Digital Commons Network^™

The Influence Of Language Background And Second Language Phonetics Training On The Perception Of Lexical Stress In A Second Language, Todd A. Gibson, Carolina Bernales

Faculty Publications

Language background and second language (L2) training both have been found to contribute to L2 lexical stress perception. To explore their relative contributions, a lexical stress perception task was administered to a total of 129 university students of different language backgrounds. A group of 62 monolingual English-speaking students in the U.S.A. and 67 English-as-a-foreign-language students in Chile were asked to identify lexical stress in trochees and iambs. Chileans with previous phonetics training performed better than Chileans without the training and performed as well as their U.S. peers. U.S. participants and those Chileans without previous phonetics training performed better with trochees …

Vowel Acoustic Characteristics Of Southern American English Variation In Louisiana, Hyunju Chung

Faculty Publications

This study examined acoustic characteristics of vowels produced by speakers from Louisiana, one of the states in the Southern English dialect region. First, how Louisiana vowels differ from or are similar to the reported patterns of Southern dialect were examined. Then, within-dialect differences across regions in Louisiana were examined. Thirty-four female adult monolingual speakers of American English from Louisiana, ranging in age from 18 to 23, produced English monosyllabic words containing 11 vowels/i, É, e, É, æ, E, u, ÊŠ, o, É, É/. The first two formant frequencies at the midpoint of the vowel nucleus, direction, and amount of formant …

Expressive Language Abilities Of Boys With Idiopathic Autism Spectrum Disorder And Boys With Fragile X Syndrome + Autism Spectrum Disorder: Cross-Context Comparisons, Elizabeth Hilvert, Audra Sterling, Eileen Haebig, Laura Friedman

Faculty Publications

Background and aims: Understanding the unique expressive language profiles of children with phenotypically similar, but distinct neurodevelopmental disorders, such as idiopathic autism spectrum disorder and fragile X syndrome with a co-diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder (fragile X syndrome + autism spectrum disorder), has both clinical and theoretical implications. However, comparative studies of these two clinical groups have been limited, and results have been inconsistent, partially as a result of different assessment methods being utilized. Thus, the current study compared the expressive language profiles of boys with idiopathic autism spectrum disorder and boys with fragile X syndrome + autism spectrum disorder …

Introduction To The Special Issue On English In The Southern United States: Social Factors And Language Variation, Irina Shport, Wendy Herd

Faculty Publications

The Southern United States have long been known for language diversity, yet linguistic research in this region has often focused on broad descriptions of characteristics of Southern American English as compared to other regional dialects of American English. Linguistic subregions in the South, however, are distinctly different from each other, and additional social variation also occurs within those subregions. Thus, the different English varieties spoken in the South cannot be collapsed under a single umbrella. Analyzing varieties of English in the Southern United States calls for a narrower approach, which will more accurately represent diverse Southern communities, their languages of …

Celebrating The Twentieth Anniversary Of The Voice And Speech Review, Rockford Sansom, Rena Cook, Julia Guichard, Jeff Morrison, Mandy Rees, Lynn Watson

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Korematzu, Hirabayashi, And The Second Monster, Eric L. Muller

Faculty Publications

It is a trope at least as old as Beowulf: the unexpected second monster. Beowulf arrives in Heorot to take on Grendel, the demon who has been terrorizing the Ring-Danes’ mead-hall. He bests the monster in battle and Grendel slinks off, one-armed and bloodied, to die. The Ring-Danes honor Beowulf with a great banquet; he has slaughtered their nemesis and there is much to celebrate. Full of mead and a newfound sense of safety, the revelers drift off to sleep. That is when a terrible new monster bursts upon the scene—Grendel’s mother, the beast that brought Grendel into the …

Too Busy To Be Manipulated: How Multitasking With Technology Improves Deception Detection In Collaborative Teamwork, Nathan W. Twyman, Jeffrey G. Proudfoot, Ann-Frances Cameron, Eric Case, Judee K. Burgoon, Douglas P. Twitchell

Faculty Publications

Deception is an unfortunate staple in group work. Guarding against team members’ deceptive tactics and alternative agendas is difficult and may seem even more difficult in technology-driven business environments that have made multitasking during teamwork increasingly commonplace. This research develops a foundation for a nuanced theoretical understanding of deception detection under these conditions. The intersection of information technology multitasking and deception detection theories is shown to produce various and sometimes competing ideas about how this type of multitasking might affect truthfulness assessments in real-time teamwork. A laboratory study involving a collaborative game helped evaluate the different ideas using manipulated deception …

