Bilingual Groups Research Articles

Probing the Impact of Prematurity on Segmentation Abilities in the Context of Bilingualism.

Infants born prematurely are at a high risk of developing linguistic deficits. In the current study, we compare how full-term and healthy preterm infants without neuro-sensorial impairments segment words from fluent speech, an ability crucial for lexical acquisition. While early word segmentation abilities have been found in monolingual infants, we test here whether it is also the case for French-dominant bilingual infants with varying non-dominant languages. These bilingual infants were tested on their ability to segment monosyllabic French words from French sentences at 6 months of (postnatal) age, an age at which both full-term and preterm monolinguals are able to segment these words. Our results establish the existence of segmentation skills in these infants, with no significant difference in performance between the two maturation groups. Correlation analyses failed to find effects of gestational age in the preterm group, as well as effects of the language dominance within the bilingual groups. These findings indicate that monosyllabic word segmentation, which has been found to emerge by 4 months in monolingual French-learning infants, is a robust ability acquired at an early age even in the context of bilingualism and prematurity. Future studies should further probe segmentation abilities in more extreme conditions, such as in bilinguals tested in their non-dominant language, in preterm infants with medical issues, or testing the segmentation of more complex word structures.

Evidence of non-selective lexical access to second and third language in unbalanced multilinguals: an N400 study on the processing of interlingual homographs

Bilinguals and multilinguals commonly encounter words in their multiple languages which share some linguistic aspects. Among those are interlingual homographs, or words that have the exact same orthography in two different languages. The current study examined, through a semantic judgment task in English with ERP recording, how multilinguals (speakers of Brazilian Portuguese, English and German) accessed the meanings of interlingual homographs that belonged to their dominant and non-dominant foreign languages compared to a control group of Brazilian Portuguese-English bilinguals. The findings demonstrated that multilinguals were slower to respond to the English-German interlingual homographs as compared to control stimuli (no homographs). The results also demonstrated that, when the interlingual homographs were semantically related to their targets in the non-target language, there were significantly more errors and a higher RT than in unrelated conditions. Additionally, only the bilinguals presented the typical N400 effect for unrelated conditions, suggesting that the co-activation of the non-target language due to interlingual homographs modulated this ERP in the multilingual group. Our results provide support for the Bilingual Interactive Activation plus model and suggest that literature findings on interference between first and second languages also hold for second and third languages.

Executive functions are modulated by the context of dual language use: diglossic, bilingual and monolingual older adults

AbstractStudies investigating the role of dual language use in modulating executive functions have reported mixed results, with some studies reporting benefits in older adults. These studies typically focus on bilingual settings, while the role of dual language use in diglossic settings is rarely investigated. In diglossia, the two language varieties are separated by context, making it an ideal test case for the effects on cognition of Single Language Contexts, as defined by the Adaptive Control Hypothesis (Green & Abutalebi, 2013). We compare the performances of three groups of older adults, Arab diglossics (n = 28), bilinguals (n = 29), and monolinguals (n = 41), on the Flanker and Stroop tasks, measuring inhibition abilities, and the Color-shape task, measuring switching abilities. We report a diglossic benefit in inhibition as measured by the Flanker task only, and no benefits for the bilingual group. These findings are discussed with reference to conversational contexts in dual language use.

INFLUENCE OF CLIL BILINGUAL PHYSICAL EDUCATION ON THE ENGAGEMENT MOTOR TIME

The engagement motor time is one of the most studied variables in the Physical Education (PE) subject. Its importance is increasing, especially today due to the levels of physical inactivity and sedentary lifestyle of children and adolescents. The objective of this research is to know how CLIL is being implemented in PE sessions, according to the CESEFA questionnaire, and how the introduction of a new language (L2) impacts on the TCM of the subject. To this end, 30 PE sessions were recorded with different teachers, both bilingual (n = 11) and monolingual (n = 19) to later compare the information obtained using descriptive and contrast statistics (ANOVA). The results show a significant reduction of 11.4% in TCM of the bilingual groups compared to the monolingual groups. Furthermore, the implementation of CLIL in PE sessions should be improved considerably since it presents relatively low values. Finally, it is necessary to highlight the importance of specific methodological training in bilingual teachers to be able to develop their teaching work within quality criterio.

