The role of the basal ganglia in human language function remains unknown, despite a corpus of literature documenting the association between vascular lesions of the dominant nonthalamic subcortical (NS) region and disordered language. Theories of subcortical language function have been postulated (e.g., Crosson, 1985; Wallesch & Papagno, 1988), however, research in this field has remained largely data-driven, providing limited descriptions of individuals with vascular NS lesions in terms of performance on standard off-line language measures. This approach has failed to reveal the underlying nature of these language deficits “locally” in terms of various dynamic and temporally constrained linguistic and nonlinguistic component processes. The current series of studies are based largely on the premise that such empirical data has the potential to speak more directly to the cogency of current theories proposing a subcortical role in language or related cognitive functions. The present thesis investigated the performance of individuals with dominant chronic vascular NS lesions, compared to matched control subjects, individuals with Parkinson’s disease (PD) (also assumed to have NS dysfunction) and subjects with cortical lesions (CL), on a series of experiments which allowed for the real-time examination of language processing, manipulating the degree to which automatic and attentional/strategic processing is invoked. The theoretical underpinning of these experiments hinges primarily on the proposed role of frontal-subcortical systems in mediating aspects of language via attentional/strategic mechanisms. Accordingly, it was hypothesised that the locus of impairment for individuals with NS lesions would be centred selectively on those facets of language processing which require increased recourse to these proposed frontal-subcortical cognitive capacities. The language abilities of 15 subjects with chronic dominant NS lesions, 15 matched control subjects, 14 matched subjects with CL, and 12 matched individuals with PD were examined initially on the Western Aphasia Battery (WAB) and the Boston Naming Test (BNT). Most NS subjects were classified as non-aphasic according to the WAB, however, circumscribed deficits were evidenced, typically in generative and confrontation naming. In contrast, the CL group showed significant deficits on most aspects of the WAB compared to matched normal control subjects, and presented with a more severe impairment than NS subjects overall on the WAB and in confrontation naming and repetition. The PD group performance was not significantly different from the matched control group, while PD subjects performed better than the NS group overall on the WAB. The same cohort of NS, CL, PD, and control subjects undertook a battery of complex language measures designed to place a range of higher-order cognitive demands on the language processing system. This battery included subtests from the Test of Language Competence-Expanded Edition (TLC-E), the Test of Word Knowledge (TOWK), and The Word Test-Revised (TWT-R). The NS, CL, and PD subjects presented with marked disturbances in those tasks involving cognitive-linguistic flexibility, sentence formulation, indeterminacy of meaning, and metalinguistic manipulation of the lexical-semantic system. Collectively, the off-line results suggest that those aspects of language processing which are more heavily reliant on higher-order cognitive capacities are selectively compromised in subjects with NS lesions and PD. This assumption was further examined and substantiated in a series of on-line lexical ambiguity priming experiments performed by a subset of the original NS subjects (n = 10), matched control subjects (n = 10), matched CL subjects (n=10), and matched PD subjects (n = 10). When lexical ambiguities were presented in a single word context as word triplets, NS subjects showed rapid nonselective lexical activation, suggesting that intact lexical-semantic information could be accessed via automatic routines, similar to control subjects. Unlike control subjects, however, NS subjects were unable to sustain any form of significant activation, implying a selective impairment in the ability to manipulate lexical-semantic information through attentional/controlled processing. This breakdown was qualitatively different to the controlled processing disturbance evidenced by CL subjects, who maintained nonselective meaning facilitation over time, while PD subjects showed a pattern of selective priming consistent with a reduction in attentional processing. The emerging picture of a dissociation between intact automatic processing and compromised attentional/strategic lexical processing in the NS subjects was further elucidated in an experiment examining the processing of unequibiased lexical ambiguities in isolation. In this study, NS and PD subjects showed rapid nonselective meaning facilitation, again implying intact automatic lexical processing. While control and CL subjects evidenced multiple meaning activation followed by selective facilitation of the dominant meaning, NS and PD subjects were unable to achieve selective meaning facilitation, instead showing a protracted period of nonselective lexical activation. This finding suggested that when ambiguities were encountered in isolation, there was not an absolute breakdown in attentional processing per se, but rather a circumscribed deficit in the selective attentional engagement of the semantic network on the basis of meaning frequency, possibly implicating a disturbance of inhibitory mechanisms