Biomedical subjects

S P Law

Publications and source records attributed to S P Law.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2000

Sentence processing deficits in two Cantonese aphasic patients.

This paper reports the performances of two Cantonese aphasics on tasks examining their sentence processing deficits. The data on sentence comprehension show that thematically noncanonical sentences, full passives, and subject-gap sentences present greater difficulty to these patients than canonical sentences, truncated passives, and object-gap sentences, respectively. These patterns are consistent with previous observations on Chinese aphasics and are expected given the structural differences between Chinese and English. In a Cantonese grammaticality judgment test, a set of structures are identified that can elicit clear judgments from normal subjects and aphasics, contrary to the claim that grammaticality judgments in Chinese are probabilistic and fragile. Most interestingly, the patients' overall performance patterns reveal a double dissociation between sentence comprehension and judgment of sentence well-formedness, suggesting that the two tasks are supported by independent processing mechanisms.

Adult↗

PubMed2000

Structural prominence hypothesis and Chinese aphasic sentence comprehension.

The Structural Prominence Hypothesis (SPH) proposed in Friederici and Gorrell (1998) has been claimed to find support from cross-linguistic data and to be empirically superior to linear strategies. In this article we evaluate the SPH against data of thematic-role-reversal comprehension of Chinese aphasics using Mandarin Chinese and Cantonese. We focus on the comprehension of Chinese relativized constructions for the reason that linear position and structural prominence diverge in these structures. The two types of strategies thus make different predictions about thematic reversal comprehension with respect to these structures. An examination of the performance patterns of Chinese aphasics from three different studies (Su & Law, 1993; Law & Leung, 1998a, 1998b) reveals a tendency on the part of the patients to make use of heuristics that takes into consideration the linear order of lexical NPs, not their structural prominence. Furthermore, their strategy does not necessarily make reference to verb position.

Adult↗

PubMed1986

The regulation of menstrual cycle and its relationship to the moon.

UNLABELLED: A synchronous relationship between the menstrual cycle and lunar rhythm was confirmed by: Investigative data: Among the 826 female volunteers with a normal menstrual cycle, aged between 16 and 25 years, a large proportion of menstruations occurred around the new moon (28.3%), while at other times during the lunar month the proportion of menstruations occurring ranged between 8.5-12.6%; the difference was significant (p less than 0.01). LABORATORY FINDINGS: The 6-hydroxymelatonin levels in the urina sanguinis of 3 female volunteers reached their zenith prior to and during menstruation, gradually declining to their nadir during ovulation. The difference in 6-hydroxymelatonin between menstruation and ovulation was significant (p less than 0.01). Two of these three volunteers had their zenith in the period of the new moon and nadir 3-4 days prior to the full moon respectively. Clinical experience: The lunar-menses-regulatory therapy in treatment of Nephropenic secondary amenorrhea revealed 4 clinical cure, 5 marked effect, 8 menogogue and 3 ineffect out of 20 cases.

Adolescent↗