The comprehension of connectives is crucial for understanding the discourse relations that make up a text. We studied connective comprehension in English to investigate whether adult comprehenders acquire the meaning and intended use of connectives to a similar extent and how connective features and individual differences impact connective…

This study investigated how computer agents' language style affects summary writing in an Intelligent Tutoring System, called CSAL AutoTutor. Participants interacted with two computer agents in one of three language styles: (1) a "formal" language style, (2) an "informal" language style, and (3) a "mixed" language…

Efforts to understand changes in language development and variations in language production across lifespan have increased considerably in the past several decades (Sankoff, 2017). In narrative discourse production, although several studies have reported age-related differences, the findings are not consistent. Additionally, previous research has…

Grammatical and lexical cohesion are necessary conditions to guarantee a text's coherence (Halliday and Hasan 1976). Grammatical cohesion is classified into four types of relation: reference, conjunction, substitution, and ellipsis. This study aims to investigate the use of the cohesive device of reference in written discourse produced by…

Establishing local coherence relations is central to text comprehension. Positive-causal coherence relations link a cause and its consequence, whereas negative-causal coherence relations add a contrastive meaning (negation) to the causal link. According to the cumulative cognitive complexity approach, negative-causal coherence relations are…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to determine (a) correlates of informativeness and efficiency in discourse and (b) potential cross-linguistic and stimulus type (picture vs. nonpicture) differences in measures of informativeness and efficiency in Spanish/English bilingual adults in the United States. Method: Eighty-eight Spanish/English…

Research has identified a number of linguistic features that influence the reading comprehension of young readers; yet, less is known about whether and how these findings extend to adult readers. This study examines text comprehension, processing, and familiarity judgment provided by adult readers using a number of different approaches (i.e.,…

Persons with traumatic brain injury (TBI) often show impaired linguistic and/or narrative abilities. The present study aimed to document the features of narrative discourse impairment in a group of adults with TBI. 14 severe TBI non-aphasic speakers (GCS less than 8) in the phase of neurological stability and 14 neurologically intact participants…

This paper examines text structure and patterns of cohesion in stories written by a group of adults with a history of childhood language impairment. The study aimed to extend our knowledge of writing difficulties in this group by building upon a study that examined clause level phenomena (Smith-Lock, Nickels, & Mortensen, this issue). Ten adults…

This study investigated the usefulness of the Cantonese Linguistic Communication Measure (CLCM) in monitoring changes of narrative production in five Chinese adults with aphasia in the period of spontaneous recovery (SR group) and four who underwent anomia therapies (Tx group). Language samples elicited from a picture description task were…

The aim of this paper is to discuss some of the productive discourse devices and markers noted in 50 spoken narratives elicited from Telugu native speakers. Since most of them are college students and residents of Hyderabad, they are also exposed to English as well as Hindi-Urdu (Dakkhini). After presenting certain salient features of Telugu…

This study examined the representation of knowledge in text writing in 20 ten-year-old children and 20 adults in the Netherlands. The research analyzed the use of clause linking devices to compose larger text units. Special attention was given to the use of causal relational markers and the extent to which causal relations within the texts matched…

This study examined the benefits of the combined used of a hearing aid and tactual aid to supplement lip-reading in the reception of speech and for the recognition of environmental sounds in an adult with profound hearing loss. Speech conditions included lip-reading alone (L), lip-reading + tactual aid (L+TA) lip-reading + hearing aid (L+HA) and…

This study examined age-related changes in narrative speech of 79 adults aged 40-91 who told stories from their pictorial representations. Quantity, information content and cohesion of narratives were analysed using a detailed transcription and codification system. We carried out a LISREL analysis to study relationships between narrative…

Studied 60 adults to determine age differences in cohesion of narrative retellings in reference and conjunction discourse systems. Older adults scored significantly lower on the memory span measure, recalled less story information, and made more referential errors in retellings than younger adults. (RJC)