Early Bilinguals Research Articles

ФРАГМЕНТ РАЗМЕТКИ В ЛИНГВИСТИЧЕСКОМ КОРПУСЕ RuTuBiC. ПЕРЕКЛЮЧЕНИЕ КОДА ИЛИ ЛЕКСИЧЕСКОЕ ЗАИМСТВОВАНИЕ?

The article presents a solution to one of the problems of special linguistic markup in the RuTuBiC corpus – the Russian Speech Corpus of Russian-Turkic Bilinguals, asso-ciated with error annotation at the lexical level. The corpus includes three subcorpuses representing materials of the Russian speech of Shor-Russian, Tatar-Russian and Khakass-Russian bilinguals. The article presents solutions developed on the basis of all subcorpuses; the illustrative contexts are drawn from the Shor-Russian subcorpus, recordings of interviews with 14 respondents, about 20 hours of sound. The recordings were made during expeditions to Shoria in 2017–2019. Bilingualism of the respondents is defined as early natural bilingualism with the dominance of the second Russian lan-guage, mother tongues are languages of the family heritage. The theoretical basis of the research was works on linguistic contact at the lexical level. Solutions based on the differentiation of lexemes fully mastered by the system of standard Russian and units with the status of borrowings from other subsystems of the national language and other languages are proposed. In the latter case, linguistic and contextual features are distin-guished that oppose lexical borrowing and code-switching. The typical errors singled out at the lexical level are: [LexId] – idiomatic expressions that are not fixed in the standard language (dialectal and vernacular, slang, etc.), they can also be Turkic calques; [LexSem] – general Russian words used in meanings different from those fixed in the normative sources; [LexSemAgr] – violations of the lexical and semantic agreement norms. The units borrowed from the mother tongue of the respondents are located on the scale of transitions from nuclear to borderline. The nuclear units marked with the [Lex] tag are dialectal units, common words, other word usage cases that are outside the standard, as well as borrowings from the Turkic languages that are not included in the dictionaries of standard Russian. On the border “to the left” are borrowings assimilated to different degrees. On the border “to the right” are non-assimilated borrowings and code-switches. The [CodeSw] marks code-switching, insertion of mother tongue elements into Russian speech. The author considers the inclusion of statements as nuclear cases of code-switching, and single lexical inclusions as transitional cases. Code-switching is evidenced by metatext and linguistic proper, primarily phonetic, indicators. There is an insignificant number of both lexical borrowings and cases of code-switching in the speech of the respondents of the RuTuBiC corpus, which depends on the type of bilingualism. The typicality of metatext marking of borrowings and code-switches is determined by the discursive, genre and thematic limitations of the corpus.

Speech behavior of bilingual primary school children in a multinational region

Historically, the Russian language has become a common means of communication in the Russian Federation. The Republic of Crimea is a place where the population is represented by a multinational community. At that, some areas are densely populated with a single nation, where children speak the Tatar language, that is, are essentially everyday bilinguals. The most characteristic type of bilingualism in Russia is the national Russian language, which is learned both through training and direct communication with the Russian-speaking population. Early everyday bilingualism is common when the assimilation of the native and Russian languages develops almost in parallel. The authors have received new information on the peculiarities of the acquisition of Russian and native Tatar languages in primary school children raised in a multilingual environment. It is proved that speech therapy examination of speech disorders in bilingual children should be conducted in two languages. The article presents developed recommendations for teaching bilingual children in a Russian-language school, depending on the degree of proficiency in Russian and the presence of speech disorders.

Supplemental Material for Early Bilingualism Predicts Enhanced Later Foreign Language Learning in Secondary School

Supplemental Material for Early Bilingualism Predicts Enhanced Later Foreign Language Learning in Secondary School

Executive functions in French-Greek early bilinguals: In search of the suggested bilingual advantage

