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At least 631 records · Page 35Linked to original sources
PubMed2005

Forced-choice analysis of segmental production by Chinese-accented English speakers.

This study describes the development of a minimal-pairs word list targeting phoneme contrasts that pose difficulty for Mandarin Chinese-speaking learners of English as a second language. The target phoneme inventory was compiled from analysis of phonetic transcriptions of about 800 mono- and polysyllabic English words with examples of all the vowels, diphthongs, and syllable onsets and codas of the language. The Mandarin-specific minimal-pairs list derived from the phonetic transcription analyses contains 190 items. Tape recordings were made of 8 Mandarin speakers reading a randomized version of target items from the minimal-pairs list and a set of 20 sentences. Listeners who were native American English speakers judged the words in a forced-choice task and wrote down what they understood of the sentences. Correlations between listener responses on the forced-choice task and the sentence intelligibility scores showed differences in the strength of the relationship with sentence intelligibility across categories of minimal-pairs contrasts. Multiple regression analysis found listener responses on the minimal-pairs task to account for approximately 76% of the variance in speakers' sentence intelligibility scores, showing that performance on the minimal pairs of the probe list does predict connected speech intelligibility. Analyses of individual contrasts indicate target phonemes most often misperceived by native listeners.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2005

Preschoolers learning Hmong and English: lexical-semantic skills in L1 and L2.

Picture naming and picture identification tasks were used to investigate lexical-semantic skills in young children learning Hmong as a first language (L1) and English as a second language (L2). A total of 19 children, ages 3;4 (years;months)-5;2, participated in this study. Performance on lexical tasks was analyzed as a function of development (older and younger participants), language (Hmong and English), modality (receptive and expressive skills), and the nature of total or "composite" vocabulary scores (translation equivalents or singles, reflecting comparable forms in both languages as compared to concepts lexicalized into only 1 language). Older participants outperformed younger participants in English, but not Hmong, indicating a relative stabilization of L1 skills, alongside more robust growth in L2. The difference between expressive and receptive performance was also much greater in Hmong than English. Composite scores were always greater than single language scores and the proportion of translation equivalents increased with age.

Analysis of Variance↗
PubMed2006

Lexical-semantic organization in bilingual children: evidence from a repeated word association task.

PURPOSE: This study examined lexical-semantic organization of bilingual children in their 2 languages and in relation to monolingual age-mates. METHOD: Twelve Mandarin-English bilingual and 12 English monolingual children generated 3 associations to each of 36 words. Responses were coded as paradigmatic (dog-cat) or syntagmatic (dog-bark). RESULTS: Within the bilingual group, word association performance was comparable and correlated between 1st and 2nd languages. Bilingual and monolingual children demonstrated similar patterns of responses, but subtle group differences were also revealed. When between-group comparisons were made on English measures, there was a bilingual advantage in paradigmatic responding during the 1st elicitation and for verbs. CONCLUSION: Results support previous studies in finding parallel development in bilinguals' 1st- and 2nd-language lexical-semantic skills and provide preliminary evidence that bilingualism may enhance paradigmatic organization of the semantic lexicon.

Analysis of Variance↗
PubMed2006

Action naming in Spanish and English by sequential bilingual children and adolescents.

PURPOSE: Verb processing in early sequential Spanish-English bilinguals was investigated. Primary study goals were to identify potential patterns of development in relative levels of verb processing efficiency in a 1st (L1) and 2nd (L2) language and to investigate factors influencing cognitive control of the dual-language system in developing bilinguals. METHOD: Four age groups of early sequential Spanish-English bilinguals (5-7 years, 8-10 years, 11-13 years, and 14-16 years of age) named action pictures in single-language (Spanish or English) and mixed-language (alternating Spanish and English) conditions. Dependent variables were accuracy and response time (RT). RESULTS: Action-naming proficiency improved in both L1 and L2 with age, with a shift from L1 to L2 dominance in accuracy. In comparison with the single-language condition, the mixed-language condition engendered slower RT for all age groups and lower accuracy for the 3 younger age groups. The oldest age group did not show accuracy difference between the conditions. CONCLUSIONS: These general patterns of verb processing across age, language, and processing conditions replicated and enriched previous findings of noun processing in similar populations (K. J. Kohnert, E. Bates, & A. E. Hernandez, 1999). However, verb processing was considerably slower and less accurate than noun processing. Theoretical and applied implications of these findings are discussed.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2006

