Cross-language Similarity Research Articles

A Formal Literature Review: The Roles of Cross-language Similarity and Context in Adults’ Idiom Learning of a Second Language

This essay reviews some existing papers to understand how the similarities between a person’s native language and the new language they are learning, and the context affects adult learners’ ability to acquire idioms in a second language. Idioms are a common form of communication in any language. Therefore, it is essential for truly mastering a new language. However, due to their rich cultural connotations and the need for communicative contexts, learning these idiomatic expressions can be quite difficult. Previous studies have shown that in the process of learning a second language, idioms in the new language are easier to master when they are very similar in meaning or structure to those in the learner’s first language. In addition, the rich context can also help learners better understand and use them. Future studies should delve into the influential mechanisms and create more effective strategies to help adults become proficient in using idioms of a second language.

The Competition Model and Adult Second Language Learning: Cross-Language Similarity and L2 Morphosyntax Learning

Adult second language learners arrive at the language learning situation with an already formed first language grammar system in place. The study of cross-language similarity across the first and second languages explores how the similarities and differences in the two languages make learning more or less difficult, particularly for adult learners. From a Competition Model (MacWhinney, 1997) framework, the authors and their colleagues have conducted research examining the relationship between cross-language similarity and adult second language learning and processing with actual learners and in training paradigms with naïve learners; converging methodological approaches have been used (eye tracking, event related brain potentials, self- paced reading, and grammaticality judgments). We review these studies and describe the predictions derived from the Competition Model framework as a function of whether grammatical constructions are formed similarly or differently in the two languages or are unique to the second language. We conclude with a description of Brian MacWhinney’s influence on this body of research.

The influence of cross-language similarity and transparency on idiom knowledge in non-immersed L2 speakers

Idioms are frequently used by native speakers but pose challenges for L2 learners. In this study, we aimed to identify the key psycholinguistic properties that predict L2 idiom knowledge among non-immersed speakers. A total of 53 Chilean L2 English speakers participated in an online idiom knowledge test, requiring them to recognize the figurative meanings of 99 English idioms and rate their transparency. The results showed that cross-language similarity and transparency, in conjunction with familiarity, significantly predicted L2 idiom knowledge. Conversely, literal plausibility, decomposability, frequency, and predictability did not significantly impact L2 idiom knowledge. Our findings support the Parasitic Hypothesis of vocabulary development and suggest that non-immersed L2 learners heavily rely on their L1 lexical and conceptual networks. The study underscores the importance of semantic transparency and cross-language similarity in L2 idiom acquisition, particularly for learners in non-immersive environments. Our findings advocate for a proficiency-tailored ESL instruction approach. Initially, focus on teaching transparent idioms and those similar to the learners' native language for better comprehension and retention. As proficiency increases, gradually introduce idioms without cross-language parallels to enhance comprehensive linguistic mastery. This approach offers practical insights for language education and applied linguistics.

Bidialectal variety switching: the effects of language use and social contexts

While previous research shows that bilinguals' ability to mix and switch between two separate languages is influenced by both cross-language similarity and language use contexts, little attention has been paid to bidialectal populations. Given the linguistic and sociolinguistic differences between bilingualism and bidialectalism, it is thus unclear to what extent mechanisms underlying bidialectal variety switching resemble those underlying bilinguals. To investigate the effects of cross-variety phonological distance and variety use contexts on variety switching, we tested two groups of Chinese speakers in a bidialectal auditory word recognition task. Both groups speak a regional dialect (Chengdu Mandarin or Cantonese) as their native language and are also highly proficient in Standard Mandarin. Participants' language background and linguistic experience are collected by a language background questionnaire. Mixing and switching between two varieties are costly for bidialectal speakers in comprehension. Mixing costs can be attributed to variety switches instead of the mere presence of a mixed-variety context. While variety switch and mixing costs are not influenced by cross-variety phonological distance, they are modulated by variety dominance and habitual variety use contexts. This study highlights the similarities between bidialectals and bilinguals in language processing, as well as the significance of recognizing between- and within-group differences in conducting psycholinguistics research with multilingual populations.

