Local similarity and global variability characterize the semantic space of human languages.

How does meaning vary across the world's languages? Scholars recognize the existence of substantial variability within specific domains, ranging from nature and color to kinship. The emergence of large language models enables a systems-level approach that directly characterizes this variability through comparison of word organization across semantic domains. Here, we show that meanings across languages manifest lower variability within semantic domains and greater variability between them, using models trained on both 1) large corpora of native language text comprising Wikipedia articles in 35 languages and also 2) Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) essays written by 38,500 speakers from the same native languages, which cluster into semantic domains. Concrete meanings vary less across languages than abstract meanings, but all vary with geographical, environmental, and cultural distance. By simultaneously examining local similarity and global difference, we harmonize these findings and provide a description of general principles that govern variability in semantic space across languages. In this way, the structure of a speaker's semantic space influences the comparisons cognitively salient to them, as shaped by their native language, and suggests that even successful bilingual communicators likely think with "semantic accents" driven by associations from their native language while writing English. These findings have dramatic implications for language education, cross-cultural communication, and literal translations, which are impossible not because the objects of reference are uncertain, but because associations, metaphors, and narratives interlink meanings in different, predictable ways from one language to another.

Peekbank: An open, large-scale repository for developmental eye-tracking data of children's word recognition.

The ability to rapidly recognize words and link them to referents is central to children's early language development. This ability, often called word recognition in the developmental literature, is typically studied in the looking-while-listening paradigm, which measures infants' fixation on a target object (vs. a distractor) after hearing a target label. We present a large-scale, open database of infant and toddler eye-tracking data from looking-while-listening tasks. The goal of this effort is to address theoretical and methodological challenges in measuring vocabulary development. We first present how we created the database, its features and structure, and associated tools for processing and accessing infant eye-tracking datasets. Using these tools, we then work through two illustrative examples to show how researchers can use Peekbank to interrogate theoretical and methodological questions about children's developing word recognition ability.

What Might Books Be Teaching Young Children About Gender?

We investigated how gender is represented in children's books using a novel 200,000-word corpus comprising 247 popular, contemporary books for young children. Using adult human judgments and word co-occurrence data, we quantified gender biases of words in individual books and in the whole corpus. We found that children's books contain many words that adults judge as gendered. Semantic analyses based on co-occurrence data yielded word clusters related to gender stereotypes (e.g., feminine: emotions; masculine: tools). Co-occurrence data also indicated that many books instantiate gender stereotypes identified in other research (e.g., girls are better at reading, and boys are better at math). Finally, we used large-scale data to estimate the gender distribution of the audience for individual books, and we found that children are more often exposed to stereotypes for their own gender. Together, the data suggest that children's books may be an early source of gender associations and stereotypes.

Quantifying the syntactic bootstrapping effect in verb learning: A meta-analytic synthesis.

How do children infer the meaning of a novel verb? One prominent proposal is that children rely on syntactic information in the linguistic context, a phenomenon known as "syntactic bootstrapping". For example, given the sentence "The bunny is gorping the duck," a child could use knowledge of English syntactic roles to infer that "gorping" refers to an action where the bunny is acting in some way on a duck. Here, we examine the strength of the syntactic bootstrapping effect, its developmental trajectory and generalizability using meta-analytic methods. Across 60 experiments in the literature (N = 849 participants), we find a reliable syntactic bootstrapping effect (d = 0.24). Yet, despite its theoretical prominence, the syntactic bootstrapping effect is relatively small, comparable in size to cross-situational learning and sound symbolism, but smaller than mutual-exclusivity and gaze-following. Further, we find that the effect does not strengthen over development, and is present only for studies that use transitive sentences. An examination of a range of methodological factors suggests that the effect is not strongly influenced by methodological implementation. In the General Discussion, we consider implications of our findings for theories of verb learning and make recommendations for future research.

Still Suspicious: The Suspicious-Coincidence Effect Revisited.

Imagine hearing someone call a particular dalmatian a "dax." The meaning of the novel noun dax is ambiguous between the subordinate meaning (dalmatian) and the basic-level meaning (dog). Yet both children and adults successfully learn noun meanings at the intended level of abstraction from similar evidence. Xu and Tenenbaum (2007a) provided an explanation for this apparent puzzle: Learners assume that examples are sampled from the true underlying category (strong sampling), making cases in which there are more observed exemplars more consistent with a subordinate meaning than cases in which there are fewer exemplars (the suspicious-coincidence effect). Authors of more recent work (Spencer, Perone, Smith, & Samuelson, 2011) have questioned the relevance of this finding, however, arguing that the effect occurs only when the examples are presented to the learner simultaneously. Across a series of 12 experiments ( N = 600), we systematically manipulated several experimental parameters that varied across previous studies, and we successfully replicated the findings of both sets of authors. Taken together, our data suggest that the suspicious-coincidence effect in fact is robust to presentation timing of examples but is sensitive to another factor that varied in the Spencer et al. (2011) experiments, namely, trial order. Our work highlights the influence of pragmatics on behavior in experimental tasks.

