Reference In Udi Narrative Discourse

This thesis examines concepts of reference assignment as seen in a written collection of narrative texts from Udi, a Caucasian language from the Lez gian family. This study explores the linguistic factors that affect reference assignment in Udi narrative in terms of participants, props and time and locative phrases. Reference assignment incorporates reference forms such as nouns, noun phrases, proper names and pronouns. All of these features aid in building the mental representation of the texts in the mind of the reader. Surface-level linguistic factors, such as cohesion, coherence, backgrounding, foregrounding and focus also interact with reference forms. This paper incorporates the Givenness Hierarchy, as proposed by Gundel, Hedberg and Zacharski (1993) and Relevance Theory (Wilson & Sperber 2004) to describe Udi linguistic reference forms. I will examine these forms according to Gundel, Hedberg and Zacharski\u27s hierarchy as a method of the introduction and tracking of participants, especially, in the narrative texts of the language. In terms of Relevance Theory, I will weigh whether these devices are used to signal to the reader that the referents they introduce are worth the effort of creating an enriched encyclopedic entry, since they can indicate the most relevant characters and objects throughout the narratives. These forms appear to motivate the reader to create space in those entries for the many facets of a participant\u27s role or characteristics

Individual Differences and Episodic Memory: Examining Behaviour, Genetics, and Brain Activity.

Dual-process models propose that two processes support recognition memory; familiarity, a general sense that something has been previously encountered; and recollection, the retrieval of details concerning the context in which a previous encounter occurred. Event-related potential (ERP) studies of recognition memory have identified a set of old/new effects that are thought to reflect these processes: the 300-500ms bilateral-frontal effect, thought to reflect familiarity and the 500-800ms left-parietal effect, thought to reflect recollection. Whilst the exact functional role of these effects remains unclear, they are widely viewed as reliable indices of retrieval. The ERP literature reviewed in this thesis suggests that the characteristics of these recognition effects vary with task specific details and individual participant differences, suggesting that the recognition effects purported to index retrieval may be conditional on both task and participant. This thesis examined the influence of individual differences on behavioural measures of recognition and the neural correlates of recognition memory, focusing on factors of stimulus material, task performance and participant genotype. Clear evidence of stimulus differences were found, with pictures eliciting more anteriorly distributed effects than words, and a late onsetting frontopolar old/new effect that was unique for voices. Furthermore, the pattern of ERP activity associated with successful recognition of faces appeared to vary as a function of general face recognition ability, with participants poorer at remembering faces exhibiting a 300-500ms old/new effect not present for those good at remembering faces. The data also suggested that activity over right-frontal electrodes, evident in some previous studies, may be participant specific and could reflect additional retrieval support processes. Contrary to expectations, behavioural task performance was not found to significantly modulate the ‘typical’ recognition memory effects. However, a number of genetic polymorphisms were found to significantly influence both behavioural scores and the pattern of ERP activity associated with recognition memory. These results therefore suggest that inherent participant differences influence the neural correlates of recognition memory, in a way that variations in task performance do not. Overall, the results from this thesis therefore suggest that the ‘typical’ bilateral-frontal and left-parietal effects thought to index retrieval are not universal. Furthermore the results suggest that the specific processes engaged during retrieval (as indexed by variations in ERP activity) may be dependent on specific task requirements, stimulus material and the genetic makeup of the individual

A functional electrical stimulation system for human walking inspired by reflexive control principles

This study presents an innovative multichannel functional electrical stimulation gait-assist system which employs a well-established purely reflexive control algorithm, previously tested in a series of bipedal walking robots. In these robots, ground contact information was used to activate motors in the legs, generating a gait cycle similar to that of humans. Rather than developing a sophisticated closed-loop functional electrical stimulation control strategy for stepping, we have instead utilised our simple reflexive model where muscle activation is induced through transfer functions which translate sensory signals, predominantly ground contact information, into motor actions. The functionality of the functional electrical stimulation system was tested by analysis of the gait function of seven healthy volunteers during functional electrical stimulation–assisted treadmill walking compared to unassisted walking. The results demonstrated that the system was successful in synchronising muscle activation throughout the gait cycle and was able to promote functional hip and ankle movements. Overall, the study demonstrates the potential of human-inspired robotic systems in the design of assistive devices for bipedal walking

Investigating the Functional Utility of the Left Parietal ERP Old/New Effect: Brain Activity Predicts Within but Not Between Participant Variance in Episodic Recollection.

A success story within neuroimaging has been the discovery of distinct neural correlates of episodic retrieval, providing insight into the processes that support memory for past life events. Here we focus on one commonly reported neural correlate, the left parietal old/new effect, a positive going modulation seen in Event-Related Potential (ERP) data that is widely considered to index episodic recollection. Substantial evidence links changes in the size of the left parietal effect to changes in remembering, but the precise functional utility of the effect remains unclear. Here, using forced choice recognition, we present a novel population level test of the hypothesis that the magnitude of the left parietal effect correlates with memory performance. We recorded ERPs in two large samples of healthy young adults, and successfully replicated existing within participant modulations of the magnitude of the left parietal effect with recollection. Critically, however, both datasets also show that across participants the magnitude of the left parietal effect does not correlate with behavioural measures of memory - including both subjective and objective estimates of recollection. We conclude that across participants, and tasks, variability in the magnitude of the left parietal old/new effect cannot be used to infer differences in memory. Taken together, these novel findings provide important constraints on the functional interpretation of the left parietal effect, suggesting that differences in the magnitude of old/new effects found between groups cannot be used to infer differences in recollection

The influence of life experiences on the development of resilience in older people with co-morbid health problems.

Background: Co-morbidity is a major late-life challenge with poor outcomes, yet many older people are resilient. We consider an ecopsychosocial framework of resilience to investigate this disparity. This theorises that sources of resilience may be personal, social and structural. We explored older people’s responses and reactions to significant life experiences, to understand resilience development for managing later life health challenges.Methods: We applied a two-stage, cross-sectional mixed-methods design to the Cognitive Function and Ageing Studies Wales (CFAS Wales). Participants’ defined quantitatively as resilient (high level of well-being despite co-morbidity) were identified in the wave 1 dataset. A sub-sample of the resilient participants aged 65+ were randomly selected for semi-structured interviews (N=20). Qualitative thematic analyses were both inductive and deductive.Results: The analyses revealed four primary life experiences reflecting different developmental trajectories. ‘Early years as formative’ and ‘work and employment as formative’ occurred at normative developmental stages in the life-course. In contrast non-normative life events such as loss, bereavement, illness of self and others underpinned the themes of ‘adverse events and experiences’ and ‘caring experiences’. Four potential mechanisms for resilience were central to these life experiences, reflecting reactions, actions and development: ‘character and self-identity’; ‘approach to life and insight’; ‘meaningful relationships and belonging’.Conclusions: This work contributes further theoretical insights into the ecopsychosocial resilience framework. It highlights the process of interdependence between the individual and the wider environment, suggesting how the availability and accessibility of resources and human agency (protective factors), can influence, and be influenced by, the timing of significant events and experiences. In doing so, it corroborates international healthy ageing policy which recognises resilience as important for a public health response to support older people to adjust to changes and losses experienced in later life. It highlights the importance of current and future policies and services for supporting the management of adverse events earlier in the life-course, and recommends that policies and services take a ‘long view’ on population health and well-being and consider the whole life-course, in addition to specific points in the ageing process