Spanish and English Proficiency in the Linguistic Encoding of Mental States in Narrative Retellings

Abstract

The present study investigated whether differences existed among 28 sequential bilingual children, ages 9–11 years, with varied English proficiency, in their clausal and nonclausal choices for encoding subjective concepts in narratives in both Spanish and English. The subjective categories examined were perceptual action, psychological action, and private state reports. Despite a significant difference in age between the two proficiency groups, results present evidence for similar patterns of ability and variability in the syntactic encoding of subjective categories. Both proficiency groups expressed private state reports most frequently across languages; however, English language use might have influenced the proportion of subjectivity category use. Furthermore, differences between proficiency groups were not found for a measure of clausal complexity, but differences in clause type usage and aspects of nonclausal complexity were attributed to the language of retelling. Patterns of performance reinforce the importance of assessing children in both Spanish and English.