Promoting Replicability in Developmental Research Through Meta-analyses: Insights From Language Acquisition Research.

Previous work suggests that key factors for replicability, a necessary feature for theory building, include statistical power and appropriate research planning. These factors are examined by analyzing a collection of 12 standardized meta-analyses on language development between birth and 5 years. With a median effect size of Cohen's d = .45 and typical sample size of 18 participants, most research is underpowered (range = 6%-99%; median = 44%); and calculating power based on seminal publications is not a suitable strategy. Method choice can be improved, as shown in analyses on exclusion rates and effect size as a function of method. The article ends with a discussion on how to increase replicability in both language acquisition studies specifically and developmental research more generally.

Linguistic structure emerges through the interaction of memory constraints and communicative pressures.

If memory constraints were the only limitation on language processing, the best possible language would be one with only one word. But to explain the rich structure of language, we need to posit a second constraint: the pressure to communicate informatively. Many aspects of linguistic structure can be accounted for by appealing to equilibria that result from these two pressures.

Evidence for Infant-directed Speech Preference Is Consistent Across Large-scale, Multi-site Replication and Meta-analysis.

There is substantial evidence that infants prefer infant-directed speech (IDS) to adult-directed speech (ADS). The strongest evidence for this claim has come from two large-scale investigations: i) a community-augmented meta-analysis of published behavioral studies and ii) a large-scale multi-lab replication study. In this paper, we aim to improve our understanding of the IDS preference and its boundary conditions by combining and comparing these two data sources across key population and design characteristics of the underlying studies. Our analyses reveal that both the meta-analysis and multi-lab replication show moderate effect sizes (d ≈ 0.35 for each estimate) and that both of these effects persist when relevant study-level moderators are added to the models (i.e., experimental methods, infant ages, and native languages). However, while the overall effect size estimates were similar, the two sources diverged in the effects of key moderators: both infant age and experimental method predicted IDS preference in the multi-lab replication study, but showed no effect in the meta-analysis. These results demonstrate that the IDS preference generalizes across a variety of experimental conditions and sampling characteristics, while simultaneously identifying key differences in the empirical picture offered by each source individually and pinpointing areas where substantial uncertainty remains about the influence of theoretically central moderators on IDS preference. Overall, our results show how meta-analyses and multi-lab replications can be used in tandem to understand the robustness and generalizability of developmental phenomena.

The puzzling relationship between multi-laboratory replications and meta-analyses of the published literature.

What is the best way to estimate the size of important effects? Should we aggregate across disparate findings using statistical meta-analysis, or instead run large, multi-laboratory replications (MLR)? A recent paper by Kvarven, Strømland and Johannesson (Kvarven et al. 2020 Nat. Hum. Behav. 4, 423-434. (doi:10.1038/s41562-019-0787-z)) compared effect size estimates derived from these two different methods for 15 different psychological phenomena. The authors reported that, for the same phenomenon, the meta-analytic estimate tended to be about three times larger than the MLR estimate. These results are a specific example of a broader question: What is the relationship between meta-analysis and MLR estimates? Kvarven et al. suggested that their results undermine the value of meta-analysis. By contrast, we argue that both meta-analysis and MLR are informative, and that the discrepancy between the two estimates that they observed is in fact still largely unexplained. Informed by re-analyses of Kvarven et al.'s data and by other empirical evidence, we discuss possible sources of this discrepancy and argue that understanding the relationship between estimates obtained from these two methods is an important puzzle for future meta-scientific research.

Gender stereotypes are reflected in the distributional structure of 25 languages.

Cultural stereotypes such as the idea that men are more suited for paid work and women are more suited for taking care of the home and family, may contribute to gender imbalances in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields, among other undesirable gender disparities. Might these stereotypes be learned from language? Here we examine whether gender stereotypes are reflected in the large-scale distributional structure of natural language semantics. We measure gender associations embedded in the statistics of 25 languages and relate these to data on an international dataset of psychological gender associations (N = 656,636). People's implicit gender associations are strongly predicted by gender associations encoded in the statistics of the language they speak. These associations are further related to the extent that languages mark gender in occupation terms (for example, 'waiter'/'waitress'). Our pattern of findings is consistent with the possibility that linguistic associations shape people's implicit judgements.

Shaping semantic networks with transcranial direct current stimulation.

Images depict specific objects (e.g., a specific dog), yet are named with categorical labels (e.g., "dog"). We examined how semantic representations activated by images may be influenced by implicit labelling. Participants saw images of familiar objects and generated words associated with each image while undergoing transcranial direct current stimulation over the posterior superior temporal gyrus. Additional participants judged how representative generated associates were of the picture category and guessed the category based on the associates. Anodal stimulation was predicted to up-regulate labelling and thereby increase the extent to which participants produced associate that were more representative of the pictured category. Associates generated by anodally stimulated subjects were found to be more representative and enabled more accurate guessing of the category from which they were generated. The general pattern of results was replicated in a follow-up study using words rather than picture cues. Together these results suggest labelling may help stabilise semantic representations, leading to more robust representation of category-relevant information.

