Language is an essential component of human behavior. It is ubiquitous, but more importantly, it is malleable and it is constantly changing. Part of the dynamic nature of informal communication is the introduction and adoption of new linguistic elements. Online communication provides a window into this informal public discourse; therefore, it may be useful for testing hypotheses about the processes underlying the acquisition and use of new words. The comprehension of informal language may lead to an understanding of how these new informal words are integrated into our mental lexicon. The current study was an electroencephalographic (EEG) investigation of the brain processes that underlie informal language. We recorded event-related potentials while participants engaged in a lexical decision task. For this experiment, participants made judgments about Twitter targets primed with semantically related or unrelated words. Classic psycholinguistic studies have shown very specific event-related potentials (ERPs) for semantic processing. Most notably, the N400 event-related potential component is an index of lexical expectancy and semantic relatedness. In contrast to the literature, we did not find classic N400 priming effects. However, our results revealed marked differences between informal and traditional targets. Our results suggest that informal language is more difficult to process than traditional language.

The suppression of unwanted thoughts is an effortful process. An ironic effect of this process is that the unwanted thoughts can become hyper-accessibility after a period of their suppression, known as “post-suppression rebound”. In the present study the impact of providing energy (through a glucose drink) on post-suppression rebound was investigated. One hundred and twenty participants participated in the main study, and another 30 participants served as a baseline group. Half of the participants in the main study were given a drink containing glucose and the other half was given a placebo drink containing an artificial sweetener. All participants wrote a passage about a “day in the life” of a gay male, with half the participants directed to avoid using stereotypes. A subsequent lexical decision task measured activation of stereotypes. Finally, a measure of prejudice was given to account for individual differences. Neither the direction to avoid using stereotypes nor the glucose resulted in lower stereotypicality of the “day in life” passages. Furthermore, response times during the lexical decision task did not differ between any of the main conditions or the baseline condition. However, the combination of both glucose and directed suppression did result in more positive passages, suggesting that the combination assists in reducing negative stereotype usage. Results are discussed in terms of stereotype usage and suppression and prejudice level.

This dissertation identified key parallels between the theories of place attachment and interpersonal attachment, a comparison that then informed three objectives of the research program: (1) to explore the functions of place attachment and describe which are shared with interpersonal attachment; (2) to examine how these functions differ according to stable individual differences in place and person attachment; and (3) to assess whether these functions differ according to the geographical scale at which the attachment rests. An additional methodological goal was to bring a new approach to the study of place attachment, drawing on experimental paradigms used in interpersonal attachment research. Research objectives were achieved through the completion of three separate studies. Study 1 began the inquiry into the functions of place attachment with a content analysis of community members’ open-ended descriptions about places to which they consider themselves attached. Thirteen categories of benefits were revealed: memories, belonging, relaxation, positive emotions, activity support, comfort--security, self-growth, freedom--control, entertainment, connection to nature, practical benefits, privacy, and aesthetics. These functions were discussed with reference to the functions of interpersonal attachment previously identified in the literature. The next two studies used experimental methodologies to further evaluate, and expand upon, the functions of place attachment identified in Study 1. Study 2 evaluated whether a security function exists for place attachment by