Moving beyond the monosyllable in models of skilled reading:Mega-study of disyllabic nonword reading

AbstractMost English words are polysyllabic, yet research on reading aloud typically focuses on monosyllables. Forty-one skilled adult readers read aloud 915 disyllabic nonwords that shared important characteristics with English words. Stress, pronunciation, and naming latencies were analyzed and compared to data from three computational accounts of disyllabic reading, including a rule-based algorithm (Rastle & Coltheart, 2000) and connectionist approaches (the CDP++ model of Perry, Ziegler, & Zorzi, 2010, and the print-to-stress network of Ševa, Monaghan, & Arciuli, 2009). Item-based regression analyses revealed orthographic and phonological influences on modal human stress assignment, pronunciation variability, and naming latencies, while human and model data comparisons revealed important strengths and weaknesses of the opposing accounts. Our dataset provides the first normative nonword corpus for British English and the largest database of its kind for any language; hence, it will be critical for assessing generalization performance in future developments of computational models of reading

Traumatic brain injury in England and Wales: prospective audit of epidemiology, complications and standardised mortality.

OBJECTIVES: To provide a comprehensive assessment of the management of traumatic brain injury (TBI) relating to epidemiology, complications and standardised mortality across specialist units. DESIGN: The Trauma Audit and Research Network collects data prospectively on patients suffering trauma across England and Wales. We analysed all data collected on patients with TBI between April 2014 and June 2015. SETTING: Data were collected on patients presenting to emergency departments across 187 hospitals including 26 with specialist neurosurgical services, incorporating factors previously identified in the Ps14 multivariate logistic regression (Ps14n) model multivariate TBI outcome prediction model. The frequency and timing of secondary transfer to neurosurgical centres was assessed. RESULTS: We identified 15 820 patients with TBI presenting to neurosurgical centres directly (6258), transferred from a district hospital to a neurosurgical centre (3682) and remaining in a district general hospital (5880). The commonest mechanisms of injury were falls in the elderly and road traffic collisions in the young, which were more likely to present in coma. In severe TBI (Glasgow Coma Score (GCS) ≤8), the median time from admission to imaging with CT scan is 0.5 hours. Median time to craniotomy from admission is 2.6 hours and median time to intracranial pressure monitoring is 3 hours. The most frequently documented complication of severe TBI is bronchopneumonia in 5% of patients. Risk-adjusted W scores derived from the Ps14n model indicate that no neurosurgical unit fell outside the 3 SD limits on a funnel plot. CONCLUSIONS: We provide the first comprehensive report of the management of TBI in England and Wales, including data from all neurosurgical units. These data provide transparency and suggests equity of access to high-quality TBI management provided in England and Wales.AH is supported by the University of Cambridge, UK and Medical Research Council/Royal College of Surgeons of England Clinical Research Training Fellowship (Grant no. G0802251). P.J.H. is supported by National Institute for Health Research Professorship, Academy of Medical Sciences/Health Foundation Senior Surgical Scientist Fellowship and the National Institute for Health Research Biomedical Research Centre, Cambridge.This is the final version of the article. It first appeared from the BMJ Publishing Group. via https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2016- 01219

The Bilingual cost in speech production : studies of phonological and articulatory processes

The main objective of this dissertation is to examine the consequences of bilingualism on speech production. Previous research has shown that bilingual speakers experience a cost compared to monolinguals in a variety of linguistic experiments. We investigated the origins of the bilingual cost by exploring influences of particular variables such as phonological similarity. Moreover, we investigated the scope of the bilingual cost by assessing speech performance, focusing on articulatory durations and noun-phrase production. We provide evidence that increased phonological similarity among words within one language slows speech, whereas increased phonological similarity across translations helps bilinguals to overcome the bilingual cost. In addition, our results show that the bilingual cost generalizes to articulatory durations and noun-phrase production. The current dissertation provides a more specific understanding of speech processing at phonological and articulatory stages in mono- and bilinguals, and extends our knowledge on the bilingual cost in speech production.El objetivo principal de esta tesis es examinar las consecuencias del bilingüismo en la producción del habla. Estudios anteriores han demostrado que los hablantes bilingües presentan una mayor dificultad que los monolingües durante la realización de diferentes experimentos lingüísticos. Investigamos los orígenes del coste del bilingüismo, explorando los efectos de variables como la similitud fonológica. Además, investigamos el alcance del coste, evaluando las duraciones articulatorias durante el habla y la producción de sintagmas nominales. Mostramos que una mayor similitud fonológica entre palabras de una lengua ralentiza el habla, mientras que una mayor similitud entre traducciones ayudó a los bilingües a superar el coste. Finalmente, demostramos que el coste bilingüe se extiende a las duraciones articulatorias y a la producción de sintagmas nominales. Esta tesis aporta nuevas evidencias acerca del efecto que la similitud fonológica tiene sobre la producción del habla y proporciona un conocimiento más específico sobre cómo el bilingüismo influye durante las últimas fases del procesamiento del habla