Comprehension of English articles by Korean learners of L2 English and L3 Spanish

Abstract This study aimed to compare the comprehension of second language (L2) English articles by native speakers of Korean, an article-less language, and by Korean learners of English as an L2 and Spanish as a third language (L3). The participants were 22 adult learners with advanced overall proficiency in L2 English and L3 Spanish. They completed two tasks, an online self-paced reading task and an offline acceptability rating task. The findings showed that both the trilingual and the bilingual groups relied on definiteness in distinguishing English articles as native speakers do. The findings related to the trilingual group were predicted by the morphological congruency hypothesis, but those related to the bilingual group were against the predictions of the fluctuation hypothesis. A comparison between the two non-native groups showed that the trilingual group had a higher sensitivity to distinguish English articles than the bilingual group, which provides evidence for positive backward transfer from the L3 to the L2 in article comprehension by learners of English whose L1 is article-less, such as Korean.

Bilingualism with minority languages: Why searching for unicorn language users does not move us forward

AbstractThis paper addresses several problematic scientific practices in psycholinguistic research. We discuss challenges that arise when working with minority languages, such as the notion of monolingual/monocultural normality and its historical origins, the stereotype of native-speakerism, the quest for testing people who fit specific profiles, the implications of the policy that urges scholars to match bilingual groups to monolingual comparison groups, and the use of powerful theoretical narratives that may evoke problematic labels and ableist terminology. These issues invest the field of psycholinguistics with questionable practices that contribute to the marginalization of groups that do not tick the standard normative boxes. Surveying some of the most widespread scientific practices in the field of psycholinguistics, our emphasis is on how several processes and policies may embody stereotypes that contribute to the exclusion of certain groups from the scientific literature, with grievous consequences for the visibility and the representation of some minoritized languages.

Russian heritage language development in narrative contexts: Evidence from pre- and primary-school children in Norway, Germany, and the UK.

The present study aims at obtaining a comprehensive picture of language development in Russian heritage language (RHL) by bringing together evidence from previous investigations focusing on morphosyntax and global accent as well as from a newly conducted analysis of a less-studied domain-lexical development. Our investigation is based on a narrative sample of 143 pre- and primary-school bilinguals acquiring RHL in Norway, Germany, and the United Kingdom. We performed a multiple-way analysis of lexical production in RHL across the different national contexts, across both languages (heritage and societal), also comparing bilinguals and monolinguals. The results revealed a clear and steady increase with age in narrative length and lexical diversity for all bilingual groups in both of their languages. The variation in lexical productivity as well as the differences between the bilingual groups and between bilinguals and monolinguals were attributed to input factors with language exposure in the home and age of starting preschool as the major predictors. We conclude that, overall, the results from lexical, grammatical, and phonological acquisition in RHL support the view that having longer exclusive or uninterrupted exposure to a heritage language in early childhood is beneficial for its development across domains.

Motivation to learn Korean as L2 or L3 in a bilingual, bicultural community

ABSTRACT The motivation of linguistically diverse young adults to learn Korean as a Foreign Language (KFL) was studied at a university on the US-Mexico border. This diglossic setting permitted a complex investigation of multiple elements, including L2-motivation theoretical attributes, exposure to Korean contemporary pop culture, and the linguistic and cultural diversity of the local community. 152 KFL university students completed an online survey. Participants were sorted into four language groups according to the degree to which English/Spanish predominated in their daily life: Spanish-dominant, balanced, and English-dominant bilinguals, in addition to English monolinguals. Maximum Likelihood Exploratory Factor Analysis found two underlying KFL motivation factors, which were conceptualised as a social-cultural factor (F1) and an educational factor (F2). This underlying motivation structure was then further explored to find associations between the factor-based motivational attributes and the four language groups. Repeated MANOVA measures found statistically significant interactional effects and between-group differences between the balanced and non-balanced bilingual groups and the English monolinguals. Further discussion highlights the diglossic environment, the cultural interests of bilingual young adults in L3 learning, and the role of English as a power language.

Dominance, Language Experience, and Increased Interaction Effects on the Development of Pragmatic Knowledge in Heritage Bilingual Children

Abstract We investigate whether dominance, language experience, and increased interaction have an effect on the development of heritage bilingual children’s knowledge of the discourse-pragmatic constraints guiding null and overt subjects. A group of child heritage bilinguals (n = 18, mean age = 5;5) and comparison groups of adults: Mexican Spanish monolinguals (n = 15), heritage bilinguals in the United States (n = 16), and English monolinguals in the United States (n = 16) completed a language background questionnaire, a portion of the Bilingual English-Spanish Assessment (BESA) in English and Spanish, a forced-choice task (FCT) in Spanish, and two acceptability judgment tasks (AJT s): one in English and one in Spanish. Results showed that heritage children and adults pattern similarly and differently from adult monolinguals. Increased interaction at home has a positive effect on accuracy in the pragmatic conditions that license null subjects in Spanish without affecting overt subject patterns in English, the dominant language.