Identifying constitutive articles of cumulative dissertation theses by bilingual text similarity. Evaluation of similarity methods on a new short text task

Abstract Cumulative dissertations are doctoral theses comprised of multiple published articles. For studies of publication activity and citation impact of early career researchers, it is important to identify these articles and link them to their associated theses. Using a new benchmark data set, this paper reports on experiments of measuring the bilingual textual similarity between, on the one hand, titles and keywords of doctoral theses, and, on the other hand, articles’ titles and abstracts. The tested methods are cosine similarity and L1 distance in the Vector Space Model (VSM) as baselines, the language-indifferent methods Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) and trigram similarity, and the language-aware methods fastText and Random Indexing (RI). LSA and RI, two supervised methods, were trained on a purposively collected bilingual scientific parallel text corpus. The results show that the VSM baselines and the RI method perform best but that the VSM method is unsuitable for cross-language similarity due to its inherent monolingual bias.

Examining the success of three kinds of cross-language similarity in predicting English listeners’ discrimination of Danish vowels

Several methods have been used in second language speech research to predict nonnative listeners’ discrimination of foreign language speech sounds. The present study examined how well three of these methods predict the discrimination of the four tightly spaced Danish unrounded front vowels by native listeners of Standard Southern British English (SSBE), whose four front vowels are evenly spaced along the close-open dimension. Experiment 1 examined the ecphoric similarity of the Danish and English vowels in a perceptual assimilation task in which L1 SSBE listeners used native labels and goodness-of-fit ratings in identifying the Danish vowels. Experiment 2 examined the perceptual similarity of the English and Danish vowels in a graded discrimination task in which the same listeners rated the degree of dissimilarity of Danish-English vowel pairs. The third prediction of discriminability was derived from an acoustic comparison of the Danish and English vowels in the F1/F2 space. The same participants as in Experiments 1 and 2 then discriminated three Danish front vowel contrasts. None of the three methods was found to fully successfully predict discrimination of the Danish vowels by the SSBE listeners. The presentation will discuss reasons for the lack of predictive power of the three widely used methods.

When the Easy Becomes Difficult: Factors Affecting the Acquisition of the English /iː/-/ɪ/ Contrast

The degree of similarity between the sounds of a speaker’s first and second language (L1 and L2) is believed to determine the likelihood of accurate perception and production of the L2 sounds. This paper explores the relationship between cross-linguistic similarity and the perception and production of a subset of English vowels, including the highly productive /iː/-/ɪ/ contrast (as in “beat” vs. “bit”), by a group of Spanish/Catalan native speakers learning English as an L2. The learners’ ability to identify, discriminate and produce the English vowels accurately was contrasted with their cross-linguistic perceived similarity judgements. The results showed that L2 perception and production accuracy was not always predicted from patterns of cross-language similarity, particularly regarding the difficulty distinguishing /iː/ and /ɪ/. Possible explanations may involve the way the L2 /iː/ and /ɪ/ categories interact, the effect of non-native acoustic cue reliance, and the roles of orthography and language instruction.

Automaticity of lexical access in deaf and hearing bilinguals: Cross-linguistic evidence from the color Stroop task across five languages

