The vocabulary spurt predicts the emergence of backward semantic inhibition in 18‐month‐old toddlers

The current study examines the relationship between 18‐month‐old toddlers’ vocabulary size and their ability to inhibit attention to no‐longer relevant information using the backward semantic inhibition paradigm. When adults switch attention from one semantic category to another, the former and no‐longer‐relevant semantic category becomes inhibited, and subsequent attention to an item that belongs to the inhibited semantic category is impaired. Here we demonstrate that 18‐month‐olds can inhibit attention to no‐longer relevant semantic categories, but only if they have a relatively large vocabulary. These findings suggest that an increased number of items (word knowledge) in the toddler lexical‐semantic system during the “vocabulary spurt” at 18‐months may be an important driving force behind the emergence of a semantic inhibitory mechanism. Possessing more words in the mental lexicon likely results in the formation of inhibitory links between words, which allow toddlers to select and deselect words and concepts more efficiently. Our findings highlight the role of vocabulary growth in the development of inhibitory processes in the emerging lexical‐semantic system.     

Inside bilingualism: Language background modulates selective attention to a talker's mouth

Previous findings indicate that bilingual Catalan/Spanish‐learning infants attend more to the highly salient audiovisual redundancy cues normally available in a talker's mouth than do monolingual infants. Presumably, greater attention to such cues renders the challenge of learning two languages easier. Spanish and Catalan are, however, rhythmically and phonologically close languages. This raises the possibility that bilinguals only rely on redundant audiovisual cues when their languages are close. To test this possibility, we exposed 15‐month‐old and 4‐ to 6‐year‐old close‐language bilinguals (Spanish/Catalan) and distant‐language bilinguals (Spanish/”other”) to videos of a talker uttering Spanish or Catalan (native) and English (non‐native) monologues and recorded eye‐gaze to the talker's eyes and mouth. At both ages, the close‐language bilinguals attended more to the talker's mouth than the distant‐language bilinguals. This indicates that language proximity modulates selective attention to a talker's mouth during early childhood and suggests that reliance on the greater salience of audiovisual speech cues depends on the difficulty of the speech‐processing task.     

Linking property crime using offender crime scene behaviour: A comparison of methods

This study compared the ability of seven statistical models to distinguish between linked and unlinked crimes. The seven models utilised geographical, temporal, and modus operandi information relating to residential burglaries (n = 180), commercial robberies, (n = 118), and car thefts (n = 376). Model performance was assessed using receiver operating characteristic analysis and by examining the success with which the seven models could successfully prioritise linked over unlinked crimes. The regression‐based and probabilistic models achieved comparable accuracy and were generally more accurate than the tree‐based models tested in this study. The Logistic algorithm achieved the highest area under the curve (AUC) for residential burglary (AUC = 0.903) and commercial robbery (AUC = 0.830) and the SimpleLogistic algorithm achieving the highest for car theft (AUC = 0.820). The findings also indicated that discrimination accuracy is maximised (in some situations) if behavioural domains are utilised rather than individual crime scene behaviours and that the AUC should not be used as the sole measure of accuracy in behavioural crime linkage research.     

Teaching in contexts: Designing a competency‐based religious studies program

Over the last decade, the discipline of religious studies has promoted religious literacy as both an invaluable contribution to curriculum and an indispensable social good. While much has been written on the importance of the study of religion for the development of religious literacy, little attention has been given to the identification of the disciplinary skills and content knowledge (or what we refer to as religious studies competencies) a student develops through extended study of religion. In this essay, we present an example of how to integrate a religious studies competency‐based model into program design and implementation. We argue that the transition to a competency‐based religious studies program has two potential benefits. First, competency program design provides an opportunity to redesign and update religious studies programs in a more responsible manner that aligns with our students, institution, discipline, and profession. Second, competency program design facilitates the conditions where we can better avoid duplicating the much criticized world religions paradigm.     

Clarity and creativity as womanist ethics for teaching and evaluating theological writing

This article uses womanist ethics and theories of writing instruction to illuminate the experiences of black women seminarians with theological writing at a predominantly white institution. The three cases presented here highlight two ethics for teaching and evaluating theological writing: clarity and creativity. Already triply marginalized by race, sex, and class, black women are often greeted with unwritten norms around academic theological writing that threaten their self‐concept and their development as producers of theological knowledge. This work centers reflections of student‐learning on the voices of black women who found their own ways of negotiating these demands. Their responses to the problems of writing for and in white, male‐dominated theological discourses provide moral strategies that all writers can employ and that all theology professors can make a regular part of their ethical pedagogical practice.     

World religion and fake news: A pedagogical response in an age of post‐truth

This article describes a pedagogical response to teaching world religions courses in a post‐truth age. The course assignment and its application, utilized in both online and in‐person formats, bridge student academic pursuits with religious traditions, require students to engage with source‐based journalism, and extend beyond the classroom into many of the contemporary politics encroaching upon the humanities fields. Related to the first, the objective of the assignment is for students to discover that religiosity permeates multiple sectors, both private and public, corresponding with student career paths. As a result, students discover that religion is relevant to their academic pursuits and that they must consider the possibilities of how religion might integrate with their career choices. Regarding the second objective, the assignment develops student digital media literacy skills as a form of civic education that challenges the current political attacks on journalism and factuality. Last, this exercise acknowledges the realities facing many humanities programs across the country and offers this assignment as a way of engaging with those issues within the classroom. See as well, published in this issue of the journal, three short companion essays by Sarah L. Schwarz, Jonathan R. Herman, and Harshita Mruthinti Kamath, each of which analyzes this pedagogical strategy for their particular teaching contexts.     

语言加工过程中的视听跨通道整合

日常生活中, 语言的使用往往出现在某个视觉情境里。大量认知科学研究表明, 视觉信息与语言信息加工模块并不是独立工作, 而是存在复杂的交互作用。本文以视觉信息对语言加工的影响为主线, 首先对视觉信息影响言语理解, 言语产生以及言语交流的相关研究进展进行了综述。其次, 重点对视觉信息影响语言加工的机制进行了探讨。最后介绍了关于视觉信息影响语言加工的计算模型, 并对未来的研究方向提出了展望。