Two experiments examined the dynamics of lexical activation in spoken-word recognition. In both, the key materials were pairs of onset-matched picturable nouns varying in frequency. Pictures associated with these words, plus two distractor pictures were displayed. A gating task, in which participants identified the picture associated with…

Two experiments are reported that examine how manipulations of visual attention affect speakers' linguistic choices regarding word order, verb use and syntactic structure when describing simple pictured scenes. Experiment 1 presented participants with scenes designed to elicit the use of a perspective predicate ("The man chases the dog/The dog…

Purpose: To construct a table for upper and lower limits of the 95% critical range for changes in word recognition scores obtained with monosyllabic word lists (of lengths 10, 25, 50, and 100 words) using newly available methods. Although such a table has been available for nearly 30 years (A. R. Thornton & M. J. M. Raffin, 1978), the earlier…

Language is generally viewed as conveying information through symbols whose form is arbitrarily related to their meaning. This arbitrary relation is often assumed to also characterize the mental representations underlying language comprehension. We explore the idea that visuo-spatial information can be analogically conveyed through acoustic…

Individuals with the rare genetic disorder, Williams syndrome, have an unusual cognitive profile with relatively good language abilities but poor non-verbal and spatial skills. This study explored the interaction between linguistic and spatial functioning in Williams syndrome by investigating individuals' comprehension of spatial language. A group…

Hemisphere-specific processing of laterally presented global and local stimulus levels was investigated by (a) examining interactions between the visual field of stimulus presentation and the response hand and (b) comparing intra- with inter-hemispheric effects of level priming (i.e. faster and more accurate performance when the target level…

Previous research has shown that the appearance of task-irrelevant abrupt onsets influences saccadic eye movements during visual search and may slow down manual reactions to target stimuli. Analysis of reaction time distributions in the present study offers evidence suggesting that top-down inhibition processes actively suppress oculomotor or…

Great controversy exists on whether associative learning occurs without awareness. In Experiment 1, 31 participants received discrimination training by repeated presentations of two stimulus sequences (S1[subscript A] right arrow S2[subscript A], and S1[subscript B] right arrow S2[subscript B]), S1 being a masked stimulus. S2 were imperative…

The current investigation assessed the effectiveness of protective equipment, specifically arm splints, in reducing the occurrence of severe self-injurious behavior (SIB). Although the protective equipment reduced rates of SIB to near-zero levels, self-restraint subsequently emerged. In an attempt to reduce self-restraint while maintaining…

EXPERIMENTS ON LANGUAGE LEARNING WERE CONDUCTED IN WALES WITH 26 8-YEAR OLD CHILDREN, OF MIXED ABILITY, BILINGUAL IN ENGLISH AND WELSH, AND ABOUT TO LEARN GERMAN. A STUDY OF THE LEARNING PROCESSES WAS MADE BY A VARIETY OF TESTS USED TO MEASURE LISTENING, UNDERSTANDING, IMITATING, AND WRITING. PRESENTED IN THIS DOCUMENT ARE THE DIFFERENT…

THE IDENTIFICATION OF THE OPTIMAL COMBINATION OF STIMULI AND THEIR TIMING FOR LARGE INCREASES IN RECOGNITION VOCABULARY IN A FOREIGN LANGUAGE AFTER STUDENTS HAVE MASTERED THE BASIC STRUCTURE OF THE LANGUAGE WAS THE SUBJECT OF RESEARCH UNDERTAKEN WITH STUDENTS ENROLLED AT THE GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF LANGUAGES AND LINGUISTICS. FOLLOWING A…

FURTHER EXAMINATION WAS MADE OF AN EARLIER RESEARCH FINDING WHICH SHOWED, CONTRARY TO "LOGICAL" ANALYSIS, THAT VERBAL REPRESENTATIONS EVOKE MORE SENSORY RESPONSES THAN DO BLACK AND WHITE LINE DRAWING REPRESENTATIONS OF THE SAME STIMULI. THIS RESEARCH FINDING HAD BEEN CONFIRMED BY TWO EARLIER STUDIES WHOSE SUBJECTS WERE ALL WHITE STUDENTS…

This study assessed the effects of bizarreness, prompt modality, and prompt type for 144 five and eight year-old children on recognition memory of pictorial pairs. Presentation of stimuli was self-paced, allowing for the collection of study time and response latency data, as well as recording number correct. While both bizarre and nonbizarre forms…

THE RELATIVE EFFECTIVENESS OF EIGHT TYPES OF VISUAL ILLUSTRATION OF THE HUMAN HEART WAS TESTED IN NINTH THROUGH TWELFTH GRADE CLASSES. THE EIGHT TYPES--ABSTRACT LINE DRAWINGS, DETAILED SHADED DRAWINGS, PHOTOGRAPHS OF HEART MODELS, AND REALISTIC MODELS, EACH IN BLACK AND WHITE AND IN COLOR--AND A CONTROL PRESENTATION WITH NO ILLUSTRATIONS WERE…

Two experiments studied the influence of an individual's cognitive style on concept identification. Subjects were high school males, classified into levels of cognitive style according to their performance on the Hidden Figures Test. For the first experiment, three non-overlapping groups of 30 each were required to classify figural patterns, which…