Language Dominance Research Articles

How Many Collocations do Heritage Speakers Know?

The current study examines a previously understudied dimension of heritage speakers’ lexical knowledge by focusing on verbal collocations. Two tests were designed in order to assess both receptive (recognition) and productive (recall) knowledge of sixty Spanish collocations. The collocations were divided into three types (congruent, partially congruent, and incongruent) based on a ratings survey that established their degree of correspondence with English. Participants’ language dominance and their use of Spanish in various daily activities were included as individual variables. The results indicate that the participants knew a vast majority of the collocations on the recognition test, but that their ability to recall the collocations was somewhat more limited. Congruency had a significant effect on participants’ performance, but this finding must be interpreted in light of the interaction between congruency and word frequency. Significant correlations were found between performance on both tests and language dominance, as well as a number of variables involving interaction in Spanish (text messaging) and exposure (listening to music, reading for fun). These data are discussed in relation to previous studies on the acquisition of collocations and heritage speakers’ knowledge of individual words.

Electrophysiology reflects the influence of discourse context on auditory semantic processing in bilinguals.

Most language experiences take place at the level of multiple sentences. However, previous studies of second language (L2) comprehension have typically focused on lexical- and sentence-level processing. Our study addresses this gap by examining auditory discourse comprehension in 32 English/French bilinguals. We tested the prediction of the noisy channel model (Futrell & Gibson, 2017) that bilinguals will rely more on top-down, discourse-level cues in L2 because these are common across languages, as opposed to the language-specific associations of an often weaker L2. We further hypothesized that these effects could be influenced by individual differences, such that participants with lower L2 proficiency or working memory would have more difficulty building and maintaining discourse context. Specifically, we measured the N400 response, an index of automatic semantic processing. Participants heard three-sentence stories with prime and target words in the final sentence whose lexical association was manipulated, as was the congruence of the target with the preceding discourse. Overall, our results support the noisy channel model of language comprehension in a sample of highly proficient bilinguals. We observed larger N400 effects of discourse congruence than lexical association, and the difference between these 2 conditions was greater in the L2 than in the L1. Additionally, the effects of lexical association were limited to the L1 and predicted by individual differences in language dominance but not working memory. These findings suggest that bilinguals do indeed make greater use of top-down, supralinguistic information in their L2 compared with their L1. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Fibre-specific laterality of white matter in left and right language dominant people

Language is the most commonly described lateralised cognitive function, relying more on the left hemisphere compared to the right hemisphere in over 90% of the population. Most research examining the structure-function relationship of language lateralisation only included people showing a left language hemisphere dominance. In this work, we applied a state-of-the-art "fixel-based" analysis approach, allowing statistical analysis of white matter micro- and macrostructure on a fibre-specific level in a sample of participants with left and right language dominance (LLD and RLD). Both groups showed a similar extensive pattern of white matter lateralisation including a comparable leftwards lateralisation of the arcuate fasciculus, regardless of their functional language lateralisation. These results suggest that lateralisation of language functioning and the arcuate fasciculus are driven by independent biases. Finally, a significant group difference of lateralisation was detected in the forceps minor, with a leftwards lateralisation in LLD and rightwards lateralisation for the RLD group.

Predicting mother and child emotional availability in Singaporean bilingual English and Mandarin dyads: A multilevel approach to the specificity principle

When interacting with one another, bilingual caregivers and their young bilingual children can switch from one language to another to convey emotion and information in meaningful ways. The Specificity Principle (Bornstein, 2017) states that specific setting conditions affect specific outcomes in specific ways in specific individuals at specific times. Here we tested three constituents of the Specificity Principle: We evaluated how the language used in interaction (setting condition) differentially affects different dimensions of emotional availability (outcomes) in mothers and children (individuals). Twenty-six Singaporean English-Mandarin bilingual mother-child dyads (Mother M age = 33 years; Child M age = 19 months) participated in two counterbalanced play sessions, one exclusively in English and one exclusively in Mandarin. Using recursive-partitioning analyses, we assessed (i) how child language dominance, dimensions of maternal emotional availability, and mother-child physiological synchrony accounted for dimensions of child emotional availability and (ii) how child language dominance, child emotional availability, and mother-child physiological synchrony accounted for overall maternal emotional availability. In agreement with predictions from the Specificity Principle, our results show that different predictors of different dimensions of child and mother emotional availability differ according to whether the mother interacted with her child in the child's dominant or non-dominant language. The findings suggest that language specificity influences the quality of mother-child interactions.

What Cognates Reveal about Default Language Selection in Bilingual Sentence Production.

