Contribution de l'apprentissage précoce d'une deuxième langue au développement de la conscience linguistique et à l'apprentissage de la lecture

The present study aims to validate the effects of second language learning on children's linguistic awareness. More particularly, we examine whether bilingual background improves the ability to manipulate morpho‐syntactic structure. We postulate that children who received a precocious learning of two languages (French‐German) may develop enhanced awareness and control of syntactic structure since they need an appropriate syntactic repertoire in each language. In return, these children will gain access to the written language with more ease. Our results show an advantage for the children who attended bilingual classes since kindergarten: they were better at grammatical judgement and correction tasks and word recognition.     

The effects of student gender,race, and achievement on career exploration advice given by canadian preservice teachers

This study investigated the effects of gender, race, and achievement on ratings of appropriateness of occupations and classifications of occupations (people, data, things) suitable for future exploration by ninth-grade students. The subjects (N=125; 106 females, 19 males), advanced undergraduate education students, were each asked to evaluate a case folder in which gender (female, male, not stated), race (Native, non-Native), and achievement (higher average, lower average) were systematically varied. Subjects gave ratings of appropriateness for future exploration of occupations on 5-point Likert-type scales. The occupations rated also represented three classifications (data, people, things), yielding a second dependent variable. Analysis was accomplished using two four-way analyses of variance. The attribute most influencing ratings was achievement. However, the three-way interactions of gender, race, and achievement limit direct interpretation of the data, and suggest that complex combinations of student attributes influence teachers. The limitations of the present study are emphasized; the implications for advising young women and for future research are discussed.     

Book notes

Religion, Society, and Psychoanalysis: Readings in Contemporary Theory Janet Liebman Jacobs & Donald Capps, eds., 1997 Boulder, CO., Oxford: Westview Press 282 pp., £48.50 (hb), £14.95 (pb) ISBN 0–8133–2647–8 (hb), ISBN 0–8133–2648–6 (pb)

On the Genealogy of Morals: A Polemic Friedrich Nietzsche/Douglas Smith, 1998 Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press xxxvii + 170 pp., £5.99, US$10.95 ISBN 0–19–283617‐X

Seeing through the Media: A Religious View of Communications and Cultural Analysis Michael Warren, 1997 Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press International 213 pp., US$17.00 ISBN 1–56338–211–3

Citizens and Exiles: Christian Faith in a Plural World Michael Nazir‐Ali, 1998 London: SPCK 198 pp., £12.99 (pb) ISBN 0–281–05050–3

Historical Dictionary of Catholicism William J. Collinge, 1997 Lanham, Md., London: The Scarecrow Press 551 pp., £53.00 ISBN 0–8108–3233‐X

Calendars in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Measuring Time James C. Vanderkam, 1998 London, New York: Routledge 136 pp., £35.00 ISBN 0–415–16513‐X

The Explorer's Guide to Judaism Jonathan Magonet, 1998 London: Hodder & Stoughton 340 pp., £8.99 (pb) ISBN 0–340–70984–7

The Explorer's Guide to Christianity Marcus Braybrooke, 1998 London: Hodder & Stoughton 287 pp., £8.99 (pb) ISBN 0–340–71005–5     

Applying Research Domain Criteria to the study of emotion dysregulation in infancy and early childhood

Emotion regulation is a principal task of early development. The failure to develop effective emotion regulation skills is associated with behavioural, academic, psychological and socioemotional difficulties. Although researchers have studied emotion regulation for decades, work on emotion dysregulation—defined as the inability to maintain emotional control, engage with the environment or recover from distress in a developmentally appropriate manner—is rare and there are discrepancies in its conceptualisation among very young samples. While some scientists refer to emotion dysregulation as if it were a discrete concept, it may be more accurately depicted as a multidimensional system of developmental processes. The National Institute of Mental Health's Research Domain Criteria (RDoC) is a framework that allows researchers to track dysfunction across multiple areas of analysis and may be an ideal system for exploring the multidimensional nature of infant emotion dysregulation. In this paper, we draw on empirical studies to describe how the RDoC framework can be used to support studies of emotion dysregulation in infancy. This proposed model can also serve as a roadmap for future researchers to follow to generate the evidence base for a multidimensional conceptualisation of infant emotion dysregulation and its underlying mechanisms.     

Classifying Muslims: Contextualizing Religion and Race in the United Kingdom and Germany

Since the late 20th century, public discourse in Muslim-minority countries has centered around the question of how to classify Muslims. In this paper, we compare the state, academic, and self-classification of Muslims in two countries: the United Kingdom and Germany. We propose that the historical experience of anti-Semitism makes religion a more salient master category to understand Muslims in Germany, while the history of both anti-Semitism and anti-Black racism largely resulting from colonial domination means that religion together with race are master categories used to understand Muslims in the United Kingdom. Through this multilayered ethnographic and historical analysis, we challenge taken-for-granted assumptions in both the political and academic milieu about what it means to be Muslim, emphasizing the importance of the interplay between sociopolitical categories and self-identifications.     

Changes in Multidigit Synergies and Their Feed-Forward Adjustments in Multiple Sclerosis

The authors explored the changes in multidigit synergies in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) within the framework of the uncontrolled manifold hypothesis. The specific hypotheses were that both synergy indices and anticipatory synergy adjustments prior to the initiation of a self-paced quick action would be diminished in the patients compared to age-matched controls. The MS patients and age-matched controls (n = 13 in both groups) performed one-finger and multifinger force production tasks involving both accurate steady-state force production and quick force pulses. The patients showed significantly lower maximal finger forces and a tendency toward slower force pulses. Enslaving was increased in MS, but only in the lateral fingers (index and little). Indices of multifinger synergies during steady-state force production were lower in MS, mainly due to the lower amount of intertrial variance that did not affect total force. Anticipatory synergy adjustments were significantly delayed in MS. The results show that MS leads to significant changes in multidigit synergies and feed-forward adjustments of the synergies prior to a quick action. The authors discuss possible contributions of subcortical structures to the impaired synergic control.     

Why metaphors make good insults: perspectives,presupposition, and pragmatics

Metaphors are powerful communicative tools because they produce ‘framing effects’. These effects are especially palpable when the metaphor is an insult that denigrates the hearer or someone he cares about. In such cases, just comprehending the metaphor produces a kind of ‘complicity’ that cannot easily be undone by denying the speaker’s claim. Several theorists have taken this to show that metaphors are engaged in a different line of work from ordinary communication. Against this, I argue that metaphorical insults are rhetorically powerful because they combine perspectives, presupposition, and pragmatics in the service of speech acts with assertoric force.