Effects of Bilingualism on Multi-Word Production

It has been shown that bilinguals are disadvantaged on some language production tasks when compared to monolinguals. The present study investigated the effects of bilingualism on lexical retrieval in single and multi-word utterances. To this purpose, we tested three groups of 35 participants each (Spanish monolinguals, highly proficient Spanish-Catalan and Catalan-Spanish bilinguals) in two sets of picture naming experiments. In the first one, participants were asked to name black-and-white object drawings by single words. In the second one, participants had to name colored pictures with determiner adjectival noun phrases (NP) like “the red car”. In both sets of experiments, bilinguals were slower than monolinguals, even when naming in their dominant language. We also examined the articulatory durations of both single word and NP productions for this bilingual disadvantage. Furthermore, response onset times and durations of all groups in both experiments were affected by lexical variables of the picture names. These results are consistent with previous studies (Ivanova & Costa, 2008, Gollan et al., 2005) showing a bilingual disadvantage in single word production and extend these findings to multiword-utterances and response durations. They also support the claim that articulatory processes are influenced by lexical variables

Le coût bilingue dans la production de la parole : des études sur les processus phonologiques et articulatoires

L'objectif principal de cette thèse est d'étudier les conséquences du bilinguisme sur la production de la parole. Des recherches antérieures ont montré que les locuteurs bilingues montrent un coût par rapport aux monolingues dans différentes expériences linguistiques. Nous avons étudié les origines du coût bilingue en explorant l'influence de variables spécifiques comme la similitude phonologique. En outre, nous avons examiné la portée du coût bilingue en évaluant des durées articulatoires de la parole et la production de groupes nominaux. Nous rapportons que l'augmentation de la similarité phonologique entre les mots d'une même langue ralentit la parole, alors que l'augmentation de la similarité phonologique entre les langues aide les bilingues à surmonter le coût bilingue. En outre, nos résultats ont montré que le coût bilingue se généralise aux phases articulatoires et à la production de groupes nominaux. Cette thèse fournit de nouvelles données sur le traitement de la parole pendant les stades phonologiques et articulatoires chez les locuteurs mono- et bilingues, et étend notre connaissance sur le coût bilingue en production de parole.The main objective of this dissertation is to examine the consequences of bilingualism on speech production. Previous research has shown that bilingual speakers experience a cost compared to monolinguals in a variety of linguistic experiments. We investigated the origins of the bilingual cost by exploring influences of particular variables such as phonological similarity. Moreover, we investigated the scope of the bilingual cost by assessing speech performance, focusing on articulatory durations and noun-phrase production. We provide evidence that increased phonological similarity among words within one language slows speech, whereas increased phonological similarity across translations helps bilinguals to overcome the bilingual cost. In addition, our results show that the bilingual cost generalizes to articulatory durations and noun-phrase production. The current dissertation provides a more specific understanding of speech processing at phonological and articulatory stages in mono- and bilinguals, and extends our knowledge on the bilingual cost in speech production.El objetivo principal de esta tesis es examinar las consecuencias del bilingüismo en la producción del habla. Estudios anteriores han demostrado que los hablantes bilingües presentan una mayor dificultad que los monolingües durante la realización de diferentes experimentos lingüísticos. Investigamos los orígenes del coste del bilingüismo, explorando los efectos de variables como la similitud fonológica. Además, investigamos el alcance del coste, evaluando las duraciones articulatorias durante el habla y la producción de sintagmas nominales. Mostramos que una mayor similitud fonológica entre palabras de una lengua ralentiza el habla, mientras que una mayor similitud entre traducciones ayudó a los bilingües a superar el coste. Finalmente, demostramos que el coste bilingüe se extiende a las duraciones articulatorias y a la producción de sintagmas nominales. Esta tesis aporta nuevas evidencias acerca del efecto que la similitud fonológica tiene sobre la producción del habla y proporciona un conocimiento más específico sobre cómo el bilingüismo influye durante las últimas fases del procesamiento del habla

Characterizing the Bilingual Disadvantage in Noun Phrase Production

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Reconciling phonological neighborhood effects in speech production through single trial analysis

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Sequential processing during noun phrase production

International audienceThis study examined whether the brain operations involved during the processing of successive words in multi word noun phrase production take place sequentially or simultaneously. German speakers named pictures while ignoring a written distractor superimposed on the picture (picture-word interference paradigm) using the definite determiner and corresponding German noun. The gender congruency and the phonological congruency (i.e., overlap in first phonemes) between target and distractor were manipulated. Naming responses and EEG were recorded. The behavioural performance replicated both the phonology and the gender congruency effects (i.e., shorter naming latencies for gender congruent than incongruent and for phonologically congruent than incongruent trials). The phonological and gender manipulations also influenced the EEG data. Crucially, the two effects occurred in different time windows and over different sets of electrodes. The phonological effect was observed substantially earlier than the gender congruency effect. This finding suggests that the processing of determiners and nouns during determiner noun phrase production occurs at least partly sequentially. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved

On the temporal and functional origin of L2 disadvantages in speech production: a critical review

Despite a large amount of psycholinguistic research devoted to the issue of processing differences between a first and a second language, there is no consensus regarding the locus where these emerge or the mechanism behind them. The aim of this article is to briefly examine both the behavioral and neuroscientific evidence in order to critically assess three hypotheses that have been put forward in the literature to explain such differences: the weaker links, executive control, and post-lexical accounts. We conclude that (a) while all stages of processing are likely to be slowed down when speaking in an L2 compared to an L1, the differences seem to originate at a lexical stage; and (b) frequency of use seems to be the variable mainly responsible for these bilingual processing disadvantages.This work was supported by grants from the Spanish government (PSI2008-01191, Consolider Ingenio 2010 CSD2007-00012) and the Catalan government (Consolidado SGR 2009-1521), a predoctoral grant from the Catalan government (FI) to Elin Runnqvist and predoctoral grants from the Spanish government (FPU) to Kristof Strijkers and Jasmin Sadat