When producing connected speech, bilinguals often select a default-language as the primary force driving the utterance. The present study investigated the cognitive mechanisms underlying default language selection. In three experiments, Spanish-English bilinguals named pictures out of context, or read aloud sentences with a single word replaced by a picture with a cognate (e.g., lemon-limón) or noncognate name (e.g., table-mesa). Cognates speeded naming and significantly reduced switching costs. Critically, cognate effects were not modulated by sentence context. However, switch costs were larger in sentence context, which also exhibited significant language dominance effects, asymmetrical switch costs, and asymmetrical cognate facilitation effects, which were absent or symmetrical respectively in bare picture naming. These results suggest that default-language selection is driven primarily by boosting activation of the default language, not by proactive inhibition of the nondefault language. However, relaxation of proactive control in production of connected speech leads to greater reliance on reactive control to produce language switches relative to out-of-context naming, a contextually driven dynamic tradeoff in language control mechanisms.

Executive function, language dominance and literacy skills in Spanish-speaking language-minority children: A longitudinal study

In the United States, children whose home language is Spanish are at increased risk for the development of reading difficulties. Studies have reported a link between executive function (EF) and reading; few studies have examined this linkage in Spanish-speaking language-minority (LM) children. This longitudinal study examined the association between preschool EF and kindergarten reading-related skills in 241 Spanish-speaking LM children (M-age in preschool = 54.23 months, SD = 6.17). In preschool, children completed measures of inhibitory control (IC) and working memory (WM) in their dominant language, and early literacy skills in Spanish and English. In the fall of their kindergarten year, children completed code- and language-related literacy measures in both languages. A 2-factor model (IC and WM) accounted for children's preschool EF. Most zero-order correlations between EF factors and kindergarten outcomes in Spanish (rs = 0.03-0.40) and English (rs = 0.05-0.35) were statistically significant. For English-language outcomes, WM was more strongly associated with code-related skills and IC with language-related skills; for Spanish-language outcomes, WM was more strongly related to both code- and language-related skills than IC. There was little difference in the associations between EF and reading outcomes based on the language in which EF was measured (i.e., the child's dominant language). When controlling for early literacy skills in the same language as the kindergarten outcomes, EF contributed significant unique variance to kindergarten skills in English but not in Spanish. For Spanish language outcomes, early literacy skills appear to mediate the role of preschool EF. The results suggest that children's development in cognitive domains, such as EF, may have an important role in the acquisition of core early reading skills for Spanish-speaking LM children.

Preoperative assessment of language dominance through combined resting-state and task-based functional magnetic resonance imaging

Preoperative assessment of language dominance through combined resting-state and task-based functional magnetic resonance imaging

Corpus Callosum Diffusion Anisotropy and Hemispheric Lateralization of Language in Patients with Brain Arteriovenous Malformations.

Background: The corpus callosum (CC) plays a key role in mediating interhemispheric connectivity and developing functional hemispheric asymmetries. The purpose of this study was to investigate the changes in CC microstructure accompanying interhemispheric language reorganization in patients with brain arteriovenous malformations (AVMs). Methods: Forty-one patients with an unruptured AVM located in anatomically defined language areas underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging and diffusion tensor imaging. Hemispheric dominance in Broca's area (BA) and Wernicke's area (WA) was assessed separately. Right-sided or bilateral language dominance was classified as atypical lateralization. The CC was segmented into five subregions, and the mean fractional anisotropy (FA) was extracted. The relationship between callosal FA and language lateralization patterns was statistically analyzed. Results: We observed atypical language lateralization in 16 (39.0%) patients. Patients with atypical lateralization exhibited significantly higher mean FA values in the total CC (p = 0.002) and the anterior (p = 0.047), midanterior (p = 0.001), and midposterior (p = 0.043) subregions. Significant interaction effects of BA and WA lateralization were found for FA values in the total CC (p = 0.005) and the midanterior subregion (p = 0.004). Conclusions: These results indicate that AVM patients with atypical language lateralization exhibit higher callosal FA values, reflecting greater interhemispheric connectivity. Our findings contribute additional insights into the understanding of functional and structural plasticity of the human brain under pathological states. Impact statement Brain arteriovenous malformations (AVMs) are congenital lesions that frequently lead to interhemispheric language reorganization. In this study, by combining diffusion tensor imaging and functional magnetic resonance imaging, we investigated the relationship between callosal fractional anisotropy (FA) and language reorganization in patients with AVMs. We found that callosal FA was significantly higher in patients with atypical language lateralization, especially in those with crossed lateralization of Broca's and Wernicke's areas. This study demonstrated the remodeling of the corpus callosum microstructure accompanying language reorganization in AVM patients, providing insights into the structural and functional plasticity of the human brain associated with congenital cerebrovascular disease.