The well-known Stroop interference effect has been instrumental in revealing the highly automated nature of lexical processing as well as providing new insights to the underlying lexical organization of first and second languages within proficient bilinguals. The present cross-linguistic study had two goals: 1) to examine Stroop interference for dynamic signs and printed words in deaf ASL-English bilinguals who report no reliance on speech or audiological aids; 2) to compare Stroop interference effects in several groups of bilinguals whose two languages range from very distinct to very similar in their shared orthographic patterns: ASL-English bilinguals (very distinct), Chinese-English bilinguals (low similarity), Korean-English bilinguals (moderate similarity), and Spanish-English bilinguals (high similarity). Reaction time and accuracy were measured for the Stroop color naming and word reading tasks, for congruent and incongruent color font conditions. Results confirmed strong Stroop interference for both dynamic ASL stimuli and English printed words in deaf bilinguals, with stronger Stroop interference effects in ASL for deaf bilinguals who scored higher in a direct assessment of ASL proficiency. Comparison of the four groups of bilinguals revealed that the same-script bilinguals (Spanish-English bilinguals) exhibited significantly greater Stroop interference effects for color naming than the other three bilingual groups. The results support three conclusions. First, Stroop interference effects are found for both signed and spoken languages. Second, contrary to some claims in the literature about deaf signers who do not use speech being poor readers, deaf bilinguals' lexical processing of both signs and written words is highly automated. Third, cross-language similarity is a critical factor shaping bilinguals' experience of Stroop interference in their two languages. This study represents the first comparison of both deaf and hearing bilinguals on the Stroop task, offering a critical test of theories about bilingual lexical access and cognitive control.

Nonlinearities in bilingual visual word recognition: An introduction to generalized additive modeling

AbstractThis paper introduces the generalized additive mixed model (GAMM) and the quantile generalized additive mixed model (QGAMM) through reanalyses of bilinguals’ lexical decision data from Dijkstra et al. (2010) and Miwa et al. (2014). We illustrate how regression splines can be used to test for nonlinear effects of cross-language similarity in form as well as for controlling experimental trial effects. We further illustrate the tensor product smooth for a nonlinear interaction between cross-language semantic similarity and word frequency. Finally, we show how the QGAMM helps clarify whether the effect of a particular predictor is constant across distributions of RTs.

EVIDENCE OF NON-SELECTIVE LEXICAL ACCESS IN CHILDREN FROM A PORTUGUESE-ENGLISH BILINGUAL SCHOOL

The issue of language selectivity regarding lexical access of bilingual adults has been thoroughly reported in the literature. However, studies with bilingual children are still limited, especially in the Brazilian context. To fill this gap, the present study was conducted with the goal of investigating whether the same cognate facilitation effect reported for bilingual adults is also true for bilingual children. To do so, two experiments were carried out. In Experiment 1, 53 Portuguese-English bilingual children from 3rd and 7th grade took part in a lexical decision task which had a Portuguese and an English version. In Experiment 2, 18 English monolinguals performed the English version of the lexical decision task. The results of Experiment 1 showed that the cognate effect was evident for the two groups of bilinguals when the task was performed in the L2- English, even though no statistical difference between the two groups of bilinguals was found. When performing the task in the L1 – Portuguese, the bilingual groups showed no cognate effect, which suggests that these participants had not reached a level of proficiency in which the L2 can influence L1 processing. The results of Experiment 2 showed no cognate facilitation effect for monolinguals, indicating that the results of the bilingual participants, in the English version of the lexical decision task, were indeed due to the cognate status of the words of the bilingual's two languages. In short, the present results favor the nonselective view of lexical access and the effect of proficiency in the perception of cross language similarity.

Brain decoding in multiple languages: Can cross-language brain decoding work?

The approach of cross-language brain decoding is to use models of brain decoding from one language to decode stimuli of another language. It has the potential to provide new insights into how our brain represents multiple languages. While it is possible to decode semantic information across different languages from neuroimaging data, the approach’s overall success remains to be tested and depends on a number of factors such as cross-language similarity, age of acquisition/proficiency levels, and depth of language processing. We expect to see continued progress in this domain, from a traditional focus on words and concrete concepts toward the use of naturalistic experimental tasks involving higher-level language processing (e.g., discourse processing). The approach can also be applied to understand how cross-modal, cross-cultural, and other nonlinguistic factors may influence neural representations of different languages. This article provides an overview of cross-language brain decoding with suggestions for future research directions.