within the semantic network. A cross-modal priming experiment was used to investigate how lexical ambiguities were processed and resolved in a biased sentential context. Initially, lexical activation for the neurological patient groups appeared influenced by contextual information to a greater extent than in normal controls, which may indicate delayed lexical decision making or disturbed automatic lexical access. Only the PD and NS individuals failed to then maintain selective facilitation of the contextually appropriate meaning, suggesting a breakdown in the attention-based control and maintenance of semantic activation on the basis of integrated sentential constraints. This finding was extended in another cross-modal priming experiment, where NS and PD subjects appeared unable to use discourse-level information to select meanings and develop topical inferences via attentional/strategic mechanisms, while CL subjects showed a selective disturbance of inference development. The results of this thesis have served to delineate certain dynamic aspects of language processing in individuals with NS lesions in terms of automatic lexical processing components and processes involving the attentional/strategic selection of meaning on the basis of meaning frequency and various types of contextual information. In general, the NS group showed a demarcation between intact automatic processing and a breakdown in attentional/strategic processing which was manifest differently depending on the conditions under which processing was invoked. Furthermore, the performance of NS subjects on attentional operations was able to be dissociated under certain conditions from CL group performance and was similar to the PD group’s performance in certain instances. These preliminary findings are consistent with recent theories proposing a role for frontal-subcortical systems in the “top-down” modulation of semantic processing via executive attentional and strategic mechanisms. Although a disturbance in these systems provides a parsimonious explanation of the NS and PD group performance, such conclusions are drawn tentatively with the caveat that the precise neuropathological basis of cognitive-linguistic deficits in these individuals remains unclear at present.

No description available.

The main objective of this dissertation is to investigate the effects of acquiring a second language (L2) at later periods of language development and native-like homonym processing in the first language (L1) from the perspective of Event-Related brain Potentials (ERP) using a cross-modal lexical decision task. To date, there is a lack of neurophysiological investigations into the effect that acquiring an L2 can have on processing strategies in the L1, and whether or not there is a precise age at which L2 exposure no longer affects native-like language processing. As such, my goal is to pinpoint this sensitive period specifically for homonym processing. To achieve this, I will present and discuss the results of two studies. The first study employs behavioural response measures using a cross-modal lexical decision task where participants simultaneously heard a sentence and made a decision to a visually-presented pseudoword or real word. The second study employs ERP measures using a novel ERP paradigm which investigates not only the main objective of this dissertation, but the second objective as well. This second objective is for this dissertation to become the first to evaluate the outcome of combining the cross-modal lexical decision task with ERPs. The behavioural and neurophysiological results for the monolingual group support the Reordered Access Model (Duffy, Morris, & Rayner, 1988) while the results for the bilingual groups do not. The results of the current studies indicate that those bilinguals who acquired French as an L2 rather than as a second native L1 show increasing divergence from monolingual native speakers in L1 homonym processing, with later acquirers exhibiting an exponentially marked divergence. This was found even though the task was carried out in English, the L1 (or one of the L1s) of all participants. The diverging performances of the bilinguals from the monolinguals were apparent in behavioural responses as well as in the amplitude, scalp distribution, and latency of ERP components, These differences were unique to each group, which supports the hypothesis that the acquisition of an L2 influences processing in the L1 (Dussias & Sagarra, 2007). Specifically, the early and late bilingual groups exhibited a marked divergence from the monolingual group as they revealed syntactic priming effects (p<.001) as well as lexical frequency effects (p<.001). They also revealed the greatest P600-like effect as they processed target words which were inappropriately- related to the priming homonyms (such as skin in Richard had a shed in the back of the garden). This suggests a heightened sensitivity to surface cues due to the L2 influencing homonym processing in the L1 (Cook, 2003; Dussias & Sagarra, 2007). Comparatively, the monolingual group revealed equal N400-like effects for lexical ambiguities overall compared to the unrelated conditions, and a context-by-frequency-interaction slowing their processing of the target word that is appropriately-related to the subordinate reading of the priming homonym, suggesting that they are not as sensitive to these same surface cues. Importantly, these results confirm that using ERPs along with a cross-modal lexical decision task is a promising paradigm to further study language processing.