Investigating Linguistic Abilities and its Relationship with Empathy, Emotional Intelligence and Cognitive Flexibility

Purpose. Languages play an important role in shaping our brain and personality. Numerous studies in the past have found that bilingual and trilingual individuals outperform monolinguals on certain cognitive assessments. In some studies, monolinguals have outperformed the other two groups on emotional tests. Most of the studies have reported mixed findings on this topic, making it difficult to draw conclusions.
 Procedure. For the first time, the present study attempts to examine linguistic ability, empathy, emotional intelligence and cognitive flexibility in an Indian sample of 90 participants (Mage = 26.86 years, SD = 7.45) (28 monolingual, 30 bilingual and 32 trilingual). Each of the participants completed the Interpersonal Reactivity Index Questionnaire, Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire – Short Form and Colour Stroop Test on PEBL (Psychology Experiment Building Language) software.
 Results. One – Way ANOVA revealed statistically significant results for Empathy [F(2,87) = 218.84, p < 0.001], Emotional Intelligence [F(2,87) = 232.19, p < 0.001] and Cognitive Flexibility [F(2,87) = 27.05, p < 0.001]. Mean empathy score was 38.67 for monolingual group, 65.86 for bilingual group and 81.25 for trilingual group. Mean emotional intelligence score was 76.32 for monolinguals, 151.93 for bilinguals and 195.15 for trilingual group. Mean conflict score was 253.24 for monolinguals, 108.29 for bilinguals and 20.64 for trilingual group. Pairwise comparisons and Tukey’s HSD displayed differences across groups, with the trilingual group outperforming the other two groups on all three variables. Results from this study showed large effect sizes (η2): 0.84 for EI, 0.83 for empathy and 0.38 for cognitive flexibility.
 Conclusions. Findings from this study highlight the important role played by languages and the associated benefits they offer. Participants speaking more languages dominated this study as they had better empathy, emotional intelligence and cognitive flexibility when compared to their monolingual counterparts.

Noun canonicity in heritage speakers and monolingual speakers of Spanish

The present investigation examines the role of Spanish noun gender-correlated endings when accessing gender agreement in two different linguistic populations: Spanish-English bilingual heritage speakers and monolingual speakers of Spanish. This study analyzed data from 34 monolingual speakers of Spanish from the Dominican Republic and 44 heritage speakers of Spanish born in the United States who completed a picture naming task in Experiment 1 (determiner-noun agreement) and a picture description task in Experiment 2 (noun-adjective agreement). Results found that canonicity, particularly overt gender marking cues, seemed to have a facilitatory effect for monolingual speakers as seen by significantly faster naming times with transparent nouns on both experiments RTs analysis. However, within the heritage speaker group, no canonicity effects were found on either experiments RTs analyses indicating a difference between the monolingual and bilingual group. There was, however, an effect of noun canonicity in the accuracy rates of both experiments in the monolingual and bilingual group, specifically, a facilitatory effect of transparency, consonant with other studies with heritage speakers and/or monolingual speakers of Spanish (Hur, Lopez and Sanchez 2020; Montrul, Davidson, De La Fuente and Foote 2014; Montrul, De La Fuente, Davidson and Foote 2013; Alarcón 2011; Montrul, Foote and Perpiñán 2008). The main effects of canonicity and frequency found in Experiment 1 monolingual’s RTs analysis and the interaction between frequency and canonicity found in Experiment 2 strongly suggest that canonicity along with noun frequency (noun lexico-syntactic information) have a facilitatory effect in the gender agreement process. Therefore, these results corroborate the predictions of the Two-Route Hypothesis proposed by Gollan and Frost (2001) and psycholinguistic studies that have found a lexico-syntactic route and word-form route to gender access (Caffarra, Jansen and Barber 2014). Findings in the present study contribute to the understanding of different processing mechanisms in two adult populations and to our knowledge of the overall role of predictive nominal endings in gender agreement processes in both monolingual and heritage speakers of Spanish.