assessing the impact of threat exposure on the mental accessibility of place attachment words. Specifically, threat exposure was operationalized by mistakes made on a lexical decision task, and place attachment proximity was represented by participants’ subsequent reaction times to place attachment words in this task. Results showed that exposure to threats increased proximity-seeking to places of attachment, but not to other types of places. Study 3 evaluated the ability of place attachment to provide belongingness, control, meaningfulness, self-esteem, and improved affect, and this was done within the context of a commonly-used ostracism paradigm. Place attachment was manipulated using a visualization exercise, and ostracism was manipulated using a bogus rejection paradigm. The dependent variables included participants’ current moods and experienced levels of psychological need satisfaction (i.e., meaning, self-esteem, control, and belongingness). Although ostracism did not interact with the place attachment visualization, the latter was found to increase individuals’ current levels of self-esteem, meaning, belongingness, control and negative affect, but only among participants without an avoidant place attachment style. This comparison between interpersonal attachment and place attachment revealed some overlap between the two types of bonding, and most importantly, inspired new research questions and methodological approaches to advance the study of place attachment – a less mature theory, but one with much applied value and theoretical potential. / Graduate / 0451

It has long been held that processing at the single word level during reading is automatic. However, research has recently begun to emerge that challenges this view. The literature surrounding the processing of emotion while recognizing printed words is limited, but some findings in the processing of emotion in faces suggest that negative stimuli (especially threat stimuli) promote quick and accurate processing. The purpose of the present experiments is to investigate whether negative emotionally-laden words are afforded priority processing in visual word recognition compared to positive emotionally-laden words. Two experiments are reported that manipulated the lexicality and valence of the target and distractor stimuli (Experiments 1 & 2), the validity of a spatial pre-cue (Experiments 1 & 2), and the presence of a distractor item (Experiment 2). Participants were asked to determine whether the target stimulus spelled a word or not. Response times on valid trials were faster compared to invalid trials, response times to negative emotionally-laden words were slower compared to positive emotionally-laden words, and the presence of a distractor item encouraged better focus on the target stimuli in the absence of any evidence that the valence of the distractor itself was processed. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that visual word recognition is not automatic given that processing benefited from the accurate direction of spatial attention. Furthermore, negative emotionally-laden words benefited equally compared to positive emotionally-laden words and therefore provide no evidence of automatic processing.

Η παρούσα εργασία εστιάζει στο ρόλο της κεφαλής στα παρατακτικά σύνθετα της Νέας Ελληνικής (ΝΕ). Το πρόβλημα έγκειται στο γεγονός πως δεν μπορούμε να υποστηρίξουμε με ακρίβεια ποιο συστατικό αποτελεί την κεφαλή σε αυτό το είδος των συνθέτων, δεδομένου ότι η γραμματική κατηγορία του συνθέτου μπορεί να προκύπτει και από τα δύο συστατικά, η σημασία του συνθέτου προκύπτει εξίσου από τα δύο συστατικά, και τα επιθετικά παρατακτικά σύνθετα εμφανίζουν σχετικά ελεύθερη σειρά όρων. Σχετικά με το παραπάνω πρόβλημα έχουν διατυπωθεί βάσει μορφολογικών/σημασιολογικών κριτηρίων τα εξής: Πρώτον, τα παρατακτικά σύνθετα έχουν δύο κεφαλές (Ten Hacken, 2000; Kageyama, 2009). Δεύτερον, στα παρατακτικά σύνθετα το πρώτο συστατικό λειτουργεί ως κεφαλή (Ανδριώτης, 1960; Li, 1993; Kiparsky, 2009). Τρίτον, για τα ελληνικά, είτε η έννοια της κεφαλής δεν έχει νόημα στα παρατακτικά σύνθετα, είτε συμβατικά και χάριν συμμετρίας με τα προσδιοριστικά σύνθετα, ως κεφαλή ορίζεται το δεύτερο συστατικό (Ράλλη, 2007:90-91). Υπό το πρίσμα της ψυχογλωσσολογίας, η κεφαλή φαίνεται να έχει ουσιαστικό ρόλο στην επεξεργασία των συνθέτων. Ωστόσο, ο ακριβής ρόλος της παραμένει ασαφής καθώς τόσο αυτή όσο και η θέση των συστατικών φαίνεται να αλληλεπιδρούν κατά την επεξεργασία των