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1. How Special Is Language Production? Perspectives From Monitoring and Control

   https://doi.org/10.1016/bs.plm.2018.08.006  

   Nozari, N. (January 2018, The psychology of learning and motivation)

   Federmeier, K. D. (Ed.)

   In his seminal essay, “The Modularity of Mind” Fodor (1983), presents arguments in favor of language comprehension as a special module along with other input processing systems. His view on language production is less clear. In this chapter, I first demonstrate that language production and comprehension are quite similar when evaluated in light of Fodor's criteria for modules: both meet a subset of those criteria in that their behavior resembles automatic processing; neither, however, is informationally encapsulated. This partial conformity with the criteria for specialized modules, leaves the question “How special is language production?” unanswered. I will then propose that this question can be answered by re-examining the origin of what resembles the behavior of an automatic system. I will argue that language production is, in fact, an efficiently monitored and controlled system, and that such monitoring and control mechanisms are shared between language production and other systems. These domain-general mechanisms, however, operate on domain-specific representations, creating specialized monitoring-control loops that can be selectively trained and selectively damaged. 

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2. Monitoring, control and repair in word production

   https://doi.org/10.1038/s44159-025-00417-1  

   Nozari, Nazbanou (March 2025, Nature Reviews Psychology)

   Word production is the process of turning a thought into motor movements that produce a spoken word. This process has traditionally been studied using two approaches — the psycholinguistic approach and the motor speech approach — that focus on dierent stages of the production process. In this Perspective, I highlight the strengths of these two approaches and merge them with broader frameworks and theories of action and cognition to open new directions for language production research. I discuss proposed models for how speakers assess whether production is going smoothly (monitoring), adjust to diculties (control) and x errors (repair). Each proposal combines language production research with insights from other areas of cognition to demonstrate the utility and necessity of a closer integration of broader cognitive frameworks into models of word production. 

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3. ADVANCING THE STATE OF THE ART IN L2 SPEECH PERCEPTION-PRODUCTION RESEARCH: REVISITING THEORETICAL ASSUMPTIONS AND METHODOLOGICAL PRACTICES

   https://doi.org/10.1017/S0272263121000371  

   Nagle, Charles L.; Baese-Berk, Melissa M. (January 2021, Studies in Second Language Acquisition)

   null (Ed.)

   Abstract One of the basic goals of second language (L2) speech research is to understand the perception-production link, or the relationship between L2 speech perception and L2 speech production. Although many studies have examined the link, they have done so with strikingly different conceptual foci and methods. Even studies that appear to use similar perception and production tasks often present nontrivial differences in task characteristics and implementation. This conceptual and methodological variation makes meaningful synthesis of perception-production findings difficult, and it also complicates the process of developing new perception-production models that specifically address how the link changes throughout L2 learning. In this study, we scrutinize theoretical and methodological issues in perception-production research and offer recommendations for advancing theory and practice in this domain. We focus on L2 sound learning because most work in the area has focused on segmental contrasts. 

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4. Capturing the variation in language experience to understand language processing and learning

   https://doi.org/10.1075/lia.20018.kro  

   Kroll, Judith F.; Takahesu Tabori, Andrea; Navarro-Torres, Christian (July 2021, Language, Interaction and Acquisition)

   Abstract A goal of early research on language processing was to characterize what is universal about language. Much of the past research focused on native speakers because the native language has been considered as providing privileged truths about acquisition, comprehension, and production. Populations or circumstances that deviated from these idealized norms were of interest but not regarded as essential to our understanding of language. In the past two decades, there has been a marked change in our understanding of how variation in language experience may inform the central and enduring questions about language. There is now evidence for significant plasticity in language learning beyond early childhood, and variation in language experience has been shown to influence both language learning and processing. In this paper, we feature what we take to be the most exciting recent new discoveries suggesting that variation in language experience provides a lens into the linguistic, cognitive, and neural mechanisms that enable language processing. 

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5. Capturing the variation in language experience to understand language processing and learning.

   Kroll, Judith; Takahesu Tabori, Andrea; Navarro-Torres, Christian (August 2021, LIA)

   Kail, Michèle; null (Ed.)

   A goal of early research on language processing was to characterize what is universal about language. Much of the past research focused on native speakers because the native language has been considered as providing privileged truths about acquisition, comprehension, and production. Populations or circumstances that deviated from these idealized norms were of interest but not regarded as essential to our understanding of language. In the past two decades, there has been a marked change in our understanding of how variation in language experience may inform the central and enduring questions about language. There is now evidence for significant plasticity in language learning beyond early childhood, and variation in language experience has been shown to influence both language learning and processing. In this paper, we feature what we take to be the most exciting recent new discoveries suggesting that variation in language experience provides a lens into the linguistic, cognitive, and neural mechanisms that enable language processing. 

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