Made available in DSpace on 2017-07-10T18:55:44Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Keli Rosa.pdf: 5523223 bytes, checksum: f511a3670568eb57374cd64afcea343f (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-03-11 / The research presented here was focused on reflections and analyses involving the translation of lexical ambiguity between two languages of different modality: we refer to the Portuguese Language and Brazilian Sign Language Libras; more specifically our focus is on the word "state." In such a context, as well as in translations of which take part two oral auditory languages, the translation involving Portuguese and Libras requires the translator a judicious and careful analysis of their lexical choices at the moment often he is translating the source text message to the target text. In this task the t ambiguous lexical items that need to be properly understood in the source language for the translation to happen no meaning problems in the target language. Hence the interest in analyzing the strategies used for the translation of "state" can happen without causing any problems of meaning in the target language. For our analysis, we rely on a corpus consisting of 774 sentences, which were subjected to linguistic analysis and translation into Libras glosses by a professional listener in accordance with Decree 5.626/05. The basis for our discussion is in the main concepts underlying the translation process under the assumptions of authors such as Campos(1986), Quadros (2001, 2004), Oustinoff (2011), Rónai (1976) and Jakobson (1975), and authors who studied lexical ambiguity, as Ullmann (1964), Azeredo (2011) and Silva (2006) / A pesquisa ora apresentada focalizou-se em reflexões e análise envolvendo a tradução da ambiguidade lexical entre duas línguas de modalidade diferentes: referimo-nos à Língua Portuguesa e a Língua Brasileira de Sinais Libras; mais especificamente, trataremos aqui da palavra estado . Em tal contexto, assim como ocorre em traduções das quais tomam parte duas línguas orais auditivas, a tradução envolvendo o Português e a Libras exige do tradutor analisar criteriosa e cuidadosamente as suas escolhas lexicais no momento em que está remontando a mensagem do texto fonte para o texto alvo. Nessa tarefa os itens lexicais ambíguos precisam ser devidamente compreendidos pelo tradutor já na língua fonte para que a tradução possa acontecer sem provocar problemas de sentidos na língua alvo. Daí vem o interesse em analisar as estratégias utilizadas para que a tradução de estado possa acontecer sem provocar problemas de sentidos na língua alvo. Para nossas análises, contamos com um corpus formado por 774 sentenças, que foram submetidas a análises linguísticas e à tradução para glosa Libras por um profissional ouvinte capacitado conforme o Decreto 5.626/05. Como base para discussão, pautamo-nos nos principais conceitos que permeiam a tradução sob os pressupostos de autores como Campos (1986), Quadros (2001, 2004), Oustinoff (2011), Rónai (1976) e Jakobson (1975), e os que tratam da ambiguidade lexical, como Ullmann (1964), Azeredo (2011) e Silva (2006)

The main objective of this dissertation is to investigate the effects of acquiring a second language (L2) at later periods of language development and native-like homonym processing in the first language (L1) from the perspective of Event-Related brain Potentials (ERP) using a cross-modal lexical decision task. To date, there is a lack of neurophysiological investigations into the effect that acquiring an L2 can have on processing strategies in the L1, and whether or not there is a precise age at which L2 exposure no longer affects native-like language processing. As such, my goal is to pinpoint this sensitive period specifically for homonym processing. To achieve this, I will present and discuss the results of two studies. The first study employs behavioural response measures using a cross-modal lexical decision task where participants simultaneously heard a sentence and made a decision to a visually-presented pseudoword or real word. The second study employs ERP measures using a novel ERP paradigm which investigates not only the main objective of this dissertation, but the second objective as well. This second objective is for this dissertation to become the first to evaluate the outcome of combining the cross-modal lexical decision task with ERPs. The behavioural and neurophysiological results for the monolingual group support the Reordered Access Model (Duffy, Morris, & Rayner, 1988) while the results for the bilingual groups do not. The results of the current studies indicate that those bilinguals who acquired French as an L2 rather than as a second native L1 show increasing divergence from monolingual native speakers in L1 homonym processing, with later acquirers exhibiting an exponentially marked divergence. This was found even though the task was carried out in English, the L1 (or one of the L1s) of all participants. The diverging performances of the bilinguals from the monolinguals were apparent in behavioural responses as well as in the amplitude, scalp distribution, and latency of ERP components, These differences were unique to each group, which supports the hypothesis that the acquisition of an L2 influences processing in the L1 (Dussias & Sagarra, 2007). Specifically, the early and late bilingual groups exhibited a marked divergence from the monolingual group as they revealed syntactic priming effects (p<.001) as well as lexical frequency effects (p<.001). They also revealed the greatest P600-like effect as they processed target words which were inappropriately- related to the priming homonyms (such as skin in Richard had a shed in the back of the garden). This suggests a heightened sensitivity to surface cues due to the L2 influencing homonym processing in the L1 (Cook, 2003; Dussias & Sagarra, 2007). Comparatively, the monolingual group revealed equal N400-like effects for lexical ambiguities overall compared to the unrelated conditions, and a context-by-frequency-interaction slowing their processing of the target word that is appropriately-related to the subordinate reading of the priming homonym, suggesting that they are not as sensitive to these same surface cues. Importantly, these results confirm that using ERPs along with a cross-modal lexical decision task is a promising paradigm to further study language processing.