συνθέτων (Jarema 2006:57). Δεδομένου του προβληματισμού που υπάρχει στη βιβλιογραφία σχετικά με το ποιο από τα δύο συστατικά λειτουργεί ως κεφαλή στα παρατακτικά σύνθετα, προχωρήσαμε στη διεξαγωγή ενός on-line οπτικού πειράματος λεξικής απόφασης (on-line visual lexical decision task). Πειραματικό υλικό: 16 υπαρκτά παρατακτικά σύνθετα, (πχ. ψωμοτύρι, βορειοδυτικός, ανοιγοκλείνω), 16 υπαρκτά προσδιοριστικά σύνθετα, (πχ. μολυβοθήκη, ερωτοχτυπημένος, αφισοκολλώ), 16 νεολογικά παρατακτικά σύνθετα (πχ. σκουποφαράσι, αγενοθρασύς, τρεχογλιστρώ) και 16 νεολογικά προσδιοριστικά σύνθετα (πχ. πικρόφρουτο, χρηματοκερδισμένος, ιδρωτοστάζω) λειτούργησαν ως primes για τα πρώτα και τα δεύτερα συστατικά τους, καθώς επίσης και για ένα σύνολο λέξεων ελέγχου, παρελκυστικών λέξεων και μη λέξεων. Συμμετέχοντες: 25 φυσικοί ομιλητές της (ΝΕ). Διαδικασία: Οι συμμετέχοντες καλούνταν να απαντήσουν αν οι λέξεις που εμφανίζονταν στην οθόνη του υπολογιστή τους είναι λέξεις της (ΝΕ). Αυτό που μετρήσαμε στο συγκεκριμένο πείραμα ήταν ο χρόνος αντίδρασης (ΧΑ) των συμμετεχόντων. Αποτελέσματα: Όταν λειτουργούσε ως prime προσδιοριστικό σύνθετο (υπαρκτό/ νεολογικό) τότε ο (ΧΑ) ήταν μικρότερος στο πρώτο συστατικό. Όταν λειτουργούσε ως prime παρατακτικό σύνθετο (υπαρκτό/ νεολογικό) τότε ο (ΧΑ) ήταν παραπλήσιος τόσο στο πρώτο όσο και στο δεύτερο συστατικό. Συμπεράσματα: Σύμφωνα με τα αποτελέσματα, φαίνεται πως στα παρατακτικά σύνθετα και τα δύο συνθετικά συνεισφέρουν εξίσου στην αναγνώριση του συνθέτου, γεγονός που ίσως αναδεικνύει την ύπαρξη δύο κεφαλών στα παρατακτικά σύνθετα. / The present study focus on the role of morphological head in representation and processing of coordinate compounds in Modern Greek (MG). The problem is that we cannot support accurately which constituent is the morphological head in this kind of compounds, due to the fact that the grammatical category of compound can result from both constituents, the meaning of compound result from both constituents and the adjective coordinate compounds sometimes show free word order. Previous research based on morphological and semantic criteria has formulated the following: Firstly, the coordinate compounds have two morphological heads (Ten Hacken, 2000; Kageyama, 2009). Secondly, the first constituent is the morphological head in coordinate compounds (Andriotis, 1960; Li, 1993; Kiparsky, 2009). Thirdly, in (MG) either the notion of morphological head has no sense in coordinate compounds, or conventional and for the sake of symmetry with determinative compounds, as head defined the second constituent (Ralli, 2007:90-91). In the light of Psycholinguistics, the morphological head seems to have a prominent role in compound’s processing. Nevertheless, the exact role of head is still unclear as both the headedness and the position-in-the-string of compound interact in the processing of compounds across languages (Jarema 2006:57). The central question in this study is the following: Which of two constituents is the morphological head in coordinate compounds? To answer this question, we started out an on-line visual lexical decision task. Materials: 16 real coordinate compounds, (i.e. [psomotiri]=bread and cheese, [vorioδitikos]=northwest, [aniγoklino]=open and close), 16 real determinative compounds (i.e. [molivothici]= pencil case, [erotoxtipimenos]=love-struck, [afisokolo]= stick poster), 16 neologism coordinate compounds (i.e. [skupofarasi]= broom and dustpan, [aγenothrasis]= rude and cheeky, [trexoγlistro]= run and glide), 16 neologism determinative compounds (i.e. [pikrofruto]= bitter fruit, [xrimatokerδismenos]= one who has earned money, [idrotostazo]= drip sweat), used as primes both for their first and second constituents. Also, used as primes for a set of controls, fillers and nonwords. Participants: 25 native speakers of (MG). Procedure: Participants were asked to respond if the words presented in the screen of the computer are words of Modern Greek. In this experiment, we measured the reaction time (RT) of participants. Results: When the determinative compound (real/neologism) was the prime, the (RT) was lesser in the first constituent. When the coordinate compound (real/neologism) was the prime, the (RT) was similar both in the first and second constituent. Conclusion: According to the results, both first and second constituent of coordinate compounds contribute equal in compound recognition. This perhaps highlights the existence of two morphological heads in coordinate compounds.

