This article reviews research on the effects of conversational style on learning. Studies of conversational style have variously investigated "personalization" through changing instances of first-person address to second or third person, including sentences that directly address the learner; including more polite forms of address; and…

Strengths and weaknesses of three approaches to the study of the input requirements of second language learners are described. The data-oriented, the language-model, and the processing-model approaches are then compared with respect to their claims concerning the metalinguistic needs of the learner. (Author/CB)

Working on the assumption that an adequate model of comprehension must also deal with its connotative aspect (the aspect that concerns the feeling, mood, or "tone" of the text), this paper examines the concept of contextual tone. After defining tone according to its various senses and synonymous forms (voice, attitude, style, mood, and…

Two experiments indicating that children's linguistic generalizational biases change from a semantically-based system to a syntactical-structural system provide evidence for a semantic-relational bias in children's early grammars and support the notion that children's generalizational biases shift from a semantic-relational basis to a…

This paper considers the problem of differentiating thought and language in a way that makes it possible to relate them to each other. The analysis covers approaches of sociolinguistic research, different models of language and cognitive functioning within psychology and linguistics, the cybernetic approach, and psycholinguistic analyses. A common…

A major problem in using traditional assessment procedures lies in the use of theoretical and statistical assumptions for interpreting and measuring attention, memory, and verbal abilities, and attempting to relate these constructs to academic subjects. With respect to evaluating temperaments and learning styles, the present methods of…