Children\u27s Sensitivity to Pitch Variation in Language

Children acquire consonant and vowel categories by 12 months, but take much longer to learn to interpret perceptible variation. This dissertation considers children’s interpretation of pitch variation. Pitch operates, often simultaneously, at different levels of linguistic structure. English-learning children must disregard pitch at the lexical level—since English is not a tone language—while still attending to pitch for its other functions. Chapters 1 and 5 outline the learning problem and suggest ways children might solve it. Chapter 2 demonstrates that 2.5-year-olds know pitch cannot differentiate words in English. Chapter 3 finds that not until age 4–5 do children correctly interpret pitch cues to emotions. Chapter 4 demonstrates some sensitivity between 2.5 and 5 years to the pitch cue to lexical stress, but continuing difficulties at the older ages. These findings suggest a late trajectory for interpretation of prosodic variation; throughout, I propose explanations for this protracted time-course

Data From: Developmental Change in English-Learning Children’s Interpretations of Salient Pitch Contours in Word Learning

To efficiently recognize words, children learning an intonational language like English should avoid interpreting pitch-contour variation as signaling lexical contrast, despite the relevance of pitch at other levels of structure. Thus far, the developmental time-course with which English-learning children rule out pitch as a contrastive feature has been incompletely characterized. Prior studies have tested diverse lexical contrasts and have not tested beyond 30 months. To specify the developmental trajectory over a broader age range, we extended a prior study (Quam & Swingley, 2010), in which 30-month-olds and adults disregarded pitch changes, but attended to vowel changes, in newly learned words. Using the same phonological contrasts, we tested 3- to 5-year-olds, 24-month-olds, and 18-month-olds. The older two groups were tested using the language-guided-looking method. The oldest group attended to vowels but not pitch. Surprisingly, 24-month-olds ignored not just pitch but sometimes vowels as well—conflicting with prior findings of phonological constraint at 24 months. The youngest group was tested using the Switch habituation method, half with additional phonetic variability in training. Eighteen-month-olds learned both pitch-contrasted and vowel-contrasted words, whether or not additional variability was present. Thus, native-language phonological constraint was not evidenced prior to 30 months (Quam & Swingley, 2010). Given the surprising insensitivity to mispronunciations at 24 months, we tested 24-month-olds in two additional experiments, which are reported in Supplemental Materials. Experiment S1 tested 24-month-olds in the low-variability condition of the Switch procedure used at 18 months, finding that—in contrast to 18-month-olds—24-month-olds did not detect switches to the trained word-object pairings when the switches involved either a pitch change or a vowel change. Experiment S2 again used Switch habituation training, but tested children in a language-guided looking test instead of a Switch test (Yoshida, Fennell, Swingley, & Werker, 2009). Again, 24-month-olds showed no evidence of detecting subtle differences in word pronunciations. The data from all five experiments (1, 2, 3, S1, S2) are included in the data files in the interests of transparency

Procedural-Memory, Working-Memory, and Declarative-Memory Skills Are Each Associated With Dimensional Integration in Sound-Category Learning

This paper investigates relationships between procedural-memory, declarative-memory, and working-memory skills and adult native English speakers’ novel sound-category learning. Participants completed a sound-categorization task that required integrating two dimensions: one native (vowel quality), one non-native (pitch). Similar information-integration category structures in the visual and auditory domains have been shown to be best learned implicitly (e.g., Maddox et al., 2006). Thus, we predicted that individuals with greater procedural-memory capacity would better learn sound categories, because procedural memory appears to support implicit learning of new information and integration of dimensions. Seventy undergraduates were tested across two experiments. Procedural memory was assessed using a linguistic adaptation of the serial-reaction-time task (Misyak et al., 2010a,b). Declarative memory was assessed using the logical-memory subtest of the Wechsler Memory Scale-4th edition (WMS-IV; Wechsler, 2009). Working memory was assessed using an auditory version of the reading-span task (Kane et al., 2004). Experiment 1 revealed contributions of only declarative memory to dimensional integration, which might indicate not enough time or motivation to shift over to a procedural/integrative strategy. Experiment 2 gave twice the speech-sound training, distributed over 2 days, and also attempted to train at the category boundary. As predicted, effects of declarative memory were removed and effects of procedural memory emerged, but, unexpectedly, new effects of working memory surfaced. The results may be compatible with a multiple-systems account in which declarative and working memory facilitate transfer of control to the procedural system

