Many language learners lack the motivation to read complex texts. Because high-immersion Virtual Reality (VR) is increasingly reported to be highly motivating, the goal of our study was to compare English as a Second Language (ESL) learners' (N=79) motivation while reading a story with subtitles in VR (experimental group) versus reading the same…

Five types of Verb Phrase (VP) anaphors which appear to exist in free variation actually have specific grammatical, semantic, and rhetorical functions which account for the existence of some to the exclusion of others in certain syntactic environments. The five anaphors are: "do so,""do it," Verb Phrase Deletion (VPD), VPD with…

The purpose of this experiment was to determine if subjects who were unaware that a phrase has been deleted from a sentence could match the deleted phrase in both semantic content and syntactic position. Subjects were required to complete one of two blanks in a sentence with a prepositional phrase. Instructions stressed that these completions…

How syntax affects sentence prosody is explored. It is demonstrated that the lengthening of phase-final words and pausing afterward reflect a distinctly prosodic representation in which phonological constituents are arranged in a hierarchical nonrecursive structure. A model of prosodic pronunciation is also presented. (SLD)

This paper examines the role of movable adverbs in Mandarin Chinese. In terms of their position within a sentence, most Mandarin adverbs can be classified as movable or non-movable. While identification of either class may be based on their semantic categories or on the number of syllables, the motivation for placing a movable adverb in front of…

A group of syntactic studies, primarily concerning English and German, within the framework of generalized phrase structure grammar include: "English Adverb Placement in Generalized Phrase Structure Grammar" (Belinda L. Brodie), concerning the placement of modal, evaluative, temporal, and verb phrase adverbs; "Syntactic Conditions on Two Types of…

This review of research involving children's moral judgment of literature indicates that such research has been plagued by serious methodological problems stemming largely from the fact that the stimulus materials used to assess children's comprehension and evaluations have tended to be poorly constructed. It contends that this forces children to…

The grammar which is concerned with meaning (the province of New Semantics), with its foundations in our perceptions of the surrounding world, can be learned in the elementary classroom through storytelling. Understanding of the sentence concept develops by allowing the child to use his language responsively and deliberately to organize the world…

Students can improve their writing skills by studying grammar. In learning to apply a logical system in their analysis of sentence parts, for example, students develop mental discipline. This discipline can be strengthened through the grammatical analysis of their own papers. In these evaluations, which include error and stylistic analyses and a…

Criteria for defining individual members of the preposition word class are set forth. Arguments are presented against calling prepositions meaningless, yet it is conceded and explained that those which occur in wider contexts are vaguer due to their greater variability. The unitary, polysemous, and/or homonymous nature of prepositions are…

This theoretical paper discusses (1) the meaning of the concept of structure, how the concept of structure is used by psychologists, and how the concept can be defined, and (2) the role of the concept "structure" in cognitive development with specific reference to Piaget's vision of intellectual development. The meanings of the term…

This investigation studied the development of certain predicates called factives, such as "sad,""happy,""know," and "true," by studying the semantic effects of negation on the complements of both factive and non-factive predicates. The subjects were 60 children, divided into three age groups of ten boys and…

This paper examines a phenomenon in the Setswana language whereby certain affixes, when combining with the verbal base, adjust their positions and forms according to phonological rules that can be termed "imbrication." D. T. Cole, among others, made a fair attempt at a morphological identification of these realizations, but did not go…

This study investigates whether other relationships in sentence structure besides the "brother-in-law" relation sanction surrogate agreement in Zinacanteco Tzotzil (Mayan). Surrogate agreement refers to cases in which an element that lies outside the class of regular agreement controllers in a language (the surrogate) controls…

Formal grammar study is important in schools above the elementary level because it can lead to improved understanding of the nature and functions of language. Although newer grammars, based on structural linguistics and transformational-generative grammar, have not met the needs of the schools, their potential should not be ignored with a return…