The translation industry has witnessed rapid technological improvements in recent years. This rapid improvement is ascribed to a huge demand for the workload. Using a computer in the field of translation is very important due to the huge demand for fast and accurate translation. Translation tools came to existence due to the low proficiency of…

Acquiescence is often defined as the systematic selection of agreeable ("strongly agree") or affirmative ("yes") responses to survey items, regardless of item content or directionality. This definition implies that acquiescence is immune to item characteristics; however, the influence of item characteristics on acquiescence…

This paper investigates the effect of sentence complexity, specifically lexical and syntactic surprisal, on L2 listening difficulty. Psycholinguistic studies revealed that surprisal cases correlate with textual comprehension difficulty. Based on surprisal theory, these cases are less probable or expected, considering the precedent context, thus…

A major open question in natural language research is the role of communicative efficiency in the origin and on-line processing of language structures. Here, we use word pairs like "chimp/chimpanzee", which differ in length but have nearly identical meanings, to investigate the communicative properties of lexical systems and the communicative…

It is proposed that humans have available to them two systems for interpreting natural language. One system is familiar from formal semantics. It is a type based system that pairs a syntactic form with its interpretation using grammatical rules of composition. This system delivers both plausible and implausible meanings. The other proposed system…

We explore the consequences of letting the incremental and integrative nature of language processing inform the design of competence grammar. What emerges is a view of grammar as a system of local monotonic constraints that provide a direct characterization of the signs (the form-meaning correspondences) of a given language. This…

Verbal memory is a fundamental prerequisite for language learning. This study investigated 7-month-olds' (N = 62) ability to remember the identity and order of elements in a multisyllabic word. The results indicate that infants detect changes in the order of edge syllables, or the identity of the middle syllables, but fail to encode the order…

This study reports on a sentence processing experiment in second language (L2) French that looks for evidence of trace reactivation at clause edge and in the canonical object position in indirect object cleft sentences with complex embedding and cyclic movement. Reaction time (RT) asymmetries were examined among low (n = 20) and high (n = 20)…

The present study examined the inhibitory processes of spoken word recognition of Chinese homophones during sentence processing, using a standard cross-modal naming experiment with an innovative design and materials construction. Results confirmed that (1) preceding sentence context has exerted an early effect on disambiguating among different…

Assessment data from the United States and international reports of student achievement indicate that upper elementary students are failing to meet basic levels of proficiency in fractions and writing, and that this is particularly prevalent with students with or at-risk for learning disabilities in mathematics. Proficiency with fractions has been…

Two eye-tracking experiments tested (a) whether L2 learners benefit from the consistency of input modality (auditory instead of written processing instruction [PI] training) and (b) whether they benefit from training using the same voice as the test voice. Results confirmed a robust effect of PI training on picture-selection accuracy, yet the…

Purpose: This article includes results from a multistate randomized controlled trial designed to investigate the impacts of a language-focused classroom intervention on primary grade students' proximal language skills and distal reading comprehension skills. Method: The sample included 938 children from 160 classrooms in 4 geographic regions in…

This paper explores analysis of feedback data collected from student consultations at two mathematics support centres at universities in Australia and Ireland. Unstructured text data was collected over six years and includes qualitative data on student queries collected during the consultations from mathematics and statistics related subjects.…

We used multidimensional item response theory to test the internal structure of the Phonological Awareness Literacy Screening in Spanish for Preschool and test for item parameter drift. The measure is aligned with the simple view of reading, which defines reading as consisting of two equally important dimensions: decoding and language…

In 2015, the "Programme for International Student Assessment" (PISA) introduced multiple changes in its study design, the most extensive being the transition from paper- to computer-based assessment. We investigated the differences between German students' text responses to eight reading items from the paper-based study in 2012 to text…