Perceptions of Language Acquisition in Different Bilingualism Development

When bilingualism is brought up as a term, is commonly associated with just the ability to speak two languages, and some other factors that come with this term are not considered in order to give an identity to the individuals who are considered bilinguals. Some aspects of this environment, for example, the background that individuals in how to acquire the language play an important role in order to see how those individuals perceive some of the aspects that are implied in linguistics studies. Another thing to consider is how the social environment that individuals have affects their language development and by the same, it can provide them a feeling of belongingness in certain environments that are around them. Also, these differences in the background of bilinguals can make them have a different perception of each aspect because even if the development of two languages has reached the same goal, the process that those individuals followed to achieve those goals was different and could make them get a different perspective due to the different aspects that each individual identifies in their different process. All of the aspects that are associated with the acquisition of a second language will be analyzed in this paper and will provide the data that allow the identification of each perspective of two different groups of bilinguals, and will make clearer if those aspects, has a big influence on language development.

Spanish Lexical Accessibility and Vocabulary Acquisition: Catalan Dominant Bilinguals and Spanish Monolinguals Compared

In this study it was investigated whether Catalan dominant bilinguals from Girona performed differently on a Spanish vocabulary test in comparison to Spanish monolinguals from Toledo. The test measured both lexical knowledge and lexical accessibility. The test was administered to two groups of bilinguals and monolinguals: one aged 5-6 and another aged 8-9. The monolinguals outperformed the bilinguals at both ages, but most of the Catalan dominant bilinguals fell within monolingual norm at age 8-9, despite the fact that at group level the differences were still observable.

The Effect of Speech Perception in Noise on Arabic and Spanish Bilingual Listeners.

The purpose of this study was to compare speech perception performance in noise, as measured by signal-to-noise ratio for 50% correct scores (SNR-50) and SNR loss, between monolingual English speakers and two bilingual second-language learner populations with normal hearing sensitivity: Arabic-English and Spanish-English bilinguals. Additionally, this study observed how speech perception in noise varied as a function of language dominance for the Arabic-English bilinguals. This study was a quasi-experimental, nonrandomized study. Adults with normal peripheral hearing sensitivity participated in this study: Group 1 (n = 16) bilingual Arabic-English speakers who learned English as a second language; Group 2 (n = 10) bilingual Spanish-English speakers from a previous study; Group 3 (n = 27) monolingual English speakers combined from this study and the study of Mendel and Widner (2016). Speech perception was assessed using standardized methods for the Quick Speech-in-Noise (QuickSIN), the Bamford-Kowal-Bench Speech-in-Noise, the Hearing in Noise Test (HINT), and the Words-in-Noise tests. The two bilingual groups had significantly higher SNR-50 scores and greater SNR loss as compared to their monolingual peers. SNR-50 negatively correlated with language dominance for the QuickSIN and HINT for the Arabic-English speakers. Despite having normal hearing and being proficient in the English language, bilingual Arabic-English and Spanish-English speakers exhibited a mild SNR loss. Speech perception abilities were affected by test difficulty as well as the individual's degree of language dominance.

The Republic of Belarus and Ukraine: Contrasts of Ethnic and Linguistic Identity

The Republic of Belarus is the only state of the Near Abroad, where, with a reduction in the share of the Russian population, since the beginning of the 21st century, there has been an increase in the proportion of citizens who called Russian their native language and actively used it in everyday life. Ukraine, despite the signifcant similarity with the Republic of Belarus in the linguistic structure of the population, is the direct opposite of the latter in the course of linguistic processes. The purpose of the article is to compare the course of ethnolinguistic processes in these two neighboring countries. The study assesses the change in the size of the main ethnic communities and linguistic groups of Ukraine in the period from 2001 to 2021, depending on the scenario of ethnolinguistic dynamics — actually “Ukrainian” and “Belarusian”. The study revealed that in the population of Ukraine the main shifts took place within the groups of bilinguals (or biethnophores) that changed their identity depending on the political situation. Despite Ukraine’s notable successes in “titulating” and linguistic assimilation of the non-Ukrainian population, in the transition to the “Belarusian” version of the national policy, due to the high proportion of bilinguals in the population, these processes can reverse.

