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Journal of Biomedical Semantics Jun 2023The Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable(FAIR) Principles explicitly require the use of FAIR vocabularies, but what precisely constitutes a FAIR vocabulary...
BACKGROUND
The Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable(FAIR) Principles explicitly require the use of FAIR vocabularies, but what precisely constitutes a FAIR vocabulary remains unclear. Being able to define FAIR vocabularies, identify features of FAIR vocabularies, and provide assessment approaches against the features can guide the development of vocabularies.
RESULTS
We differentiate data, data resources and vocabularies used for FAIR, examine the application of the FAIR Principles to vocabularies, align their requirements with the Open Biomedical Ontologies principles, and propose FAIR Vocabulary Features. We also design assessment approaches for FAIR vocabularies by mapping the FVFs with existing FAIR assessment indicators. Finally, we demonstrate how they can be used for evaluating and improving vocabularies using exemplary biomedical vocabularies.
CONCLUSIONS
Our work proposes features of FAIR vocabularies and corresponding indicators for assessing the FAIR levels of different types of vocabularies, identifies use cases for vocabulary engineers, and guides the evolution of vocabularies.
Topics: Vocabulary, Controlled; Vocabulary; Biological Ontologies
PubMed: 37264430
DOI: 10.1186/s13326-023-00286-8 -
Database : the Journal of Biological... Jan 2018Tripal community database construction toolkit utilizing the content management system Drupal. Tripal is used to make biological, genetic and genomic data more...
Tripal community database construction toolkit utilizing the content management system Drupal. Tripal is used to make biological, genetic and genomic data more discoverable, shareable, searchable and standardized. As funding for community-level genomics databases declines, Tripal's open-source codebase provides a means for sites to be built and maintained with a minimal investment in staff and new development. Tripal is ultimately as strong as the community of sites and developers that use it. We present a set of developer tools that will make building and maintaining Tripal 3 sites easier for new and returning users. These tools break down barriers to entry such as setting up developer and testing environments, acquiring and loading test datasets, working with controlled vocabulary terms and writing new Drupal classes.
Topics: Databases, Genetic; Humans; Software; Vocabulary
PubMed: 30295719
DOI: 10.1093/database/bay099 -
The British Journal of Sociology Mar 2021This paper examines the relationship between parents' and children's language skills for a nationally representative birth cohort born in the United Kingdom-the...
This paper examines the relationship between parents' and children's language skills for a nationally representative birth cohort born in the United Kingdom-the Millennium Cohort Study (MCS). We investigate both socioeconomic and ethnic differentials in children's vocabulary scores and the role of differences in parents' vocabulary scores in accounting for these. We find large vocabulary gaps between highly educated and less educated parents, and between ethnic groups. Nevertheless, socioeconomic and ethnic gaps in vocabulary scores are far wider among the parents than among their children. Parental vocabulary is a powerful mediator of inequalities in offspring's vocabulary scores at age 14, and also a powerful driver of change in language skills between the ages of five and 14. Once we account for parental vocabulary, no ethnic minority group of young people has a negative "vocabulary gap" compared to whites.
Topics: Adolescent; Cohort Studies; Humans; Language; Parent-Child Relations; Parents; Vocabulary
PubMed: 33595850
DOI: 10.1111/1468-4446.12780 -
Journal of Speech, Language, and... Dec 2021This study investigated within-language and between-language associations between phonological memory, vocabulary, and grammar in French-English ( = 43) and...
PURPOSE
This study investigated within-language and between-language associations between phonological memory, vocabulary, and grammar in French-English ( = 43) and Spanish-English ( = 25) bilingual children at 30, 36, and 48 months. It was predicted that phonological memory would display both within-language and between-language relations to language development and that these relations would be stronger at the youngest age.
METHOD
Bilingual children participated in free-play sessions in both of their languages at each age, from which vocabulary and grammatical information (number of different words and mean length of utterance) was extracted. Vocabulary information was also obtained from parent inventories completed when the children were 30 months and a standardized receptive vocabulary test administered at 36 and 48 months. The children were also administered nonword repetition tests in both of their languages at each age.
RESULTS
Mixed logistic regression indicated that phonological memory was associated with vocabulary and grammar within the same language and phonological memory in the other language. In two of the four statistical models, phonological memory exhibited positive between-language relations, and in one model, it exhibited negative between-language relations to language development. Results also indicated that within-language and between-languages effects remained constant, or between-language associations decreased during the age range studied.