Bilinguals must manage two languages on a daily basis, which requires, among other things, dealing with cross-linguistic interference. Such cognitive training is assumed to underlie better performance of bilinguals, relative to monolinguals, in non-verbal cognitive tasks. Ηowever, the suggested advantage has recently been questioned. The present study aimed at shedding light into this debate, focusing on French-Greek early bilingual adults. Exposure to two languages from the first few years of life has been suggested to favour the demonstration of an advantage. Bilinguals were compared to Greek-speaking monolingual adults (matched for age, gender, non-verbal intelligence, and SES) on executive function tasks, tapping switching, inhibition, and updating processes. Task demands were also manipulated. In line with the suggested advantage and as expected, in the switching paradigm, bilinguals performed faster overall and demonstrated a smaller mixing cost; this can be assumed to reflect better general monitoring and top-down processing for bilingual participants. In contrast, the groups did not differ on switching cost, neither on the inhibition and updating measures. Moreover, contrary to what was expected, the cognitive measures did not correlate with an index of how balanced bilingualism was. Findings do not support a general and robust cognitive advantage in a sample of early bilinguals. Factors that might influence its observation are discussed, along with lines of future research.

Examining Co-activation Through Cross-Linguistic Influence among Bilinguals in Spoken Language Processing: Evidence from Eye Movements

The aim of this paper is to examine the cross-linguistic influences of both early and late bilinguals in spoken language processing and the differences between them. There were four undergraduates, comprising of two early and two late bilinguals, participated voluntarily in this research. The Tobii X 300 was used as the equipment to be applied when measuring and recording the eye-movements of students. Four conditions, namely between competition, within competition, simultaneous competition, and no competition, were designed as the stimuli. Findings were coded as containing zero or greater-than-zero fixations of each condition (if it was present) along with their respective filler (control). The presence of competition can be measured by employing time course sensitive response measures which is the time to first fixation. The results of this study have illustrated through the presence of cross-linguistic influence in bilinguals that the two languages in the bilinguals mind exist in a state of co-activation regardless of their age of acquisition, consistent with previous studies conducted. However, the age of acquisition of a bilingual’s second language differentiates the type of cross-linguistic influence that a bilingual is likely to face when processing their second language. Keywords: Co-activation; cross-linguistic; early and late bilinguals; spoken language processing; eye tracking

Exploration of Attentional and Executive Abilities in French-Speaking Children Immersed in Dutch Since 1, 2, 3, and 6 Years.

Advantages in diverse aspects of cognitive functioning have been reported in early bilinguals (Bialystok, 2011) as well as in children frequenting an early bilingual immersion school program (Nicolay and Poncelet, 2015). However, during the last decade, some studies failed to replicate these advantages. Currently, the presence of cognitive benefits in children frequenting an immersion program remains debated. The lack of consistency between the studies could come from the fact that time spent by children within the immersion program is variable from one study to the other and that studies used different tasks to assess the same cognitive function. The main aim of the present study was to determine how time spent in immersion affects the emergence of cognitive advantages along the primary schooling. We compared 196 immersed Dutch-speaking children since they were 5 years old and 195 non-immersed French-speaking children, from different grades of the primary schooling (i.e., at 6, 7, 8, and 12 years old) by using the same attentional and executive tasks as those used in previous studies having shown a bilingual advantage. Furthermore, these groups were matched on a set of variables known to influence cognitive functioning. After 1, 2, and 3 years of enrolment in this program, performances of immersed compared to non-immersed children did not differ for any task. However, after 6 years, immersed children outperformed non-immersed children on the cognitive flexibility and the working memory tasks. These results show that, in French-speaking children immersed in Dutch, cognitive advantages could depend on the length of time spent in immersion since they are not present at the beginning (after 1, 2, and 3 years) but seem to emerge at the end of it (after 6 years). In contrast, in previous studies conducted in English immersion, advantages appear at the beginning of the primary schooling but are absent at the end of it. Furthermore, these results suggest that the emergence of cognitive advantages may vary depending on the second language learned. The results are discussed in terms of linguistic characteristics and status of the languages at stake.

