The Use of a Reading Lexicon to Aid Contextual Vocabulary Acquisition by EFL Arab Learners Abstract This article investigates how the use of a deliberate approach of analyzing a given reading may predict differences in CVA effectiveness. Sixty Arab EFL learners were randomly assigned to an experimental group and a control group, thirty participants for each. The experimental group received training in the deliberate Clarke and Nation (System 8:211–220, 1980) CVA technique, whereas the control group were not guided through a training method. Then, both groups were asked to answer three vocabulary tests and then participate to finish a series of six readings adjusted using Nation’s K-level reading lexicon to control the difficult words during readings. After treatments, the students took a post-test vocabulary session. Results show that the group that have used the deliberate CVA technique retained about twice as many new words as the other group did. That is the use of a deliberate-CVA methodology significantly improves learning. The experimental manipulation produced a learning effect that was 76.1% greater than that of the control group in terms of word context recognition and 128.0% greater than that of the control group in terms of word definition accuracy. Pedagogical implications, limitations and directions for further research are discussed.

The Aachen List of Trait Words Abstract In this study, we present the Aachen List of Trait Words (ALoT), including a total of 606 German adjectives with English translations, describing personality traits. The lack of ratings regarding the social desirability of traits led us to create a German trait database. Ratings of valence and social desirability were obtained from 100 participants. Statistical analyses of 99 participants indicated that valence and social desirability ratings were strongly correlated. However, there are several words showing a weak or no relationship. Furthermore, uncommon words were rated less positively (or desirable) than more common traits. Word frequency and word length were positively correlated, showing that short terms were more common than long ones. Social desirability and valence ratings are presented together with several psycholinguistic variables known to influence word processing (e.g. word length) in the ALoT. Scores for each word are provided as supplemental materials. The ALoT is intended to provide stimulus material for experiments dealing with the affective processing of German trait adjectives.

How Do Different Types of Alignment Affect Perceived Entity Status? Abstract Perceptions of entitativity are thought to be influenced by salient features such as the physical proximity and physical similarity of group members (Campbell in Behav Sci 3:14–25, 1958). But social interactions among group members involve a number of low-level alignment (Pickering and Garrod in Behav Brain Sci 27:212–225, 2004) and synchronization (Marsh et al. in Top Cogn Sci 1:320–339, 2009) processes. Conversational partners, for instance, become aligned in syntax, semantics, emotion, and bodily posture. In this paper, we explore whether alignment correlates with observers’ judgments of entitativity, and, moreover, which specific forms of alignment have the strongest effects on these judgments. Results revealed that only emotional alignment had on effect on judgments of entitativity. We discuss how future work may further assess the role of various dimensions in shaping the perception of group status in linguistic interaction.

How do Emotion Word Type and Valence Influence Language Processing? The Case of Arabic–English Bilinguals Abstract The current study examines the influence of word type (i.e., emotion-label vs. emotion-laden) and valence (i.e., positive vs. negative vs. neutral) on the processing of emotion words among bilinguals. To this end, three groups of Arabic–English bilinguals (n = 120 per group) completed the tasks of free recall, ratings for concreteness, imageability and context availability, and discrete word association. Two groups, representing different levels of second language (L2) exposure completed the tasks in English while the third group completed the tasks in Arabic. The results of the free recall and rating tasks generally supported the influence of word type, valence and L2 exposure on the processing of emotional content; namely, emotion-label vs. emotion-laden vs. neutral words and negative vs. positive emotion words generally behaved significantly differently, and the participants with increased L2 exposure usually outperformed the ones with less exposure. In contrast, the word association task often failed to present statistically significant findings. The results are interpreted in line with the specific nature of the Arabic mental lexicon, the existing literature, and relevant theoretical models of emotion and the bilingual mental lexicon. Directions for future research are proposed.

Children’s Comprehension of Irony: Studies on Polish-Speaking Preschoolers Abstract We explored the topic of irony comprehension by preschoolers. Two hundred and thirty-one children (77 four-year-olds, 89 five-year-olds, and 65 six-year-olds) were tested with the Irony Comprehension Task (ICT, Banasik and Bokus, in: Poster presented at the psycholinguistics conference in Flanders, Berg en Dal, 2012). Participants were asked questions checking comprehension of the intended meaning behind an ironic comment. Four conditions were used for the ironic utterances: targeted (ironic comment was a reference to the addressee’s behavior), non-targeted (ironic comment was not a reference to the addressee’s behavior), with symmetric dyads (a child said the ironic comment to another child), and asymmetric dyads (an adult said the ironic comment to a child). All groups achieved high irony comprehension scores. The results show a significant difference in accuracy between the 4-year-olds and the 6-year-olds only. The youngest group more accurately understood ironic utterances that referred to the addressee’s action than those that did not, while older children did not show these differences. The aspect of who is speaking to whom was also significant only for the youngest children. These results provide important new insights into factors potentially influencing figurative language comprehension. Components such as participant structure and irony type require acknowledgement in the discussion on irony difficulty.