Percepció d’inseguretat a Barcelona: factors individuals i entorn de barri

Treballs Finals del Màster de Criminologia, Política Criminal i de Seguretat, Facultat de Dret, Universitat de Barcelona, Curs: 2012-2013, Tutor: Juli Sabaté DelgadoEl tema d’aquest treball és l’anàlisi de la percepció d’inseguretat a Barcelona per tal de d’identificar els factors que expliquen la construcció de la inseguretat tenint en compte tant els aspectes individuals com els de l’entorn físic, social i convivencial dels barris. L’anàlisi es concreta en l’any 2011 per tal d’afrontar un altre punt important de la investigació, que és considerar quines variables han pres una rellevància especial en la inseguretat en un moment de crisi econòmica i social com l’actual

Mandarin-English Bilinguals Process Lexical Tones in Newly Learned Words in Accordance with the Language Context

Previous research has mainly considered the impact of tone-language experience on ability to discriminate linguistic pitch, but proficient bilingual listening requires differential processing of sound variation in each language context. Here, we ask whether Mandarin-English bilinguals, for whom pitch indicates word distinctions in one language but not the other, can process pitch differently in a Mandarin context vs. an English context. Across three eye-tracked word-learning experiments, results indicated that tone-intonation bilinguals process tone in accordance with the language context. In Experiment 1, 51 Mandarin-English bilinguals and 26 English speakers without tone experience were taught Mandarin-compatible novel words with tones. Mandarin-English bilinguals out-performed English speakers, and, for bilinguals, overall accuracy was correlated with Mandarin dominance. Experiment 2 taught 24 Mandarin-English bilinguals and 25 English speakers novel words with Mandarin like tones, but English-like phonemes and phonotactics. The Mandarin-dominance advantages observed in Experiment 1 disappeared when words were English-like. Experiment 3 contrasted Mandarin-like vs. English-like words in a within-subjects design, providing even stronger evidence that bilinguals can process tone language-specifically. Bilinguals (N = 58), regardless of language dominance, attended more to tone than English speakers without Mandarin experience (N = 28), but only when words were Mandarin-like -- not when they were English-like. Mandarin-English bilinguals thus tailor tone processing to the within-word language context

Can bilingual children turn one language off? Evidence from perceptual switching.

Bilinguals have the sole option of conversing in one language in spite of knowing two languages. The question of how bilinguals alternate between their two languages, activating and deactivating one language, is not well understood. In the current study, we investigated the development of this process by researching bilingual children's abilities to selectively integrate lexical tone based on its relevance in the language being used. In particular, the current study sought to determine the effects of global conversation-level cues versus local (within-word phonotactic) cues on children's tone integration in newly learned words. Words were taught to children via a conversational narrative, and word recognition was investigated using the intermodal preferential-looking paradigm. Children were tested on recognition of words with stimuli that were either matched or mismatched in tone in both English and Mandarin conversations. Results demonstrated that 3- to 4-year-olds did not adapt their interpretation of lexical tone changes to the language being spoken. In contrast, 4- to 5-year-olds were able to do so when supported by informative within-word cues. Results suggest that preschool children are capable of selectively activating a single language given word-internal cues to language.Ministry of Education Tier 1 Academic Research Fund [FY2013FRC2-009]Available online 11 April 2016. 24 month embargo.This item from the UA Faculty Publications collection is made available by the University of Arizona with support from the University of Arizona Libraries. If you have questions, please contact us at [email protected]

Attrition Effects in Mandarin-English Bilinguals of Varying Proficiency

Previous research has shown that English dominance caused an attrition effect in tone processing in native Mandarin speakers (Quam & Creel, 2017). There were two explanations offered, either tones are more prone to attrition because of their unique mental representation, or English dominant bilinguals are able to recruit English perceptual categories to process the Mandarin vowels. This research project is a verification and expansion of that research investigating how dominance in English, a non-tonal language, impacts lexical tonal processing in Mandarin for Mandarin-English bilinguals. This research project is testing the robustness of this effect in two ways. The first is a replication study (Experiment 1). The second test is a new experimental paradigm (Experiment 2) testing the two hypotheses by investigating whether vowels unique to Mandarin also show attrition effects. Language dominance for participants is determined via the MultiLingual Naming Test (Gollan, Weissberger, Runnqvist, Montoya, & Cera, 2012), the Bilingual Dominance Survey of Dunn & Fox Tree (2009), and Age of Arrival in an English-speaking country. Experiment 1 confirmed and almost perfectly replicated the original research. Preliminary data analysis for Experiment 2 indicates that English dominance is linked to slower tone identification. However, data from the first 20 (Mandarin dominant) participants replicate data patterns of the original study and Experiment 1. Once English dominant participants have been recruited and tested, further analysis will be able to confirm or refute the predictions of the original research