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Individual differences in language skills
Individuals differ greatly in their ability to use language. While language users readily accept this fact, psycholinguistics has only recently begun to systematically examine this variability.
To contribute to this growing field of research and to move beyond some of its limitations, a research team at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, spear-headed by Antje Meyer, James McQueen and Florian Hintz, developed an extensive battery of behavioral tests measuring (1) linguistic experience, (2) general cognitive skills implicated in language processing, and (3) linguistic processing skills for younger adult speakers of Dutch. The Individual Differences in Language Skills (IDLaS-NL) test battery has been validated in a large number of individuals and is available to the research community.
To facilitate work on individual differences in other languages, Sandra Bethke, Antje Meyer and Florian Hintz are currently developing a German version of the test battery (IDLaS-DE). As its Dutch sibling, the German battery features tests falling into the broader categories (1)-(3). In five pilot studies run with samples of around 80 participants each, the overall structure of the German test battery has been finalized and will be validated as a whole with a sample of approximately 170 participants. Following successful validation, we will use advanced statistical modelling techniques to compare the German and Dutch data.
Sandra Bethke is a PhD student in the Psychology of Language Department at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, supervised by Antje Meyer and Florian Hintz. Further information can be found on her website.
Publications
Bethke, S., Meyer, A.S., & Hintz, F. (in revision) German Auditory and Image (GAudI) Vocabulary Test. PLoS One. [Preprint]
Hintz, F., Shkaravska, O., Dijkhuis, M., van ‘t Hoff, V., Huijsmans, M., van Dongen, R.C.A., Voeteé, L.A.B., Trilsbeek, P., McQueen, J.M., & Meyer, A.S. (2024). IDLaS-NL – A platform for running customized studies on individual differences in Dutch language skills via the internet. Behavior Research Methods, 56(3), 2422-2436.
Hintz, F., McQueen, J. M., & Meyer, A. S. (2024). Using Psychometric Network Analysis to Examine the Components of Spoken Word Recognition. Journal of Cognition, 7(1): 10, 1–22.
Hintz, F., Voeten, C.C., Dobó, D., Lukics, K.S., & Lukács, A. (2024). The role of general cognitive skills in integrating visual and linguistic information during sentence comprehension: Individual differences across the lifespan. Scientific Reports, 14(1), 17797.
Hintz, F. & Momenian, M. (in revision). Domain-general processing speed is involved in structural assembly but not lexical access during spoken language production. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review.
Hintz, F., Dijkhuis, M., van ’t Hoff, V., Huijsmans, M., Kievit, R.A., McQueen, J.M., & Meyer, A.S. (submitted). Evaluating the factor structure of the Dutch Individual Differences in Language Skills (IDLaS-NL) test battery. Brain Research. [Preprint]
Hintz, F., Huijsmans, M., & Huettig, F. (submitted). Written rather than spoken language experience predicts speed of spoken word recognition. Cognition. [Preprint]
McConnell, K., Hintz, F., & Meyer, A.S. (in press). Individual differences in online research: Comparing lab-based and online administration of a psycholinguistic battery of linguistic and domain-general skills. Behavior Research Methods. [Preprint]