Leísmo or fake-leísmo? New Insights into Catalan Contact Spanish from the FEC Corpus

The aim of this study is to describe the use of the pronouns le and les in the Spanish spoken in the province of Barcelona. We analyzed a sample of 12 reading tasks and 22 oral interviews taken from two corpora: the FEC (Fonología del Español Contemporáneo, Pustka et alii 2018) corpus (with mainly Catalan-dominant bilingual speakers) and the Corpus oral de profesionales de la lengua castellana en Barcelona (Sinner 2001, with mainly Spanish-dominant bilinguals). In doing so, we took into account several linguistic variables as well as language dominance of the speakers in order to find out 1) if there is leísmo in Catalan Contact Spanish (although there is no equivalent of leísmo in Catalan) and if so, 2) which features of the referent and of the verb trigger leísmo in this variety, and 3) if Catalan-dominant bilinguals produce leísmo to a lesser extent. While the results of the reading task suggest that leísmo is not absent in the Spanish of Barcelona, there are only a few cases of leísmo in spontaneous speech in both corpora. Regarding the linguistic variables, we see that on the one hand, leísmo is not restricted to leísmo correcto in our corpora; on the other hand, the majority are fake-leismo cases. Thus, our data seem to suggest that the Spanish of Barcelona is only a fake-leísmo variety. Regarding the language dominance, however, we find that Catalan-dominant bilinguals do not produce fewer cases of leísmo, since the leísmo rate is higher in the FEC corpus.

Mixed Codes in Mindy Cake & Cookies Recipe Book by Mindy Mot

This study aims to find out understanding and analyzing the forms of code mixing, the types and factors of code mixing happened in this book was written by Mindy Mot. The technique of data collection used literate study. The method of this research used descriptive qualitative method. The object of this research is “The Mindy Cake & Cookies” as a recipe book written by Mindy Mot. The result showed that there were words and phrases form of code mixing in the recipe book “Mindy Cake & Cookies” by Mindy Mot. The type of code mixing in this book was named as code mixing out. In this book, there was no mixed code found because Mindy Mot did not insert the regional languages in her book. The writing of the recipe book used Indonesian which was inserted into English therefore it was found an only code mixing out. The factors caused the mixing of codes in “Mindy Cake & Cookies” recipe book by Mindy Mot are the perception of the author’s language background, language dominance, language attitude, psycholinguistic motivation, commercialization for the target market.

Translation distractors facilitate production in single- and mixed-language picture naming

ABSTRACT In the picture-word interference (PWI) task, semantically related distractors slow production, while translation-equivalent distractors speed it, possibly implying a language-specific bilingual production system [Costa, A., Miozzo, M., & Caramazza, A. (1999). Lexical selection in bilinguals: Do words in the bilingual's two lexicons compete for selection? Journal of Memory and Language, 41(3), 365–397. https://doi.org/10.1006/jmla.1999.2651]. However, in most previous PWI studies bilinguals responded in just one language, an artificial task restriction. We investigated translation facilitation effects in PWI with language switching. Spanish-English bilinguals named pictures in single- or mixed-language-response blocks, with superimposed distractors in the target language (Experiment 1), or in the non-target language (Experiment 2). Both experiments replicated previously reported translation facilitation effects in both single-language and mixed-language-response blocks. However, language dominance was reversed in mixed-language response blocks, implying inhibition of the dominant language and competition between languages. These results may be explained by a language non-specific selection model in which bilinguals do not restrict selection to one language, with translation facilitation being caused by facilitation at the semantic level offsetting competition at the lexical level.

Language indexicalities in multilingual English language classrooms: A narrative inquiry

Language indexicality is the major problem in multilingual classrooms. Students from minority language communities may feel dominated in the classroom due to the lack of competency in the dominant languages used in the classroom. I have been dealing with such diversified classes for a long time and my teaching experience motivated me to carry out this research. This study tried to explore the nature of language dominance in a multilingual English language classroom and how students of minority community feel in the classroom. I used narrative inquiry as the main research design and purposive sampling procedure for sampling the participants and research site. Language dominance in the multilingual classroom was found problematic for minority community students. They mainly feel dominated in the classroom and do not enjoy studying in the classroom. The study also found that minority language learners are demotivated to take part in classroom interaction. Inappropriate use of dominating language by the teachers also found more problematic in the study. The study concluded that use of dominant language heavily in the multilingual classroom creates problem rather than helping those students who have different mother tongues.

