Investigated incidental language-learning by subjects using multimedia as a self-study and mandatory component of an undergraduate module. Language items recalled and reused while subjects were engaged in a meaning-focused task were compared with those in two multimedia applications for evidence of incidental learning. Analysis compared language…

Analyzes the discourse completion data collected through Japanese English-as-a-foreign-language learners with reference to four speech functions--thanking, apology, request, and offering. Compares Japanese learners' expressions with expressions obtained by native speakers of English stored in the London-Lund corpus of Spoken English. (Author/VWL)

Focuses on the importance of phonology in establishing orthographic representations. In normal readers, phonological and orthographic representations of words are so closely connected that they are usually coactivated, whereas in dyslexics, this connection is less strong, so that orthographic representations interfere less with phonemic…

Reports an empirical investigation into the influence of purpose for reading on performance in reading in English as a Second Language for academic purposes. High intermediate and advanced level university students of ESL read an academic procedural text for one of two purposes. Results showed a significant interaction between purpose and task, as…

Describes a Web-based course management system called TeleTOP that was developed at the University of Twente (Netherlands) to shift the focus in a course from the presentation of content to the facilitation of learners making contributions to the course. Considers instructor tasks, changes in class activities, and implications for the instructor…

Investigated how meaning is negotiated in two different types of interactions between native and nonnative speakers: a relatively unstructured conversation and a two-way information-gap task. Results suggest conversational interaction has the potential for substantial learning opportunities at multiple levels of interaction even though it offered…

Although increasing feedback specificity is generally beneficial for immediate performance, it can undermine certain aspects of the learning needed for later, more independent performance. The results of the present transfer experiment demonstrate that the effects of increasing feedback specificity on learning depended on what was to be learned,…

The study investigated the effects of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) use on pupils with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) symptoms. Nine Greek primary school pupils with ADHD symptoms and four others with no such deficit worked on a computer, either individually or collaboratively, once a week for a six-week period.…

There is a growing volume of research on task-based language use; however, the nature of "task proficiency" has not yet been clearly defined. In order to gain new insights, this study examines the relationship between the process of communication in an L2 and a task outcome by analysing lexical density, as obtained from the pattern of a…

This study assessed theory of mind understanding in children with congenital profound visual impairment (CPVI): children who have had no access to visual information throughout development. Participants were 18 children with CPVI and no other impairments, aged between 5 and 11 years, and 18 children with normal vision, matched individually on…

Two studies are presented on expressive happy and sad drawings made by British 4- to 12-year-olds (n = 80 and 160, respectively) in which the drawings were assessed individually for the quantity and quality of expressive devices. Quantity was measured in the number of appropriate expressive content themes and formal properties evident in each…

The aim of this paper is to offer a view of the primary school as an institution with structural properties comparable to institutions in general. Five studies will provide the basis from which such a view is developed, those by Sorokin, (1938), Perrow, (1965), Schon (1970), Taylor, "et al" (1974) and Collins and Porras, (1998). The…

Background: WILSTAAR comprises a programme for identifying and treating 8-10-month-old infants who are at risk of language and cognitive difficulties. It has been adopted by health trusts, and included in Sure Start intervention schemes, throughout the UK. This study addresses one of the main queries raised by critics of the programme, by…

Intergroup attitudes were assessed in African-American (N=70) and non-African-American minority (N=80) children, evenly divided by gender, in first (M=6.5 years old) and fourth (M=9.6 years old) grades attending mixed-ethnicity public schools in a suburban area of a large mid-Atlantic city in the USA. Children were interviewed to test hypotheses…

Children (ages 5, 7, and 9 years) and young adults completed two visual attention tasks that required them to make a forced choice identification response to a target shape presented in the center of a computer screen. In the first task (high correlation condition) each target was flanked with the same distracters on 80% of the trials (valid…