First-Language Phonetic Drift of Yemeni Arabic Stops

This study aims at examining the occurrence and direction of any phonetic interlanguage interference among Yemeni Arabic-English bilinguals by indicating the acoustic similarities and differences of L1 Yemeni Arabic stops produced by bilinguals and comparing it to monolinguals. It investigates Voice Onset Time of stops in initial and medial position as well as Preceding Vowel Duration of stops in medial position. A total of 60 native Yemeni Arabic subjects were involved in this study. Thirty subjects were late bilinguals with English as their L2 whereas the other 30 were monolinguals. Data was collected through two production tests: one for the bilingual group and the other for the monolingual group. All the subjects were asked to produce a list of Arabic words with the target stops /b, t, d, k/ in word-initial and word-medial position. Each subject in both samples was recorded individually. The bilingual subjects showed significantly longer mean Voice Onset Time values than monolinguals for /t, k/ whereas they showed mean Voice Onset Time values for the voiced stops /b, d/ that were very close in values to the monolingual group. However, bilinguals showed shorter mean values than monolinguals for the Preceding Vowel Duration, but the difference was not significant. The findings reveal that bilinguals showed signs of English-induced L1 phonetic drift in their pronunciation of Arabic /t, k/ whereas not in their realisation of Arabic /b, d/. This study provides conclusive evidence that L2 characteristics can systematically affect matured L1 phonological systems even among late bilinguals.

Studying hemispheric lateralization of 4-month-old infants from different language groups through near-infrared spectroscopy-based connectivity.

Early monolingual versus bilingual experience affects linguistic and cognitive processes during the first months of life, as well as functional activation patterns. The previous study explored the influence of a bilingual environment in the first months of life on resting-state functional connectivity and reported no significant difference between language groups. To further explore the influence of a bilingual environment on brain development function, we used the resting-state functional near-infrared spectroscopy public dataset of the 4-month-old infant group in the sleep state (30 Spanish; 33 Basque; 36 bilingual). Wavelet Transform Coherence, graph theory, and Granger causality methods were performed on the functional connectivity of the frontal lobes. The results showed that functional connectivity strength was significantly higher in the left hemisphere than that in the right hemisphere in both monolingual and bilingual groups. The graph theoretic analysis showed that the characteristic path length was significantly higher in the left hemisphere than in the right hemisphere for the bilingual infant group. Contrary to the monolingual infant group, the left-to-right direction of information flow was found in the frontal regions of the bilingual infant group in the effective connectivity analysis. The results suggested that the left hemispheric lateralization of functional connectivity in frontal regions is more pronounced in the bilingual group compared to the monolingual group. Furthermore, effective connectivity analysis may be a useful method to investigate the resting-state brain networks of infants.

Emotional factors of early vocabulary in Spanish as a second language

AbstractPrevious studies analysing the differences in emotionality in first and second language suggest that affective content of lexical items is modulated in certain contexts. This paper investigates the differences in valence and arousal ratings for 300 early words, in both oral and written modalities, through speakers’ subjective appraisal of words given by two immersion groups of Spanish late bilinguals (Chinese and European) compared with a group of native speakers. The main goal of our study is to identify the lexical areas where variability occurs, regarding to a set of affective (emotional charge and intensity), grammatical (nouns, adjectives and verbs) and semantic (concreteness) features of words. Our results show that valence is the dimension where the greatest variability is observed between native and bilinguals, although the influence of the independent factors differs considerably. Besides, arousal yields illuminating data regarding the grammatical category of words and differentiation between the groups of participants.

The Influence of Prior Linguistic Knowledge on Second Language Semantic Implicit Learning: Evidence from Cantonese–English Bilinguals

AbstractPrevious studies have shown that prior linguistic knowledge affects semantic implicit learning when stimuli are presented in the first language. We report an experiment that investigated whether such crosslinguistic influence from the first language would still emerge in the second language for semantic implicit learning of novel articles and fire/water semantic category mappings, a semantic distinction that is explicitly marked by semantic radicals in Chinese but not in English and a type of form–meaning connections that has not been investigated. We found that 30 Cantonese–English bilinguals and 30 native English speakers learned the target form–meaning connections and that the knowledge that they developed may have been implicit, as shown through post‐experiment verbal reports. Moreover, the bilingual group was significantly faster than the English group in distinguishing fire/water English nouns. These findings extend the range of semantic‐based regularities that can be learned at the implicit level and suggest that the markings of fire/water distinctions in Chinese affect second language task performance.

Impacts of the COVID-19 disruption on the language and literacy development of monolingual and heritage bilingual children in the United States.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11145-022-10388-x.