Investigating the Declarative-Procedural Gap for the Indirect Speech Construction in L2 Learners Abstract It is common to have good declarative but poor procedural knowledge of a foreign language, especially for classroom learners. To study this gap in a constrained manner, we asked Chinese learners of English to repeat, correct and produce indirect speech. The indirect speech construction was selected in the present study because it is known to be a particularly complex construction. Chinese university students who all had good declarative knowledge of the rules governing indirect speech were selected to have overall low or high oral proficiency when assessed in a free speech situation. High proficiency participants pursued strategies that increased their speech rate while reducing errors. They used more idiomatic English, more chunked expressions, and showed less negative transfer from Mandarin, compared to low proficiency participants. Indeed use of chunks was the primary means by which both groups of participants were able to increase their accuracy, complexity, and speaking rate. Low proficiency but not high participants showed evidence of a speed-accuracy trade-off. They either kept errors low at the cost of high pausing, or produced many errors with the benefit of rapid speech. Identifying preferences for speed versus accuracy could facilitate methods for encouraging learners to move out of their comfort zones.

Factors Related to Linguistic Content in Video Narrative of Adolescents with Cancer and Healthy Controls Abstract A long history exists of the utilization of narratives to help young people cope with stress and illness. Research is beginning to focus on video based story-telling for the purpose of intervention, however little research has been conducted to look at factors that influence the narrative content of these films. As a pilot, and within the context of a larger study, the current research was conducted with n = 10 adolescents with cancer and n = 10 healthy peers exploring participant characteristics (e.g. personality, quality of life, etc.) and their relationship with linguistic consent of the film. Despite little to no differences identified in demographic characteristics, results identified distinct differences between each group, suggesting that linguistic aspects of film narratives differ in adolescents with and without cancer. This research can serve to motivate future directions of exploration surrounding the content of film narratives and their relationship to patient well-being.

Causal Information Over Facial Expression: Modulation of Facial Expression Processing by Congruency and Causal Factor of the Linguistic Cues in 5-Year-Old Japanese Children Abstract It is unknown whether linguistic cues influence preschoolers’ recognition of facial expression when the emotion of the face is incongruent with the linguistic cues and what type of linguistic cue is influential in the modulation of facial expression. In a priming task, we presented 5-year-old children three types of linguistic information conveying happy or sad emotion (simple label, label with rich causal explanation of emotion, and label with poor causal explanation of emotion) prior to the presentation of a happy or a sad face. We asked participants to recognize emotion of facial expression and examined whether they follow linguistic information than the facial expression when the emotions of linguistic information and face were incongruent. As a result, children who were presented the label with rich causal explanation judged emotion of face according to the linguistic information, whereas children who were presented the simple label or the label with poor causal explanation followed the emotions of facial expression. This result indicated that children’s autonomic reliance on situational cues depends on the emotional causality and the concreteness of emotional state conveyed by the linguistic cues. This finding contributes to our understanding of the face inferiority effect on children’s developing notion of emotions.

Processing of Translation-Ambiguous Words by Chinese–English Bilinguals in Sentence Context Abstract Translation ambiguity, which occurs commonly when one word has more than one possible translation in another language, causes language processing disadvantage. The present study investigated how Chinese–English bilinguals process translation-ambiguous words, and whether it is affected by the second language (L2) proficiency and sentence context, through translation recognition task. Each ambiguous word was paired with dominant and subordinate translations and categorized into different types according to the semantic similarity between translations. Results revealed that translation-ambiguous words were not well-placed in comparison to unambiguous counterparts, with slower and less successful performance. Dominant translations were processed more quickly and accurately than subordinate translations. As L2 proficiency increased, the higher the semantic similarity between translations was, the quicker the processing of translation-ambiguous words was. Sentences with high semantic constraint brought about a greater effect on ambiguity resolution than those with low semantic constraint, especially for ambiguous words with less semantically similar translations. The current study not only provides an important insight into the processing mechanism of translation-ambiguous words from a new perspective of different-script languages, but also sheds some light on the understanding of sentence context effect on ambiguity resolution.

The Semantic Integration Between Two Subliminally Perceived Words Simultaneously Presented at Different Locations Abstract In the present study, we showed evidence of an integration between two unconscious semantic representations. In experiment 1, two masked Chinese words of the same or different categories (“orange apple” or “grape hammer”) were simultaneously presented in the prime, followed by two Chinese words also of same or different categories in the target. We examined possible prime/target visual feature priming, semantic category priming and motor response priming effects. Moreover, two ISI intervals (53, 163 ms) between the prime and the target words were used to examine the positive and negative priming. The results revealed a negative motor response priming and a positive semantic category priming effect independent of the ISI when the target words were of the same category. Experiment 2 eliminated an alternative interpretation of the effect based on different number of category words changed across the prime and the target. Experiment 3 eliminated a potential confound of unequal numbers of trials for motor congruent and incongruent conditions in Experiment 1. Overall, these results indicated an integration between the meanings of the two subliminally perceived words in the prime. The difference between simultaneous and sequential presentations, and the reason why positive priming was not observed when the interval between the prime and the target was short were discussed in the context of unconscious semantic integration.