Flowchart-Based Cross-Language Source Code Similarity Detection

Source code similarity detection has various applications in code plagiarism detection and software intellectual property protection. In computer programming teaching, students may convert the source code written in one programming language into another language for their code assignment submission. Existing similarity measures of source code written in the same language are not applicable for the cross-language code similarity detection because of syntactic differences among different programming languages. Meanwhile, existing cross-language source similarity detection approaches are susceptible to complex code obfuscation techniques, such as replacing equivalent control structure and adding redundant statements. To solve this problem, we propose a cross-language code similarity detection (CLCSD) approach based on code flowcharts. In general, two source code fragments written in different programming languages are transformed into standardized code flowcharts (SCFC), and their similarity is obtained by measuring their corresponding SCFC. More specifically, we first introduce the standardized code flowchart (SCFC) model to be the uniform flowcharts representation of source code written in different languages. SCFC is language-independent, and therefore, it can be used as the intermediate structure for source code similarity detection. Meanwhile, transformation techniques are given to transform source code written in a specific programming language into an SCFC. Second, we propose the SCFC-SPGK algorithm based on the shortest path graph kernel to measure the similarity between two SCFCs. Thus, the similarity between two pieces of source code in different programming languages is given by the similarity between SCFCs. Experimental results show that compared with existing approaches, CLCSD has higher accuracy in cross-language source code similarity detection. Furthermore, CLCSD cannot only handle common source code obfuscation techniques used by students in computer programming teaching but also obtain nearly 90% accuracy in dealing with some complex obfuscation techniques.

The effects of word concreteness on cross-language neural pattern similarity during semantic categorization

Previous behavioral studies have suggested that word concreteness affects the similarity of semantic representations between native and second languages. However, it is unclear whether and how word concreteness influences the cross-language similarity in neural representations. In the present study, we quantified the neural pattern similarity between native and second languages by using representational similarity analysis, and examined the modulatory effect of word concreteness on cross-language similarity in neural representations. Twenty-six Chinese-English bilinguals performed a semantic decision task during fMRI scan. Results showed that concrete and abstract words elicited stronger activation in the right sensorimotor cortex for nonverbal processing and the left prefrontal cortex for verbal processing, respectively. Consistently, representational similarity analysis revealed that concrete and abstract words showed higher cross-language neural pattern similarity in those brain regions for nonverbal and verbal processing, respectively. More importantly, we found that the left middle temporal gyrus contained item-specific cross-language semantic representations for abstract words. These results suggest that word concreteness plays an important role in influencing cross-language similarity in neural representations. • RSA is used to quantify cross-language pattern similarity. • Concrete and abstract words elicit distinct neural activity patterns. • LMTG shows item-specific cross-language pattern similarity for abstract words.

Basic color categories in Mandarin Chinese revealed by cluster analysis.

Previous claims of the number of color categories and corresponding basic color terms in modern Mandarin Chinese remain irreconcilable, mainly due to the shortage in objectively evaluating the basicness of color terms with statistical significance. Therefore the present study applied k-means cluster analysis to investigate native Mandarin Chinese speakers’ color naming data of 330 color chips similar to those used in World Color Survey. Results confirmed that there are 11 basic color categories among modern Mandarin speakers in Taiwan, one corresponding to each basic color term. Results also showed that observers overwhelmingly agreed in their use of Mandarin color terms, including those that had yielded ambiguous results in previous studies (gray, brown, pink, and orange). There is significant cross-language similarity when comparing the distribution of color categories in the World Color Survey chart with American English and Japanese data. The motif analysis and group mutual information analysis suggest that Mandarin color terms used in Taiwan describe very similar categories and are, hence, similarly precise in communicating color information as those in Japanese and American English. These results show that three languages of fundamentally different cultures and histories have very similar basic color terms.

