Search Results (20)

Background/Objectives: Verbs are considered to be more abstract than nouns, as they represent actions, states, and events, which are less tangible, more flexible in their meaning and thus less univocally specified. It has been suggested that children acquire abstract concepts based on their linguistic contexts of use, making use of semantic and syntactic cues. By contrast, according to theories of embodied cognition, conceptual knowledge is based on physical and perceptual interaction with the world. The present study investigates whether the verbal and the visual modality produce similar or different results in the processes of construction and reactivation of novel verbs, corresponding to new compositional abstract concepts, in children of different ages. In Experiment 1, the acquisition of the concept was determined based on the quality of verbal explanation; in Experiment 2, participants were asked to decide whether a visual representation fitted the concept or not. Thus, response modality could be either explicit or implicit, and either congruent or incongruent with respect to learning modality. Methods: In Experiment 1, 100 children from grade 1 to 5 were asked to explain the meaning of verbs introduced via verbal or visual instances. In Experiment 2, 15 children aged 8 to 10 had to judge pictures as (not) being examples of previously verbally or visually presented novel verbs. Results: The results of Experiment 1 show more accurate explanations after verbal presentation across all grades. In Experiment 2, verbal presentation was no longer associated with more accurate matching responses, but rather with slower decision times. Conclusions: Modality congruence, explicitness and linguistic (semantic and syntactic) factors were all shown to play a role, which is discussed in a developmental perspective. Full article

Background/Objectives: Both language and music are capable of encoding and communicating semantic concepts, suggesting a potential overlap in neurocognitive mechanisms. Moreover, music training not only enhances domain-specific musical processing but also facilitates cross-domain language processing. However, existing research has predominantly focused on Indo-European languages, with limited evidence from paratactic languages such as Mandarin Chinese. In addition, the impact of variations in musical expertise on these shared processing mechanisms remains unclear, leaving a critical gap in our understanding of the shared neural bases for semantic processing in language and music. This event-related potential (ERP) study investigated whether Chinese sentences and musical chord sequences share semantic processing mechanisms and how musical expertise modulates these mechanisms. Methods: This study recruited 46 college students (22 musicians and 24 non-musicians). Participants read Chinese sentences presented word-by-word visually, while chord sequences were delivered auditorily, with each word temporally aligned to one chord. Sentences included semantically acceptable or unacceptable classifier–noun pairs and chord sequences ended with in-key or out-of-key chords. Participants were instructed to focus on reading sentences while ignoring the concurrent music. ERP signals were recorded, and time-locked to final words to capture neural dynamics during semantic integration. Results: The behavioral results showed that musicians were influenced by musical regularity when reading (acceptable: F(1, 44) = 25.70, p < 0.001, η_p² = 0.38; unacceptable: F(1, 44) = 11.45, p = 0.002, η_p² = 0.21), but such effect was absent in non-musicians (ps > 0.05). ERP results showed that musical semantic processing had a substantial impact on both P200 (F(1, 44) = 9.95, p = 0.003, η_p² = 0.18), N400 (musicians: F(1, 44) = 15.80, p < 0.001, η_p² = 0.26; non-musicians: F(1, 44) = 4.34, p = 0.043, η_p² = 0.09), and P600 (musicians: F(1, 44) = 5.55, p = 0.023, η_p² = 0.11; non-musicians: F(1, 44) = 8.68, p = 0.005, η_p² = 0.17) components. Furthermore, musical expertise exerted modulatory effects during later stages, as evidenced by divergent N400 and P600 latency patterns between musicians and non-musicians. Specifically, ERP amplitudes exhibited opposing trends: musicians showed an enhanced N400 and diminished P600, while non-musicians displayed a weaker N400 and stronger P600. Conclusions: Our findings provide novel evidence that Mandarin Chinese and chord sequences engage partially overlapping neural mechanisms for semantic processing both in the early (P200) and the late (N400 and P600) stages. Crucially, this study is the first to demonstrate that musical expertise may gradually reorganize these shared mechanisms, enabling two initially independent but functionally analogous semantic mechanisms into a domain-general processing system. These insights deepen our understanding of the neurocognitive mechanisms underlying linguistic and musical semantic processing and highlight how expertise shapes the neural architecture of cross-domain mechanisms. Full article

