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1. 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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2. The Neurocognitive Underpinnings of Second Language Processing: Knowledge Gains From the Past and Future Outlook

   https://doi.org/10.1111/lang.12601  

   van Hell, Janet G. ( July 2023 , Language Learning)

   The past decades have seen an explosion of research using electrophysiological or neuroimaging techniques for studying the neurocognitive underpinnings of second language (L2) processing. Although this field has a shorter history than does research on language learning more generally, important insights into the neurocognitive basis of L2 processing have driven it to the center stage of language science. In this target article forLanguage Learning’s 75th Jubilee volume, I illustrate the field's impressive achievements by selectively reviewing electrophysiological and neuroimaging research on L2 processing and bilingual brain organization. I also review changing perspectives in the field (including individual difference and experience‐based perspectives, neural network approaches, neuroplasticity, and L2‐learning related neural changes) and identified challenges, promises, and future directions (revisit native‐speaker benchmark, increase linguistic diversity, enhance ecological validity, intensify research on child L2 learners’ brain, adopt lifelong approach to L2 learning) that can lead to a better understanding of the neural underpinnings of L2 learning and processing.

    

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3. When event knowledge overrides word order in sentence comprehension: Learning a first language after childhood

   https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.13073  

   Cheng, Qi ; Mayberry, Rachel I. ( January 2021 , Developmental Science)

   Limited language experience in childhood is common among deaf individuals, which prior research has shown to lead to low levels of language processing. Although basic structures such as word order have been found to be resilient to conditions of sparse language input in early life, whether they are robust to conditions of extreme language delay is unknown. The sentence comprehension strategies of post‐childhood, first‐language (L1) learners of American Sign Language (ASL) with at least 9 years of language experience were investigated, in comparison to two control groups of learners with full access to language from birth (deaf native signers and hearing L2 learners who were native English speakers). The results of a sentence‐to‐picture matching experiment show that event knowledge overrides word order for post‐childhood L1 learners, regardless of the animacy of the subject, while both deaf native signers and hearing L2 signers consistently rely on word order to comprehend sentences. Language inaccessibility throughout early childhood impedes the acquisition of even basic word order. Similar to the strategies used by very young children prior to the development of basic sentence structure, post‐childhood L1 learners rely more on context and event knowledge to comprehend sentences. Language experience during childhood is critical to the development of basic sentence structure.

    

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4. Language systematizes attention: How relational language enhances relational representation by guiding attention

   https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2023.105671  

   Yuan, Lei ; Novack, Miriam ; Uttal, David ; Franconeri, Steven ( February 2024 , Cognition)

   Language can affect cognition, but through what mechanism? Substantial past research has focused on how labeling can elicit categorical representation during online processing. We focus here on a particularly powerful type of language—relational language—and show that relational language can enhance relational representation in children through an embodied attention mechanism. Four-year-old children were given a color-location conjunction task, in which they were asked to encode a two-color square, split either vertically or horizontally (e.g., red on the left, blue on the right), and later recall the same configuration from its mirror reflection. During the encoding phase, children in the experimental condition heard relational language (e.g., “Red is on the left of blue”), while those in the control condition heard generic non-relational language (e.g., “Look at this one, look at it closely”). At recall, children in the experimental condition were more successful at choosing the correct relational representation between the two colors compared to the control group. Moreover, they exhibited different attention patterns as predicted by the attention shift account of relational representation (Franconeri et al., 2012). To test the sustained effect of language and the role of attention, during the second half of the study, the experimental condition was given generic non-relational language. There was a sustained advantage in the experimental condition for both behavioral accuracies and signature attention patterns. Overall, our findings suggest that relational language enhances relational representation by guiding learners’ attention, and this facilitative effect persists over time even in the absence of language. Implications for the mechanism of how relational language can enhance the learning of relational systems (e.g., mathematics, spatial cognition) by guiding attention will be discussed. 

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5. Understanding speech and language in tuberous sclerosis complex

   https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2023.1149071  

   Gipson, Tanjala T. ; Oller, D. Kimbrough ; Messinger, Daniel S. ; Perry, Lynn K. ( June 2023 , Frontiers in Human Neuroscience)

   Tuberous Sclerosis Complex (TSC), is a neurocutaneous disorder, associated with a high prevalence of autism spectrum disorder (ASD; ∼50% of individuals). As TSC is a leading cause of syndromic ASD, understanding language development in this population would not only be important for individuals with TSC but may also have implications for those with other causes of syndromic and idiopathic ASD. In this mini review, we consider what is known about language development in this population and how speech and language in TSC are related to ASD. Although up to 70% of individuals with TSC report language difficulties, much of the limited research to date on language in TSC has been based on summary scores from standardized assessments. Missing is a detailed understanding of the mechanisms driving speech and language in TSC and how they relate to ASD. Here, we review recent work suggesting that canonical babbling and volubility—two precursors of language development that predict the emergence of speech and are delayed in infants with idiopathic ASD—are also delayed in infants with TSC. We then look to the broader literature on language development to identify other early precursors of language development that tend to be delayed in children with autism as a guide for future research on speech and language in TSC. We argue that vocal turn-taking, shared attention, and fast mapping are three such skills that can provide important information about how speech and language develop in TSC and where potential delays come from. The overall goal of this line of research is to not only illuminate the trajectory of language in TSC with and without ASD, but to ultimately find strategies for earlier recognition and treatment of the pervasive language difficulties in this population. 

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