Award Abstract # 0715500
Psycholinguistic Investigation of Lexical Access in Hebrew and Maltese

NSF Org: BCS
Division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences
Recipient: UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA
Initial Amendment Date: August 17, 2007
Latest Amendment Date: June 7, 2012
Award Number: 0715500
Award Instrument: Continuing Grant
Program Manager: Joan Maling
BCS
 Division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences
SBE
 Directorate for Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences
Start Date: September 15, 2007
End Date: August 31, 2013 (Estimated)
Total Intended Award Amount: $166,763.00
Total Awarded Amount to Date: $168,376.00
Funds Obligated to Date: FY 2007 = $45,601.00
FY 2008 = $63,105.00

FY 2009 = $59,670.00
History of Investigator:
  • Adam Ussishkin (Principal Investigator)
    adam.ussishkin@gmail.com
Recipient Sponsored Research Office: University of Arizona
845 N PARK AVE RM 538
TUCSON
AZ  US  85721
(520)626-6000
Sponsor Congressional District: 07
Primary Place of Performance: University of Arizona
845 N PARK AVE RM 538
TUCSON
AZ  US  85721
Primary Place of Performance
Congressional District:
07
Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): ED44Y3W6P7B9
Parent UEI:
NSF Program(s): Linguistics,
International Research Collab
Primary Program Source: 0100999999 NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT
01000809DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT

01000910DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT
Program Reference Code(s): 0000, 5905, 5914, 5976, 5979, 7298, OTHR
Program Element Code(s): 131100, 729800
Award Agency Code: 4900
Fund Agency Code: 4900
Assistance Listing Number(s): 47.075

ABSTRACT

Languages belonging to the Semitic sub-family of the Afro-Asiatic language family are known for their very unusual characteristics. Most famous among these is the discontiguous nature of the elements that make up related words in these languages. For instance, the Hebrew words gadal 'he grew', gadol 'big', higdila 'she enlarged' and migdal 'tower' all share a meaning connected to size, yet it is impossible to isolate a contiguous string of sounds shared by these words. Instead, the words share the three root consonants 'gdl', which never occur by themselves in isolation. A long-standing question about word structure in this type of language concerns the possible ways in which native speakers of Hebrew and other Semitic languages store these words in their mind. One theory hypothesizes that the unit 'gdl' is stored, while another theory hypothesizes that the actual words themselves are stored. This project will investigate which of these theories is more likely to be correct by studying two Semitic languages, Hebrew and Maltese. Databases for each language will be created in order to properly document and compute words in these languages, along with their relevant properties. Psycholinguistic experiments will then be carried out in order to probe how speakers of these languages store words.

The database component of the research project will be of great use to other researchers in a variety of fields. Additionally, the research will encourage cross-disciplinary research on these languages, and promote the visibility of Maltese, which is an under-documented language. The research has potential consequences for language pedagogy, because it will lead to new knowledge about the mental retrieval of words in Hebrew and Maltese.

This project is co-funded by the Office of International Science and Engineering.

Please report errors in award information by writing to: awardsearch@nsf.gov.

Print this page

Back to Top of page