Computational models of infant word-finding typically operate over transcriptions of infant-directed speech corpora. It is now possible to test models of word segmentation on speech materials, rather than transcriptions of speech. We propose that such modeling efforts be conducted over the speech of the experimental stimuli used in studies…

It is widely assumed that subliminal word priming is case insensitive and that a short SOA (< 100 ms) is required to observe any effects. Here we attempted to replicate results from an influential study with the inclusion of a longer SOA to re-examine these assumptions. Participants performed a semantic categorisation task on visible word…

This dissertation explores the role of memory in language processing, and specifically how interference during lexical encoding can result in downstream interference during retrieval. The dissertation merges insights from both the sentence processing literature as well as the study of memory in non-sentential contexts and focuses on two factors…

Previous research has shown that language learners tend to produce fewer and less-natural multi-word sequences (MWSs) compared to native speakers of the same language. In the present study, collocational processing was investigated in a sentence reading task. Specifically, the familiar collocations were predicted to modulate the P3 mean amplitudes…

The morphological structure of complex words impacts how they are processed during visual word recognition. This impact varies over the course of reading acquisition and for different languages and writing systems. Many theories of morphological processing rely on a decomposition mechanism, in which words are decomposed into explicit…

Speech in everyday conversations is riddled with discourse markers (DMs), such as "well," "you know," and "like." However, in many lab-based studies of speech comprehension, such DMs are typically absent from the carefully articulated and highly controlled speech stimuli. As such, little is known about how these DMs…

The present study explores the issue of why ambiguous words are recognized faster than unambiguous ones during word recognition. To this end we contrasted two different hypotheses: the "semantic feedback" hypothesis (Hino and Lupker in J Exp Psychol Hum Percept Perform 22:1331-1356, 1996. https://doi.org/10.1037/0096-1523.22.6.1331), and…

There is a general consensus in theories of human speech recognition that humans engage in predictive processing during online speech processing. There are also claims that predictive processing indicates the operation of a predictive coding (PC) mechanism (Rao & Ballard, 1999). Formally, PC is a generative model where top-down signals consist…

The present study investigated the effect of emotional valence on auditory word recognition memory in English as a foreign language. Participants included 48 native Spanish speakers whose foreign language was English. They viewed four emotionally negative, four positive, and four neutral videos that, in total, contained 48 emotionally valenced…

Chinese coordinative compound words are common and unique in inter-character semantic and orthographic relationships. This study explored the inter-character orthographic similarity effects on the recognition of transparent two-morpheme coordinative compound words. Seventy-two native Chinese readers participated in a lexical decision task. The…

A large body of research suggests that spoken language processing is heavily influenced by social characteristics of the speaker, and conversely, that socio-cognitive processing is influenced by the language spoken by our interlocutors. However, little is known about the extent to which this interaction that is observed in adulthood has its roots…

The purpose of this study is to investigate the interaction between processing lexical and speaker-specific information in spoken word recognition. The specific question is whether repetition and semantic/associative priming is reduced when the prime and target are produced by different speakers. In Experiment 1, the prime and target were repeated…

Emotion (positive and negative) words are typically recognized faster than neutral words. Recent research suggests that emotional valence, while often treated as a unitary semantic property, may be differentially represented in concrete and abstract words. Studies that have explicitly examined the interaction of emotion and concreteness, however,…

Cross-situational word learning (XSWL) tasks present multiple words and candidate referents within a learning trial such that word-referent pairings can be inferred only across trials. Adults encode fine phonological detail when two words and candidate referents are presented in each learning trial (2 × 2 scenario; Escudero, Mulak, & Vlach,…

The majority of words in most languages consist of derived poly-morphemic words but a cross-linguistic review of the literature (Amenta and Crepaldi in Front Psychol 3:232-243, 2012) shows a contradictory picture with respect to how such words are represented and processed. The current study examined the effects of linearity and structural…