CONCLUSION
Overall, the findings provide some support for cross-language associations between phonological memory and lexical and grammatical skills.
Topics: Child; Child Language; Humans; Language Development; Language Tests; Linguistics; Multilingualism; Vocabulary
PubMed: 34731575
DOI: 10.1044/2021_JSLHR-21-00176 -
Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews Jun 2017Sleep plays a role in strengthening new words and integrating them with existing vocabulary knowledge, consistent with neural models of learning in which sleep supports... (Meta-Analysis)
Meta-Analysis Review
Sleep plays a role in strengthening new words and integrating them with existing vocabulary knowledge, consistent with neural models of learning in which sleep supports hippocampal transfer to neocortical memory. Such models are based on adult research, yet neural maturation may mean that the mechanisms supporting word learning vary across development. Here, we propose a model in which children may capitalise on larger amounts of slow-wave sleep to support a greater demand on learning and neural reorganisation, whereas adults may benefit from a richer knowledge base to support consolidation. Such an argument is reinforced by the well-reported "Matthew effect", whereby rich vocabulary knowledge is associated with better acquisition of new vocabulary. We present a meta-analysis that supports this association between children's existing vocabulary knowledge and their integration of new words overnight. Whilst multiple mechanisms likely contribute to vocabulary consolidation and neural reorganisation across the lifespan, we propose that contributions of existing knowledge should be rigorously examined in developmental studies. Such research has potential to greatly enhance neural models of learning.
Topics: Humans; Knowledge; Learning; Memory; Sleep; Vocabulary
PubMed: 28274725
DOI: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2017.01.054 -
PloS One 2023Glosses provide an effective way of fostering second language (L2) vocabulary acquisition. Expanding on previous research, we explored how a vocabulary test announcement...
Glosses provide an effective way of fostering second language (L2) vocabulary acquisition. Expanding on previous research, we explored how a vocabulary test announcement prior to reading a glossed text influences the reading behaviors and subsequent vocabulary acquisition of L2 learners. The participants of this study comprised 65 Korean undergraduate students. The participants were assigned to either a vocabulary test announcement (TA) or a no test announcement (NTA) group. Thereafter, the researchers read to the participants a short story containing 16 glossed words displayed in the bottom margin. The students' responses to the reading comprehension test and a battery of vocabulary tests (i.e., form recall, meaning recall, and meaning recognition) were captured immediately and one week after the assessments. The results showed that while processing in-text target words and marginal glosses, no variation in eye-tracking measures (e.g., gaze duration and total reading time) was observed among the TA and NTA groups. In contrast, the TA group spent significantly longer time fixating on bottom-margin target words than the NTA group during eye-tracking measures. Regardless of the testing phase, the vocabulary test results showed that only the form recall scores in the TA group were significantly higher than the NTA group. However, the differences in meaning recall and recognition scores were not significant. Collectively, these results suggest that vocabulary test announcements likely enhance the favorable effects of glossed text, particularly through promoting visual word form acquisition. However, the effects do not strengthen form-meaning associations without compromising L2 learners' reading comprehension.
Topics: Humans; Vocabulary; Language Tests; Eye-Tracking Technology; Language; Mental Recall; Comprehension
PubMed: 36656841
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0280552 -
PloS One 2021There are increasing applications of natural language processing techniques for information retrieval, indexing, topic modelling and text classification in engineering...
There are increasing applications of natural language processing techniques for information retrieval, indexing, topic modelling and text classification in engineering contexts. A standard component of such tasks is the removal of stopwords, which are uninformative components of the data. While researchers use readily available stopwords lists that are derived from non-technical resources, the technical jargon of engineering fields contains their own highly frequent and uninformative words and there exists no standard stopwords list for technical language processing applications. Here we address this gap by rigorously identifying generic, insignificant, uninformative stopwords in engineering texts beyond the stopwords in general texts, based on the synthesis of alternative statistical measures such as term frequency, inverse document frequency, and entropy, and curating a stopwords dataset ready for technical language processing applications.
Topics: Humans; Natural Language Processing; Semantics; Task Performance and Analysis; Vocabulary
PubMed: 34351911
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0254937 -
Journal of Speech, Language, and... Sep 2023This study explored approaches for measuring vocabulary among bilingual children with varying levels of proficiency in Spanish and English.
PURPOSE
This study explored approaches for measuring vocabulary among bilingual children with varying levels of proficiency in Spanish and English.
