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PubMed1997

Human genetic affinities for Y-chromosome P49a,f/TaqI haplotypes show strong correspondence with linguistics.

Numerous population samples from around the world have been tested for Y chromosome-specific p49a,f/TaqI restriction polymorphisms. Here we review the literature as well as unpublished data on Y-chromosome p49a,f/TaqI haplotypes and provide a new nomenclature unifying the notations used by different laboratories. We use this large data set to study worldwide genetic variability of human populations for this paternally transmitted chromosome segment. We observe, for the Y chromosome, an important level of population genetics structure among human populations (FST = .230, P < .001), mainly due to genetic differences among distinct linguistic groups of populations (FCT = .246, P < .001). A multivariate analysis based on genetic distances between populations shows that human population structure inferred from the Y chromosome corresponds broadly to language families (r = .567, P < .001), in agreement with autosomal and mitochondrial data. Times of divergence of linguistic families, estimated from their internal level of genetic differentiation, are fairly concordant with current archaeological and linguistic hypotheses. Variability of the p49a,f/TaqI polymorphic marker is also significantly correlated with the geographic location of the populations (r = .613, P < .001), reflecting the fact that distinct linguistic groups generally also occupy distinct geographic areas. Comparison of Y-chromosome and mtDNA RFLPs in a restricted set of populations shows a globally high level of congruence, but it also allows identification of unequal maternal and paternal contributions to the gene pool of several populations.

DNA Probes↗
PubMed2006

Quantitative and qualitative evaluation of linguistic input support to a prelingually deaf child with cued speech: A case study.

This paper studies the linguistic input attended by a deaf child exposed to cued speech (CS) in the final part of her prelinguistic period (18-24 months). Subjects are the child, her mother, and her therapist. Analyses have provided data about the quantity of input directed to the child (oral input, more than 1,000 words per half-an-hour session; cued ratio, more than 60% of oral input; and attended ratio, more than 55% of oral input), its linguistic quality (lexical variety, grammatical complexity, etc.), and other properties of interaction (child attention and use of spontaneous gestures). Results show that both adults provided a rich linguistic input to the child and that the child attended most of the input that the adults cued. These results might explain the positive linguistic development of children exposed early to CS.

Adult↗
PubMed2005

A satisfactory-oriented approach to multiexpert decision-making with linguistic assessments.

This paper proposes a multiexpert decision-making (MEDM) method with linguistic assessments, making use of the notion of random preferences and a so-called satisfactory principle. It is well known that decision-making problems that manage preferences from different experts follow a common resolution scheme composed of two phases: an aggregation phase that combines the individual preferences to obtain a collective preference value for each alternative; and an exploitation phase that orders the collective preferences according to a given criterion, to select the best alternative/s. For our method, instead of using an aggregation operator to obtain a collective preference value, a random preference is defined for each alternative in the aggregation phase. Then, based on a satisfactory principle defined in this paper, that says that it is perfectly satisfactory to select an alternative as the best if its performance is as at least "good" as all the others under the same evaluation scheme, we propose a linguistic choice function to establish a rank ordering among the alternatives. Moreover, we also discuss how this linguistic decision rule can be applied to the MEDM problem in multigranular linguistic contexts. Two application examples taken from the literature are used to illuminate the proposed techniques.

Algorithms↗
PubMed2000

Linguistic ability in early life and the neuropathology of Alzheimer's disease and cerebrovascular disease. Findings from the Nun Study.

