Effects of emotion on word processing are well established in monolingual speakers. However, studies that have assessed whether affective features of words undergo the same processing in a native and nonnative language have provided mixed results: Studies that have found differences between native language (L1) and second language (L2) processing attributed the difference to the fact that L2 learned late in life would not be processed affectively, because affective associations are established during childhood. Other studies suggest that adult learners show similar effects of emotional features in L1 and L2. Differences in affective processing of L2 words can be linked to age and context of learning, proficiency, language dominance, and degree of similarity between L2 and L1. Here, in a lexical decision task on tightly matched negative, positive, and neutral words, highly proficient English speakers from typologically different L1s showed the same facilitation in processing emotionally valenced words as native English speakers, regardless of their L1, the age of English acquisition, or the frequency and context of English use.

We explore the properties of foreigner talk through word reduction. Word reduction signals that the speaker is referring to the same entity than previously and should be preserved for foreigner talk. However, it leads to intelligibility loss, which work against foreigner talk.Pairs of speakers engaged in a task where native speakers talked either to a native or non-native listener. Natives talking to non-natives performed foreigner talk for duration and intensity.Duration and intensity were reduced for native and non-native listeners equally.These results suggest that word reduction is insensitive to the communicative adjustments in the context of foreign talk.Keywords: word reduction, foreigner talk, non-native speakers, word duration, word intensity IntroductionAs native speakers, we make considerable efforts to accommodate our speech to the needs of non-native listeners, a phenomenon known as foreigner talk. Native speakers talking to non-native listeners tend to speak slower and louder than when speaking to native listeners. Also, they show less vowel reduction, avoid idiomatic expressions, or use high frequency words and simple syntactic constructions. Natives talking to non-natives also include more repetitions and clarifications (for a review see Wooldridge, 2001; see also Arthur, Weiner, Culver, Lee & Thomas, 1980;Ferguson, 1971;Henzl, 1979; Long, 1983;Nelson, 1992;Ramamurti, 1980; Scarborough, Dmitrieva, Hall-Lew, Zhao & Brenier, 2007;Tarone, 1980).Here we focus on the acoustic adjustments that characterize foreign talk to investigate its impact on one pervasive phenomenon in dialogue, namely word reduction (see Aylett & Turk, 2004; Baker & Bradlow, 2009; Bell, Gregory, Brenier, Jurafsky, Ikeno & Girand, 2002;Jurafsky, Bell, Gregory & Raymond, 2001). In particular, we assess whether word reduction is affected by the acoustic adjustments of foreigner talk.One way to explore word reduction is repetition in a given communicative interaction.Repeated words are characterized by having shorter durations, reduced intensities and narrower pitch as compared to when words are introduced for the first time in the discourse (see Baker & Bradlow, 2009; Bell et al., 2002; Bell et al, 2003; Clark & Haviland, 1977;Fowler & Housum, 1987;Gregory, Raymond, Bell, Fosler-Lussier & Jurafsky, 1999;Lieberman, 1963; Samuel & Troicki, 1998;Watson, Arnold & Tanenhaus, 2008). Beyond single words, repetition also leads to the shortening of referential expressions, meaning that the first time that a referent is introduced in the discourse, it tends to be longer and more explicit than its subsequent times

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Replacing traditional journals with a more modern solution is not a new idea. Here, we propose ways to overcome the social dilemma underlying the decades of inaction. Any solution needs to not only resolve the current problems but also be capable of preventing takeover by corporations: it needs to replace traditional journals with a decentralized, resilient, evolvable network that is interconnected by open standards and open-source norms under the governance of the scholarly community. It needs to replace the monopolies connected to journals with a genuine, functioning and well-regulated market. In this new market, substitutable service providers compete and innovate according to the conditions of the scholarly community, avoiding sustained vendor lock-in. Therefore, a standards body needs to form under the governance of the scholarly community to allow the development of open scholarly infrastructures servicing the entire research workflow. We propose a redirection of money from legacy publishers to the new network by funding bodies broadening their minimal infrastructure requirements at recipient institutions to include modern infrastructure components replacing and complementing journal functionalities. Such updated eligibility criteria by funding agencies would help realign the financial incentives for recipient institutions with public and scholarly interest.

A sample of 641 participants were presented with four decision-making tasks during the first stages of the COVID–19 lockdown in Spain: The dictator game, framing problems, utilitarian/deontological and altruistic/egoistic moral dilemmas. Participants also completed questionnaires on mental health status and experiences related to the COVID–19 pandemic. We used boosted regression trees (an advanced form of regression analysis based on machine learning) to model relationships between responses to the questionnaires and decision-making tasks. Results showed that the psychological impact of the COVID–19 pandemic predicted participants’ responses to the framing problems and utilitarian/deontological and altruistic/egoistic moral dilemmas (but not to the dictator game). More concretely, the more psychological impact participants suffered, the more they were willing to choose the safest response in the framing problems, and the more deontological/altruistic were their responses to moral dilemmas. These results suggest that the psychological impact of the COVID–19 pandemic might prompt automatic processes.