Abstract
Bilingual children experience a rapid shift in language preference and input dominance from L1 to L2 upon entering kindergarten when regular contact with L2 starts. Though this change in dominance affects further L1 development, little is known about how various factors shape this. The present study examines the combined influence of different background factors including not only chronological age, age of onset of L2 (L2 AoO), and gender, but also various L1 input measures on L1 receptive and expressive lexical and morphological (case and verb inflections) development in Russian-German bilingual children. For lexical skills, we found a general strong impact of chronological age, gender, and input factors but a differential impact of L2 AoO. Only expressive lexical skills were influenced by language dominance). Morphological development was influenced in the following way: chronological age and gender were most relevant for the acquisition of verb inflection, whereas age, L1 use in the nuclear family and L2 AoO affected the acquisition of case on nouns. This pattern explains the findings of the second series of analyses of longitudinal data, which showed that case is more vulnerable than verb inflection to language attrition – or, taking another perspective – to heritage Russian grammar restructuring.
Highlights
In migrant families where two parents speak the same home language (L1), toddlers and pre-kindergarten children experience dominance in this L1 as opposed to the environment language, i.e., language of the country in which they live (L2)
This study reported on the differentiated impact of various background factors on L1 acquisition of lexicon and morphology in Russian-German bilinguals in the situation of the change of input dominance from heritage language to L2 upon entering kindergarten
The results obtained from the differentiated treatment of input—nuclear family vs. other people—suggested that the evaluation of the nuclear family input is a significant predictor for the acquisition of lexical and case abilities in a heritage language
Summary
In migrant families where two parents speak the same home language (L1), toddlers and pre-kindergarten children experience dominance in this L1 as opposed to the environment language, i.e., language of the country in which they live (L2). According to recent studies (Kohnert and Bates, 2002; Oller and Eilers, 2002; Oller et al, 2011 among others), a shift to L2 preference as a result of this strongly increasing language input takes place within 2–3 years of L2 exposure This shift in language preference is shaped by various factors and strongly impacts the development of dual languages of bilingual children. The language measures are significantly correlated with the background factors age [receptive lexicon r(204) = 0.599, p < 0.001, expressive lexicon r(202) = 0.607, p < 0.001, case r(152) = 0.328, p < 0.001, verbal inflection r(117) = 0.231, p = 0.011] and L1 use in the nuclear family [receptive lexicon r(204) = 0.191, p = 0.006, expressive lexicon r(202) = 0.385, p < 0.001, case r(152) = 0.316, p < 0.001, verbal inflection r(117) = 0.182, p = 0.048] to different degrees ranging from small to large.
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