This thesis challenges the claim that syntactic change should be modeled in terms of adjustments in the probability distribution of competing grammars (Kroch 1989b; Yang 2000). Building onwork of Boersma (1998), Boersma and Hayes (2001), and Bresnan et al. (2001), I propose a novel formal framework for modeling syntactic change that is firmly embedded in the inherent variability tradition (Wein...

The growing numbers of ELLs (English language learners) makes the search for new effective and efficient instructional methods a priority. While several teaching methods and tools are used to help ELLs succeed in becoming proficient English speakers, technology has gained substantial attention due to the abundance of new technology tools, which are helping us, achieve more in less time and also...

The number of possible distinct names of reasonable length is necessarily finite, and with the heavy demand for new names in some areas of current English-speaking commerce it seems possible that the supply might approach exhaustion. Numbers of possibilities cannot be calculated exactly, because most wordforms theoretically allowed by English phonology are too clumsy to be usable. However, Mont...

In general, no disproportionate detrimental effects of irrelevant background speech on cognition are found in aging individuals, although this is predicted by the inhibitory view of aging. This may be due to the nature of the primary task (most studies involve a verbal learning task) or the cognitive level at which irrelevant speech interferes with this task. In this study, the irrelevant speec...