The purpose of this research was to study grammatical categories in the Tagalog mental lexicon using lexical decision tasks. Some linguists question whether words in Tagalog can be classified as nouns and verbs (Foley, 1998; Kaufman, 2011) because most root words can be inflected for any grammatical function and because verbs cannot be used in their uninflected form. Previous studies with English and German (Kauschke and Stenneken 2008) have shown that participants respond differently to nouns and verbs in lexical decision tasks. These studies have also shown that participants respond differently to transitive and intransitive verbs in lexical decision tasks. It was assumed that if nouns and verbs exist in Tagalog, response times to Tagalog lexical decision tasks will show similar patterns to those performed in English and German. Two experiments were performed to examine whether words are classified as nouns and verbs in the Tagalog mental lexicon and whether other factors affected that classification. For the experiments, native speakers of Tagalog participated in lexical decision tasks and response times were measured. The first experiment tested the classification of root nouns and verbs. Contrary to findings in other languages, there was no significant difference between response times to nouns and verbs. However, there were differences in response times to nouns from different semantic categories and to verbs with different morphosyntactic structures. The second experiment examined the classification of inflected nouns and verbs. Again, the results showed no difference between response times to nouns and verbs. There was also no difference between transitive and intransitive verbs. However, there was a slight difference between verbs of different voice inflections. The results of the experiments suggest the while the grammatical classes of nouns and verbs may not be the most important features of words in the Tagalog mental lexicon, they may still play a role since different features, semantics or morphosyntactics, did affect the responses to words from the different categories.

No description available.

This thesis describes basic research into visual word recognition and decision making. Determining the best matching lexical representation for a given stimulus involves interactions between representations. The standard task for studying these processes is the lexical decision task (LDT), but there is still debate regarding the factors that affect how individuals make lexical decisions. The nature of lexical interactions and the processes underlying lexical decision-making were addressed here by testing response congruency effects in the masked priming variant of the LDT. The results of seven masked priming experiments showed a robust response congruency effect that depends on the difficulty of the word-nonword discrimination. This finding resolved apparent inconsistencies in previous research. The experiments were simulated using the Bayesian Reader and the Spatial Coding Model (SCM). The probability based Bayesian Reader model failed to accommodate the findings. However, a good fit to the data was provided by a modified version of the SCM in which the assumptions regarding the nature of lexical interactions were changed such that word nodes inhibit only (closely) related competitors. The model also assumes that the difficulty of the word-nonword discrimination affects the degree to which stimulus typicality informs lexical decisions. A critical issue for these experiments involved the definition of orthographic typicality. An algorithm for measuring orthographic typicality and for generating nonwords with a specific level of orthographic typicality (OT3) was developed. An unprimed LDT experiment showed that OT3 affected decision latency even when other standard measures of orthographic typicality were controlled. Two additional masked priming experiments showed that highly typical primes lead to faster word responses and slower nonword responses than less typical primes. Overall, the results of this research enhance our understanding of the processes underlying visual word recognition and lexical decision making, and also have important methodological implications for the field.

No description available.

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

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.

No description available.

Thesis (M.A.)--Miami University, Dept. of Spanish and Portuguese, 2009. / Title from first page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 66-68).