Findings from the Nun Study indicate that low linguistic ability in early life has a strong association with dementia and premature death in late life. In the present study, we investigated the relationship of linguistic ability in early life to the neuropathology of Alzheimer's disease and cerebrovascular disease. The analyses were done on a subset of 74 participants in the Nun Study for whom we had handwritten autobiographies completed some time between the ages of 19 and 37 (mean = 23 years). An average of 62 years after writing the autobiographies, when the participants were 78 to 97 years old, they died and their brains were removed for our neuropathologic studies. Linguistic ability in early life was measured by the idea (proposition) density of the autobiographies, i.e., a standard measure of the content of ideas in text samples. Idea density scores from early life had strong inverse correlations with the severity of Alzheimer's disease pathology in the neocortex: Correlations between idea density scores and neurofibrillary tangle counts were -0.59 for the frontal lobe, -0.48 for the temporal lobe, and -0.49 for the parietal lobe (all p values < 0.0001). Idea density scores were unrelated to the severity of atherosclerosis of the major arteries at the base of the brain and to the presence of lacunar and large brain infarcts. Low linguistic ability in early life may reflect suboptimal neurological and cognitive development, which might increase susceptibility to the development of Alzheimer's disease pathology in late life.

Adult↗
PubMed1999

Utterance rate and linguistic properties as determinants of lexical dysfluencies in children who stutter.

Two important determinants of variation in stuttering frequency are utterance rate and the linguistic properties of the words being spoken. Little is known how these determinants interrelate. It is hypothesized that those linguistic factors that lead to change in word duration, alter utterance rate locally within an utterance that then gives rise to an increase in stuttering frequency. According to the hypothesis, utterance rate variation should occur locally within the linguistic segments in an utterance that is known to increase the likelihood of stuttering. The hypothesis is tested using length of tone unit as the linguistic factor. Three predictions are confirmed: Utterance rate varies locally within the tone units and this local variation affects stuttering frequency; stuttering frequency is positively related to the length of tone units; variations in utterance rate are correlated with tone unit length. Alternative theoretical formulations of these findings are considered.

Child↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Who benefits from training in linguistic awareness in the first grade, and what components show training effects?

Who among first graders benefit from training in linguistic awareness, and what components of the linguistic awareness are most amenable to training effects? At the beginning of Grade 1 prospective at-risk readers (26 out of 117) were identified on the basis of very low phonological awareness. In the autumn term, they received practice in linguistic awareness. When compared to controls individually matched controls on phonological awareness, listening comprehension, and WISC-R scores, the intervention group showed a more rapid building-up of phonological awareness, especially phoneme-blending ability, as well as superiority in word recognition, spelling, and listening comprehension, which were sustained until the end of Grade 1. Reading comprehension could not be compared because 8 of the 26 controls did not read fluently enough to be tested. The half of the control group with cognitive delays, receiving normal special education instruction, performed consistently worse than their matched pairs in the intervention group. The latter group showed development of phonological awareness, decoding, and spelling equal to that of the cognitively nearly average intervention group and their matched pairs in the control group, who received no additional support. These three groups, originally defined as at-risk readers, performed at the level of other preschool nonreaders at the end of Grade 1. In sum, the children with cognitive delays benefitted from training in linguistic awareness. The results underscore the importance of phoneme synthesis skills in beginning reading and spelling, at least with regular languages.

Awareness↗
PubMed2006

Evaluating linguistic equivalence of patient-reported outcomes in a cancer clinical trial.

BACKGROUND: In order to make meaningful cross-cultural or cross-linguistic comparisons of health-related quality of life (HRQL) or to pool international research data, it is essential to create unbiased measures that can detect clinically important differences. When HRQL scores differ between cultural/linguistic groups, it is important to determine whether this reflects real group differences, or is the result of systematic measurement variability. PURPOSE: To investigate the linguistic measurement equivalence of a cancer-specific HRQL questionnaire, and to conduct a sensitivity analysis of treatment differences in HRQL in a clinical trial. METHODS: Patients with newly diagnosed chronic myelogenous leukemia (n = 1049) completed serial HRQL assessments in an international Phase III trial. Two types of differential item functioning (uniform and non-uniform) were evaluated using item response theory and classical test theory approaches. A sensitivity analysis was conducted to compare HRQL between treatment arms using items without evidence of differential functioning. RESULTS: Among 27 items, nine (33%) did not exhibit any evidence of differential functioning in both linguistic comparisons (English versus French, English versus German). Although 18 items functioned differently, there was no evidence of systematic bias. In a sensitivity analysis, adjustment for differential functioning affected the magnitude, but not the direction or interpretation of clinical trial treatment arm differences. LIMITATIONS: Sufficient sample sizes were available for only three of the eight language groups. Identification of differential functioning in two-thirds of the items suggests that current psychometric methods may be too sensitive. CONCLUSIONS: Enhanced methodologies are needed to differentiate trivial from substantive differential item functioning. Systematic variability in HRQL across different groups can be evaluated for its effect upon clinical trial results; a practice recommended when data are pooled across cultural or linguistic groups to make conclusions about treatment effects.