The verbal noun in the modern, currently spoken p-Celtic language Welsh is of a different nature than any other word class known in Standard Average European Languages (SAEs), to which the Insular Celtic tongues do not belong. This subject has occasionally attracted attention. Welsh language grammars clearly identify a berfenw ‘verb noun’, which Thomas (1996, p. 28) calls a citation form with no specific person or time allocation. However, non-Welsh descriptions of the verbal noun tend to trigger confusion by allocating varied SAE terms to it, like ‘verb noun infinitives’ (Myhill, 1985), ‘verbal noun infinitives’ (Carnie & Guilfoyle, 2000, p. 10), ‘infinitives’ (Borsley et al., 2007, p. 70), and ‘non-finite verb(al) forms’ (Sackmann, 2022, p. 2), most of them belittling the prominent nominal functions of this word class. Coming from a historical perspective, Scherschel et al. (2018) call the Welsh verbal noun an ‘event noun’, which seems more appropriate, as is shown in this paper, in which a detailed analysis of the major features of this Welsh word class is carried out. Full article

This paper aims to revisit a construction found in some Spanish varieties which refers to a set constituted by a singular referent and an annex introduced by the item con ‘with’: PRO(noun)_[PL] with-DP. This construction triggers plural agreement and can be doubled by a plural pronoun, indicating that the annex is included in the set to which verbal agreement and the plural pronoun refer. For example, Nosotros con Juan viajamos ayer (literally, ‘We with Juan travelled.1PL yesterday’) means ‘Juan and I travelled yesterday’. We explore the Spanish PRO_[PL] with-DP, taking into account its discursive properties together with the syntactic requirements involved in the agreement patterns. In fact, although the two individuals denoted by this construction are involved as equal participants in the event, they have a different discursive status: one of them introduces new information, while the other refers to the immediate communicative situation. If some notions regarding information structure can be coded by binary features such as [+/−anaphor] and [+/−contrast], it is possible to find plurality triggered by the opposite combination of features within the same syntactic object. PRO_[PL] with-DP is a possibility that the lexicons of some languages offer. Full article

This paper explores the diachrony of the Portuguese contrastive connective ao passo que (‘whereas’). First, we describe its syntactic and semantic properties in present-day European Portuguese. With this contemporary analysis in mind, we explore the semantic and syntactic changes from the PP ao passo que (lit. ‘at the step/pace that’) into first a temporal connective of simultaneity (‘at the same time as’) and, ultimately, a contrastive expression. The evolution of expressions with temporal meanings into contrastive ones has been documented in many languages. In our paper, we show that another related meaning, that of the gradual development of events that are temporally simultaneous, may also evolve into a contrastive meaning. We also examine the role of the syntax and semantics of the noun passo in this process. Furthermore, we discuss the internal analyzability of the connective and provide evidence for the retention of some internal syntax, which has implications for current theories on the nature of complex categories. Full article

In this paper, I explore the properties and the uses of the past participles in the Arbëresh variety of S. Nicola dell’Alto, an Albanian dialect still spoken in Southern Italy, which has been in contact with Italo-Romance varieties for more than five centuries. The data are discussed in comparison to standard Albanian and the contact language, Italian. In Albanian grammar, there is only one type of participle: the past participle. It has both verbal and adjectival properties. As a verbal form, the participle is used in compound and in periphrastic tenses, in combination with both the auxiliaries KAM ‘have’ and JAM ‘be’. It can also be used in combination with other particles to create non-finite verbal forms such as gerund or infinitive or to build up temporal expressions. Finally, it can also be used after some modal impersonal verbs. Verbal participles never show agreement. Albanian participles can also be adjectival. All the adjectives derived by a participial verb take a linking article and always agree with the noun they modify in gender, number, Case and definiteness. The formal distinction of the verbal participles from adjectival participles seems to correlate with the aspectual properties of the construction: a verbal participle appears in eventive structures, whereas an adjectival participle occurs in stative structures. But, as we shall see, this is not always the case. Arbëresh participles have maintained the same morphological and syntactical properties of Albanian. They can be used both in stative and in eventive contexts, but in Arbëresh eventive passives, which are built up as in Italian rather than as in Albanian, the adjectival participles are always inflected. Agreement is obligatory in all the contexts where it is in Italian. This is a clear contact-induced change. The data presented in this paper show that Arbëresh, on the one hand, preserves features of Albanian grammar, whereas, on the other hand, it has undergone changes under the influence of the surrounding Italo-Romance varieties. Full article

According to certain approaches to adaptation, readers and listeners quickly adjust their processing of sentences to match properties of recently encountered sentences. The present preregistered study used ERP (event-related brain potentials) to investigate how and when readers change their processing in response to recent exposure to sentences of a particular structure. We presented English speakers (n = 36) with three virtual blocks of English sentences with and-coordination ambiguities. In the first and third block, the ambiguity was always resolved towards a noun phrase (NP-) coordination; in the second block, the structure was always a clausal (S-) coordination. We manipulated the plausibility of the critical noun after the conjunct. N400 and P600 plausibility effects were probed to see to what extent the reader preferred an NP- coordination or expected the sentence to continue differently. Our results suggest that readers change their processing as a function of recent exposure but that they do not immediately adapt to the target structure. Furthermore, we observed substantial individual variation in the type and change in response over the course of the study. The idea that structural adaptation is immediate and a direct reflection of the properties of the recent context therefore needs to be fine-tuned. Full article

