Biological and Cognitive Plausibility in Connectionist Networks for Language Modeling

If we want to explain cognitive processes with means of connectionist networks, these networks have to correspond with cognitive systems and their underlying biological mechanisms in different respects. The question of biological and cognitive plausibility of connectionist models arises from two different aspects – first, from the aspect of biology – on one hand, one has to have a fair understanding of biological mechanisms and cognitive mechanisms in order to represent them in a model, and on the other hand there is the aspect of modeling – one has to know how to construct a model to represent precisely what we are aiming at. Computer power and modeling techniques have improved dramatically in recent 20 years, so the plausibility problem is being addressed in more adequate ways as well. Connectionist models are often used for representing different aspects of natural language. Their biological plausibility had sometimes been questioned in the past. Today, the field of computational neuroscience offers several acceptable possibilities of modeling higher cognitive functions, and language is among them. This paper brings a presentation of some existing connectionist networks modeling natural language. The question of their explanatory power and plausibility in terms of biological and cognitive systems they are representing is discussed

The Linking of Prepositional Meanings in the Mental Lexikon of Croatian High School Students Learning German and English

In der vorliegenden Arbeit werden Interferenzerscheinungen im Bereich der Präpositionen untersucht. Als Versuchspersonen wurden die Schüler eines Zagreber Gymnasiums zu ihren Kenntnissen im Gebrauch von Präpositionen im Deutschen, Englischen und Kroatischen befragt. Die Muttersprache Kroatisch zeigte sich stabil und weist erwartungsgemäß keine Einflüsse aus den Fremdsprachen auf. Obwohl Deutsch meistens als die 'schwächere' und 'weniger beliebte' Fremdsprache gilt, und, wie angenommen, einige interferenzbedingte Einflüsse aus dem Englischen und Kroatischen empfängt, wurden in der vorliegenden Analyse auch wesentliche übertragungen aus dem Deutschen ins Englische entdeckt, wodurch die Position des Englischen als der 'stärkeren' und 'besser bewältigten' Fremdsprache in Frage gestellt wird.The following article studies interference phenomena in the field of prepositions and presents the results of a survey conducted among students of one grammar high school in Zagreb, who were tested for their knowledge of Croatian, English and German prepositions. As expected, there could not be found any examples of foreign influence in their native language – Croatian. In spite of the fact that German is often perceived as the "weaker" and "less popular" language in comparison to English and that there was some interference of German prepositions with those from English and Croatian, the analysis of the results also shows that there have been significant transfers of meanings from German to English, which undermines the status of English as the "better" and "easily acquired" foreign language

Foreign language eff ect and moral decision making

Efekt stranoga jezika odnosi se na razlike u ishodima procesa donošenja odluka ovisno o tome odvija li se on na materinskom ili stranom jeziku. Cilj ovog istraživanja bio je ispitati postoji li efekt stranog jezika na procjenjivanje etičnosti postupanja u različitim situacijama, odnosno ispitati utječe li jezik na kojem je moralna dilema prezentirana na procjene prihvatljivosti kršenja moralnih normi. Moralne dileme upotrijebljene u istraživanju opisivale su širok raspon situacija: od onih s kojima se susrećemo u svakodnevnom životu pa do situacija u kojima je potrebno odlučivati o životima ljudi, a razlikovale su se i s obzirom na to koliko su teški moralni prekršaji koje opisuju. U istraživanju su sudjelovali studenti germanistike Filozofskog fakulteta Sveučilišta u Zagrebu, koji su po slučaju raspodijeljeni u dvije skupine, jednu koja je ispunjavala upitnike na hrvatskom jeziku i drugu koje je ispunjavala upitnike na njemačkom jeziku. Istraživanje se sastojalo od tri dijela. Prvi dio činio je Upitnik svakodnevnog morala i socijalnih normi, drugi se dio sastojao od tri moralne dileme koje su opisivale moralne prekršaje različitog stupnja težine, a posljednji dio sastojao se od priča koje su opisivale situacije u kojima je bilo potrebno odlučivati o životima ljudi. Zadatak sudionika bio je procijeniti koliko je opisani postupak moralno pogrešan. Rezultati upućuju na postojanje efekta stranog jezika onda kada se radilo o blažim moralnim prekršajima i onda kada je bilo potrebno odlučivati o životima – sudionici koji su rješavali zadatke na hrvatskom jeziku procjenjivali su opisane situacije više pogrešnima od onih koji su iste zadatke rješavali na njemačkom jeziku. Efekta nije bilo u situaciji velikog moralnog prijestupa kao ni u upitniku svakodnevnog morala i socijalnih normi.Foreign language eff ect (FLE) refers to different outcomes of the decision–making process depending on whether it is carried out in a native or a foreign language. The aim of this study was to examine whether the FLE is present in the assessment of moral wrongness of behaviour in diff erent scenarios. Put differently, the aim was to examine whether the language in which the moral dilemma was presented influenced ratings of acceptability of violating moral norms. Dilemmas used in the research described a wide range of situations ranging from the ones that could be faced in everyday life to the situations in which decisions about people’s lives had to be made and diff ered in degree of violation of moral norms they described. The study participants, students of German Language and Literature from the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zagreb, were divided into two groups: one group completed the questionnaire in Croatian, while the other group completed it in German. Th e questionnaire consisted of three parts: a Questionnaire of Everyday Morality and Social Norms, three moral dilemmas describing moral misdeeds of varying degrees, and scenarios describing situations in which it was necessary to decide on the lives of people. Th e task of the participant was to rate the moral wrongness of the described behaviour. Th e results show that FLE was present in mild moral offences as well as when it was necessary to decide on the lives of people – participants who assessed violating moral norms in the Croatian language rated them as less acceptable than those who assessed the same violations in German. Th e eff ect was not present for great moral off ense nor in the Questionnaire of Everyday Morality and Social Norms

Acquisition of verbs in Croatian, French and Austrian German - an outline of a comparative analysis

Research of child language acquisition, i. e. comparisons of acquisition in typologically different languages, play a significant role in shedding some light on universal linguistic features. The aim of our paper is to compare acquisition of verbal morphology in three languages belonging to different branches of IndoEuropean languages and to compare developing verbal systems in children as well as the order of emergence of verbal forms in each of them. Furthermore, the results on regularities occurring in all three languages have been discussed. The analysis of process of developing verbal system within each particular language is based on tense and mood. Provided error analysis gave us some further insights into the linguistically active role that child takes at certain stage of its linguistic development. The intention of this paper is to point to relevant aspects of developing linguistic system common to all three analysed languages, but at the same time drawing the attention to those language segments that need to be taken into consideration due to the limitations imposed by the language variations

Acquisition of verbs in Croatian, French and Austrian German - an outline of a comparative analysis

Research of child language acquisition, i. e. comparisons of acquisition in typologically different languages, play a significant role in shedding some light on universal linguistic features. The aim of our paper is to compare acquisition of verbal morphology in three languages belonging to different branches of IndoEuropean languages and to compare developing verbal systems in children as well as the order of emergence of verbal forms in each of them. Furthermore, the results on regularities occurring in all three languages have been discussed. The analysis of process of developing verbal system within each particular language is based on tense and mood. Provided error analysis gave us some further insights into the linguistically active role that child takes at certain stage of its linguistic development. The intention of this paper is to point to relevant aspects of developing linguistic system common to all three analysed languages, but at the same time drawing the attention to those language segments that need to be taken into consideration due to the limitations imposed by the language variations