Clinical Trials, Phase III as Topic↗
PubMed1998

Linguistic psychotherapy research: new directions and promising findings.

Language configures experience and is our primary instrument of meaning making. Its central role in the construction of our subjective and interpersonal worlds provides the rationale for investigating its forms and functions in psychotherapy. Three clinically relevant dimensions of language (i.e., connectivity, modality, and complexity) are outlined and several examples of linguistic variables on each dimension are defined. Linguistic studies of psychotherapy are then presented in terms of focal points of assessment: pretherapy, intherapy, and posttherapy. At each focal point, innovative applications of linguistic variables are presented, often in contexts that permit direct contrast with more traditional methodologies. Promising preliminary results suggest that linguistic research can help to better differentiate and describe patient psychopathology at pretherapy, therapist and patient processes in therapy, and patient gains at posttherapy.

Child↗
PubMed2001

An integrated multi-media package for learning clinical phonetics and linguistics.

Competence in the phonetic and linguistic analysis of normal and disordered spoken language is a basic requirement for all students and practitioners of speech and language therapy. This paper presents a learning package specifically designed for individuals who need to acquire or update practical skills and theoretical knowledge in clinical linguistic analysis. VISUAL-CLIP (VIdeo SUpported Active Learning in Clinical LInguistics and Phonetics) is a student-centred, interactive, multi-media tutorial in clinical linguistics and phonetics, based on digitised video- and audio-taped speech data from a child with a complex communication disorder. Data can be analysed from different perspectives and at different levels of difficulty using separate but inter-linked modules on phonetics, phonology, grammar, semantics and pragmatics. Case history information, formal assessment results, theoretical background and an annotated bibliography are also integrated into the CD-ROM based package.

Communication Disorders↗
PubMed2001

SignStream: a tool for linguistic and computer vision research on visual-gestural language data.

Research on recognition and generation of signed languages and the gestural component of spoken languages has been held back by the unavailability of large-scale linguistically annotated corpora of the kind that led to significant advances in the area of spoken language. A major obstacle has been the lack of computational tools to assist in efficient analysis and transcription of visual language data. Here we describe SignStream, a computer program that we have designed to facilitate transcription and linguistic analysis of visual language. Machine vision methods to assist linguists in detailed annotation of gestures of the head, face, hands, and body are being developed. We have been using SignStream to analyze data from native signers of American Sign Language (ASL) collected in our new video collection facility, equipped with multiple synchronized digital video cameras. The video data and associated linguistic annotations are being made publicly available in multiple formats.

Computer Simulation↗
PubMed2005

Linguistically mediated visual search: the critical role of speech rate.

Recent studies have shown that the presentation of concurrent linguistic context can lead to highly efficient performance in a standard conjunction search task by the induction of an incremental search strategy (Spivey, Tyler, Eberhard, & Tanenhaus, 2001). However, these findings were obtained under anomalously slow speech rate conditions. Accordingly, in the present study, the effects of concurrent linguistic context on visual search performance were compared when speech was recorded at both a normal rate and a slow rate. The findings provided clear evidence that the visual search benefit afforded by concurrent linguistic context was contingent on speech rate, with normal speech producing a smaller benefit. Overall, these findings have important implications for understanding how linguistic and visual processes interact in real time and suggest a disparity in the temporal resolution of speech comprehension and visual search processes.

