Increases in the verbal and fluid cognitive abilities of disadvantaged children attending preschool in the Netherlands

The current longitudinal study examined the development of general cognitive abilities of 4–6-year-old children of low-income, ethnic-minority families in preschool over two and a half years by determining the changes in general, and in verbal and fluid cognitive abilities, relative to age norms, using an intelligence test. The results revealed significant increases over time, relative to age norms, in full scale and in both verbal and fluid intelligence test scores of disadvantaged children, with medium effect sizes. These gains in measured intelligence were moderated by children's home language and age. Children who gained most also profited most from their increased abilities with respect to emergent school skills. Gains in verbal intelligence predicted emergent school vocabulary, but gains in fluid intelligence did not. Overall, gains in fluid intelligence predicted emergent math skills, and gains in verbal intelligence predicted emergent math skills only among older children.     

语境与言语交际

语言的运用离不开语境,语境对交际中话语的理解起着关键的作用。本文首先探讨了国内外语言学界对语境概念的界定和语境研究的情况;接着通过举例论述了语境在言语交际中的作用以及语境对言语交际的制约。     

英汉委婉语的对比研究

委婉语是各种文化中都存在的一种表达方式。传统的委婉语研究主要局限于委婉语的言语表达，而本文提出，现代委婉语研究范畴应用同时包容非言语委婉语表达。在这种广义委婉语的基础上，作者从四个方面展开英汉委婉语的对比，指出二者的差异，并肯定了二者的趋同现象。     

言语幽默的认知解读——论脚本对立、语境、嘲笑对象的互补

现代语言学对幽默研究始于Raskin的脚本理论（SSTH）,国内对言语幽默的研究也完成了从Grice的合作原则理论到应运关联理论的认知解读转向。但是从认知语言学角度的关联理论、概念整合理论、心智空间论和不一致的消解论,都无法回避这些模型并不仅仅适用于言语幽默的认知解读这一问题。如果从言语幽默的生成机制入手,从接受者的角度分析言语幽默认知解读过程中脚本、语境和嘲笑对象的互补,就可以说明言语幽默的特殊性。     

Vocally cued personality prototypes: An implicit personality theory approach

Competence and benevolence are two personality prototypes that have emerged in research on voice and personality. While traits comprising these prototypes have been described, there is incomplete information about the interaction effects of speech rate, pitch variation, and loudness during impression formation processes. Five hypotheses and three research questions were advanced to examine main and interaction effects of the three vocal variables on the two personality prototypes. The main effects hypotheses were significant for both prototypes. Rate and pitch variation were the most influential for competence and benevolence, respectively. For competence, one interaction effect (rate by pitch variation) was significant. For benevolence, two interaction effects were significant (pitch variation by loudness, and pitch variation by rate). The results are discussed in the theoretical framework provided by implicit personality theory and the structures of the two personality prototypes.     

Parents who hit and scream: Interactive effects of verbal and severe physical aggression on clinic-referred adolescents’ adjustment

The goals of this study were first, to delineate the co-occurrence of parental severe physical aggression and verbal aggression toward clinic-referred adolescents, and second, to examine the interactive effects of parental severe physical aggression and verbal aggression on adolescent externalizing and internalizing behavior problems. This research involved 239 referrals of 11- to 18-year-old youth and their dual-parent families to a non-profit, private community mental health center in a semi-rural Midwest community. Multiple informants (i.e., adolescents and mothers) were used to assess parental aggression and adolescent behavior problems. More than half of clinic-referred adolescents (51%) experienced severe physical aggression and/or high verbal aggression from one or both parents. A pattern of interactive effects of mother-to-adolescent severe physical aggression and verbal aggression on adolescent behavior problems emerged, indicating that when severe physical aggression was present, mother-to-adolescent verbal aggression was positively associated with greater adolescent behavior problems whereas when severe physical aggression was not present, the links between verbal aggression and behavior problems was no longer significant. No interactive effects were found for father-to-adolescent severe physical aggression and verbal aggression on adolescent adjustment; however, higher father-to-adolescent verbal aggression was consistently linked to behavior problems above and beyond the influence of severe physical aggression. The results of this study should promote the practice of routinely assessing clinic-referred adolescents and their parents about their experiences of verbal aggression in addition to severe physical aggression and other forms of abuse.     

