Thesis (M. Phil.)--University of Hong Kong, 2006. / Title proper from title frame. Also available in printed format.

Thesis (M. Phil.)--University of Hong Kong, 2006. / Title proper from title frame. Also available in printed format.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2007. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 106-116).

Edited by James F. Kavanagh and Ignatius G. Mattingly. / "Proceedings of a conference on 'the relationships between speech and learning to read' in a series entitled Communicating by language, sponsored by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, National Institutes of Health [held May 16-19, 1971, at Belmont, Elkridge, Md.]" / Includes bibliographies.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2000. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 98-107). Also available on the Internet.

The purpose of the present study was to investigate word meaning and its development in primary school children (6-12 years) . It was argued that the learning and development of the meanings of words such as pain cannot be primarily explained by means of ostensive definition. Furthermore, existing theories of word meaning which deal predominantly with substantive words fail to account for the learning of non-ostensive words. The pertinent psychological, linguistic and developmental psycholinguistic approaches to word meaning are reviewed briefly. The prototype approaches to word meaning are modified to apply to non-ostensive words . The focus is on conceptual meaning, that is, the way in which the senses of a word alter in different contexts. It is argued that the meaning of the word is its use in a diversity of linguistic contexts. The term "grammar" is applied in a unique way to encompass the meaning of the word (which stems in part from the words with which it co-occurs) as well as its selective use with other words in the language. Ninety-five metalinguistically-phrased tasks comprising short questions and picture-story sequences were analyzed in depth. The tasks were administered individually. A flexible interview afforded additional probing for each question. The analysis comprised percentage scores of responses at different age levels together with verbatim transcripts and qualitative descriptions: Uniformity, variation and developmental trends were found on different tasks for any particular word. Developmental trends were noted in children's understanding of particular words (for example, same), thereby extending the findings of previous researchers. There was evidence for a progression in children's ability to take into consideration that a word alters its sense according to the linguistic context in which it occurs (for example, same as it relates to chair versus dress versus pain). A comprehensive account of the words meaning could be established when a diversity of tasks was applied for each word. Children of different age levels employed different strategies in answering the questions posed. A model is proposed to describe the development of the meaning of non-ostensive words during the primary school years. It is suggested that psycholinguistic studies on word meaning be re-evaluated and that language and reading programmes incorporate the notion of "grammar". Application of this approach to the study of substantive word meaning in preschool children has important implications for theories of word meaning and for therapeutic intervention.

Retardation of language development or articulatory proficiency is characteristic of children with specific organic or intellectual deficits. It is recognized that the moderately retarded preschool youngster is especially susceptible to delays in language acquisition probably as a concomitant attribute of general intellectual deficiency. The literature of learning and child development documents and highlights the significant growth experienced by the infant and preschool youngster long before he first enters school. The advent of preschool educational opportunities for exceptional children can be expected to prevent many of the debilitating results associated with general intellectual mental retardation. Research has demonstrated that much is to be gained through early childhood compensatory education. The evidence gained from programs of intervention in the area of language has effectively shown that intensive stimulation in school aged mildly and moderately retarded children results in gains in language performance. Similarly, investigations of language improvement in younger deprived children have had positive results. Consequently, two important facts are to be recognized: (a) It is possible to effect positive change in language ability of young children whose intellectual functioning is assumed capable of normalcy. (b) It is possible to effect positive change in language ability of older children whose intellectual capacities have been limited by organic or environmental factors. These lead to an important question, the subject of the research reported herein. Can language proficiency be effectively improved in moderately retarded preschool aged children? From the thirty-two children comprising the population of the preschool for the retarded at the Research Unit for Exceptional Children, University of British Columbia, sixteen children were selected to form the experimental and control groups in a sixteen week project studying the language performance of the children. The sixteen children were matched in pairs on the basis of age in months, length in preschool experience, raw score on the PPVT, and raw score on a modified Stanford Binet. Matched pairs were used to insure that the experimental and control groups were as nearly equivalent at the outset as possible. For sixteen weeks the experimental group participated for thirty minutes per day in a group oral language training program. For an equal period of time the control group participated in a non-directive program in which language activities were correlated with motor, sensory, and social activities. During posttesting sessions all the children were tested using the same, or equivalent forms of the pretest instruments. The difference between pretest to posttest events was considered to be a measure of change in language performance. Statistical analysis of these data was applied to determine significance. At the conclusion of the study the children of the experimental group scored significantly better than the children of the control group on all variables. Pretest to posttest experimental group gain was significant, while the same measure for the control group evidenced no measurable difference. While intergroup differences at the beginning of the study were negligible, the between-group differences after participation in oral language training were demonstrably significant. There were, therefore, important gains made by the experimental group, while no real gains were evidenced by the control group. It seems reasonable to assume from the data analyses that programed intervention in the language domain is both feasible and desirable for moderately retarded preschool children. The immediate effects of language training however, leave other questions unanswered and in want of further investigation. Questions regarding lasting effects of language intervention, as well as the degree of effective facilitation in learning of other skills as a result of language training, need investigation. It has been, however, demonstrated that the first step, that of immediate and positive change in language performance, can be facilitated by direct intervention in the language training of moderately retarded children. / Education, Faculty of / Educational and Counselling Psychology, and Special Education (ECPS), Department of / Graduate

