Understanding how people learn the phonological patterns of their language is a major challenge facing the field of phonology. In this dissertation, I approach the issue of phonological learning by focusing on "saltatory" alternations, which occur when two alternating sounds "leap over" an intermediate, invariant sound (e.g.,…

This research study is an investigation of student-laboratory (i.e., lab) learning based on students' perceptions of experiences using questionnaire data and evidence of their science-laboratory performance based on paper-and-pencil assessments using Maryland-mandated criteria, Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) criteria, and published…

This dissertation project examined the influence of language typology on the use of segmentation cues by second language (L2) learners of English. Previous research has shown that native English speakers rely more on sentence context and lexical knowledge than segmental (i.e. phonotactics or acoustic-phonetics) or prosodic cues (e.g., word stress)…

Artificial lexicons have previously been used to examine the time course of the learning and recognition of spoken words, the role of segment type in word learning, and the integration of context during spoken word recognition. However, in all of these studies the experimenter determined the frequency and order of the words to be learned. In three…

Learning a phonetic category (or any linguistic category) requires integrating different sources of information. A crucial unsolved problem for phonetic learning is how this integration occurs: how can we update our previous knowledge about a phonetic category as we hear new exemplars of the category? One model of learning is Bayesian Inference,…

Dramatic biodiversity changes occurring globally from species loss and invasion have altered native food webs and ecosystem processes. My research objectives are to understand the consequences of fish diversity to freshwater systems by (1) examining the food web consequences of multiple top predators, (2) determining how biodiversity influences…

This dissertation investigates the relation between prosodic events at the phrasal level and component events at the rhythmic level. The overarching hypothesis is that the interaction among component rhythmic events gives rise to prosodic patterns at the phrasal level, while at the same time being constrained by the latter, and that in the case of…

The purpose of this study was to examine an activity-based intervention, dialogic reading with embedded explicit phonological awareness strategies, applied as a preventive approach by parents in their home settings located within a culturally and ethnically diverse urban region. This study investigated the effects of training parents to employ a…

Much recent research has described the development of innovative functions of "like" as a discourse marker ("'Like' they're trying to be discreet about it") or discourse particle ("Maybe it's 'like' a girl thing") and as a quotative marker ("He's 'like' 'I don't want to work until later'"). Comparatively little is known about how speakers acquire…

When linguistic input provides inconsistent evidence for grammatical structures, children tend to regularize. For example, children learning languages from parents who are imperfect users of the language regularize their parents' inconsistent usages (Singleton & Newport, 2004). Previous studies (Hudson Kam & Newport, 2005, 2009) have examined this…