Cross-Language Plagiarism Detection using Word Embedding and Inverse Document Frequency (IDF)

The purpose of cross-language textual similarity detection is to approximate the similarity of two textual units in different languages. This paper embeds the distributed representation of words in cross-language textual similarity detection using word embedding and IDF. The paper introduces a novel cross-language plagiarism detection approach constructed with the distributed representation of words in sentences. To improve the textual similarity of the approach, a novel method is used called CL-CTS-CBOW. Consequently, adding the syntax feature to the approach is improved by a novel method called CL-WES. Afterward, the approach is improved by the IDF weighting method. The corpora used in this study are four Arabic-English corpora, specifically books, Wikipedia, EAPCOUNT, and MultiUN, which have more than 10,017,106 sentences and uses with supported parallel and comparable assemblages. The proposed method in this paper combines different methods to confirm their complementarity. In the experiment, the proposed system obtains 88% English-Arabic similarity detection at the word level and 82.75% at the sentence level with various corpora.

Vowel dynamics in the acquisition of L2 English – an acoustic study of L1 Polish learners

ABSTRACT This article presents an acoustic study of the acquisition of vowel formant dynamics in L2 (Southern British) English by Polish learners at two levels of proficiency, along with baseline data from L1 English and L1 Polish. Results from our experiment suggest that the acquisition of English vowels by Polish learners entails a temporal reorganization such that vocalic targets in English are housed later in a vowel’s duration than they are in Polish or Polish-accented English. This leads to an increase in the degree of formant movement through the 20%–40% portion of vowel duration with increased English proficiency. Implications of these findings for cross-language phonetic similarity, a crucial concept for current theoretical models of L2 speech, are also discussed.

Perceptual categorization of English vowels by native European Portuguese speakers

This study reports the results of a perceptual assimilation task (PAT) used to assess the degree of perceived cross-language (dis)similarity between the vowel inventories of European Portuguese (L1) and American English (L2) and, thus, predict difficulty in the perception and production of non-native vowels. Thirty-four native European Portuguese speakers completed a PAT, in which they mapped both L2 English and L1 Portuguese vowels to native vowel categories and rated them for goodness-of-fit to L1 vowels. The results are discussed in terms of theoretical models of cross-language perception and L2 speech learning (SLM, Flege, 1995, & PAM-L2, Best & Tyler, 2007).-----------------------------------------------------------------------------CATEGORIZAÇÃO PERCEPTIVA DE VOGAIS INGLESAS POR FALANTES NATIVOS DE PORTUGUÊS EUROPEUEste estudo reporta os resultados de uma tarefa de assimilação percetiva, usada para avaliar o grau de semelhança inter-linguística entre os inventários vocálicos de português europeu (L1) e de inglês americano (L2), e, assim, prever dificuldades na perceção e produção de sons não nativos. Trinta e quatro falantes nativos de português europeu completaram uma tarefa de assimilação perceptiva, na qual identificaram vogais do inglês (L2) e do português (L1) de acordo com as categorias fonológicas da sua língua nativa, avaliando também a qualidade de representatividade categorial. Os resultados são discutidos partindo de dois modelos de perceção inter-linguística e aprendizagem de fala L2 (SLM, Flege, 1995, & PAM-L2, Best & Tyler, 2007).---Original em inglês.

“If a perceptual problem exists, what are its roots?” Types of cross-language similarity, hypercorrection, and unexplored root canals

James Jenkins had a keen interest in the nature of perceptual problems of nonnative listeners and in the perceived similarity of speech sounds. This presentation reports on a series of experiments which examined how well four different types of similarity predict nonnative speech perception. The different types are ecphoric and perceptual cross-language similarity, perceived within-language similarity, and acoustic similarity. One set of experiments examined how well cross-language perceptual assimilation (English to Danish) and within- language similarity ratings (English-English) of English consonants by Danish listeners predict Danes’ identification of English consonants. Another set of experiments explored the roots of English listeners’ discrimination problems for the closely spaced Danish unrounded front vowels by relating these problems to two types of perceived cross-language similarity (ecphoric and perceptual) and to acoustic similarity. Results suggest that each of the four types of similarity accounts for some of the perceptual problems, but none does so exhaustively, probably because the root system of these problems is affected by additional factors including nonnative listeners’ hypercorrection and by perceptual asymmetries. The clear conclusion from these experiments is that Jim’s question will keep us busy for quite some time. [Work supported by Carlsberg Foundation and Inge Lehmanns Legat af 1983.]