Efeitos de dominância linguística e de tempo de exposição formal à língua na produção de pronomes clíticos por crianças bilingues português/francês

This study investigates the effects of two external linguistic variables – language dominance and time of formal exposure – on the production and placement of clitic pronouns of Portuguese-French bilingual children. Using two elicited production tasks and a parental sociolinguistic questionnaire, we show that language dominance plays a role in rates of omission and rates of clitic production. On the other hand, a higher time of formal exposure to Portuguese does not determine better performance neither in what concerns clitic omission nor clitic placement in Portuguese-French bilingual children.

Validity of parents’ classifications of bilingual children’s language dominance

ABSTRACT Bilingual children’s dominance can predict a variety of language and cognitive outcomes. The purpose of this study was to test the validity of parents’ classifications of 3- to 6-year-old bilingual children’s dominance against relative receptive vocabulary scores. In Study 1, the parents’ classifications of Mandarin-English bilingual children’s dominance corresponded to relative vocabulary scores only for children reported to be very Mandarin dominant. Similar results were obtained in Study 2 with French-English bilinguals and very French dominant children. We argue these results reflect well-known estimation processes and that asking parents to judge each language separately might yield more valid results.

Adolescent language outcomes in a complex trilingual context: When typical does not mean unproblematic

This study examined the long-term language outcomes of adolescents in the complex multilingual context of Iceland, where children learn Icelandic as a first (L1) or second language (L2), in a background of incidental English from internet and media sources. Method50 adolescents enrolled in grades 8, 9 and 10 in Reykjavik (Iceland) public schools (27 L1 speakers and 23 L2 speakers) participated. Standardized language tests and language samples were collected in Icelandic and English. Self-ratings and parent ratings of language proficiency were obtained in Icelandic, English and, for L2 speakers, in the home language as well. ResultsAs in previous studies, L2 speakers scored far below L1 speakers on formal tests of Icelandic, and also in conversation. The groups were similar in their English skills, with both groups scoring far below L1 English norms. Self-rated performance agreed well with measured performance. For the L2 speakers, self-rated performance in the home language was similar to performance in Icelandic and English. L1 speakers demonstrated much higher performance in Icelandic than English; L2 speakers’ performance was more evenly distributed over their three languages. DiscussionThe considerable English exposure available in Iceland leads to similar English skills for both L1 and L2 groups, but affects their overall language development in different ways. L1 adolescents maintain a clear dominance in Icelandic, whereas the proficiency of the L2 group is more equally distributed across their three languages, leading to unpredictable patterns of language dominance and at the group level, low performance compared to native speaker expectations in all three languages. These language outcomes in adolescence are of great concern as they do not equip the L2 speakers with the functional communication skills they require for further schooling and jobs. The study calls for a reconsideration of typical multilingual outcomes as necessarily implying unproblematic language skills and suggest that language policy changes are required in Iceland to ensure that children graduate compulsory education with solid language skills that allow them to pursue their goals.

A Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Approach for Language Laterality Assessment in Young Children.

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is a usable technique to determine hemispheric dominance of language function, but high-quality fMRI images are difficult to acquire in young children. Here we aimed to develop and validate an fMRI approach to reliably determine hemispheric language dominance in young children. We designed two new tasks (story, SR; Letter picture matching, LPM) that aimed to match the interests and the levels of cognitive development of young children. We studied 32 healthy children (6–10 years old, median age 8.7 years) and seven children with epilepsy (7–11 years old, median age 8.6 years) and compared the lateralization index of the new tasks with those of a well-validated task (verb generation, VG) and with clinical measures of hemispheric language dominance. A conclusive assessment of hemispheric dominance (lateralization index ≤-0.2 or ≥0.2) was obtained for 94% of the healthy participants who performed both new tasks. At least one new task provided conclusive language laterality assessment in six out of seven participants with epilepsy. The new tasks may contribute to assessing language laterality in young and preliterate children and may benefit children who are scheduled for surgical treatment of disorders such as epilepsy.

