and low N words in children resulted from children not knowing the high N words’ neighbors (i.e., whether the high N stimuli were effectively low N in the study). This study used targets with very high N (i.e., \u3e 10 neighbors), assessed children’s knowledge for orthographic neighbors, and tested the developmental trajectory of form priming for low N (i.e., 0 neighbors) and high N (i.e., \u3e 10 neighbors) stimuli using a masked priming, lexical decision paradigm with children (8-12 years), adolescents (13-17 years), and adults (18-23 years). Post-experiment testing indicated that children knew approximately 9.6 of the neighbors for high N words, confirming that these stimuli were high N for children. When primed with a form prime, adults, adolescents, and children showed facilitation for the low N word targets. Children also showed facilitation for the high N targets, whereas adolescents showed non-significant inhibition and adults showed inhibition trending towards significance. The developmental trajectory in high N form priming was approximated using a cubic function, reaching adult-like levels around the age of thirteen. Thus, developmental differences in high N form priming are not the result of smaller effective N in children, ORTHOGRAPHIC NEIGHBORHOOD SIZE 3 suggesting a possible developmental change in how orthographic neighbors of a target word inhibit the target or compete with the target during lexical decision

Developmental differences in masked form priming are not driven by vocabulary growth

As children develop into skilled readers, they are able to more quickly and accurately distinguish between words with similar visual forms (i.e. they develop precise lexical representations). The masked form priming lexical decision task is used to test the precision of lexical representations. In this paradigm, a prime (which differs by one letter from the target) is briefly flashed before the target is presented. Participants make a lexical decision to the target. Primes can facilitate reaction time by partially activating the lexical entry for the target. If a prime is unable to facilitate reaction time, it is assumed that participants have a precise orthographic representation of the target and thus the prime is not a close enough match to activate its lexical entry. Previous developmental work has shown that children and adults' lexical decision times are facilitated by form primes preceding words from small neighborhoods (i.e. very few words can be formed by changing one letter in the original word; low N words), but only children are facilitated by form primes preceding words from large neighborhoods (high N words). It has been hypothesized that written vocabulary growth drives the increase in the precision of the orthographic representations; children may not know all of the neighbors of the high N words, making the words effectively low N for them. We tested this hypothesis by 1) equating the effective orthographic neighborhood size of the targets for children and adults and 2) testing whether age or vocabulary size was a better predictor of the extent of form priming. We found priming differences even when controlling for effective neighborhood size. Furthermore, age was a better predictor of form priming effects than vocabulary size. Our findings provide no support for the hypothesis that growth in written vocabulary size gives rise to more precise lexical representations. We propose that the development of spelling ability may be a more important factor