The largest group of English language learners in the United States is comprised individuals who speak Spanish as a first language. There is a growing need for speech-language pathologists to better understand the language development of children learning two languages in order to distinguish between typical and disordered communication with this population. For monolingual English speakers, rate of grammatical morpheme acquisition is typically predicted based on MLU. In bilingual children, current language use has been determined to be a potentially more useful predictor of language performance. The purpose of this study was to determine English grammatical morpheme performance for English-Spanish bilingual preschool-age children based on their language exposure. Data was drawn from two existing data sets that included a total of 314 children. Their performance on the BESA was analyzed for grammatical morphemes in English. Interviews were conducted to determine language use and exposure. We present patterns of English grammatical morpheme acquisition in bilingual children as related to current language use. / text

Typically developing Spanish-English bilingual children's production of twelve grammatical morphemes was analyzed for accuracy and described as a function of their English mastery, as indexed by mean length of utterance (MLU). Results revealed positive trends in morpheme accuracy as MLU increased. Despite a large degree of between subject variability, the data demonstrated general patterns that were consistent with previous literature, namely that the rate and trajectory of morpheme acquisition differs from monolingual norms, and that particular morphemes are predictably more and less challenging for bilingual children to produce accurately. MLU "cut-points" were suggested based on functional breaks in accuracy for several morphemes. / text

"September 2008". / Thesis (DAppLing)--Macquarie University, Division of Linguistics and Psychology, Dept. of Linguistics, 2009. / Bibliography: p. 189-196. / The purpose of this research was to analyse the pragmalinguistic and sociopragmatic development of language groups at different proficiency levels and investigate the relationship between interlanguage pragmatics and grammatical competence. For this study, 36 native Spanish speaking EFL learners at different proficiency levels were asked to respond in English to 24 different situations which called for the speech acts of request and apology. Their English performances were compared to those of 12 American English native speakers in order to provide base-line cultural data. Thirty six Mexican Spanish native speakers also participated as a control group in order to analyse the role of the mother tongue in the performances of the EFL learners. The data, collected using a carton oral production task (COPT), were analysed quantitatively and qualitatively. Results showed three important findings that illuminate the relationship between pragmatic development and grammatical competence and lent support to Kasper and Rose's (2003) claim of a universal pragmatic principle. The first finding suggested that basic adult learners possess a previous pragmatic knowledge in their L1 that allows them to focus on the intended meaning and, in most cases, and to assemble (from the linguistic structures available to them) an utterance that conveys a pragmatic intention and satisfies the communicative demands of a social situation. The second finding revealed that there are two essential conditions to communicate a linguistic action: the knowledge of the relevant linguistic rules and the knowledge of how to use them appropriately and effectively in a specific context. Without an elementary knowledge of the linguistic rules, it is impossible to select the forms to realize a speech act in a target-like manner. The findings further suggested that advanced learners possess the grammatical knowledge to produce an illocutionary act, but they need to learn the specific L2 pragmatic conventions that enable them to know when to use these grammatical forms and under what circumstances. / Mode of access: World Wide Web. / xi, 238 p. ill

不同金融體系結構，引導資金分配的過程也會有所差異，進而導致不同的經濟發展模式。本研究主要探討在不同地方金融制度中，地方政府與地方金融機構及地方企業之間的互動關係，如何影響中國大陸地方經濟發展模式。 本文認為，自中國政府推動金融改革以來，依據融資來源，各地區將會出現以銀行信貸為主、以中央資金為主及以民間金融為主的三種不同地方金融制度，這三種不同的地方金融制度對地方政府行為有不同的限制和影響。另一方面，各地方政府都是由不同的官僚部門所組成，存在不同部門之間的利益衝突，能否良好協調各部門之間的衝突將會影響地方資源的配置情形。在特定地方金融制度的影響下，加上各地方政府不同的官僚結構運作，本研究認為最終將會引導出五種不同的地區經濟發展路徑。 / The purpose of this dissertation is to explore how local political and economic institutions shape divergent paths of regional economic development among different localities in China. This research proposes five models of Chinese regional economic development. Through an analysis of Chinese different localities, this research states that under the constraints of local distinct financial structures, the ways in which local governments and businesses develop different strategies to interact and respond to market competition and difficulties influence capacities of local government for economic leadership, and result in various economic developmental patterns.