How letter order is encoded in bilingual reading? The role of deviant-letter position in cognate word recognition

ABSTRACTObjective: Previous literature in the monolingual domain has showed that letter position is not encoded in an absolute-position manner. However, with the exception of the unpublished work by Font [(2001). Rôle de la langue dansl’accès au lexique chez les bilingues: Influence de la proximité orthographique et sémantique interlangue surla reconnaissance visuelle de mots (Unpublished Doctoral thesis). Université Paul Valery, Montpellier)], there is no study investigating this issue with bilinguals. According to Font, the recognition of cognate words is affected by the position of the deviant letter. This calls the validity of the input-coding scheme of the most relevant computational model of bilingual word recognition (The Bilingual Interactive Activation Plus Model [BIA+; Dijkstra, T., & vanHeuven, W. J. (2002). The architecture of the bilingual word recognition system: From identification to decision. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 5, 175–197. doi:10.1017/S1366728902003012; Dijkstra, T., Miwa, K., Brummelhuis, B., Sappelli, M., & Baayen, H. (2010). How cross-language similarity and task demands affect cognate recognition. Journal of Memory and Language, 62, 284–301. doi:10.1016/j.jml.2009.12.003]) into question, since it holds that letter positions are perfectly encoded. The aim of the present research was to further examine the way letter position is encoded during non-native reading by manipulating the deviant-letter position of European Portuguese (EP)-English (EN) cognate words.Method: To that purpose 288 stimuli (144 Portuguese-English translation words [72 cognates and 72 noncognates] and 144 pseudowords) were selected. Cognates were assigned to two experimental conditions according to deviant-letter position: 1) at end of the word (matriz-MATRIX); and 2) at the beginning of the word (coala-KOALA). A third condition varying both at the beginning and at the end (e.g., escala-SCALE) was also included as a control to test how the degree of cross-language overlap modulates the results. Twenty-eight proficient Portuguese-English bilinguals were asked to perform a masked priming lexical decision task in English.Results: The results revealed faster responses for cognates with greater degree of cross-language overlap (Conditions 1 and 2). More important, priming effects were not modulated by deviant-letter position, i.e., the size of priming was similar across condition 1 and 2.Conclusion: Although a priori, no amendments seems to be needed in the “front-end” of the coding scheme of the BIA+ model when cognate words are considered, future studies should be developed in order to explore if these results are restricted to outer deviant-letters.

A longitudinal study on the gradual cognate facilitation effect in bilingual children’s Frisian receptive vocabulary

ABSTRACTThis longitudinal study investigated to what extent the acquisition of cognates among bilingual children depends on the degree of cross-language similarity and intensity of exposure to the tested language, and whether children’s sensitivity to cognates with different degrees of cross-language similarity changes over time. For three consecutive years, 120 Frisian-Dutch bilingual children were tested on their Frisian receptive vocabulary. The sample was split into three groups that differed with respect to intensity of exposure to Frisian at home. In the receptive vocabulary task, cross-language similarity was systematically manipulated through four cognate categories, differing in their degree of overlap between Frisian and Dutch. The results showed a gradual cognate facilitation effect for children with a low intensity of exposure to Frisian. The higher the degree of cross-language similarity, the better their performance. This implies that the co-activation of the two languages depends on the degree of cross-language similarity. Over time, their performance improved the most on non-identical cognates with a cross-linguistic phonological regularity between Frisian and Dutch. This suggests that as they grow older, children with a low intensity of exposure to Frisian become better at recognizing regularities in the overlap of the Frisian and Dutch phonological systems.