This dissertation examines the association between the quality of children’s language experiences – as operationalized by adult verbal warmth – and their cognitive developmental outcomes. A socioeconomically diverse sample of 43 parents and their 5-to-9-year-old children participated in this study. A digital audio recording of the home environment was obtained, and children completed a high-resolution, structural MRI scan as well as direct assessments of their language and reading skills. The audio recordings were transcribed and coded using a coding scheme newly developed by the candidate in consultation with leading experts, in order to identify and quantify psycholinguistic elements of adult-child communication. Primary hypotheses included that adult verbal warmth is associated with (1) language and reading outcomes (2) the neural regions associated with each. To date, no studies have combined a transcription-based, fine-grained analysis of naturalistic home recordings with neuroimaging data. As such, this study represents a new line of inquiry at the nexus of developmental psychology, neuroscience, and education. The findings shed light on the impact of psychosocial language experiences on child development and on which forms of adult-child communication are most conducive to learning. Such information can inform programs that aim to teach parents ways to nurture their children’s development through high-quality child-directed speech. Social, educational, and clinical implications for mitigating risk factors and bolstering protective factors in order to, ultimately, foster healthy development for all children, are discussed.

This dissertation comprised three studies investigating early language and reading development of children with hearing loss who used listening and spoken language. The first study examined conversation techniques used by parents during dinnertimes at home with their preschool children with hearing loss (N = 37). Twenty-minute dinnertime segments were extracted from daylong, naturalistic Language ENvironment Analysis (LENA) recordings. Transcripts were coded for parents’ use of open- and closed-ended language elicitation, reformulation, imitation, directives, and explicit instruction in vocabulary and grammar. Participants’ receptive vocabulary and knowledge of basic concepts were also measured. Parents’ use of conversation techniques varied widely, with closed-ended elicitations and directives used most frequently during dinner. Open-ended language elicitation related significantly to children’s receptive vocabulary, and explicit vocabulary instruction was correlated with basic-concepts skills. Thematic analysis found common themes of concrete conversation topics and sibling speakers. In addition, parents who used many techniques often introduced abstract conversation topics; electronic media was present in all conversations with few techniques. The second study investigated the longitudinal complexity and quantity of the language input and output of 14 preschool children with hearing loss. Participants’ receptive vocabulary and understanding of basic concepts were measured and daylong recordings were collected at two time points one year apart. Twenty-minute dinnertime segments were extracted from each recording, and adults’ and children’s utterances were coded for syntactic and clausal complexity and lexical diversity. The quantity and complexity of parental language input remained consistent over one year. The initial clausal complexity of the children’s utterances related to their general receptive vocabulary, while the initial syntactic complexity of the children’s utterances related to their understanding of basic concepts one year later. The third study explored the reading skills achieved by 64 children with hearing loss in prekindergarten through third grade. Participants’ mean scores on eight reading subtests of the Woodcock-Johnson IV Tests of Achievement were all within one standard deviation of the tests’ normative means. Relative strengths were found in basic reading skills, including phonological awareness and spelling. Relative weaknesses were found in oral reading and word- and sentence-reading fluency. When 53 participants’ skills were measured one year later, they had made significant gains in letter-word identification, sentence-reading fluency, and word-reading fluency, suggesting that they had made more than one year’s progress in one year’s time while enrolled in a specialized program.

Researchers across domains of behavior analysis agree that complexities of language acquisition can be defined by the degree to which an individual acquires language relations in the absence of direct training. In a series of studies, I examined the role of voluntary echoic responses on the onset of bidirectional naming (BiN) and the implications of the naming continuum, defined by accuracy of listener and speaker responses for familiar stimuli, on the emergence of untrained, language relations. Using a group descriptive analysis, I tested the correlations between storybook naming experiences and accuracy of listener (selection) and speaker (tact) responses across 24 toddlers, aged 20- to 37-months-old. During the naming experience, I measured voluntary production of the target stimulus (saying the target word). During the naming probe, I measured accuracy of untaught listener and speaker responses. While there were not significant associations between voluntarily saying the target stimulus and the accuracy of listener/speaker responses and voluntary responses remained low across 3 naming experiences, there were significant associations among accuracy of listener/speaker responses across the 3 experiences. Listener responses significantly increased across the three experiences, suggesting the emergence of unidirectional naming (UniN); however, speaker responses remained low. In Experiment II, I tested the effects of echoic clarity (phonemic responses that each participant demonstrated) on accuracy of untaught listener/speaker responses using storybook naming experiences. Data remained consistent in suggesting that UniN was present, but echoic clarity was not functionally related to measures of BiN. In Experiment III, I tested the effects of temporal proximity of visual and auditory stimuli on voluntary echoics and accuracy of listener/speaker responses using Successive Naming Experiences with Novel Stimuli (SNENS). This consisted of presenting auditory and visual stimuli simultaneously or with a one-second delay between the visual and auditory stimuli. Data remained consistent across participants in showing that the accuracy of listener/speaker responses was not dramatically affected by temporal proximity of visual and auditory stimuli. Serendipitous findings of this experiment suggested that the joining of listener and speaker responses may be required for acquisition of more complex derived relations. I conducted Experiment IV to address the unanticipated findings of the pilot study, by testing if a functional relation exists between the naming continuum and the emergence of other arbitrarily applicable derived relations (AAR). Four of the 6 participants demonstrated mastery of mutual and combinatorial entailment relations following increased degrees of BiN, while 2 of the participants demonstrated increases in combinatorial entailment relations. Results suggested a functional relation exists between the accuracy of untaught listener/speaker responses for word-object relations and the emergence of other AAR. I discuss these findings with regards to the essential stimulus control for untaught language relations as a history of reinforcement for correspondence.