The thirteenth edition has been revised, clarified, and updated throughout to ensure that it remains the most comprehensive and accessible introductory linguistics textbook on the market. The revised chapter on morphology includes a more thorough discussion of allomorphy and adds sections on templatic morphology, suprasegmental morphology, and morphological metathesis to give students a more complete picture of all morphological phenomena. The chapter on language and computers has been updated with new sections on deep learning, artificial neural networks, and on other areas of computational linguistics, providing readers with a better sense of current research and applications in this rapidly developing field. Other additions include new sections on syntactic non-constituents and non-generative rule systems in the syntax chapter and a complete rewrite to the creole languages file in the language contact chapter. We have also adopted the use of the singular they when referring to a generic person whose gender is unknown or irrelevant. Exercises and lists of other readings have been updated throughout.
Language Files 11th Edition Answer Key
An Internet platform was established in the participating language zones (Czech, Dutch, English, German, Greek, Lithuanian, Polish, Romanian and Swedish; later, in October 2010, the French language zone joined the expert advice system). This Internet platform enables CF patients/lay people as well as clinicians to get expert advice/answers to questions they pose in their mother language.
The ECORN-CF patient advice platform is designed to include a two-stage central quality control mechanism. Firstly, expert answers are assessed on a national/language-zone level (national platform) and secondly on a European level (central English archive). At the national level, the quality of the expert answer is assessed by a national moderator. All expert answers are then translated into English and a European moderator/coordinator assesses the accuracy. The accuracy of the expert answers is checked (i.e. their conformance to existing guidelines) and judged as "good", "with flaws" or "unacceptable". In case an answer was not scored as "good", feedback is given to the expert, and a proposal for an amended/extended answer is provided according to published clinical guidelines. The aim of providing feedback is to improve the quality of answers over time by a training effect and provide high quality expert answers. The final approved expert answer is published on both the national platform in the mother language of the questioner, and also in English in the central archive. If the questioners provide an e-mail address, they are informed of the published answer. If no guidelines on a particular area exist, then answers are based on expert opinion. Such questions are marked in the archive to indicate the need for a consensus and development of guidelines.
Content quality of answers from the Dutch language zone during the early and later period of the ECORN-CF system. Ten expert answers from the early period (1-10) and ten expert answers from the later period (11-20) were assessed. Each column represents the mean of the four scores given to a single answer (one additional rater scored only the formal quality). The squares represent the highest and lowest scores given to that answer. The blue columns at the end of each group of ten expert answers represent the mean of the scores for all answers of the early period and the later period, respectively; they did not differ between early and later period (p = 0.095). Dark grey columns represent answers with a mean score of "good" quality.
Formal quality of answers from the Dutch language zone during the early and later period of the ECORN-CF system. Ten expert answers from the early period (1-10) and ten expert answers from the later period (11-20) were assessed. Each column represents the mean of the five scores given to a single answer. The squares represent the highest and lowest scores given to that answer. The blue columns at the end of each group of ten expert answers represent the mean of the scores for all answers of the early period and the later period, respectively; they did not differ between early and later period (p = 0.265). Dark grey columns represent answers with a mean score of "good" quality, light grey columns those of "satisfactory" quality.
Content quality of answers in all six language zones during the early and later period of the ECORN-CF system. Each column represents the mean of all scores for the expert answers from the respective period marked as "early" or "later" and the respective language zone. The squares represent the highest and lowest mean score given to a single answer. The blue columns marked as "all" represent the mean of the scores for all 50 expert answers from all language zones of the early period and for all 58 expert answers from all language zones of the later period, respectively. Dark grey columns represent answers of "good" quality, light grey columns those of "satisfactory" quality. B/NL = Belgium/Netherlands, CZ = Czech Republic, GER = Germany, LIT = Lithuania, ROM = Romania, UK = United Kingdom.
Formal quality of answers in all six language zones during the early and later period of the ECORN-CF system. Each column represents the mean of all scores for the expert answers from the respective period marked as "early" or "later" and the respective language zone. The squares represent the highest and lowest mean score given to a single answer. The blue columns marked as "all" represent the mean of the scores for all 50 expert answers from all language zones of the early period and for all 58 expert answers from all language zones of the later period, respectively. The squares represent the highest and lowest mean score given to a single answer. Dark grey columns represent answers of "good" quality, light grey columns those of "satisfactory" quality. B/NL = Belgium/Netherlands, CZ = Czech Republic, GER = Germany, LIT = Lithuania, ROM = Romania, UK = United Kingdom.
Other factors which may have contributed to poor agreement between individuals and over time include the raters' professional background (pediatricians, physiotherapist, representative of CF-patient organization), country of origin, exposure to lay questions and expert answers over the time frame of the project. Training of the expert panel undertaking quality assessment (e.g. training seminars and teaching manuals) is key to ensure a valid estimate of quality of expert advice. Another goal which we pursued with the implementation of this quality assessment tool was to gather information about the quality of answers in each language zone and its development over time. We did not show an improvement of quality of answers over the time frame of the study and this is likely attributed to the short time frame between the early and later periods as well as the low numbers of questions in some language zones. Furthermore, four out of six language zones already had a "good" quality level of answers during the early period, which remained "good" during the later period.
The quality assessment of expert answers revealed that, when taking all answers from all language zones, the overall content and formal quality was on a good level in both periods. However, in two out of six participating language zones (i.e. the Eastern European Member States Romania and Lithuania), the level of quality of answers remained on a "satisfactory" level. Unlike some countries Romania and Lithuania had no experience with such a platform until the start of the ECORN-CF project, the number of questions asked on those platforms was quite low compared to other language zones and the time between the early and later period was relatively short, so that the possibility to gain experience in order to improve the quality of answers was lacking.
The best scores for content and formal aspects of answers were achieved in the Dutch language zone which also did not have prior experience with Internet patient advice platforms. The Dutch language zone had a unique approach to development of expert answers. A local team of medical residents/registrars were encouraged to develop an answer which was then discussed in a group forum. A standardized format was used for group discussions which included: what aspects are desirable to appear in the answer?; how is the given answer judged from the other members of the group?; is the content correct, what is lacking? All this information was used to develop a complete answer which was approved by the moderator before submission to the ECORN-CF platform. Adoption of similar processes in other language zones would improve quality and consistency of answers in the ECORN-CF project. 2ff7e9595c
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