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No description available.

Made available in DSpace on 2017-07-10T18:56:08Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 elias_garcia.pdf: 1847671 bytes, checksum: 0dadeff62d3206dd60522615d69c1e6a (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-12-13 / The phenomenon of lexical ambiguity vehemently troubles researchers in the area of linguistics, especially in the teaching and learning processes, but not much discussed in the business area. Therefore, this was the focus we chose to study in this thesis. Bring this subject to business. We have noticed that in the accounting activity, the mandatory financial reports issued by professionals carry a high burden of ambiguity, mainly due to polysemy and homonymy. Starting from these findings, the research questions are: i) Is there external interference in the accounting lexicon that defines a terminology of the area? ii) How to reduce the lexical ambiguity present in the accounting reports? In order to answer these questions, we have chosen to study some financial reports that are required by companies, especially public companies, to reflect on the occurrence of the phenomenon of lexical ambiguity in the financial reports of companies. With this objective, we can know the linguistic impacts that this phenomenon can cause in the process of understanding the information disclosed by the accountants in these reports. In order to comply with this objective, we have selected two mandatory reports called "Explanatory Notes to the Financial Statements and Management Report", published by publicly traded companies, Petrobras, Vale, Editora Abril, Bradesco, Banco do Brasil and Embraer (representing all industries, services and commerce). To detect the phenomenon of ambiguity, we studied four terms, CASH, COST, EXPENSE and PROFIT that are frequent in business activity. We use as theoretical support Corpus Linguistics and the Terminology of specialties. The methodology used is based on documentary research with content analysis. After the theoretical discussions on linguistics, corpus linguistics and terminology, we analyzed the existence of ambiguity in the words selected in the reports and explained the possible meanings in each sentence of the selected reports aiming at disambiguation, in order to alleviate the often pernicious effects of the phenomenon for users of the accounting information. As results, we confirm that there is ambiguity in the lexicon of accounting; that there is great external interference of the legislative aspect in the formation of accounting terminology and that much of the accounting information is affected by the phenomenon of ambiguity. / O fenômeno da ambiguidade lexical incomoda veementemente os pesquisadores da área da linguística, principalmente no tocante aos processos de ensino e aprendizagem, mas não muito discutido na área de negócios. Logo, esse foi o foco que escolhemos para estudar nessa tese. Buscamos trazer esse assunto para o meio empresarial. Percebemos que na atividade contábil, os relatórios financeiros obrigatórios emitidos pelos profissionais carregam uma alta carga de ambiguidade, principalmente pela polissemia e homonímia. A partir dessas constatações, as perguntas da pesquisa são: (i) Existe interferência externa no léxico da contabilidade que define uma terminologia própria da área? (ii) Como reduzir a ambiguidade lexical presente nos relatórios contábeis? Para responder a essas perguntas, optamos por estudar alguns relatórios financeiros que são de publicação obrigatória pelas empresas, em especial, pelas companhias de capital aberto, com o objetivo de refletir sobre a ocorrência do fenômeno da ambiguidade lexical nos relatórios financeiros das empresas. Com esse objetivo, podemos conhecer os impactos linguísticos que esse fenômeno pode causar no processo de compreensão da informação divulgada pelos contadores nesses relatórios. Para cumprir esse objetivo, selecionamos dois relatórios obrigatórios denominados Notas Explicativas às Demonstrações Financeiras e Relatório da Administração, publicados pelas companhias de capital aberto Petrobras, Vale, Editora Abril, Bradesco, Banco do Brasil e Embraer, que representam todos os ramos de atividade (indústria, serviços e comércio). Para detectar o fenômeno da ambiguidade, estudamos quatro termos, CAIXA, CUSTO, DESPESA e LUCRO os quais são frequentes na atividade empresarial. Utilizamos como suporte teórico a Linguística de Corpus e a Terminologia de especialidades. A metodologia empregada está sustentada na pesquisa documental com a análise de conteúdo. Após as discussões teóricas sobre Linguística, Linguística de Corpus e Terminologia, analisamos a existência da ambiguidade nas palavras selecionadas nos relatórios, e explicamos os significados possíveis em cada frase dos relatórios selecionados, visando à desambiguação, no sentido de minorar os efeitos muitas vezes perniciosos do fenômeno para os usuários da informação contábil. Como resultados, confirmamos que existe ambiguidade no léxico da contabilidade; que existe grande interferência externa do aspecto legislativo na formação da terminologia contábil; e que grande parte da informação contábil é afetada pelo fenômeno da ambiguidade.