A Phonetic Account of Spanish-English Bilinguals’ Divergence with Agreement

Does bilingual language influence in the domain of phonetics impact the morphosyntactic domain? Spanish gender is encoded by word-final, unstressed vowels (/a e o/), which may diphthongize in word-boundary vowel sequences. English neutralizes unstressed final vowels and separates across-word vocalic sequences. The realization of gender vowels as schwa, due to cross-linguistic influence, may remain undetected if not directly analyzed. To explore the potential over-reporting of gender accuracy, we conducted parallel phonetic and morphosyntactic analyses of read and semi-spontaneous speech produced by 11 Monolingual speakers and 13 Early and 13 Late Spanish-English bilinguals. F1 and F2 values were extracted at five points for all word-final unstressed vowels and vowel sequences. All determiner phrases (DPs) from narratives were coded for morphological and contextual parameters. Early bilinguals exhibited clear patterns of vowel centralization and higher rates of hiatuses than the other groups. However, the morphological analysis yielded very few errors. A follow-up integrated analysis revealed that /a and o/ were realized as centralized vowels, particularly with [+Animate] nouns. We propose that bilinguals’ schwa-like realizations can be over-interpreted as target Spanish vowels. Such variable vowel realization may be a factor in the vulnerability to attrition in gender marking in Spanish as a heritage language.

(Divergent) Participation in the California Vowel Shift by Korean Americans in Southern California

This study investigates the participation in the California Vowel Shift by Korean Americans in Los Angeles. Five groups of subjects participated in a picture narrative task: first-, 1.5-, and second-generation Korean Americans, Anglo-Californians, and (non-immigrant) Korean late learners of English. Results showed a clear distinction between early vs. late bilinguals; while the first-generation Korean Americans and the late learners showed apparent signs of Korean influence, the 1.5- and the second-generation Korean Americans participated in most patterns of the California Vowel Shift. However, divergence from the Anglo-Californians was observed in early bilinguals’ speech. Similar to the late bilinguals, the 1.5-generation speakers did not systematically distinguish prenasal and non-prenasal /æ/. The second-generation speakers demonstrated a split-/æ/ system, but it was less pronounced than for the Anglo-Californians. These findings suggest that age of arrival has a strong effect on immigrant minority speakers’ participation in local sound change. In the case of the second-generation Korean Americans, certain patterns of the California Vowel Shift were even more pronounced than for the Anglo-Californians (i.e., /ɪ/-lowering, /ɑ/-/ɔ/ merger, /ʊ/- and /ʌ/-fronting). Moreover, the entire vowel space of the second-generation Korean Americans, especially female speakers, was more fronted than that of the Anglo-Californians. These findings suggest that second-generation Korean Americans may be in a more advanced stage of the California Vowel Shift than Anglo-Californians or the California Vowel Shift is on a different trajectory for these speakers. Possible explanations in relation to second-generation Korean Americans’ intersecting gender, ethnic, and racial identities, and suggestions for future research are discussed.

Shared or Separate Representations? The Spanish Palatal Nasal in Early Spanish/English Bilinguals

The purpose of this study is to examine phonetic interactions in early Spanish/English bilinguals to see if they have established a representation for the Spanish palatal nasal /ɲ/ (e.g., /kaɲon/ cañón ‘canyon’) that is separate from the similar, yet acoustically distinct English /n+j/ sequence (e.g., /kænjn̩/ ‘canyon’). Twenty heritage speakers of Spanish completed a delayed repetition task in each language, in which a set of disyllabic nonce words were produced in a carrier phrase. English critical stimuli contained an intervocalic /n+j/ sequence (e.g., /dɛnjɑ/ ‘denya’) and Spanish critical stimuli contained intervocalic /ɲ/ (e.g., /deɲja/ ‘deña’). We measured the duration and formant contours of the following vocalic portion as acoustic indices of the /ɲ/~/n+j/ distinction. The duration data and formant contour data alike show that early bilinguals distinguish between the Spanish /ɲ/ and English /n+j/ in production, indicative of the maintenance of separate representations for these similar sounds and thus a lack of interaction between systems for bilinguals in this scenario. We discuss these discrete representations in comparison to previous evidence of shared and separate representations in this population, examining a set of variables that are potentially responsible for the attested distinction.

Does Critical Period Affect Bilingual Advantage for Working Memory and Metacognition?

There have been many studies exploring the advantages that bilingualism confers to individuals’ working memory and metacognition (see Ransdell, 2006; Del Missier et al., 2010). The hypothesis of language critical period states that if no language learning and teaching happen during the critical period, an individual will never be able to fully grasp any language to a full extent (Fromkin et al., 1974). This study investigates whether late bilingualism (second language acquisition after the critical period) will positively affect a person’s working memory and metacognition just like early bilingualism (second language acquisition before the critical period) does. Sixty Chinese persons between the ages of 18 and 35 participated in my online experimental protocol, including a language experience questionnaire, a reading comprehension exam, and a reading span task. I found that late bilingualism poses a similar advantage to an individual’s working memory as early bilingualism, while it negatively affects an individual’s metacognitive awareness of their own language ability. 