Distributive Justice And Rural America, Ann M. Eisenberg

Faculty Publications

Today’s discourse on struggling rural communities insists they are “dying” or “forgotten.” Many point to globalization and automation as the culprits that made livelihoods in agriculture, natural resource extraction, and manufacturing obsolete, fueling social problems such as the opioid crisis. This narrative fails to offer a path forward; the status quo is no one’s fault, and this “natural” rural death inspires mourning rather than resuscitation. This Article offers a more illuminating account of the rural story, told through the lens of distributive justice principles. The Article argues that rural communities have not just “died.” They were sacrificed. Specifically, distributive justice …

O'Kei: An American Novel (Annotated), Boris Pilnyak, Ronald D. Leblanc (Translator)

Faculty Publications

On January 4, 1931, Boris Pilnyak (1894-1938) wrote a letter to Joseph Stalin, pleading with the Soviet leader to grant him permission to travel to the United States in order to conduct research for an ambitious book project he was undertaking that would compare communist Russia favorably to capitalist America. Pilnyak’s request received official approval, and a few months later the writer set off for the U.S., arriving in New York by steamer on March 12, 1931, and remaining in the country until August 3, 1931. During his nearly five-month stay in America, Pilnyak became acquainted with a number of …

The Absence Of A Religiolect Among Latter-Day Saints In Southwest Washington, Joseph A. Stanley

Faculty Publications

The term religiolect was coined by Benjamin Hary (1992, xiii) to describe a variety of language used by a distinct religious community, originally within the context of the Jewish linguistic spectrum. Religion has been shown to play an important role in various aspects of language, such as Arabic loanword adoption among Telugu speakers (Salami 2010), Persian loanwords and greetings among English-speaking Bahá’is (Masumian 2015), fluency in Sanskrit (Christian 1976), language choice among Hindus in the United States (Pandharipande 2010), maintenance of Hakka in East Malaysia (Ding and Goh 2020), and prevalence of linguistic fossils in Jewish Malayalam (Gamliel 2017). “Christianese,” …

Back Vowel Distinctions And Dynamics In Southern Us English, Joseph A. Stanley, Margaret E. L. Renwick

Faculty Publications

We investigate low/back vowels /u, oʊ, ʊ, ɔ, ɑ/ in Southern American English (SAE).

Research on SAE has analyzed changes in position over generational time.

Most work on trajectories is limited to impressionistic coding (“loss of upgliding”) or reduces trajectories to summary statistics (vector length, rate of change).

We analyze both the position and the shape of back vowels’ formant trajectories in apparent time, using new data from the Digital Archive of Southern Speech (DASS).

Dynamic Written Corrective Feedback Among Graduate Students: The Effects Of Feedback Timing, Grant Eckstein, Maureen Estelle Sims, Lisa Rohm

Faculty Publications

Dynamic written corrective feedback (DWCF) is a pedagogical approach that offers meaningful, manageable, constant, and timely corrective feedback on student writing (Hartshorn et al., 2010). It emphasizes indirect and comprehensive written error correction on short, daily writing assignments. Numerous studies have demonstrated that its use can lead to fewer language errors among undergraduate and pre-matriculated college writers (see Kurzer, 2018). However, the benefits of DWCF among second language (L2) graduate writers and the role of feedback timing have not been well examined. We analyzed timed writing samples over a 12-week intervention from 22 L2 graduate students who either received biweekly …

Contextual Information In Social How-To Questions That Initiate Documentation, Matt Baker

Faculty Publications

This study introduces social question-and-answer (SQA) documentation to technical and professional communication scholarship. It conceptualizes SQA as interactive, user-generated documentation and describes contextual information types within social how-to questions that initiate documentation. It also explores whether contextual information associates with answers that complete the interactive documentation. Results reliably describe 15 information types based on content analysis of 3,529 contextual information types from 500 questions. Exploratory statistical analysis suggests that askers may increase answerability by including less speculative thought, more error messages, and less general situation information. To facilitate complete SQA documentation, the study calls for additional research into question content …

Rubric Rating With Mfrm Versus Randomly Distributed Comparative Judgment: A Comparison Of Two Approaches To Second-Language Writing Assessment, Maureen E. Sims, Troy L. Cox, Grant T. Eckstein, K. James Hartshorn, Matthew P. Wilcox, Judson M. Hart

Faculty Publications

The purpose of this study is to explore the reliability of a potentially more practical approach to direct writing assessment in the context of ESL writing. Traditional rubric rating (RR) is a common yet resource-intensive evaluation practice when performed reliably. This study compared the traditional rubric model of ESL writing assessment and many-facet Rasch modeling (MFRM) to comparative judgment (CJ), the new approach, which shows promising results in terms of reliability. We employed two groups of raters—novice and experienced—and used essays that had been previously double-rated, analyzed with MFRM, and selected with fit statistics. We compared the results of the …

