Investigates how semantic properties of functional categories are acquired by second language (L2) learners in an instructional setting. Findings suggest that L2 learners are able to acquire interpretable formal features not transferable from their native language. (Author/VWL)

This paper discusses deaf readers' acquisition of word meanings from context. It describes what is involved in deriving word meanings from context; identifies issues relevant for deaf learners; isolates factors that make an impact on the learning-from-context process (task factors, reader factors, text factors, and word features), and identifies…

Analysis of second-language exercises intended to expand context-inference skills in reading indicated that most of the exercises offered little help in developing the skill and only partial understanding of word meaning. (Author/CB)

Examines imperatives regarding their different construction forms as well as the syntactic and pragmatic features of the imperative stem that influence the form and meaning of the tag attached to it. The conclusion is drawn that the imperative tag cannot be best analyzed as merely a frozen expression. (GLR)

A critical analysis explores the strictly logical aspects and pragmatic claims of a presupposition and negation theory (Burton-Roberts, 1989). Other clearly relevant facts, not previously considered, are used to show that the theory preempted empirical issues on invalid a priori grounds. (23 references) (Author/CB)

A response to a critical analysis of a theory on presupposition and negation uses that critique's claims and proposed system to corroborate the original arguments and theory. (24 references) (Author/CB)

A semantic or a phonetic cue was given when necessary in an object-naming task involving 30 first grade children. Although the children who were poor readers named fewer objects than good readers, both groups of children benefited from phonetic cues. In contrast, semantic cues had relatively little effect. (Author/JDD)

Discusses the automatic construction of abstracts from the texts of documents. Automatic sentence extraction is examined, including syntactic criteria and semantic relational criteria; textual cohesion is discussed, including the recognition of anaphors and noun phrases; text structure is addressed; and the concept of abstract-frames is described.…

Presents a model that distinguishes between data as directly observable facts, information as structured collections of data, and knowledge as methods of using information. The discussion covers the likely benefits of the use of the model for a semantic information retrieval system using the concept of semantic categories. (28 references)…

Describes a prototype system for interactive knowledge-based indexing of the medical literature. Topics covered include current indexing practice; knowledge-based systems using frames; various types of assistance provided by the prototype system; and current research activities and plans for the development of the system. (17 references) (CLB)

The study found that using bizarre imagery was not as effective as a cued recall task in improving word recall of 14 college students with learning disabilities. Recall was also poorer during imagery than semantic processing instructions. Long-term memory for both learning disabled and non-disabled subjects was not aided by bizarre imagery.…

Study of East and West Texans' (N=62) use of double modals as single lexical items and their syntactic and semantic characteristics found that neither Aux nor subcategorization analysis could account for both single-modal and double-modal dialects. Double modals, however, could conceivably be analyzed as two-word lexical items such as idioms or…

Presents examples of how children acquire language through the principles-and-parameters model, a highly modular system in which different theories interact so that only permissible sequences arise, and highlights research on Spanish syntax and semantics. (136 references) (CB)

Describes exploratory experiments in evaluating and improving a thesaurus through studying its effect on retrieval. A formula was developed to measure the conceptual distance between queries and documents encoded as sets of thesaurus terms. Comparison to the performance of people judging conceptual distance shows that the formula accurately…

Describes the results of an analysis of 87 non-formulaic abstracts for structures of semantic dependency between sentences. An automatic structural simplification is presented which is based on an assumption about the use of the dependency structure, and the results of an evaluation of the method are discussed. (25 references) (CLB)