Doctoral Dissertation Research: Effects of Within- and Cross-language Ambiguity on Word Learning and Processing

世界上大多数人都会说双语，这对于我们理解双语者和语言学习者如何处理语言内部和跨语言的语义模糊单词的能力非常重要。当一种语言的单词在另一种语言中有多个翻译时，就会出现跨语言翻译歧义。 先前的研究表明，语言内和跨语言的歧义都会影响第一语言（L1）和第二语言（L2）的单词学习和处理。然而，很少有研究探讨歧义词含义之间的相似性如何影响语义歧义词和语义在母语和母语中的获取和处理。在托科维奇博士的指导下，切尔西·爱丁顿将通过三个事件相关的潜力/行为实验来研究这些问题。实验 1 将研究语义相似性如何影响先前已知的明确单词形式的新含义的学习。记忆和语义启动任务将测试单词的新义和旧义之间的语义相似性如何影响这些单词的学习和处理。实验 2 将使用词汇测试和语义相关性任务来研究 L2（德语）词汇的语义相似性如何影响这些单词的学习和处理。实验 3 将研究德语学习者如何通过只教参与者一种与语义模糊单词的一种含义相对应的翻译，将含义从模糊的英语单词扩展到德语词汇。学习者对单词的语义处理将使用翻译识别任务进行评估。这项研究的结果将有助于更好地理解单语者和二语学习者如何处理和学习语义歧义单词，并将为单语和双语语义记忆模型提供信息。 该项目还将支持对有前途的语言学者的科学培训。

The majority of people in the world are bilingual, which gives importance to our ability to understand how bilinguals and language learners process semantically-ambiguous words both within and across languages. Cross-language translation ambiguity occurs when a word in one language has more than one translation in another language. Previous research indicates that within- and cross-language ambiguity both affect the learning and processing of words in the first language (L1) and in the second language (L2). However, little research has explored how the similarity in meaning between ambiguous words' meanings affects the acquisition and processing of semantically-ambiguous words and meanings in L1 and L2. Under the direction of Dr. Tokowicz, Chelsea Eddington will examine these issues in three event related potential/behavioral experiments. Experiment 1 will examine how semantic similarity impacts the learning of novel meanings for previously-known unambiguous word forms. Memory and semantic priming tasks will test how semantic similarity between the words' novel and old meanings affects the learning and processing of these words. Experiment 2 will examine how semantic similarity of L2 (German) vocabulary affects the learning and processing of these words using vocabulary tests and a semantic relatedness task. Experiment 3 will examine how learners of German extend meanings from ambiguous English words to German vocabulary words by teaching participants only one translation that corresponds to one meaning of semantically-ambiguous words. Learners' semantic processing of the words will be assessed using a translation-recognition task. The results of this study will provide a better understanding of how monolinguals and L2 learners process and learn semantically-ambiguous words, and will inform models of monolingual and bilingual semantic memory. The project will also support the scientific training of a promising linguistic scholar.