Backdoor Purposivism, Anita S. Krishnakumar

Faculty Publications

It has become standard among statutory interpretation commentators to declare that, “We are all textualists now.” The comment stems from the observation that in the modern, post-Scalia era, all of the Justices on the U.S. Supreme Court pay significant attention to statutory text when construing statutes and, relatedly, that legislative history use by the Court as a whole has declined since its heyday in the 1970s. The account of textualism’s triumph is so prevalent that some scholars have declared purposivism—or at least traditional purposivism—essentially defunct. Two prominent textualist scholars in particular have suggested that there is a “new purposivism” at …

On The Rhetorical Grotesque: A Mode For Strange Times, Richard Benjamin Crosby

Faculty Publications

This essay argues that the successful political careers of certain populist leaders rhetorically enact what scholars have long recognized in art, literature, and entertainment as the grotesque. The grotesque provides a theoretically rich means for describing the vulgar and chaotic public behaviors that take strong hold among anti-elite audiences at certain points in history. By closely reading comments from political leaders cast in the grotesque mold, including Silvio Berlusconi, Hugo Chavez, and Donald Trump, this essay explains not only what the grotesque is, but also when and how it is likely to find traction in a political culture ripe for …

Processing Adjunct Control: Evidence On The Use Of Structural Information And Prediction In Reference Resolution, Jeffrey Jack Green, Michael Mccourt, Ellen Lau, Alexander Williams

Faculty Publications

The comprehension of anaphoric relations may be guided not only by discourse, but also syntactic information. In the literature on online processing, however, the focus has been on audible pronouns and descriptions whose reference is resolved mainly on the former. This paper examines one relation that both lacks overt exponence, and relies almost exclusively on syntax for its resolution: adjunct control, or the dependency between the null subject of a non-finite adjunct and its antecedent in sentences such as Mickey talked to Minnie before ___ eating. Using visualworld eyetracking, we compare the timecourse of interpreting this null subject and overt …

Understanding Diversity – Perspectives From University Departments Hosting Large Percentages Of International Students, K. James Hartshorn, Maureen Snow Andrade, Norman W. Evans, Gwyneth Gates

Faculty Publications

The international student enrollment in some university departments has grown to the point that these students are the majority. This study sought to determine the extent to which departments hosting large numbers of international English as a second language (ESL) students demonstrate awareness and planning to address these learners’ needs. Analyses were conducted in reference to a framework designed to aid institutions in meeting international ESL students’ needs. Findings indicate some awareness of students’ needs and related strategies for linguistic and cultural development. They also demonstrate that the proposed framework could foster more intentional strategies to ensure international student success.

Writing For Arts Education Policy Review, Mark Graham, Sharon Chappell, Tracie Constantino, Pam Musil, Lawrence Scripp

Faculty Publications

This article provides readers with suggestions as to how to prepare manuscripts for publication in Arts Education Policy Review. It is presented in a question-and-answer format and includes references to model policy articles.

Improving Nmt Quality Using Terminology Injection, Deryle W. Lonsdale, Duane K. Dougal

Faculty Publications

Many organizations use domain- or organization-specific words and phrases. This paper explores the use of vetted terminology as an input to neural machine translation (NMT) for improved results: ensuring that the translation of individual terms is consistent with an approved multilingual terminology collection. We discuss, implement, and evaluate a method for injecting terminology and for evaluating terminology injection. Our use of the long short-term memory (LSTM) attention mechanism prevalent in state-of-the-art NMT systems involves attention vectors for correctly identifying semantic entities and aligning the tokens that represent them, both in the source and the target languages. Appropriate terminology is then …

Design Principles For Signal Detection In Modern Job Application Systems: Identifying Fabricated Qualifications, Nathan W. Twyman, Steven J. Pentland, Lee Spitzley

Faculty Publications

Hiring a new employee is traditionally thought to be an uncertain investment. This uncertainty is lessened by the presence of signals that indicate job fitness. Ideally, job applicants objectively signal their qualifications, and those signals are correctly assessed by the hiring team. In reality, signal manipulation is pervasive in the hiring process, mitigating the reliability of signals used to make hiring decisions. To combat these inefficiencies, we propose and evaluate SIGHT, a theoretical class of systems affording more robust signal evaluation during the job application process. A prototypical implementation of the SIGHT framework was evaluated using a mock-interview paradigm. Results …

O'Kei: An American Novel, Boris Pilnyak, Ronald D. Leblanc (Translator)

Faculty Publications

On January 4, 1931, Boris Pilnyak (1894-1938) wrote a letter to Joseph Stalin, pleading with the Soviet leader to grant him permission to travel to the United States in order to conduct research for an ambitious book project he was undertaking that would compare communist Russia favorably to capitalist America. Pilnyak’s request received official approval, and a few months later the writer set off for the U.S., arriving in New York by steamer on March 12, 1931, and remaining in the country until August 3, 1931. During his nearly five-month stay in America, Pilnyak became acquainted with a number of …

First Amendment Lochnerism & The Origins Of The Incorporation Doctrine, James Y. Stern