An examination of articulatory skill in monolinguals and multilinguals: A tongue twister experiment

The main goal of this study is to determine whether articulatory differences exist between monolinguals (n = 19) and bilinguals (n = 21) through the analysis of tongue-twister production, following Goldrick & Blumstein (2006). The latter were divided into early bilinguals (consistent exposure to both of their languages before age 5, n = 8), mid bilinguals (exposure to L2 between 5 and 10 years, n = 5), late bilinguals (L2 exposure between 10 and 15 years, n = 3) and trilinguals (n = 5).The stimuli comprised 64 sequences that each contained four syllables (e.g., kif tif tif kif) and had to be repeated three times to a beat of a metronome (150 beats per minute). The recordings were rated by a trained listener, who gave a score of 1 for each accurately produced onset and coda consonant, and a score of 0 otherwise. In addition, a subset of the sounds produced were manually aligned in Praat to validate the raters' scoring and determine whether speakers also differed in less perceptible aspects of speech. The results show that while there are no overall differences in accuracy between the two groups (monolingual versus multilingual), bilinguals who were first exposed to their second language later in life (between 5 and 15) exhibit a statistically significant advantage in the articulation of tongue-twisters (Dugaillard & Spinu, 2019). Our findings underscore the importance of directly measuring bilingual language proficiency and incorporating this information to experimental design (DelMaschio & Abutalebi 2018, Sulpizio et al. 2019).

Perceptual discrimination measure of non-native phoneme perception in early and late Spanish-English and Japanese-English bilinguals

This study examined speech discrimination of English vowels /ɑ/ (as in “hot”), /ʌ/ (as in “hut”), and /æ/ (as in “hat”) by non-native English speakers, using an AXB discrimination task. Previous research shows that a person’s first language (L1) changes how speech is perceived in a second learned language (L2). Spanish and Japanese were chosen for this study because both languages share the same five spectrally different vowels, but Japanese additionally distinguishes between short and long versions of those five vowels. L2 proficiency and/or amount of L2 input were used as additional predictor variables. The target populations were early and late Spanish-English bilinguals and early and late Japanese-English bilinguals, which were compared to a control group of monolingual American English speakers. We are currently collecting data and based on previous studies (Shafer et al., under review), we predict: (1) monolinguals and early-bilinguals will show better performance than late-bilinguals; (2) discrimination of /ʌ/ vs. /æ/ contrast will be easier than other contrasts, /ʌ/ vs. /ɑ/ and /ɑ/ vs. /æ/. Our findings will address how L1 spectral-temporal cues and L2 age of acquisition affect L2 speech perception.

Inter-sentential Code-switching and Language Dominance in Cantonese–English Bilingual Children

This paper examines the relationship between language dominance and the under-investigated topic of inter-sentential code-switching in Hong Kong Cantonese–English bilingual children. Longitudinal data for six children showing different dominance patterns were analysed. MLU differentials (Yip & Matthews, 2006) were adopted to measure dominance based on five criteria: methodological compatibility, typological comparability, gradient measurement, variance validity, and multifaceted compatibility. Our results showed that bilingual children produced more inter-sentential code-switching in the context of their non-dominant language and less in their dominant-language context. We account for this asymmetry in relation to mechanisms of inhibitory control (Gross & Kaushanskaya, 2015). Further, we propose that intrasentential and inter-sentential code-switching each have a different status in bilingual children’s developing grammar, underlining the methodological importance of separating the two constructs in future investigations. We also suggest that, in societies where intra-sentential code-switching is a social norm, inter-sentential code-switching could serve as signs of early bilinguals’ dominance status.

