Research

The sounds we experience in our everyday communication can vary greatly depending on the environment. Paradoxically, increasing the sound level may lead to worse speech perception, especially in noise. This decline is known as “rollover.” It is unclear how rollover is experienced differentially across aging groups, as well as for those with and without hearing loss. In addition, there is mounting evidence that listening effort plays an important role in challenging listening conditions and can be directly quantified with objective measures such as pupil dilation. To investigate the interacting effects of temporality, sound level, background noise, and effort on perception, we assessed word identification at multiple levels and in quiet and in noise, in younger (≤25 years) and older (>50 years) listeners without or with mild-to-moderate hearing loss. Pupillometry was used to assess listening effort during these measurements. Behavioral results demonstrated that rollover occurred for both temporal and non-temporal speech contrasts. Rollover occurred in older normal-hearing and older hearing-impaired listeners when speech was presented in background noise. Pupillometry results demonstrated that listening effort was modulated by sound level and that greater listening effort was expended primarily in the presence of background noise. The effect of increased sound level on listening effort was exacerbated by age and hearing loss, with the greatest effect in older listeners with hearing loss. The age- and hearing-dependent effects of rollover highlight the potential negative impact of amplification of high sound levels and therefore has implications for effective treatment of age-related hearing loss.

Aging and hearing loss are associated with difficulty understanding fast speech. Here, we investigated how peripheral hearing sensitivity, neural speech representation, and cognitive processing contribute to this difficulty. For this purpose, we collected electrophysiological, cognitive, and behavioral assessments from 30 younger normal-hearing adults, 32 older normal-hearing adults, and 26 older hearing-impaired adults. Subcortical envelope-following responses to monosyllabic words and cortical envelope tracking to continuous speech were recorded at 0% and 40% time compression. Cognitive performance was assessed using the NIH Toolbox. Time-compressed sentence recognition was measured using an adaptive approach to determine the time compression ratio that corresponded to 50% correct performance. Younger participants showed stronger subcortical envelope encoding than older participants, and phase locking decreased with time compression across groups. Cortical envelope tracking was greater in older adults, with and without hearing loss, than in younger participants, and increased in the time-compression condition. Younger participants had higher processing speed scores than older participants and achieved 50% correct performance with higher time compression ratios than older participants. Audiometric thresholds, cortical envelope tracking to natural-rate speech, and processing speed significantly predicted time-compressed speech recognition performance. These results suggest that while both peripheral hearing sensitivity and processing speed are predictive of time-compressed speech recognition, cortical mechanisms appear to contribute to time-compressed speech recognition primarily when temporal cues are faithfully preserved in the speech signal.

This study investigates to what extent various factors affect the stop production of North Korean refugee speakers living in Seoul, South Korea, from the perspective of second dialect acquisition (SDA). The VOT and F0 values of 6,495 stops were measured from twenty-two North Korean speakers (F: 16, M: 6). The factors examined were age of arrival, length of residence (LoR), and three different aspects of social adaptation (identification, assimilation, and language attitudes). Our findings showed that the North Korean speakers with stronger South Korean identity and longer LoR produced more Seoul standard South Korean-like VOT patterns. Moreover, the speakers with positive language attitudes toward South Korea and longer LoR produced more South Korean-like F0 patterns. The results suggest that understanding various dimensions of adaptation is important to explain North Korean refugees’ SDA.

Addressing multilingual learners’ literacy development requires understanding cross-language relationships between their first and second languages. The current study investigated how Spanish language and literacy skills relate to English language and literacy skills in 106 Spanish-speaking multilingual learners in kindergarten through second grade. Using an achievement test in both Spanish and English, multilevel models revealed three key findings. First, there was partial support for the interdependence continuum: Spanish decoding significantly predicted English decoding (b = 0.73, p < .001), but Spanish reading comprehension and oral language did not predict their English counterparts. Second, Spanish decoding and oral language showed no significant cross-domain relationships with English reading comprehension. Third, English oral language did not moderate Spanish-to-English relationships, but English oral language was a consistent and significant predictor of English reading comprehension, while Spanish skills did not uniquely predict English reading comprehension beyond English oral language. Findings suggest the importance of L1 word-level skills instruction to support multilingual learners’ English literacy development in early elementary grades.