Faculty Publications

The 20th century emergence of the incorporation doctrine is regarded as a critical development in constitutional law, but while issues related to the doctrine's justification have been studied and debated for more than fifty years, the causes and mechanics of its advent have received relatively little academic attention. This Essay, part of a symposium on Judge Jeffrey Sutton's recent book about state constitutional law, examines the doctrinal origins of incorporation, in an effort to help uncover why the incorporation doctrine emerged when it did and the way it did. It concludes that, for these purposes, incorporation is best understood as …

Reading Academic Citations: How Professors And Graduate Students Read For Different Purposes, Grant Eckstein, Sarah Miner, Katie Watkins, Judy James, Mornie Sims, Allison Wallace Baker, Larissa Grahl

Faculty Publications

Citations provide truncated yet socially complex information about sources in academic texts which students are obliged to read, comprehend, and then ultimately produce as part of an academic discourse community. While researchers have observed a developmental process whereby students produce citations during source-based writing, little work has investigated the reading stage when students visually encounter citations. In this study, we explored academic reading behaviors by examining eye movements of 27 graduate students and 18 professors as they read 6 authentic research texts for various purposes (summary, analysis, synthesis). Results of factorial ANOVAs showed no differences between students and professors but …

Factors That Facilitate Or Impair Kinesic And Vocalic Nonverbal Behaviors During Interpersonal Deception, Judee K. Burgoon, Lauren M. Hamel, J. Pete Blair, Nathan W. Twyman

Faculty Publications

Nonverbal demeanor has long been thought to be a high-fidelity display window into a person’s inner self. At the same time, nonverbal behaviors are thought by laypeople to be reliable indicators of dissembling. In the realm of deception, both of those beliefs are true—and false. Humans can choose to reveal their personal identity, affiliations, attitudes, and behavioral inclinations through their nonverbal presentation of self. But, as the adaptive creatures that they are, humans also use their nonverbal actions to fabricate, conceal, and evade. In this respect, deception can disguise the true self and yet can also betray the truth. In …

Measuring Language Development Through Self-Assessment, Troy L. Cox, Dan Dewey

Faculty Publications

Talk to any cyclist or runner, and they can name instances when the universe seems to conspire against them with headwinds that hinder their progress. It is easy to identify and often blame external forces for causing us to fail. Conversely, we often attribute success to our own ability, being blissfully unaware of the tailwinds that assist us. This blindness to headwind/tailwind asymmetry (Davidai & Gilovich, 2016) in viewing one’s own performance is not limited solely to endurance athletes but can be found in other areas of self-assessment. Performance rarely occurs in a vacuum. There are typically external forces that …

Vowel Dynamics Of The Low Vowels In Cowlitz County, Washington, Joseph A. Stanley

Faculty Publications

Q1: Does Cowlitz County participate in the Elsewhere Shift?

BOT/BOUGHT:

• Not 100% merged.
• Have been in a stable near-merger since the 1930s.
• Hypothesis: Started when area was being settled (1850s–1920s) because of the demographic shift.

/æ/ BAT:

• Slowly lowering over 4 generations (since at least the 1930s)
• Women consistently ahead of the men - change in progress for over 60 years.
• Hypothesis: Began in earnest when Longview was founded (mid 1920s), in addition to language-internal pressure.

Using Accelerometer And Gyroscope Data In Common Mobile Devices To Assess Credibility, Joseph S. Valacich, Jeffrey L. Jenkins, Michael D. Byrd, David Kim, Manasvi Kumar, Parker A. Williams

Faculty Publications

An observational study examined the efficacy of using accelerometer and gyroscope (i.e., orientation) data from standard mobile devices to assess response credibility. Study participants played twenty rounds of a card game where they self-reported whether they won or lost each round. Participants received a base payment but could gain increased “bonus” payments by cheating. After the card game, participants were asked a “Yes-No” question whether they cheated while their orientation data was captured. We predicted that people concealing information about an adverse behavior (i.e., cheating), would result in differences in both absolute magnitude changes in acceleration and in rotation, as …

Gender Dynamics And Critical Reception: A Study Of Early 20th-Century Book Reviews From The New York Times, Matthew Lavin

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Solving Russian Velars: Palatalization, The Lexicon And Gradient Contrast Utilization, Jeffrey R. Parker, Andrea D. Sims

Faculty Publications

The complexity of an inflection class system is the average extent to which elements in the system inhibit motivated inferences about the realization of lexemes’ paradigm cells. Research shows that systems tend to exhibit relatively low complexity in this sense. However, representations of inflectional systems tend to include only affixal and regular patterns, leaving questions about how irregular patterns and non-affixal ‘layers’ of inflectional exponence affect the complexity of a system. We address these questions by exploring four layers of inflectional exponence of Russian nouns, including irregular patterns within each layer. Our data show that the Russian noun system exhibits …