ADVANCES IN COGNITIVE SCIENCE
Year:2001 | Volume:3 | Issue:1-2|Papers Count:11

Two experiments investigated the false memory effect (the Deese - Roediger - McDermott paradigm) among the Iranian population. In experiment 1, subjects studied list of semantically associated words. In experiment 2 which was an extension of the afore - mentioned paradigm, lists of linedrawings of semantically associated words were presented. In both experiments, a high rate of false recall and false recognition was observed. The findings suggest that a) - the effect is replicable among the Iranian population and b) - it can be generalized to pictorial stimuli. The results are discussed in terms of the network theories.

In this paper, available Studies on the processing of Farsi Language have been reviewed from different perspectives. This could help with the investigators who have similar interests. The paper has also discussed the current obstacles with regards to the semantic ambiguity and finally the Solution for the Farsi Machine translation has been presented.  

Language acquisition takes place through information processing. To understand others, what we do is in fact word recognition in others speech. Therefore, recognition involves finding separate words in Continuous speech and them presenting them to the lexicon present in memory in order to determine the words meaning. To rationalize this process, a few number of paradigms has been presented and many linguists work in this area. the current paper, presents from main theories of word recognition, they one: Cohort, Trace, Shortlist and Metrical Segment strategy. It also helps adults to assess the behaviors of Farsi-Language speaking kids in word recognition. It is also of help to know the effecting factors involved in word recognition.

This paper investigates the types and the nature of lexical entries by making distinction between stress and pitch accents in the framework of auto segmental-metrical phonology (AM). Stress is a lexical property and every lexical item has a stressed syllable. Pitch accent refers to the prominence in speech and only lexically stressed syllables can take a pitch accent. Lexemes and morphemes are units of lexicon, because base forms and affixes take pitch accents equally. It means that affixes also have independent identity in the lexicon. Some affixes do not take pitch accent and this gives them different place in grammar. Phonologically speaking, non-simple words are also lexical items. The results of this research can be used in formalizing Persian morphology for speech processing and other linguistic studies.

Three experiments examined both encoding and test variable whether there is any memory deficit in patients with Parkinson's disease in comparison with normal controls. In Experiment 1, the effect of encoding enactment was tested in free recall and cued recall. In Experiment 2, the combinations of enactment/non enactment and well/poorly integration variables were used at encoding. Again, the subjects were tested by free and cued recall. In Experiment 3, recognition memory and sentence-fragment completion tests were used with the same encoding manipulations as in Experiment 2. In general, the results of all three experiments showed no difference between PD patients and normal controls indicating that there is no memory deficit for PD patients. However, it was observed that there was some recognition deficit (especially for well integrated and verbal items) in Parkins on patients. It was suggested that the similarity between encoding and retrieval and the stage of disease should be considered as important factors for any possible memory deficit in Parkinsonian patients. It was also concluded that Parkinson patients are less well able to utilize cognitive support.

In this Paper, word stress in Persian is investigated within the constraint-based framework of Optimality Theory (Price & Smo1ensky, 1993). Earlier studies show that the default stress pattern assigns stress to the rightmost syllable of a word (ke. 'tAb, ge.' reft); however, in the presence of certain affixes, the stress pattern changes (ke. 'tab-am,' na-gereft, na-raft-' an), implying that stress assignment is not a purely phonological phenomenon (Samei, 1991; Ferguson, 1957). I propose that stressable affixes belong to special morphological classes (aspectual, derivational, etc.), that have a corresponding constraint in the grammar which outranks the conflicting phonological constraints, implying that phonology is not blind to morphology. This study is important to cognitive science because it explores the constraint conflicts between different interfaces of the grammar and the interaction between modules.

The present research aimed at analyzing the nature and structure of the concept of coping in the Iranian culture. For this purpose, preliminary data was collected from a sample of college students (n = 50) through questionnaire and interview procedures. The objective of this phase of the study was to collect information of coping strategies and believers commonly used by Iranians. In a second phase of this study, the latest version of the CRI along with Iranian coping activities was administered to Iranian college students (N=365). Maximum Likelihood Analyses (MLA) and Principal Component Analyses (PCA) were performed on subjects' responses which supported the multidimensionality of the concept of coping in the Iranian context. Confirmatory factor analyses did not replicate the CRI eight-factor solution, with Varimax or Oblique rotations. PCA on responses to the mixed scale yielded seven factors after Varimax rotation, as follows: Factor 1: Religious Coping (alpha=.92), Factor 2: Rational Problem Solving (alpha=.83), Factor 3: Cognitive Avoidance (alpha=.79), Factor 4: Positive Reappraisal (alpha=.77), Factor 5: Seeking Guidance and Support (alpha=.78), Factor 6: Seeking Alternative Rewards (alpha=.61), Factor 7: Acceptance or Resignation (alpha = .61). Although a majority of theoretically based dimensions of coping appeared to be commonly used by Iranian college students, the findings of this study have uncovered different patterns which these dimensions may form in the Iranian setting as well as a new and important dimension of coping not considered in standard coping scales. Overall the results suggest a different conceptualization of the construct of coping for the Iranian context which might have important implications for the use and further development of the CRI, and all other standard coping scales in the Iranian context.