Asymmetry and Directionality in Catalan–Spanish Contact: Intervocalic Fricatives in Barcelona and Valencia

Multilingual communities often exhibit asymmetry in directionality by which the majority language exerts greater influence on the minority language. In the case of Spanish in contact with Catalan, the asymmetry of directionality, favoring stronger influence of Spanish as a majority language over Catalan, is complicated by the unique sociolinguistic statuses afforded to different varieties of Catalan. In order to empirically substantiate the social underpinnings of directionality in language contact settings, the present study examines the variable voicing and devoicing of intervocalic alveolar fricatives in Spanish, Barcelonan Catalan, and Valencian Catalan as processes that are historically endogenous and equally linguistically motivated in both languages. Intervocalic fricatives in both languages were elicited using a phrase-list reading task, alongside sociolinguistic interviews for attitudinal data, administered to 96 Catalan–Spanish bilinguals stratified by gender, age, and language dominance in Barcelona and Valencia, Spain. Patterns of sociolinguistic stratification consistent with community-level changes in progress favoring either Catalan-like voicing or Spanish-like devoicing varied by community, with a stronger influence of Catalan on Spanish in Barcelona and Spanish on Catalan in Valencia. These asymmetries, corroborated by attitudinal differences afforded to Catalan and Spanish in Barcelona and Valencia, ultimately reinforce the role of social factors in language contact outcomes.

SURG-08. AWAKE CRANIOTOMY WITH BRAIN MAPPING FOR DIFFUSE LOW-GRADE GLIOMA: CASE REPORT OF INSTITUTIONAL EXPERIENCE IN OVERCOMING HURDLES IN A LOW-RESOURCE SETTING

Abstract Maximal safe resection of low-grade gliomas located in functional areas of the cortex while avoiding postsurgical neurologic deficits can be achieved by awake craniotomy with brain mapping. The effectiveness of this surgical technique is fairly established in the developed world, however it remains to be routinely applied in low-middle income countries due to limited resources and lack of equipment. We present the case of a 44 year-old, right-handed male who had a 2-year history of focal aware motor seizures but was otherwise neurologically intact. Neuropsychological testing revealed no cognitive impairment. Cranial magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) revealed a non-enhancing, ill-defined tumor centered on the left insula and extending into the frontotemporal opercula, corona radiata, and posterior limb of the internal capsule—hypointense by T1-weighted sequence and hyperintense by T2-weighted sequence, thus radiographically consistent with diffuse low-grade glioma. Blood-oxygen-level-dependent functional MRI revealed left hemispheric language dominance in the cortex overlying the tumor, but with no motor cortex involvement. The patient underwent a protocol-driven awake craniotomy, intraoperative positive brain mapping using standard cortical stimulator, transsylvian and transcortical transopercular microsurgical approaches to achieve greater than 80% excision of the tumor. Postoperatively, the patient was seizure-free and with similar neurocognitive status prior to the surgery. The patient had been following up for standard adjuvant chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Avoidance of postsurgical neurologic deficits and maximal cytoreduction can still be achieved by awake craniotomy with brain mapping in settings with limited resources. Despite the lack of other perioperative tools and adjuncts such as diffusion tensor imaging, intraoperative ultrasonography, and even intraoperative MRI that are routinely available in high-resource settings, we illustrate in this case that comparable outcomes could be achieved by overcoming hurdles and aiming for the asymptote to the up-to-date and ideal neurosurgical treatment for diffuse low-grade gliomas.

Evaluating the performance of the visual half field paradigm as a screening tool to detect right hemispheric language dominance

ABSTRACT Language is among the most studied functional asymmetries, yet little is known about right hemispheric language dominance. Because of its low prevalence, including a big sample of individuals with this variant of brain organization implies testing large groups, which may not be feasible when using expensive techniques. One solution involves screening a large sample using a cost-efficient method and next inviting only those participants flagged as potentially right dominant for follow-up investigation. The behavioural visual half field paradigm has previously been validated and successfully applied in this manner. We report a large-scale visual half field screening performed in 315 left-handers to detect such individuals for subsequent MRI scanning. Of 38 cases selected as probably right language dominant based on a left visual half field advantage (>20 ms), 22 (58%) were confirmed by language fMRI to be rightward lateralized. This study also explored means to improve the predictive performance of the visual half field task. While we found its performance depended strongly on the chosen cut-off, overall, reaction time criteria resulted in higher true positive rates, while those based on accuracy led to superior positive predictive values. The most optimal strategy, however, may involve combining criteria considering both accuracy and reaction time.

Patient Preparation and Paradigm Design in fMRI.

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is useful for localizing eloquent cortex in the brain prior to neurosurgery. Language and motor paradigms offer a wide range of tasks to test brain regions within the language and motor networks. With the help of fMRI, hemispheric language dominance can be determined. It also is possible to localize specific motor and sensory areas within the motor and sensory gyri. These findings are critical for presurgical planning. The most important factor in presurgical fMRI is patient performance. Patient interview and instruction time are crucial to ensure that patients understand and comply with the fMRI paradigm.