Fixation, Ocular↗
PubMed2000

NLP techniques associated with the OpenGALEN ontology for semi-automatic textual extraction of medical knowledge: abstracting and mapping equivalent linguistic and logical constructs.

This research project presents methodological and theoretical issues related to the inter-relationship between linguistic and conceptual semantics, analysing the results obtained by the application of a NLP parser to a set of radiology reports. Our objective is to define a technique for associating linguistic methods with domain specific ontologies for semi-automatic extraction of intermediate representation (IR) information formats and medical ontological knowledge from clinical texts. We have applied the Edinburgh LTG natural language parser to 2810 clinical narratives describing radiology procedures. In a second step, we have used medical expertise and ontology formalism for identification of semantic structures and abstraction of IR schemas related to the processed texts. These IR schemas are an association of linguistic and conceptual knowledge, based on their semantic contents. This methodology aims to contribute to the elaboration of models relating linguistic and logical constructs based on empirical data analysis. Advance in this field might lead to the development of computational techniques for automatic enrichment of medical ontologies from real clinical environments, using descriptive knowledge implicit in large text corpora sources.

Electronic Data Processing↗
PubMed2004

The politics and semiotics of sounds--Mayan linguistics and nation-building in Guatemala.

This paper discusses the development Mayan linguistics as an authoritative field of knowledge in Guatemala. In particular, it links missionary linguists' and Maya linguists' activities with shifting nationalist agendas from the 1920s in to the late 1980s. It is argued that during the historical and intellectual moment that linguistics becomes an authoritative epistemology, phonetic analysis functions as a creative index that constitutes "expert" knowledge for particular semiotic and ideological reasons tied to competing versions of the Guatemalan imagined community.

Anthropology, Cultural↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Psychoanalysis of the impulsive character: a linguistic-communicative study.

The importance of the mode of communication, the dreams, and the linguistic study of impulsive patients is examined. The significance of the use of the imperative mood, with a rapid evacuation rhythm and good synchronization between the verbal and paraverbal levels is explicated. The obvious linguistic differences between sessions show, together with thematic clues, that it would be possible to predict impulsive discharges, that is, to formulate a predictive theory. The concept is defined, and clinical material is provided to illustrate the concept. A linguistic analysis of the patient's dreams is presented, as well as a thematic approach to the dreams. The ultilization of linguistics in psychoanalysis is systematized, and the verbs used by the patient are listed.

Adult↗
PubMed1995

Worldwide analysis of genetic and linguistic relationships of human populations.

In this study we relate language differences on a global scale with genetic distances for the same populations. The analysis is carried out on more populations (130) but fewer genetic systems (11) than earlier studies. We constructed an overall genetic distance matrix that allowed for missing values. A separate genetic distance matrix was also computed for each genetic system, and matching matrices of linguistic and geographic distances were associated with each genetic distance matrix, because the number of populations used differed among the genetic systems studied. Significant matrix correlations between language and genetics were found for both overall genetic distances and a substantial number of genetic systems, even when the effects of geographic distances were held constant. This demonstrates a significant correspondence between genetics and language on a global scale. Genetic matrices were correlated with two different linguistic distance matrices: one with higher (supraphyletic) taxonomic structure, in which among other features sub-Saharan Africans separate from non-Africans in the basal split and the Eurasiatic superphylum is postulated; and one without such structure. The correlations yield no genetic evidence to support the proposed higher linguistic structure. UPGMA and neighbor-joining trees were constructed for linguistic and genetic data. The proposed African split pattern is not supported by these data. Both types of trees indicate a pattern of grouping of east Asians, Arctic populations, and Australian natives separating from Caucasoid and African populations.

Ethnicity↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Y-STR haplotype diversity in distinct linguistic groups from East Timor.

