Whereas a growing amount of attention has been directed to the role of perceptual-cognitive aptitude in successful second language (L2) lexicogrammar learning, scholars have begun to investigate the same topic in the context of L2 pronunciation learning. To date, there is ongoing discussion on the mechanism underlying L2 speech learning in…

Purpose: Aims of this research were (a) to investigate higher order linguistic and cognitive skills of Italian children with cochlear implants (CIs); (b) to correlate them with the comprehension of irony, which has never been systematically studied in this population; and (c) to identify the factors that facilitate the development of this…

This study examined the reading comprehension profiles, and the related linguistic and cognitive skills, of 146 Chinese students in Grades 3-9 who are deaf or hard of hearing (d/Dhh). Employing a rigorous regression approach, the current study identified 19 unexpected poor comprehenders, 24 expected average comprehenders, and 16 unexpected good…

Sensitivity to lexical stress in adult German-speaking students with reading difficulty was investigated using minimal pair prepositional verbs whose meaning and syntax depend on the location of the stressed syllable. Two tests of stress perception were used: (i) a stress location task, where listeners indicated the location of the perceptually…

In the current study we investigate whether 2- and 3-year-old German children use intonation productively to mark the informational status of referents. Using a story-telling task, we compared children's and adults' intonational realization via pitch accent (H*, L* and de-accentuation) of New, Given, and Contrastive referents. Both children and…

An adaptation of the standard battery of Woodcock-Johnson III Tests of Cognitive Abilities (WJ-III) for Brazilian children and youth was investigated. The sample was composed of 1094 students (54 percent girls), ages 7-17, living in Sao Paulo state (91 percent). Items from Brazilian school books as well as from the WJ-III Spanish version…