Lexical organization in Mandarin-speaking children: insights from the semantic fluency task

Lexical organization in Mandarin-speaking children: insights from the semantic fluency task. ii To Hsusheng iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Before the completion of this project it was hard to imagine that it is even more difficult to write the acknowledgements than the thesis itself—so many people have been helping me out in different ways. This research project would not have been possible without the support of lots of people and organizations. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my academic advisor, Dr. Karla McGregor, who is not only an amazing researcher but a caring, patient, talented, passionate mentor. Whenever I need help of any kind, she is always patient and supportive, trying to work something out—even before I ask for help. I am really lucky to have her as my advisor. Huge thanks also go to the members of my committee, Dr. who have provided me with many insightful comments and suggestions for my study plan, this project, and future studies. Aphasia Lab, who gave me a lot of useful feedback on analyzing the semantic fluency data when I was completing research hours at the lab in spring 2011. I want to thank all the participating children and their parents, who made this thesis possible. Thanks to the teachers and administrators in the participating kindergartens and elementary schools in Taipei City and Taichung City, Taiwan for believing in the value of research and helping me on participant recruitment. Thanks to Yi-Wen Su for coding part of my data for reliability analysis. For coding semantic fluency data in this study it is essential but difficult to think like a child. Without her input, I would have missed some interesting insights into children's perspective on categorization. iv A special thank-you to Dr. Rick Arenas, who provided assistance on calculating the proximity scores for the AddTree analysis. The program he wrote had saved me enormous time in carrying out the analysis. who had been giving me helpful comments on this project. Very special thanks go to Nichole Eden for always standing by me throughout these years. Thanks to my fellow students at the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, particularly Joanna C. Lee and Shanju Lin, who had been giving me suggestions on my research and helping me out even before I came to the University of Iowa. Special thanks go to the friends in a study group: who often encouraged me when I …