East Timor is a country which harbors multiple ethnolinguistic groups generally assigned to an Austronesian or Papuan ancestry. The present study aimed to characterize Y-chromosome haplotype diversity in East Timor, and to test possible population structures based on linguistic and/or geographical information. Using a set of 12 Y-chromosome-specific STRs (DYS19, DYS389I and II, DYS390, DYS391, DYS392, DYS393, DYS385, DYS437, DYS438, and DYS439), haplotypes were established in 342 individuals from 12 linguistic groups (Tetum, Kwaimina, Galoli, Wetarese, Dawan, Mambai, Kemak, Tokodede, Bunak, Makasai, Makalero, and Fataluku) belonging to the three major ethnolinguistic groups in East Timor: two from the Timorese-Austronesian branch (Fabronic and Ramelaic), and a third including languages related to a Trans-New Guinea phylum (Papuan). High values of haplotype diversity, average gene diversity, and mean number of pairwise differences per locus were found in all 12 linguistic groups, except for the Wetarese from the island of Ataúro. Analysis of genetic variance (AMOVA) and pairwise genetic distance analysis showed that the East Timor population is genetically structured, and if the Bunak and Wetarese are excluded, samples group well with respect to their language affinities, and furthermore, the most genetically homogeneous groups are those following the broad ethnolinguistic classifications. Bunak and Wetarese behave as outsider groups, and are genetically more closely related to populations classified in a different linguistic group.

Asian People↗
PubMed1995

Examining the empirical and linguistic bases of current theories of agrammatism.

This paper, which is organized into five sections, critically examines the empirical support and linguistic assumptions underlying several current accounts of language disturbances in Broca's aphasia. In the first section, following a discussion of the use of signal detection methodologies in investigating grammatical sensitivity, the reliability of results from two studies that suggest that Broca's aphasic patients are differentially sensitive to grammatical constraints is examined. It is concluded that in some cases, claims of intact sensitivity are not supported. The second section examines the empirical support for the hypothesis that agrammatic patients are unable to compute syntactic dependency relationships because of slowed lexical processing. It is argued that the statistical treatment of the data and interpretive problems associated with the lexical decision paradigm undermine this hypothesis. In the third section, some of the linguistic assumptions underlying criticisms of chain-disruption hypotheses are examined. It is concluded that these criticisms are based on arguable linguistic assumptions. In the fourth section, it is argued that the linguistic and empirical support for both earlier and revised versions of Grodzinsky's default interpretive strategy is lacking. Methodological and conceptual shortcomings arising from this proposal are also discussed. In the final section, potential relationships between disordered language and currently developing models of normal language processing are discussed.

Aphasia, Broca↗
PubMed2003

Linguistic deficits in the acute phase of stroke.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: For the diagnosis of aphasia early after stroke, several screening tests are available to support clinical judgment. None of these tests enables the clinician to assess the underlying linguistic deficits, i. e. semantic, phonological and syntactic deficits, which provides indispensable information for early therapeutic decisions. The ScreeLing was designed as a screening test to detect semantic, phonological and syntactic deficits. The ScreeLing's sensitivity, specificity and accuracy in detecting aphasia and semantic, phonological and syntactic deficits were determined. METHODS: The ScreeLing was validated in an acute stroke population against a combined reference diagnosis of aphasia (aphasia according to at least two of the following measures:ne urologist's judgment, linguist's judgment, Tokentest-score). The three ScreeLing subtests were validated in the aphasic population against the presence or absence of a semantic, phonological and/or syntactic deficit according to an experienced clinical linguist. RESULTS: From a consecutive series of 215 stroke patients, 63 patients were included. The ScreeLing was an accurate test for the detection of aphasia (0.92),with a sensitivity of 86% and specificity of 96%. Sensitivity of subtests was 62 % for semantics, 54 % for phonology and 42 % for syntax. Specificity was 100 % for semantics and phonology and 80 % for syntax, and accuracy 0.84 for semantics, 0.87 for phonology and 0.64 for syntax. CONCLUSIONS: The ScreeLing is an accurate test that can be easily administered and scored to detect aphasia in the first weeks after stroke. Furthermore, the ScreeLing is suitable for revealing underlying linguistic deficits, especially semantic and phonological deficits.

Aged↗