METHOD
One hundred fifteen kindergarten and first-grade Spanish-English-speaking children completed measures of vocabulary and sentence repetition in Spanish and English. Scores were derived from their responses to the vocabulary measure: Spanish-only vocabulary, English-only vocabulary, conceptual vocabulary, and total vocabulary. Best language sentence repetition was also obtained. Using both visualization of data and statistical analysis, we tested for potential associations between children's relative language skills in Spanish and English and the scores they received on each of the vocabulary metrics.
RESULTS
Participants' single-language vocabulary scores were linearly associated with their relative language scores. Higher relative Spanish language skills corresponded with higher Spanish-only vocabulary scores, and higher English language skills corresponded with higher English-only vocabulary scores. A quadratic association between children's relative language and their conceptual vocabulary scores was observed. Children with more balanced skills in Spanish and English received lower scores for conceptual vocabulary. No association between total vocabulary and relative language was observed.
CONCLUSIONS
Results revealed evidence of differential test bias for single-language vocabulary scores and conceptual vocabulary scores. Spanish-only vocabulary underestimated knowledge of participants with higher English proficiency, whereas English-only vocabulary underestimated knowledge of participants with higher Spanish proficiency. Conceptual scoring yielded lower values for participants with relatively balanced proficiency in Spanish and English. There is need for further consideration of score and test functioning across the full continuum of bilinguals with dynamic proficiencies in each of their languages.
SUPPLEMENTAL MATERIAL
https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.23796330.
Topics: Child; Humans; Vocabulary; Multilingualism; Hispanic or Latino; Language Tests; Language
PubMed: 37541317
DOI: 10.1044/2023_JSLHR-22-00573 -
Journal of Speech, Language, and... Mar 2022The purpose of this study was to use an established model of working memory in children to predict an established model of word learning to determine whether working...
PURPOSE
The purpose of this study was to use an established model of working memory in children to predict an established model of word learning to determine whether working memory explained word learning variance over and above the contributions of expressive vocabulary and nonverbal IQ.
METHOD
One hundred sixty-seven English-speaking second graders (7- to 8-year-olds) with typical development from two states participated. They completed a comprehensive battery of working memory assessments and six word learning tasks that assessed the creation, storage, retrieval, and production of phonological and semantic representations of novel nouns and verbs and the ability to link those representations.
RESULTS
A structural equation model with expressive vocabulary, nonverbal IQ, and three working memory factors predicting two word learning factors fit the data well. When working memory factors were entered as predictors after expressive vocabulary and nonverbal IQ, they explained 45% of the variance in the phonological word learning factor and 17% of the variance in the semantic word learning factor. Thus, working memory explained a significant amount of word learning variance over and above expressive vocabulary and nonverbal IQ.
CONCLUSION
Results show that working memory is a significant predictor of dynamic word learning over and above the contributions of expressive vocabulary and nonverbal IQ, suggesting that a comprehensive working memory assessment has the potential to identify sources of word learning difficulties and to tailor word learning interventions to a child's working memory strengths and weaknesses.
SUPPLEMENTAL MATERIAL
https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.19125911.
Topics: Child; Humans; Memory, Short-Term; Phonetics; Semantics; Verbal Learning; Vocabulary
PubMed: 35148490
DOI: 10.1044/2021_JSLHR-21-00397 -
Infancy : the Official Journal of the... Jul 2022Although prior research has independently linked vocabulary development with toddlers' media usage, parental mental state talk (MST), and parent-child conversational...
Although prior research has independently linked vocabulary development with toddlers' media usage, parental mental state talk (MST), and parent-child conversational turn-taking (CTT), these variables have not been investigated within the same study. In this study, we focus on associations between these variables and 2-year-old's (N = 87) vocabulary. Child vocabulary and digital media use were measured through online questionnaires. We took a multimethod approach to measure parents' child-directed talk. First, we used a home sound environment recording (Language ENvironment Analysis technology) to estimate parents' talk (CTT). Second, parents narrated a picture book, the Frog story, to assess the parent's MST. There was a negative association between how much children watched video content and their vocabulary. However, parents reported that they frequently co-viewed and engaged with the child and media. The negative association first displayed between the amount of video content viewed and the child's developing vocabulary was fully mediated by the parents' qualitative and quantitative talk as measured by MST and CCT, respectively. We propose that the parent relative level of MST and CTT also occurs when parents engage with the child during media use.
Topics: Humans; Internet; Language Development; Parent-Child Relations; Parents; Vocabulary
PubMed: 35526265
DOI: 10.1111/infa.12476