We report two experiments investigating subject-verb and object-verb agreement in Basque. Participants repeated and completed preambles containing singular or plural subjects and objects in sentences with canonical subject-object-verb (SOV) or non-canonical object-subject-verb (OSV) order; in Experiment 2, they did so while remembering two…

This dissertation addresses semantic search of Web services using natural language processing. We first survey various existing approaches, focusing on the fact that the expensive costs of current semantic annotation frameworks result in limited use of semantic search for large scale applications. We then propose a vector space model based service…

We report the results from two experiments examining native and non-native German speakers' sensitivity to crossover constraints on pronoun resolution. Our critical stimuli sentences contained personal pronouns in either strong (SCO) or weak crossover (WCO) configurations. Using eye-movement monitoring during reading and a gender-mismatch…

One strategy that children might use to sort words into grammatical categories such as noun and verb is distributional bootstrapping, in which local co-occurrence information is used to distinguish between categories. Words that can be used in more than one grammatical category could be problematic for this approach. Using naturalistic corpus…

We take a multidimensional perspective on the development of second language (L2) speaking ability and examine how changes in the underlying cognitive variables of linguistic knowledge and processing speed interact with complexity, fluency, and accuracy over the course of a 3-month Spanish study abroad session. Study abroad provides a unique…

In recent years, significant advances have been made in intelligent tutoring systems, and these advances hold great promise for adaptively supporting computer science (CS) learning. In particular, tutorial dialogue systems that engage students in natural language dialogue can create rich, adaptive interactions. A promising approach to increasing…

Purpose: The relationship between cognitive abilities and aphasia rehabilitation outcomes is complex and remains poorly understood. This study investigated the influence of language and cognitive abilities on anomia therapy outcomes in adults with aphasia. Method: Thirty-four adults with chronic aphasia participated in Aphasia Language Impairment…

The importance of culture and social interactions in disciplinary learning and language development within specific social practices and contexts is now an agreed-upon notion in the science education literature. In a pivotal article in 1990, Lemke introduced the idea of manual-technical operations as one of four modes making up the "hybrid…

The ASCUE conference is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year making me wonder if we will be able to attend the 100th conference in 2067. By then, many of us may very well be biologically deceased. However, there is technology currently in development making it possible for a digital version of ourselves to attend not only the 2067 conference…

Nonword repetition (NWR) tasks represent one assessment tool for Specific Language Impairment (SLI). The use of such tasks has been established and verified for monolingual children. However, the diagnostic accuracy of NWR tasks for bilingual children has had variable results and must address several unique characteristics of this population. Gaps…

The ubiquitous hashtag has disruptively transformed how news stories are reported and shared across social media networks. Often, such text streams are massively multilingual with 50 different languages on an average and contain a combination of subjective user opinion, objective evolving information about the story and unrelated spam. This is in…

One of the central questions in recent second language processing research is whether the types of parsing heuristics and linguistic resources adult L2 learners compute during online processing are qualitatively similar or different from those used by native speakers of the target language. While the current L2 processing literature provides…

Intelligent tutoring systems for ill-defined domains, such as reading and writing, are critically needed, yet uncommon. Two such systems, the Interactive Strategy Training for Active Reading and Thinking (iSTART) and Writing Pal (W-Pal) use natural language processing (NLP) to assess learners' written (i.e., typed) responses and provide immediate,…

Children with limited oral language due to developmental and language delays have difficulty with communication in their everyday lives. Their trouble with speech and/or language impacts their ability to socialize with peers and learn in the school setting. Most of the research on alternative and augmentative communication systems and oral…

The current study investigated the possibility that language switches could be relatively automatically triggered by context. "Single-word switches," in which bilinguals switched languages on a single word in midsentence and then immediately switched back, were contrasted with more complete "whole-language switches," in which…