Establishing upper bounds in English monolingual and Heritage Spanish-English bilingual language development

ABSTRACT Quantificational elements such as some pose a challenge to young language learners, given their vague meaning and ability to take on an upper-bounded interpretation (relative to all) in certain contexts. The challenge is enhanced when a child is acquiring multiple languages that do not share a one-to-one mapping between their lexical entries with some. Such is the case with some in English and unos and algunos in Spanish. Indeed, Heritage Spanish-English bilinguals have been documented as diverging from monolingual children and adults in their interpretation of algunos, which is said to lexically encode this upper-bounded meaning, although early Heritage bilinguals do not demonstrate this knowledge robustly. In this article, we ask how pervasive this challenge is by (a) investigating whether the same pattern holds in English, where there are not two words for some, and (b) comparing the pragmatic process for some to other linguistic items that either invoke another pragmatic process (particularized conversational implicature) or a semantic upper bound. Our results strongly suggest that the extended process of fine-tuning of quantificational lexical entries within and across languages precedes a pragmatic comparison of alternatives, but at the same time, Heritage bilinguals demonstrate pragmatic awareness beyond generalized conversational implicatures.

Simulating Code-switching Using a Neural Network Model of Bilingual Sentence Production

Code-switching is the alternation from one language to the other during bilingual speech. We present a novel method of researching this phenomenon using computational cognitive modeling. We trained a neural network of bilingual sentence production to simulate early balanced Spanish–English bilinguals, late speakers of English who have Spanish as a dominant native language, and late speakers of Spanish who have English as a dominant native language. The model produced code-switches even though it was not exposed to code-switched input. The simulations predicted how code-switching patterns differ between early balanced and late non-balanced bilinguals; the balanced bilingual simulation code-switches considerably more frequently, which is in line with what has been observed in human speech production. Additionally, we compared the patterns produced by the simulations with two corpora of spontaneous bilingual speech and identified noticeable commonalities and differences. To our knowledge, this is the first computational cognitive model simulating the code-switched production of non-balanced bilinguals and comparing the simulated production of balanced and non-balanced bilinguals with that of human bilinguals.

Effect of Picture-Book Reading With Additive Audio on Bilingual Preschoolers' Prefrontal Activation: A Naturalistic Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy Study.

Acquiring a second language (L2) has the power to shape cognition and even the function and structure of the brain. Picture-book reading with additive audio (PRA) is a popular and convenient means of providing L2 exposure for non-balanced bilingual children; however, its contribution to bilingual children’s brain activity is unclear. This study conducted a rigorous bilingual word comprehension experiment and a naturalistic PRA task to explore the effect of L2 processing on brain activation among English as a foreign language (EFL) preschoolers, using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). We found that the two contexts of comprehending English words and bilingual switching (BS), which impose more cognitive control demands, activated the prefrontal cortex (PFC) more than did the condition of comprehending Chinese words. Furthermore, the effect of PFC activity in the condition of picture-book reading with additive English audio (English PRA) was also found to be greater than in the condition of picture-book reading with additive Chinese audio (Chinese PRA); moreover, the effect was modulated by story difficulty. Finally, a positive correlation was shown between EFL children’s English competence and PFC activation through English PRA. This study indicates that the experiences of hearing L2 auditory stories in a picture-book reading activity yielded significant changes to early bilinguals’ PFC functional for cognitive control and language processing.

CONCEPTUALLY CUED PERCEPTUAL CATEGORIZATION IN ADULT L2 LEARNERS

AbstractPrevious studies attest that early bilinguals can modify their perceptual identification according to the fine-grained phonetic detail of the language they believe they are hearing. Following Gonzales et al. (2019), we replicate the double phonemic boundary effect in late learners (LBs) using conceptual-based cueing. We administered a forced choice identification task to 169 native English adult learners of Spanish in two sessions. In both sessions, participants identified the same /b/-/p/ voicing continuum, but language context was cued conceptually using the instructions. The data were analyzed using Bayesian multilevel regression. Learners categorized the continuum in a similar manner when they believed they were hearing English. However, when they believed they were hearing Spanish, “voiceless” responses increased as a function of L2 proficiency. This research demonstrates the double phonemic boundary effect can be conceptually cued in LBs and supports accounts positing selective activation of independent perception grammars in L2 learning.