In everyday verbal communication, auditory speech perception is often disturbed by background noise. Especially in disadvantageous hearing conditions, additional visual articulatory information (e.g., lip movement) can positively contribute to speech comprehension. Patients with schizophrenia (SZs) demonstrate an aberrant ability to integrate visual and auditory sensory input during speech perception. Current findings about underlying neural mechanisms of this deficit are inconsistent. Particularly and despite the importance of early sensory processing in speech perception, very few studies have addressed these processes in SZs. Thus, in the present study, we examined 20 adult subjects with SZ and 21 healthy controls (HCs) while presenting audiovisual spoken words (disyllabic nouns) either superimposed by white noise (−12 dB signal-to-noise ratio) or not. In addition to behavioral data, event-related brain potentials (ERPs) were recorded. Our results demonstrate reduced speech comprehension for SZs compared to HCs under noisy conditions. Moreover, we found altered N1 amplitudes in SZ during speech perception, while P2 amplitudes and the N1-P2 complex were similar to HCs, indicating that there may be disturbances in multimodal speech perception at an early stage of processing, which may be due to deficits in auditory speech perception. Moreover, a positive relationship between fronto-central N1 amplitudes and the positive subscale of the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS) has been observed. Full article

This study investigated how local gender stereotype information interacts with discourse context during Chinese discourse reading. Event-related potentials were recorded while participants read two-sentence discourses, in which the first sentence provided the discourse context that either introduced a gender stereotype-countering attitude towards roles, such as “One should strive for the target job, and getting a job should not be restricted by gender”., or was neutral. The second sentence contained the critical clause in which the stereotypical gender of the object noun (a role name) was either consistent or inconsistent with the gender specified by the head noun (a kinship term) of the subject noun phrase, as in “Li’s [daughter/son] became a nurse…”. The object nouns elicited a larger N400 and a larger late negativity (LN) for the inconsistent compared to the consistent conditions in the neutral contexts. Crucially, when the discourse context offered information countering gender stereotypes, both the N400 and LN effects were reversed, with the negativities being smaller for the inconsistent compared to the consistent conditions. The reversal of the N400 effects suggests that discourse contexts can immediately override the processing of gender stereotypes, and thus readers compute discourse context and local pragmatic information simultaneously during discourse reading. Full article

In this paper, we investigate zero-derived nouns based on irregular verbs in Greek. This is an under-explored area in Greek morpho-syntax, and in this paper, we will make three main contributions. First, we will discuss the fact that the overwhelming majority of these nouns are feminine, while neuter nouns are considerably less represented and masculine nouns are almost nonexistent. As feminine is taken to be the semantically marked gender in the case of animate nouns, asserting female sex, and neuter is argued to be the default gender in Greek for inanimates, the fact that zero abstract nouns are feminine is surprising. We will argue that feminine is the default in the case of zero derivation by exploiting an analysis of flavors of n. Second, we will show that, contrary to the findings in earlier literature, certain zero-derived nouns do have argument structure, similarly to their affixed counterparts. As not all zero-derived nouns have argument structure, we will appeal to complex head formation to explain the properties of those zero-derived nouns that have an eventive interpretation but do not surface with arguments. Finally, we will turn to an examination of the size of the domain that is nominalized. Since, in our cases, we observe root allomorphy conditioned by a nominal affix in the presence of a zero verbal head, we will suggest that Pruning is the mechanism that allows this. Full article

This paper reports an event–related potential (ERP) study examining the processing of “gapless” relative clauses (RCs), normal (“gapped”) RCs, attributive clauses, Subject–Verb–Object (SVO) forms and the morphological markers de and le in Mandarin Chinese. The objectives were to (1) determine whether a processing cost signature can be identified for gap–filler processing by comparing gapped RCs with SVO forms; and (2) determine whether processing gapless RCs is more similar to processing gapped RCs that they resemble on surface or attributive clauses that they resemble structurally by comparing gapped RCs, gapless RCs, and attributive clauses. ERP data was collected from 27 native speakers as they read 160 sentences containing gapped, gapless, attributive, and SVO sentences, which differed only in the second word of the string (e.g., 教授设计的/烧菜的/助手的/设计了/那个广告… The professor designed Ø/cooked food/assistant’s/designed that advertisement…). Results indicate that (1) the head noun evoked larger N400 and P600 components and the determiner elicited a larger sustained anterior negativity for the gapped RCs than for the SVO forms, and (2) the word immediately following the head noun evoked a larger P600 and the determiner elicited a larger sustained anterior negativity for both gapped and gapless RCs than for attributive clauses. These results indicate that (1) gap–filler integration in Mandarin is both semantic (hence the N400) and syntactic (hence the P600) in nature, and (2) gapless RCs are neurophysiologically processed more like gapped RCs than attributive clauses. The ERP signatures to verb+le, verb+de, verbs with verb–object (VO)+de morphological structure, and noun+de revealed that the processing costs for VO verbs and noun modifications were higher than for simple verbs, and the morphological markers de and le induced similar processing costs, even though de triggered the positing of a syntactic gap whereas le did not. Full article