Number is a grammatical category found in nearly every language around the world (Corbett, 2000). The syntactic expression of number is referred to as grammatical number. In English and French, two number categories are in use: singular and plural. Nouns that are written more frequently in their singular form are called singular-dominant, while those that are written more frequently in their plural form are called plural-dominant. Several lexical decision and picture naming studies have found that grammatical number and noun dominance interact, resulting in a surface frequency effect for singular-dominant nouns only. Singular-dominant nouns are recognized/named significantly faster in their singular form than in their plural form, while plural-dominant nouns are recognized/named equally fast in both forms (e.g., Baayen, Burani, & Schreuder, 1997; Biedermann, Beyersmann, Mason, & Nickels, 2013; Domínguez, Cuetos, & Segui, 1999; New, Brysbaert, Segui, Ferrand, & Rastle, 2004; Reifegerste, Meyer, & Zwitserlood, 2017). The objective of this thesis is to extend our understanding of the singular-dominant noun surface frequency effect in English and French by adopting three procedures. First, advanced linear mixed modelling techniques were used to improve statistical power and accuracy. Second, the noun dominance ratio technique (Reifegerste et al., 2017) was applied to investigate whether the surface frequency effect remains significant when noun dominance was treated as a continuous variable. Third, a determiner-noun number agreement task was created to determine whether the surface frequency effect could be reproduced in a novel task. Three studies were conducted. In Study 1, two lexical decision tasks (LDTs) were conducted. Results revealed that in both English and French, singular nouns were recognized faster than plural nouns while the noun dominance effect was non-significant. The interaction between grammatical number and noun dominance was significant in French and marginally so in English. The interaction pattern was identical in both languages, singular-dominant nouns demonstrated a surface frequency effect while plural nouns did not. In Study 2, three determiner-noun number agreement tasks (NATs) were conducted. Results revealed that in both English and French, plural nouns were recognized faster than singular nouns. No other effects were significant. Incorporating irregular singular nouns (e.g., bonus) and plural nouns (e.g., mice) as foils produced the same results. In Study 3, two LDTs and one NAT were conducted. Lexical decision results revealed that in both English and French, singular nouns were recognized faster than plural nouns. However, the effects of noun collectivity and animacy were significant in English only; non-collective nouns were recognized faster than collective nouns while inanimate nouns were recognized faster than animate nouns. Number agreement results revealed that in English, plural nouns were recognized faster than singular nouns; no other effects reached significance. Taken together, my studies confirm that a strong surface frequency effect exists during visual word recognition for singular-dominant nouns. However, the surface frequency effect does not extend to the formation determiner-noun number agreement decisions, which were influenced nearly exclusively by grammatical number.

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<p>Complex Word Processing in Teenage Poor Readers- Does Morphological Knowledge Help or Hinder?</p> <p>Abstract</p> <p>This longitudinal study addressed development of morphological awareness in fourteen-to-seventeen-year-olds reading disabled (RD) high school students enrolled in the Wilson Reading Program (Wilson, 1989). Our lexical decision experiment and reading fluency assessment took place in the first (session 1) and last months (session 2) of the school year that included training with morphologically complex English words. The lexical decision stimuli were composed of derived (<em>critical</em>), compound (<em>bathtub</em>) and pseudo-complex (<em>postpone</em>) words from the training program (trained words), matched complex words not in the training program (untrained words), and nonwords. Accuracy and response times were compared between sessions, and with a comparison group of age-matched typical readers. The RD group did not demonstrate large post-training gains in reading fluency, but, there were significant improvements in accuracy and speed in visual lexical decision. These improvements did not extend to auditory lexical decision, suggesting that the observed improvements in visual word recognition were a result of the training, and not a practice effect due to multiple testing sessions. Additionally, there was post-training improvement in both trained and untrained words implying that the RD students were able to generalize their acquired knowledge of grapheme-phoneme mappings and morphological processing to novel words. Both the RD and comparison group demonstrated the same hierarchy of accuracy and response time patterns for complex words suggest a processing advantage for visually presented derived and compound words that is not skill dependent.</p> / Master of Science (MSc)