Modified Langenskiöld procedure for chronic, recurrent, and congenital patellar dislocation.

PURPOSE: Langenskiöld described a reconstructive soft-tissue procedure for irreducible lateral congenital patellar dislocations. Paley further detailed the technique in the surgical management of congenital femoral deficiency. The aim of this study was to evaluate the outcomes of patients with congenital, chronic and recurrent patellar dislocations treated with the modified Langenskiöld procedure. METHODS: This is a retrospective case series. Between 2011 and 2018, 18 knees in 13 patients (mean age 15.8 years (sd 4.4; 12 to 29.9), nine female) with diagnoses of recurrent (six patients, eight knees), chronic (four patients, six knees) and congenital (three patients, four knees) patellar dislocations were treated with the modified Langenskiöld procedure. RESULTS: There were no recurrent lateral dislocations in the congenital or recurrent groups. One of the patients in the congenital group had an overcorrection with some medial patellar maltracking but until this time has not required any further surgery. In the chronic group two of the six knees developed further dislocations; these were both on the same patient, who had no dislocations until one year after surgery. Mean Kujala score was 83.7 (sd 17; 47 to 100) for all groups. In spite of preoperative knee flexion contractures of up to 30° in three patients (six knees), all patients had full extension postoperatively. Eight patients reported being satisfied with their outcome, one was somewhat satisfied, two were very dissatisfied, and two did not respond. CONCLUSION: The modified Langenskiöld reconstruction provides a powerful correction for challenging cases of congenital and recurrent patellar dislocations. Re-dislocation as well as overcorrection can occasionally occur. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Level IV.

The role of developmental change and linguistic experience in the mutual exclusivity effect.

Given a novel word and a familiar and a novel referent, children have a bias to assume the novel word refers to the novel referent. This bias - often referred to as "Mutual Exclusivity" (ME) - is thought to be a potentially powerful route through which children might learn new word meanings, and, consequently, has been the focus of a large amount of empirical study and theorizing. Here, we focus on two aspects of the bias that have received relatively little attention in the literature: Development and experience. A successful theory of ME will need to provide an account for why the strength of the effect changes with the age of the child. We provide a quantitative description of the change in the strength of the bias across development, and investigate the role that linguistic experience plays in this developmental change. We first summarize the current body of empirical findings via a meta-analysis, and then present two experiments that examine the relationship between a child's amount of linguistic experience and the strength of the ME bias. We conclude that the strength of the bias varies dramatically across development and that linguistic experience is likely one causal factor contributing to this change. In the General Discussion, we describe how existing theories of ME can account for our findings, and highlight the value of computational modeling for future theorizing.

A Novel Treatment for a Rare Injury: Pediatric Massive Intrasubstance Rotator Cuff and Periscapular Muscle Tears Treated with a Custom Brace: A Case Report.

CASE: A 9-year-old boy sustained intrasubstance tears of the rotator cuff and periscapular muscles due to a fall, resulting in scapular winging and severely decreased shoulder range of motion. Treatment consisted of a modified thoracolumbosacral orthosis (TLSO) with a shoulder immobilizer attachment (to reduce the scapula to the thoracic wall and hold the arm in 10° of abduction). The brace was worn for 8 weeks. The patient recovered full, pain-free shoulder function and range of motion, and returned to high-level athletics. CONCLUSION: Pediatric massive intrasubstance rotator cuff and periscapular muscle tears can be treated nonoperatively with use of a modified TLSO.

The length of words reflects their conceptual complexity.

Are the forms of words systematically related to their meaning? The arbitrariness of the sign has long been a foundational part of our understanding of human language. Theories of communication predict a relationship between length and meaning, however: Longer descriptions should be more conceptually complex. Here we show that both the lexicons of human languages and individual speakers encode the relationship between linguistic and conceptual complexity. Experimentally, participants mapped longer words to more complex objects in comprehension and production tasks and across a range of stimuli. Explicit judgments of conceptual complexity were also highly correlated with implicit measures of study time in a memory task, suggesting that complexity is directly related to basic cognitive processes. Observationally, judgments of conceptual complexity for a sample of real words correlate highly with their length across 80 languages, even controlling for frequency, familiarity, imageability, and concreteness. While word lengths are systematically related to usage-both frequency and contextual predictability-our results reveal a systematic relationship with meaning as well. They point to a general regularity in the design of lexicons and suggest that pragmatic pressures may influence the structure of the lexicon.

Understanding the effect of social context on learning: A replication of Xu and Tenenbaum (2007b).

Does the source of a piece of data-the process by which it is sampled-influence the inferences that we draw from it? Xu and Tenenbaum (2007b) reported a large effect of sampling process on learning: When a category exemplar was presented by a knowledgeable teacher, learners generalized more narrowly than when it was presented from an unknowledgeable source. In 5 experiments, 4 online and 1 in-person, we attempted to replicate this result. Aggregating across our studies, we replicated the original finding of sensitivity to the sampling process, but with a smaller effect size than the original. We discuss these findings in the context of concerns about replicability more generally, as well as the practical relevance of sampling effects in psychological experiments. (PsycINFO Database Record