Phonological awareness,verbal working memory and the acquisition of literacy

This paper describes a 2-year longitudinal study of 76 initially prereading children. The study examined the relationships between phonological awareness (measured by tests of onset and rime, phonemic segmentation and phoneme deletion), verbal working memory and the development of reading and spelling. Factor analyses showed that the verbal working memory tests which were administered loaded on two distinct but highly related factors, the first of which,simple repetition, involved the repetition of verbal items exactly as spoken by the experimenter, whereas the second,backwards repetition, involved repetition of items in reverse order. Factor analyses also showed that, whist the phonological awareness variables consistently loaded on the backwards repetition factor at the beginning and end of Grade 1, by Grade 2 the phonological awareness variables loaded on a separate factor which also included sentence repetition. Results of multiple regression analyses, with reading and spelling as a compound criterion variable, indicated that phonological awareness consistently predicted later reading and spelling even when both simple and backwards repetition were controlled. In contrast, verbal working memory did not consistently predict reading and spelling across testing times. Whilst there was some indication that verbal working memory, especially backwards repetition, measured during Grade 1 did predict reading and spelling in Grade 2, these effects were no longer evident when all three phonological variables were controlled. Nevertheless, with 4 individual reading and 2 individual spelling measures as the criterion variables, it was shown that phonological awareness was not quite such a consistent predictor of reading and spelling: it was most highly related to reading pseudowords and spelling real words; but it was not so highly related to spelling pseudowords, apparently because the processing demands of the task for the young children in the study were extremely high. Given the importance of verbal working memory for the completion of phonological awareness, reading and spelling tasks, in particular for spelling pseudowords, the findings are interpreted as providing some support for a theoretical position which posits that both phonological awareness and verbal working memory contribute to the early stages of literacy acquisition. Whilst the findings suggest some support for a general underlying phonological ability, there is also evidence that, as children learn to read and write, verbal working memory and phonological awareness become more differentiated.     

Tutor scaffolding styles of dilemma solving in network-based role-play

This study investigated tutoring during collaborative role-play dealing with environmental dilemmas in a synchronous network environment. The relationships of different tutor scaffolding styles with students' discourse acts and their decision-making variables were studied. A role-play with a jigsaw design was developed using the model of real-life environmental negotiations. Tutor scaffolding supported the process of making judgements. Five role-plays consisting of 31 decision-making discussions were carried out with 14–17-year-old students (N = 62) from Estonian secondary schools. The findings indicated that the activeness of tutor scaffolding was related to the higher frequency of students' task-related discourse acts, as well as their ability to generate a mutually accepted ownership of problem representations in teams.     

体意义与动量词表达探究

话语表达的体意义着眼于时态范畴,除了可以由标记语表达,在具体的语言事实中往往可以借由动量词进行表现.动量词是对动作次数及时间的表现,动量词与话语体意义表达有紧密关联.动量表达的语义特征具有独立性、凸显性以及回溯性.体意义的动量表现,不仅是修辞手段的丰富,更是语言自身功能的外化,背后有深刻的认知机制在起作用.汉语“无形态”的特点使词语的结合产生无限可能,人们以语言表达认知世界,又以认知经验主导阅读体验,在对体意义的动量表达进行分析时,要注意把握语言功能与表达效果的统一.     

Advisor–Advisee Communication Two: The Influence of Verbal Aggression and Humor Assessment on Advisee Perceptions of Advisor Credibility and Affective Learning This paper was presented at the 2004 National Communication Association Convention in Chicago,Illinois.

The goal of the current study was to further the research line initiated by the authors that examined the influence of a variety of communication variables in the Graduate Advisor–Advisee interpersonal relationship. The current study examined the relationship between advisee perceptions of advisor verbal aggression and humor assessment and the impact these variables have on advisee affect and advisee perceptions of advisor credibility (competence, caring/goodwill, and trustworthiness). Findings revealed that advisor humor assessment was positively related to both advisee affect and advisee perceptions of advisor credibility. The study further found that advisor verbal aggression was negatively related to both advisee affect and advisee perceptions of advisorp credibility.