SPEECH ACCOMODATIONS BY AND TO OLDER ADULTS

在以往关于“老年人的言语调节”的研究中，使用参照交际任务，年轻人调整他们的流利度、语义内容和句法复杂性以适应其伴侣的感知交际需求。老年人没有进行这样的语言调整，似乎在各种情况下都使用一致的语言风格，这表明，像其他研究一样，老年人的语言产生受到工作记忆限制的限制，影响了他们复杂句法结构的产生。本研究将利用“在线”实验任务来控制句子生成任务的工作记忆需求，从而扩展老年人言语适应的研究。提出了三个系列的实验。系列1将分析语言样本，以评估并发处理需求对语言流畅性、句法复杂性和语义内容的影响。基线语言样本将与参与者同时行走、敲击食指、以复杂的模式敲击四根手指、同时听语音和听听觉胡言乱语时收集的语言样本进行比较。这些并发任务之前已经被证明会影响工作记忆任务的表现，因此，它们被预测会竞争工作记忆，进而影响语音的产生。走路和敲击速度也将在基线和同步说话条件下进行检查。系列2将使用一个句子生成任务，该任务控制词汇项的选择，并检查使用一组指定的词汇项生成句子的延迟和生成句子的复杂性。计划进行三个实验：（2a）检验句子起始时间和句子复杂性作为指定词汇项集合大小的函数。（2b）检查由单个动词生成的句子和由多个动词生成的句子的句子起始次数和句子复杂性。（2c）使用指定的词汇项目清单，检查为完成简单和复杂句子框架而生成的句子的句子起始时间和句子复杂性。系列3将使用一个受控的句子生成任务来检查启动记忆句子的延迟。计划进行三个实验：（3a）检查简单句和复杂句的句子起始次数。（3b）在简单句和复杂句的制作过程中检查句内停顿。（3c）考察语义约束和可逆句子的句子起始时间。在这三个系列的实验中，语言能力、处理速度、工作记忆和抑制的个体差异也将被检验。

In previous research on "Speech Accommodations by and to Older Adults" using a referential communication task, young adults adjusted their fluency, semantic content, and syntactic complexity to the perceived communication needs of their partners. Older adults did not make such speech adjustments and appeared to use a consistent speech style in a variety of situations, suggesting, like other lines of research, that older adults' speech production is constrained by working memory limitations that affect their production of complex syntactic constructions. The present proposal will extend this study of older adults' speech accommodations by using "on-line" experimental tasks manipulated the working memory demands of sentence production tasks. Three series of experiments are proposed. Series 1 will analyze language samples to assess the effects on concurrent processing demands on linguistic fluency, syntactic complexity, and semantic content. A baseline language sample will be compared to language samples collected while participants are concurrently walking, tapping their index fingers, tapping four fingers in a complex pattern, listening to concurrent speech, and listening to auditory babble. These concurrent tasks have previously been shown to affect performance on working memory tasks, hence, they are predicted to compete for working memory and, in turn affect speech production. Walking and tapping rates will also be examined in baseline and concurrent speaking conditions. Series 2 will use a sentence production task that controls the choice of lexical items and examines the latency to generate a sentence using a specified set of lexical items and the complexity of the generated sentence. Three experiments are planned: (2a) To examine sentence initiation times and sentence complexity as a function of the size of the set of specified lexical items. (2b) To examine sentence initiation times and sentence complexity for sentences generated from single verbs or for sentences generated from multiple verbs. (2c) To examine sentence initiation times and sentence complexity for sentences generated to complete simple and complex sentence frames using a specified inventory of lexical items. Series 3 will use a controlled sentence production task that examines the latency to initiate memorized sentences. Three experiments are planned: (3a) To examine sentence initiation times for simple and complex sentences. (3b) To examine intra-sentence pauses during the production of simple and complex sentences. (3c) To examine sentence initiation times for semantically constrained and reversible sentences. In all three series of experiments, individual differences in verbal ability, processing speed, working memory, and inhibition will also be examined.