Probability of Heritage Language Use at a Supportive Early Childhood Setting in Australia

© Copyright © 2020 Escudero, Jones Diaz, Hajek, Wigglesworth and Smit. Despite well-established research that documents the intellectual, linguistic, sociocultural and familiar benefits of early childhood bilingualism, Australia's provision of heritage language (HL) support in early childhood (EC) settings is fairly minimal, resulting in little to no access to the HL outside of the home. We report on language data from a long day care preschool that has an open bilingual policy, where two languages (HL and English) are used in naturalistic interactions between children and educators. While the quantity of language input and output is known to impact on language proficiency, there are no prior studies which focus on establishing the quantitative nature of naturalistic language production in a bilingual preschool. Our goal was to document the relative language input and output of HL and English and to examine whether there are differences across age groups in the EC setting, and during different activity types. We followed a quantitative approach in data analysis, with child and educator observations over a period of 8 weeks and an analysis of targeted videos amounting to close to an hour of recordings per child. We used Bayesian modeling to test the probability of HL use in the different age groups and per activity type. Overall, HL input was higher for toddlers than preschoolers and toddlers received more HL input than English, while preschoolers received comparable input in both languages. The higher probability of HL input in toddlers was particularly evident during story time and playing activities. Our results indicate a high level of HL use in this EC setting, suggesting success in HL maintenance and promotion of early bilingualism. Further research should explore the children's relative language output in relation to their input, individual differences, as well as extending the current methodology to other similar settings in Australia.

Dynamic Language Network in Early and Late Cantonese-Mandarin Bilinguals.

The brain representation of language in bilinguals is sculptured by several factors, such as age of acquisition (AoA) and proficiency level (PL) in second language. Although the effect of AoA-L2 on brain function and structure has been studied, little attention is devoted to dynamic properties of the language network and their differences between early and late bilinguals. In this study, we acquired resting-state fMRI data from early and late Cantonese (L1)–Mandarin (L2) bilinguals with high PLs of verbal fluency in both languages. We then analyzed dynamic functional connectivity (dFC) by using the sliding-windows approach, estimated the dFC states by using the k-means clustering algorithm, and calculated the dynamic topological properties of the language network for the early and late bilinguals. We detected four dFC states, State 1, State 2, State 3, and State 4, which may be related to phonetic processing, semantic processing, language control, and syntactic processing, respectively. Compared to the late bilinguals, the early bilinguals showed higher dFC between the inferior frontal area and the temporal area in State 1 and State 2, while higher dFC between the cerebellum and other regions in State 3. The early bilinguals showed a higher clustering coefficient and local and global efficiency in State 1 and State 3, but lower characteristic path length in State 1, than the late bilinguals. Together, these results suggested that AoA-L2 affects temporal neural activation and dynamic topological properties of the language network. These findings provide new information to understand the effect of experience of L2 acquisition on language network in bilinguals.

Unharmonious early bilingualism in inter-ethnic Lithuanian emigrant familie

The article seeks to investigate the main reasons that cause inharmonious early bilingualism in inter-ethnic Lithuanian emigrant families. The data consist of extracts from 25 semi-structured interviews with Lithuanian women and Facebook comments of such emigrant mothers. Firstly, the study identifies the reasons why some informants themselves do not speak Lithuanian in their families, which leads to their children not even being able to understand it. These reasons can be lack of knowledge about the nature of early simultaneous bilingualism with a minority language, weak or negative attitudes towards Lithuanian and / or Lithuania, urgent need to fully integrate, influence of non-Lithuanian speaking partners, dominance of the majority language over bilingual mothers, and children’s passive bilingualism or insufficient comprehension skills. On their part, children can be growing up passively bilingual because of the minority language input shortage, not enough possibilities and real need to practice it in their daily lives, and because mothers tolerate bilingual conversations with certain discourse strategies. Finally, this paper examines the factors determining underdeveloped or attriting competences in the minority language. Children might be able to participate in very simple colloquial conversations in Lithuanian but cannot express themselves more freely in it or on different topics. They lack higher quality and more various input, e.g. through books or films in the Lithuanian language. They protest against minority language classes, where they could have a chance to learn to read and write in the minority language and further develop their skills. The analysis has revealed a variety of different reasons and their complex combinations that contribute to inharmonious bilingualism with Lithuanian as a minority language. They are objective and subjective, primary and secondary, sociolinguistic, psychological, pedagogical, and maybe some other reasons. A crucial role is played by mothers’ negative emotions in the face of struggles and children’s resistance, which also negatively affects success in bilingual child-rearing.