Measured Language: Quantitative Studies of Acquisition, Assessment, and Variation focuses on ways in which various aspects of language can be quantified and how measurement informs and advances our understanding of language. The metaphors and operationalizations of quantification serve as an important lingua franca for seemingly disparate areas of linguistic research, allowing methods and constructs to be translated from one area of linguistic investigation to another.
Measured Language includes forms of measurement and quantitative analysis current in diverse areas of linguistic research from language assessment to language change, from generative linguistics to experimental psycholinguistics, and from longitudinal studies to classroom research. Contributors demonstrate how to operationalize a construct, develop a reliable way to measure it, and finally validate that measurement—and share the relevance of their perspectives and findings to other areas of linguistic inquiry. The range and clarity of the research collected here ensures that even linguists who would not traditionally use quantitative methods will find this volume useful.
Table of Contents
Introduction
Jeff Connor-Linton and Luke Wander Amoroso
1. The Ubiquitous Oral versus Literate Dimension: A Survey of Multidimensional Studies
Douglas Biber
2. When Ethnicity Isn’t Just About Ethnicity
Penelope Eckert
3. Does Language Zipf Right Along? Investigating Robustness in the Latent Structures of Usage and Acquisition
Nick C. Ellis, Matthew Brook O’Donnell, and Ute Römer
4. Subjectivity and Efficiency in Language Assessment: Explorations of a Compensatory Rating Approach
Steven J. Ross
5. Subgrouping in Nusa Tenggara: The Case of Bima-Sumba
Emily Gasser
6. Young Learners’ Storytelling in Their First and Foreign Languages
Yuko Goto Butler and Wei Zeng
7. Measuring Quechua to Spanish Cross-Linguistic Influence
Marilyn S. Manley
8. Speedup versus Automatization: What Role Does Learner Proficiency Play?
Jessica G. Cox and Anne M. Calderón
9. Frequency Effects, Learning Conditions, and the Development of Implicit and Explicit Lexical Knowledge
Phillip Hamrick and Patrick Rebuschat
10. The Differential Role of Language Analytic Ability in Two Distinct Learning Conditions Nadia M. Profozic
11. U-shaped Development: Definition, Exploration, and Falsifiable Hypotheses
Hiroyuki Oshita
12. Using Simulated Speech to Assess Japanese Learner Oral Proficiency
Hitokazu Matsushita and Deryle Lonsdale
13. Keys to College: Tracking English Language Proficiency and IELTS Test Scores in an International Undergraduate Conditional Admission Program in the United States
Reese M. Heitner, Barbara J. Hoekje, and Patrick L. Braciszewski
14. How Does Foreign Language Proficiency Change Over Time? Results of Data Mining Official Test Records
Amber Bloomfield, Steven Ross, Megan Masters, Kassandra Gynther, and Stephen O’Connell
15. The Development of Complexity in a Learner Corpus of German
Colleen Neary-Sundquist
Index
Reviews
"Georgetown Roundtables have always been notable for their richness of variety, and this volume is no exception. At the same time, a strong and persistent theme runs through this book: The irreducible centrality of quantification to understanding language, its learning, and use. Even for—perhaps especially for—the diehard qualitativist, this volume represents a signal reminder that quantification produces knowledge that cannot be ignored if language's vast complexity is to be understood."—Dwight Atkinson, associate professor, Purdue University
"In this volume, Connor-Linton and Amoroso bring together a fascinating collection of papers that cover broad linguistic territory but are united by the central role played by quantitative evidence. This refreshing perspective gives readers the opportunity to dip into research on language acquisition, foreign language learning, variation, and many other areas, and observe quantitative analysis in action. Whether you use such methods in your own work, or are a consumer of the research of others, you will find this collection interesting and enlightening."—Donna Christian, Senior Fellow, Center for Applied Linguistics
Contributors
Luke Wander Amoroso Douglas Biber Amber Bloomfield Patrick L. Braciszewski Yuko Goto Butler Anne M. Calderón Jeff Connor-Linton Jessica G. Cox Penelope Eckert Nick C. Ellis Emily Gasser Kassandra Gynther Phillip Hamrick Reese M. Heitner Barbara J. Hoekje Deryle Lonsdale Marilyn S. Manley Megan Masters Hitokazu Matsushita Colleen Neary-Sundquist Stephen O’Connell Matthew Brook O’Donnell Hiroyuki Oshita Nadia M. Profozic Patrick Rebuschat Ute Römer Steven J. Ross Wei Zeng
About the Author
Jeffrey Connor-Linton is associate professor of Linguistics at Georgetown University and past president of the American Association for Applied Linguistics.
Luke Wander Amoroso is a doctoral student in Georgetown's Linguistics program as well as a measurement/language testing expert with the US government and private companies.
