In the current study, we investigated the role of executive functions in explaining how word recognition and language comprehension jointly predict reading comprehension in multilingual and monolingual students (Grades 1 and 2). Specifically, mediation and moderation models were tested and compared to offer a more nuanced understanding of the role…

An important question within psycholinguistics is how knowledge of multiple languages impacts the coactivation of word forms and meanings during language comprehension. To the extent that a bilingual's known languages are always partially active, as predicted by models such as the bilingual interactive activation plus model (Dijkstra & Van…

The positive effects of bi-modal input on language learning are becoming a largely accepted experimental finding. However, experiments looking at bi-modal reading in a foreign language are normally limited by the common experimental situation of classroom-based researchers studying university age participants for the limited timespan of a…

The paper provides an example of how immigration is constructed by receiving societies as a comprehension or language problem that requires special solutions. It focuses on the application of Easy-to-Read, a simplified register currently in expansion which addresses different groups of people with intellectual disabilities, to immigrants in Spain.…

This study aims to establish whether the processing of different connectives (e.g., "and," "but") and different coherence relations (addition, contrast) can be modulated by a structural feature of the connected segments--namely, parallelism. While "but" is mainly used to contrast two expressions, "and"…

There are numerous studies demonstrating facilitated processing of cognates relative to noncognates for bilinguals, providing evidence that bilingual lexical access is language nonselective. We tested whether cross-language activation affects comprehension of larger units of meaning, focusing specifically on comprehension of anaphoric references.…

Previous studies offer mixed evidence regarding whether a unified model of reading comprehension predictors applies to Dual Language Learners (DLLs) and English Speakers (ESs), or whether distinctive models across language groups are empirically supported. The present study adds another dimension to this body of work by examining multiple reading…

This study investigated the effectiveness of providing L1 explicit information (EI) with practice for making more accurate and faster interpretations of L2 French "Imparfait" (IMP). Two treatments were investigated: (a) "L2-only," providing EI about the L2 with L2 interpretation practice, and (b) "L2+L1," providing…

The current study looks at whether bilinguals varying in language dominance show a processing advantage for idiomatic over non-idiomatic phrases and to what extent this effect is modulated by idiom transparency (i.e., the degree to which the idiom's figurative meaning can be inferred from its literal analysis) and cross-language similarity (i.e.,…

The present study aimed at exploring the semantic and syntactic processing differences between native and second languages in 20 early high proficient Kannada--English bilingual adults through accuracy and reaction time (RT) measurements. Subjects participated in a semantic judgement task (using 50 semantically correct and 50 semantically…

We examined sources of morphological variability in second language (L2) learners of Spanish whose native language (L1) is English, with a focus on L1-L2 similarity, morphological markedness, and knowledge type (receptive vs. expressive). Experiment 1 uses event-related potentials to examine noun-adjective number (present in L1) and gender…

This thesis explores how predictions about upcoming language inputs are computed during real-time language comprehension. Previous research has demonstrated humans' ability to use rich contextual information to compute linguistic prediction during real-time language comprehension, and it has been widely assumed that contextual information can…

Two lexical decision experiments are reported that investigate whether the same segmentation strategies are used for reading printed English words and fingerspelled words (in American Sign Language). Experiment 1 revealed that both deaf and hearing readers performed better when written words were segmented with respect to an orthographically…

This article reports a study that sought to determine whether non-native sentence comprehension can show sensitivity to two different types of Spanish case marking. Sensitivity to case violations was generally more robust with indirect objects in ditransitive constructions than with differential object marking of animate direct objects, even among…

In most languages, most of the syntactic dependency relations found in any given sentence are projective: the word-word dependencies in the sentence do not cross each other. Some syntactic dependency relations, however, are non-projective: some of their word-word dependencies cross each other. Non-projective dependencies are both rarer and more…