Thesis (M.A. (Translation studies and Lingustics)) --University of Limpopo, 2015 / The aim of this study is to investigate ambiguity in Xitsonga. There are many kinds of ambiguity, but the study mainly focuses on lexical and structural ambiguity. Lexical ambiguity occurs at word level and is caused by homonyms (homophones and homographs) and polysemes. Structural ambiguity occurs at sentence level. This kind of ambiguity manifests in the structure of the sentence itself. Data were collected through self-observation as a native Xitsonga speaker. Words and sentences with multiple meanings in Xitsonga were listed and tree diagrams were used to illustrate and disambiguate ambiguity. The study reveals that, like other languages, Xitsonga has words and sentences with double or many meanings. KEYWORDS AMBIGUITY, LEXICAL AMBIGUITY, STRUCTURAL AMBIGUITY, HOMONYM, HOMOPHONES, HOMOGRAPHS, POLYSEMES.

This work proposes an automatic system of analysis for Organic Chemistry compound names aiming to generate pictures of chemical structures. In order to accomplish this, the system receives an organic compound name, analyzes it syntactically and semantically and, if it represents a correct chemical compound, generates a visual output for the corresponding structure. An advance that the system shows in relation to other systems which deal with the same problem consists on being able to analyse both compound names that satisfy the current o±cial nomenclature constraints and those that, despite of do not respect them, represent correct organic compounds (in this case, the system will have solved a nomenclature ambiguity problem). The semantic and syntactic analysis are guided by the name component types of the chemical compounds, which motivated an implementation that fits into the Generative Lexicon Theory (GLT) formalism. Furthermore, the analysis guided by types justified the decision of implementing the system by using the parser combinators and the Clean Funcional Language as very adequate and eficient tools. The implemented system represents a significative utilitarian as an automatic Organic Chemistry instructor. / O presente trabalho propõe um sistema automático de análise de nomes de compostos da Química Orgânica visando a geração do desenho de suas estruturas químicas. Para tanto, o sistema recebe um nome de um composto orgânico, analisa-o sintática e semanticamente e, caso ele represente um composto quimicamente correto, gera uma saída visual para a estrutura química que lhe corresponda. Um avanço que o sistema apresenta com relação a outros que se propõem a efetuar tarefa semelhante e o fato de ele conseguir analisar tanto nomes de compostos que se enquadram nos padrões das nomenclaturas oficiais vigentes, quanto aqueles que, apesar de não se enquadrarem nos mesmos, representam compostos orgânicos verdadeiros (quando ocorrer tal situação, o sistema teria resolvido um problema de ambigüidade de nomenclatura). As análises sintática e semântica são guiadas pelos tipos dos componentes dos nomes químicos, fato que motivou a implementação do sistema nos moldes do formalismo da Teoria do Léxico Gerativo (TLG). Além disso, as análises guiadas pelo tipo motivaram a escolha dos combinadores de Parser e da Linguagem de Programação Funcional Clean como utilitários eficazes e adequados na execução das análises lingüísticas. O sistema implementado representa uma ferramenta muito útil como instrutor automático de Química Orgânica. / Mestre em Ciência da Computação