The terms "fortis" and "lenis" are variously regarded as having one single underlying phonetic correlate or many. An exploratory analysis of acoustic and aerodynamic data on contrasting stop series in a number of European and non-European languages confirms that a significant variation in peak intra-oral pressure and in articulatory stricture…

This article describes the predicative verbal system of Catalan Sign Language (LSC) as it is used by Deaf people in the province of Barcelona. We also present a historical perspective of the research on this topic, which provides insight into the changes that have taken place over the last few decades in sign language linguistics. The principal…

An oral examination for assessing senior undergraduate students is described. The examinations were conducted in a room with a one-way mirror so that all students could learn from each other. This procedure was much appreciated by the participants.

This study examined fourth graders' performance on two reading comprehension measures, involving a question-answering format and a cloze format, which were part of a state-mandated assessment. Word-level reading skills and oral language comprehension were important to success on both formats, but word accuracy had a stronger relationship to the…

This investigation concerned the socialization experiences and coping strategies of a group of 28 deaf adults who were raised using spoken language. Most respondents reported some level of social isolation because of (1) limitations in communication with hearing peers; (2) missing information in social, academic, and work settings; and (3) a sense…

Previous research has shown that providing written organizational lecture cues boosts notetaking and that boosting notetaking raises achievement. Lecture learning literature, however, is silent on whether spoken organizational lecture cues boost notetaking and achievement. To find out, participants listened to a lecture that contained or did not…

In a landmark study, Jusczyk and Aslin (1995 ) demonstrated that English-learning infants are able to segment words from continuous speech at 7.5 months of age. In the current study, we explored the possibility that infants segment words from the edges of utterances more readily than the middle of utterances. The same procedure was used as in…

Although spoken language is communicated via a rapidly varying signal, human listeners recognize spoken words both quickly and accurately. Nonetheless, variability in speech does have implications for both the processes and representations involved in spoken language perception. Moreover, variability effects have been observed across the lifespan,…

Research on nonverbal vocal cues and verbal irony has often relied on the concept of an "ironic tone of voice". Here we provide acoustic analysis and experimental evidence that this notion is oversimplified and misguided. Acoustic analyses of spontaneous ironic speech extracted from talk radio shows, both ambiguous and unambiguous in…

Studies of first and second language acquisition have reported that in the acquisition of long lag (aspirated) stops, the effects of the place of articulation of the stop and the height of the following vowel may be significant. This paper examines these two variables in the acquisition of English long lag stops by Spanish speakers. Results…

Learning centers are a highly regarded and widely accepted practice in early childhood classrooms. Centers offer a variety of experiences during a single time segment that encourage children to explore materials, interact with peers, and accomplish new tasks. In this article, the author presents the block center, a popular mainstay among learning…

This paper reports findings from a large-scale evaluation undertaken to explore the impact of the "linguistic phonics approach" (LPA) on young children's reading. The LPA is a systematic and applied programme that differs from traditional phonics programmes. For example, rather than ask children to look at letters and speculate on the…

Fifteen children ages 7 to 9 years who had persistent reading difficulties despite adequate instruction were provided with intensive tutorial interventions. The interventions targeted deficient phonological processing and decoding skills for 8 weeks (2 hours per day) followed by an 8-week, 1-hour-per-day intervention that focused on the…

In the past years, there have been an increasing number of instrumental investigations as to the nature of speech production errors, prompted by the concern that decades of transcription-based speech error data may be tainted by perceptual biases. While all of these instrumental studies suggest that errors are not, as previously thought,…

The present study sets out to examine the strategies used by Chinese learners in a predominantly naturalistic environment and how such learner strategy use relates to their proficiency in the second language. Data were collected from four Chinese research students in the UK using semi-structured interviews. Their proficiency in English was…