The present study investigates the interpretation of scopally ambiguous sentences containing a numeral quantifier and negation, such as (1) and (2), with a view to examining the interpretive preferences for Korean manifested by Korean-speaking children and adults, and the interpretive preferences for English manifested by Korean-speaking second…

Developmental differences in hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis responsiveness to stressors and ongoing development of glucocorticoid-sensitive brain regions in adolescence suggest that similar to the neonatal period of ontogeny, adolescence may also be a sensitive period for programming effects of stressors on the central nervous system.…

Objective: This study examined the effects of the attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder treatments, methylphenidate (MPH) and atomoxetine (ATM), on prefrontal cortex (PFC) function in monkeys and explored the receptor mechanisms underlying enhancement of PFC function at the behavioral and cellular levels. Method: Monkeys performed a working…

An important topic of current brain research is "cognitive overload." It is about the capacity of a person's working memory and the strategies employed when that capacity is taxed. The most common strategy for coping with cognitive overload is shutting down, like that point in a conversation with a non-English speaker when everything one…

Although anecdotally there appear to be differences in the way native speakers use and comprehend their native language, most empirical investigations of language processing study university students and none have studied differences in language proficiency, which may be independent of resource limitations such as working memory span. We examined…

Although phonological representations have been a primary focus of verbal working memory research, lexical-semantic manipulations also influence performance. In the present study, the authors investigated whether a classic phenomenon in verbal working memory, the phonological similarity effect (PSE), is modulated by a lexical-semantic variable,…

In an event-related potentials (ERPs) study, we examined the comprehension of different types of Chinese (Mandarin) relative clauses (object vs. subject-extracted) to test the universality and language specificity of sentence comprehension processes. Because Chinese lacks morphosyntactic cues to sentence constituent relations, it allows a test of…

In order to communicate understanding, students are often required to produce texts which present an explicit, coherent argument. This study examined the extent to which individual differences in undergraduates' topic knowledge and working memory skills were related to their ability to revise texts to better fulfil these goals. Forty-seven…

The purpose of this study was twofold: (1) to evaluate the clinical utility of a verbal working memory measure, specifically, a nonword repetition task, with a sample of Spanish-English bilingual children and (2) to determine the extent to which individual differences in relative language skills and language use had an effect on the clinical…

A growing number of studies have investigated how motivation interacts with particular cognitive functions, including attention, working memory, and other executive functions. In these studies, the emphasis has been on understanding how motivation impacts brain regions that contribute to improving behavioral performance. Less is understood about…

Background: The goal of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of a computerised working memory (WM) training on memory, response inhibition, fluid intelligence, scholastic abilities and the recall of stories in adolescents with mild to borderline intellectual disabilities attending special education. Method: A total of 95 adolescents with…

Background: The present study was aimed at investigating working memory (WM) and executive functions capacities in individuals with Williams syndrome (WS) as compared with mental-age matched typically developing (TD) children. Method: In order to serve the study goal, a sizeable battery of tasks tapping WM as well as attention, memory, planning,…

When adult students write their life story, they gather selected life experiences and transform these onto the written page. In the course of this literary process they revisit sites of the past and reflect on the meaning of past events; many reconstruct these events from the point of view of the present, and most close their narrative by…

Academic and social success in school has been linked to children's self-regulation. This study investigated the assessment of the executive function (EF) component of self-regulation using a low-cost, easily administered measure to determine whether scores obtained from the behavioral task would agree with those obtained using a laboratory-based…

Background: The majority of available psychometric tests originates from the Western World and was designed to suit the culture, language, and socio-economic status of the respective populations. Few tests have been validated in the developing world despite the growing interest in examining effects of biological and environmental factors on…