Les végétaux, contrairement aux animaux, génèrent la plupart de leurs organes et tissus au cours de leur développement post-embryonnaire et ce, grâce à des tissus contenant de petits amas de cellules souches appelés méristèmes. Le méristème apical caulinaire (MAC), situé à l’extrémité de la tige, génère toute la partie aérienne de la plante. A sa périphérie, les organes latéraux (fleurs ou feuilles) sont générés selon un patron spatio-temporel précis appelé phyllotaxie. De nombreuses données accumulées ces 20 dernières années ont démontré qu’une hormone végétale, l’auxine, joue un rôle prépondérant dans le contrôle du devenir des cellules dans le MAC. Un ensemble de données expérimentales couplées à des modèles mathématiques suggère que l’auxine s’accumule successivement dans les sites d’organogenèse grâce à l’auto-organisation de ses transporteurs membranaires et instruit les cellules à se différencier en organes.Fautes d’outils appropriés, il était impossible jusqu’alors de visualiser l’auxine in vivo et d’étudier sa dynamique temporelle. Nous avons généré un nouveau senseur de la signalisation de l’auxine, appelé DII-Venus, qui permet de visualiser de manière indirecte mais spécifique les niveaux relatifs d’auxine in planta avec une excellente résolution spatio-temporelle. Cet outil a permis de mettre en évidence pour la première fois des oscillations circadiennes d’auxine au niveau du MAC. Une analyse complète de la structure de la voie de réponse transcriptionelle à l’auxine, couplée à des approches de modélisation, a permis de mettre en évidence des propriétés « tampon » de la voie transcriptionnelle qui la rendent relativement insensible aux fluctuations d’auxine, et contribuent à la robustesse du programme organogénétique. En revanche, la voie non-transriptionnelle de réponse à l’auxine, sensible à ces oscillations, génère des rythmicités de croissance au niveau du MAC qui contribuent à déterminer la temporalité de l’émergence de nouveaux organes. Ces résultats démontrent ainsi pour la première fois que la rythmicité de l’émergence de nouveaux organes au niveau du MAC n’est pas uniquement une conséquence des capacités d’auto-organisation du tissu mais est aussi contrôlée, au moins partiellement, par une horloge biologique. / Plants, contrarily to animals, are able to generate new organs and tissues throughout their lives thanks to the activity of specialized tissues containing stem cells called meristems. The shoot apical meristem (SAM), located at the shoot tip, generates all the aerial parts of the plant that arise after germination. At its periphery, organ production occurs following precise spatio-temporal patterns also known as phyllotaxis. During the past twenty years, the phytohormone auxin has been demonstrated to play a major role in this process. Indeed, both experimental and theoretical studies strongly suggest that auxin accumulates successively in sites of organogenesis thanks to its efflux carriers, and instructs cells to differentiate into organs.However, so far, very little is known about the actual temporal dynamics of auxin in tissues, because of the lack of appropriate tool to visualize auxin in vivo. We developed a new auxin signaling sensor, called DII-VENUS, that allows for monitoring auxin levels in planta with a good spatio-temporal resolution. Using this new tool, we were able to demonstrate that for the first time that the SAM is subjected to circadian oscillations of auxin levels. Our data suggest that these oscillations are not perceived by the auxin transcriptional pathway, which is predicted, according to our mathematical models, to exhibit buffering properties. However, they are perceived by the non-transcriptional putative receptor ABP1 and translated into rhythmic growth patterns at the SAM. These growth oscillations seem to regulate organ initiation in the meristem thus demonstrating for the first time the rhythmic emergence of organs at the SAM does not only result from the self-organizing properties of the tissue but is also controlled, at least partially, by a biological clock.