Vocabulary production in toddlers from low-income immigrant families: evidence from children exposed to Romanian-Italian and Nigerian English-Italian.

Chiara Barachetti,Marinella Majorano,Germano Rossi,Rosanna Zerbato,Elena Antolini,Manuela Lavelli

doi:10.1017/s0305000921000222

Abstract

The relationship between first and second language in early vocabulary acquisition in bilingual children is still debated in the literature. This study compared the expressive vocabulary of 39 equivalently low-SES two-year-old bilingual children from immigrant families with different heritage languages (Romanian vs. Nigerian English) and the same majority language (Italian). Vocabulary size, vocabulary composition and translation equivalents (TEs) were assessed using the Italian/L1 versions of the CDI. Higher vocabulary in Italian than in the heritage language emerged in both groups. Moreover, Romanian-Italian-speaking children produced higher proportions of TEs than Nigerian English-Italian-speaking children, suggesting that L1-L2 phonological similarity facilitates the acquisition of cross-linguistic synonyms.

Highlights

The relationship between first language (L1) and second language (L2) early vocabulary acquisition in bilingual children is still debated in the literature
The present study The present study examined the expressive vocabulary of two-year-old bilingual toddlers from two linguistic communities of immigrant families, all attending nursery schools, in both the family’s heritage language (L1, Romanian or Nigerian English) and the majority language (L2, Italian)
The present study examined the expressive vocabulary of two groups of bilingual toddlers from low-income immigrant families in both the majority language of the country (Italian) and their heritage languages (Romanian and Nigerian English), in order to contribute to the debate on the relationship between vocabularies in L1 and L2

Summary

Introduction

The relationship between first language (L1) and second language (L2) early vocabulary acquisition in bilingual children is still debated in the literature. The earliest theoretical position – that young bilingual children construct their first vocabulary as a single undifferentiated language (Volterra & Taeschner, 1978) – has not been confirmed. More recent research has shown that bilingual first language learners construct two separate lexical systems from the earliest stages of word learning (Bosch & Sebastian-Galles, 2001). We need to explore further to what extent L1 and L2 early vocabularies are acquired independently or interdependently

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