This literature review investigates the neural architectures more strongly involved in sentence processing compared to the processing of unstructured word-lists, focusing on syntactic word-meaning...Show moreThis literature review investigates the neural architectures more strongly involved in sentence processing compared to the processing of unstructured word-lists, focusing on syntactic word-meaning integration. The inferior frontal gyrus, anterior temporal cortex, and posterior temporal cortex emerged as prominent regions associated with sentence processing. Additional regions, such as the angular gyrus and selective right hemispheric architecture, also exhibited enhanced activation during sentence processing. These findings support the concept of a distributed network of syntactically functional neural architecture. The results align with Hagoort's Memory, Unification, and Control model, suggesting that different components of neural architecture correlate with the model's functionality. However, persisting debates regarding the precise involvement of the IFG and its subdivisions as well as other featured regions in sentence processing warrant further investigation. Overall, this review emphasises the diffuse nature of the neural architecture underlying syntactic word-meaning integration, calling for further exploratory and explanatory investigations.Show less
Previous literature suggests that musicality benefits the perception of prosody in a second language. However, there is less literature that covers the effect of musicality on the production of...Show morePrevious literature suggests that musicality benefits the perception of prosody in a second language. However, there is less literature that covers the effect of musicality on the production of prosody in L2. This study examined 134 Dutch bilingual speakers of English with varying musical experience in their production of 11 English words during a reading-aloud task. This experiment was done in order to find out if Dutch native speakers acquire English prosody more easily when having experience with musical training. The pitch contours were measured and analyzed together with the amount of musical experience using a multi-level regression. The results that were found were insignificant and argue that the Dutch participants did not benefit from the musical training. This result contradicts previous literature, leading to an evaluation of previous results and theories.Show less
The present study attempted at answering the research question whether musical expertise facilitates acquisition of L2 prosodic features, since the effect of transfer from musical to linguistic...Show moreThe present study attempted at answering the research question whether musical expertise facilitates acquisition of L2 prosodic features, since the effect of transfer from musical to linguistic auditory processing skills was claimed by several studies. The study examined the productions of a small text by 134 L1 English and Dutch L2 English speakers with different amounts of musical experience. Multilevel regression analyses were performed to investigate the effect of musicality on the native speaker ratings, and distance between the L1 and L2 F0 range and speaking rate. Native speaker ratings proved to be unreliable, and there was a trend for higher musicality scores to predict larger F0 range distances from the native mean, contrary to the hypotheses. Based on the obtained results it was impossible to claim a positive correlation between musical expertise and more nativelike L2 prosody production. The paper concludes by discussing the methodological limitations and suggesting other prosodic features to measure in the future studies.Show less
This thesis aims to present more evidence for the theory that in the same brain areas two languages are processed. A summary is given on all the relevant background information. Also, by presenting...Show moreThis thesis aims to present more evidence for the theory that in the same brain areas two languages are processed. A summary is given on all the relevant background information. Also, by presenting an overview of case studies in Bilingual Aphasia and using a newly conducted scale and a difference-percentage, this thesis will try to give more insight in the issue if kinship plays a significant role in the parallel deterioration patterns in bilingual aphasia. The results show that a slight trend is visible in the data. Case studies scoring low on the scale of kinship, tend to have a low difference-percentage as well, which is as expected. Although the Spearman correlation is negative, this doesn’t mean that kinship doesn’t have influence on the difference-percentage. This negative correlation is most likely due to the small sample size. So, even though the correlation is negative, the trend in the data is visible and the means and knowledge are present as well, so more research is possible and recommended.Show less
