K některým aspektům "German with ease" z hlediska akvizice jazyka

Bakalářská práce se zabývá postupem (resp. sekvencí) osvojování německého slovosledu a použitelností tohoto postupu při výuce cizího jazyka. Materiálový podklad zkoumání tvoří učebnice pro samouky "German with Ease" společnosti Assimil. Tato učebnice, podle názoru autorů, nabízí metodu výuky jazyka, která se zakládá na principech podobných těm, jež jsou uplatňovány při akvizici L1. Konkrétně je cílem práce posoudit, do jaké míry byla sekvence osvojování syntaxe v učebnici Assimil respektována. Svou povahou je tedy práce kritickou analýzou učebnice založenou na poznatcích z psycholingvistiky. Teoretická část práce podává popis učebnice a srovnává metodu Assimil s jinými existujícími metodami. Zároveň představuje psycholingvistické zázemí studia sekvencí v osvojování jazyka. Praktická část se soustřeďuje na kritéria výběru dat, následnou prezentaci těchto dat a jejich vyhodnocení. Na základě závěrů z praktické části jsou předloženy návrhy, které by měly přispět ke zkvalitnění učebnice.This bachelor thesis deals with a specific sequence in the acquisition of German verb placement. The actual subject of research is the language textbook for self-learners "German with Ease" produced by the company Assimil. The textbook supposedly offers a method based on similar principles, which apply in L1 acquisition. The goal of the thesis is to asses to what extent the acquisition sequence has been respected in the textbook. The thesis thus provides a critical analysis of the textbook on a psycholinguistic background. The theoretical part consists of a description of the textbook and compares the Assimil method with other existing methods. It also reviews the psycholinguistic research in the field of acquisition sequences. The practical part of the thesis describes data types and foci, data selection, data presentation and evaluation. Based on the conclusions of the practical part, changes are presented, which may result in the textbook quality enhancement.Institute of Germanic StudiesÚstav germánských studiíFilozofická fakultaFaculty of Art

Modeling Incoherent Discourse in Non-Affective Psychosis

Background: Computational linguistic methodology allows quantification of speech abnormalities in non-affective psychosis. For this patient group, incoherent speech has long been described as a symptom of formal thought disorder. Our study is an interdisciplinary attempt at developing a model of incoherence in non-affective psychosis, informed by computational linguistic methodology as well as psychiatric research, which both conceptualize incoherence as associative loosening. The primary aim of this pilot study was methodological: to validate the model against clinical data and reduce bias in automated coherence analysis. Methods: Speech samples were obtained from patients with a diagnosis of schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder, who were divided into two groups of n = 20 subjects each, based on different clinical ratings of positive formal thought disorder, and n = 20 healthy control subjects. Results: Coherence metrics that were automatically derived from interview transcripts significantly predicted clinical ratings of thought disorder. Significant results from multinomial regression analysis revealed that group membership (controls vs. patients with vs. without formal thought disorder) could be predicted based on automated coherence analysis when bias was considered. Further improvement of the regression model was reached by including variables that psychiatric research has shown to inform clinical diagnostics of positive formal thought disorder. Conclusions: Automated coherence analysis may capture different features of incoherent speech than clinical ratings of formal thought disorder. Models of incoherence in non-affective psychosis should include automatically derived coherence metrics as well as lexical and syntactic features that influence the comprehensibility of speech

On some aspects of "German with ease" from the point of view of language acquisition

This bachelor thesis deals with a specific sequence in the acquisition of German verb placement. The actual subject of research is the language textbook for self-learners "German with Ease" produced by the company Assimil. The textbook supposedly offers a method based on similar principles, which apply in L1 acquisition. The goal of the thesis is to asses to what extent the acquisition sequence has been respected in the textbook. The thesis thus provides a critical analysis of the textbook on a psycholinguistic background. The theoretical part consists of a description of the textbook and compares the Assimil method with other existing methods. It also reviews the psycholinguistic research in the field of acquisition sequences. The practical part of the thesis describes data types and foci, data selection, data presentation and evaluation. Based on the conclusions of the practical part, changes are presented, which may result in the textbook quality enhancement