Comprehension and processing of the universal quantifier in children, adolescents and adults.

Quantifier spreading (Q-spreading), children's incorrect falsification of a universally-quantified sentence based on an 'extra-object' picture, may persist beyond childhood, and children adhere to Q-spreading without changing responses throughout testing. We examined the error patterns across wider age groups (aged 4-79) with a picture-sentence verification eye-tracking task. We also examined whether prosodic emphasis affects their comprehension and processing of universally-quantified sentences.

Early L2 Spoken Word Recognition Combines Input-Based and Knowledge-Based Processing.

This study examines the perceptual trade-off between knowledge of a language's statistical regularities and reliance on the acoustic signal during L2 spoken word recognition. We test how early learners track and make use of segmental and suprasegmental cues and their relative frequencies during non-native word recognition. English learners of Mandarin were taught an artificial tonal language in which a tone's informativeness for word identification varied according to neighborhood density.

Contrast-marking prosodic emphasis in Williams syndrome: results of detailed phonetic analysis.

Background: Past reports on the speech production of individuals with Williams syndrome (WS) suggest that their prosody is anomalous and may lead to challenges in spoken communication. While existing prosodic assessments confirm that individuals with WS fail to use prosodic emphasis to express contrast, those reports typically lack detailed phonetic analysis of speech data. The present study examines the acoustic properties of speech prosody, aiming for the future development of targeted speech interventions.

Interpretation of contrastive pitch accent in six- to eleven-year-old English-speaking children (and adults).

Both off-line and on-line comprehension studies suggest not only toddlers and preschoolers, but also older school-age children have trouble interpreting contrast-marking pitch prominence. To test whether children achieve adult-like proficiency in processing contrast-marking prosody during school years, an eye-tracking experiment examined the effect of accent on referential resolution in six- to eleven-year-old children and adults. In all age groups, a prominent accent facilitated the detection of a target in contrastive discourse sequences (pink cat → green cat), whereas it led to a garden path in non-contrastive sequences (pink rabbit → green monkey: the initial fixations were on rabbits).

Anticipatory effects of intonation: Eye movements during instructed visual search.

Three eye-tracking experiments investigated the role of pitch accents during online discourse comprehension. Participants faced a grid with ornaments, and followed pre-recorded instructions such as "Next, hang the blue ball" to decorate holiday trees. Experiment 1 demonstrated a processing advantage for felicitous as compared to infelicitous uses of L+H* on the adjective noun pair (e.