Switching between languages, or codeswitching, is a cognitive ability that multilinguals can perform with ease. This study investigates whether codeswitching during sentence reading affects early access to meaning, as indexed by the robust brain response called the N400. We hypothesize that the brain prioritizes the meaning of the word during comprehension with codeswitching costs emerging at a different stage of processing. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded while Spanish–English balanced bilinguals (n = 24) read Spanish sentences containing a target noun that could create a semantic violation, codeswitch or both. Self-reported frequency of daily codeswitching was used as a regressor to determine if the cost of reading a switch is modulated by codeswitching experience. A robust N400 to semantic violations was followed by a late positive component (LPC). Codeswitches modulated the left anterior negativity (LAN) and LPC, but not the N400, with codeswitched semantic violations resulting in a sub-additive interaction. Codeswitching experience modulated the LPC, but not the N400. The results suggest that early access to semantic memory during comprehension happens independent of the language in which the words are presented. Codeswitching affects a separate stage of comprehension with switching experience modulating the brain’s response to experiencing a language switch. Full article

Children tend to rely on semantics rather than syntax during sentence comprehension. In transitive sentences, with no reliance on semantics, the syntax-based strategy becomes critical. We aimed to describe developmental changes of brain mechanisms for syntax processing in typically developing (TD) four to six year old’s. A specially designed sentence-picture matching task using active (AV) and passive (PV) voice enforced children to use grammar cues for sentence comprehension. Fifty children with above >60% level of accuracy in PV sentences comprehension demonstrated brain sensitivity to voice grammar markers-inflections of the second noun phrase (NP2), which was expressed in a greater event-related potentials (ERP) amplitude to PV vs. AV sentences in four-, five-, and six-year-old children. The biphasic positive-negative component at 200–400 ms was registered in the frontocentral and bilateral temporoparietal areas. Only in six-year-old children P600 was registered in the right temporoparietal area. LAN-like negativity seems to be a mechanism for distinguishing AV from PV in the early stages of mastering syntax processing of transitive sentences in four to five year old children. Both behavioral and ERP results distinguished six-year-olds from four-year-old’s and five-year-old’s, reflecting the possible transition to the “adult-like” syntax-based thematic role assignment. Full article

This study focused on young children’s understanding of nature, an issue observed to be a research gap in the scientific community. The question “What nature?” is central to this research. Answers to this question were obtained from 342 children from 21 Czech kindergartens, and results showed 302 preschool and children (aged from 3 to 6.5 years) from the sample displayed a conceptual understanding of nature and expressed their ideas verbally. Qualitative content analysis and comparative analysis (nouns and verbs separately) were performed on the results. Most children interpreted nature through lists of objects or as a space or a concrete place, and most of the objects mentioned related to living nature. Children used verbs describing natural events more often than verbs describing their own or human activities in nature. The comparison between children’s, adults’, and pupils’ concepts of nature shows that children expressed their concepts in a similar, albeit not identical, manner to adults. They expressed the utilitarian and aesthetic value of nature, showed a scientific interest and an emotional connection to nature, and showed their joy in interacting with nature. Although certain similarities in children’s answers were noted, each child understands nature individually. Teachers should respect this fact and consider this in environmental and global education. Full article

The aim of this article is to provide an evolutionarily grounded explanation of central aspects of the structure of language. It begins with an account of the evolution of human causal reasoning. A comparison between humans and non-human primates suggests that human causal cognition is based on reasoning about the underlying forces that are involved in events, while other primates hardly understand external forces. This is illustrated by an analysis of the causal cognition required for early hominin tool use. Second, the thinking concerning forces in causation is used to motivate a model of human event cognition. A mental representation of an event contains two vectors representing a cause as well as a result but also entities such as agents, patients, instruments and locations. The fundamental connection between event representations and language is that declarative sentences express events (or states). The event structure also explains why sentences are constituted of noun phrases and verb phrases. Finally, the components of the event representation show up in language, where causes and effects are expressed by verbs, agents and patients by nouns (modified by adjectives), locations by prepositions, etc. Thus, the evolution of the complexity of mental event representations also provides insight into the evolution of the structure of language. Full article