Picture books, which feature the display of both text and images, have been widely used in second language (L2) learning and teaching. During picture book reading, learners need to split their attention between text and images. This behavior is believed to be crucial in cross-modal integration of information that supports comprehension. Despite its importance, integrative saccades, which refer to rapid eye movements between information presented in different modalities, have received little attention in previous L2 multimodal input research. Moreover, studies that capture attention-based learning processes often overlook the ongoing learning processes as a mediator in the treatment-outcome relationship (Jia, Ruirui, and Bronson Hui. 2025. “Modeling Relationships Between Learning Conditions, Processes, and Outcomes: An Introduction to Mediation Analysis in SLA Research.” Studies in Second Language Acquisition 47 (3): 912–47). To fill these gaps, the present brief report reanalyzed the eye-tracking data from Tytko, Tetiana, Bronson Hui, and Nick Pandža (2026. “The Effect of Multimodal Input on L2 Learners’ Reading Comprehension: A Pre-registered, Eye-Tracking Study.” Modern Language Journal 110 (1): 210–39), which examined the effect of different combinations of multimodal input reading conditions: reading-only (RO) versus reading with images (RI) versus reading with images and audio (RIA) on comprehension. With their data, we aim to explore the extent to which the effect of reading conditions on reading comprehension was mediated by the number of integrative saccades. To address this intermediary relationship, we conducted multilevel mediation analysis. It was found that, through integrative saccades, the RIA condition led to better reading comprehension than the RI condition, confirming the hypothesized mechanism that the inclusion of the audio in the RIA condition allows L2 learners to go back and forth between text and images more frequently, and this increased integration of verbal and pictorial information, in turn, led to better reading comprehension.

Hearing loss and related impairments are among the most prevalent service-related disabilities affecting military Veterans. Yet, many of the cognitive and psychosocial implications related to auditory functioning remain insufficiently understood. Growing evidence suggests that hearing aid usage can alleviate cognitive symptoms and reduce psychological, social, and emotional burdens associated with hearing loss. The present study examined associations between hearing status, overall perceptions of health, and neurocognitive functioning in combat deployed Veterans. More specifically, this study assessed whether hearing status contributes to impaired neurocognitive function and, if hearing aid usage may serve as a protective factor for cognitive symptoms and neuropsychological performance.

As humans age, circadian/diurnal preferences typically shift to earlier times of day. Recent research identifies the fatigue associated with listening effort as a fundamental concern among listeners with hearing impairment. The impact of time-of-day on perceiving speech under challenging listening conditions is, however, not well established for older listeners with hearing loss. A study was therefore initiated to measure time-of-day effects. Experienced cochlear-implant users with postlingual onsets of hearing loss completed several effortful perceptual tasks either in the morning, mid-afternoon, or at both timepoints. Sentence pairs were presented in quiet listening conditions and listeners were cued either before or after presentation, to repeat the first, second, or both sentences. Speech-in-noise (+10 SNR) scores for single sentences were also recorded. Following this, information was collected regarding time-of-day preferences, sleep habits, and fatigue, along with standardized measures of visual attention, processing speed, and working memory. Preliminary data do not currently bear out participants' intuitions regarding performance in the morning versus afternoon. Although memory load and target uncertainty reduce scores, performance across timepoints appears similar, irrespective of time-of-day-preference. Additional data for speech-in-noise will be reported.

Co-written by Rachel Romeo, 

Abstract: In adults, left hemisphere (LH) damage often leads to aphasia, but many cases of early damage leave linguistic processing intact, with a functional language system developing in the right hemisphere. To explain this early apparent equipotentiality of the two hemispheres for language, some have proposed that the language system is more bilateral during early development and becomes increasingly left-lateralized with age. We examined language lateralization using fMRI in two large developmental cohorts (total n = 273 children aged 4-16 years; n = 107 adults). Strong, adult-like LH lateralization (in response magnitude and activation volume) was evident by age 4, although other features of the LH language network showed protracted development, including the magnitude of language response and the strength of functional connectivity. Thus, although the RH can take over language function in some cases of early brain damage, this plasticity occurs in spite of adult-level LH bias present by age 4 years.

Pronoun comprehension in agrammatic aphasia has been widely studied for its implications for sentence processing. The Revised Slowed Syntax Hypothesis (SSH) attributes difficulties to interactions between pronoun type and sentence complexity, particularly for personal pronouns in exceptional case-marking constructions (ECMC). However, its cross-linguistic validity remains unclear.

Written by MLSC alumna Maria Polinsky, this paper explores the concept of multiple grammars (MGs) and their implications for linguistic theory, language acquisition, and bilingual language knowledge. Drawing on evidence from phenomena such as scope interactions, verb raising, and agreement patterns, I argue that seemingly identical surface structures can be undergirded by different grammatical analyses that may compete within speaker populations. I then propose a typology of MG distributions, including shared MGs, competing MGs, and partial MGs, each with distinct consequences for acquisition and use. Contrary to expectations of simplification, bilingualism can sometimes lead to an expansion of grammatical analyses and does not always lead to the elimination of MGs. The paper discusses methods for predicting environments conducive to MGs, considering factors such as structural ambiguity and silent elements. The examination of MGs compels us to explore how learners navigate underdetermined input, especially in bilingual contexts, and to examine the interplay between gradient acceptability judgments and categorical grammatical distinctions. The study of MGs offers valuable insights into language variation, change, and the nature of linguistic competence.