Complementing behavioral measures with electrophysiological measures in diagnostic evaluation: a case study in two languages.

This case study focuses on a bilingual, older man who spoke Polish and English and showed weaknesses on clinical measures of dichotic listening in English. It was unclear whether these test results were influenced by the participant's facility with his second language or by other nonauditory factors. To elucidate the nature of this deficit, the authors examined behavioral and electrophysiological responses during dichotic-listening tasks involving linguistic processing in both languages. A diotic (control) condition was included to examine whether nonauditory factors, such as language familiarity, memory, or decline in speed of mental processing, might explain the dichotic results. The results from this participant were compared with those obtained from a bilingual young adult who also spoke both Polish and English. Results showed a substantial left-ear deficit for the older individual on both behavioral and electrophysiological measures of dichotic listening. The pattern of results is consistent with previous findings in demonstrating that the left-ear deficit in this patient derived from an auditory-specific defect rather than from any of the extra-auditory factors associated with language facility or cognitive decline.

Acoustic Stimulation↗
PubMed2006

Effect of semantic naming treatment on crosslinguistic generalization in bilingual aphasia.

PURPOSE: The effect of semantic naming treatment on crosslinguistic generalization was investigated in 3 participants with English-Spanish bilingual aphasia. METHOD: A single-subject experimental designed was used. Participants received semantic treatment to improve naming of English or Spanish items, while generalization was tested to untrained semantically related items in the trained language and translations of the trained and untrained items in the untrained language. RESULTS: Results demonstrated a within- and across-languages effect on generalization related to premorbid language proficiencies. Participant 1 (P1; equal premorbid proficiency across languages) showed within-language generalization in the trained language (Spanish) as well as crosslinguistic generalization to the untrained language (English). Participant 2 (P2) and Participant (P3) were more proficient premorbidly in English. With treatment in English, P2 showed within-language generalization to semantically related items, but no crosslinguistic generalization. With treatment in Spanish, both P2 and P3 exhibited no within-language generalization, but crosslinguistic generalization to English (dominant language) occurred. Error analyses indicated an evolution of errors as a consequence of treatment. CONCLUSIONS: These results are preliminary because all participants were not treated in both languages. However, the results suggest that training the less dominant language may be more beneficial in facilitating crosslinguistic generalization than training the more proficient language in an unbalanced bilingual individual.

Aphasia↗
PubMed2006

Perception of individuals with voice disorders by monolingual English, bilingual Cantonese-English, and bilingual Russian-English women.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to examine the attitudes of monolingual English, bilingual Cantonese-English, and bilingual Russian-English speakers toward individuals with voice disorders. METHOD: In a mixed experimental design, a total of 30 older and 29 younger female listeners from the 3 language groups rated the voices of 10 females, each with a mild, moderate, or severe voice disorder or with no voice disorder. A semantic differential scale was used to rate the speakers on 21 attributes. RESULTS: Results indicate that the perception of individuals became increasingly negative as the severity of the disorder increased. Results also indicate that Cantonese-English bilinguals rated the individuals with severe voice disorders more negatively than did English monolinguals and that the language groups differed in their ratings for the attributes of beautiful, lovable, clean, and young. There was no overall effect of age of listener. CONCLUSION: The study demonstrates that although the language groups were uniform in ascribing more negative attributes to individuals as severity of the disorder increased, there were also significant differences between the groups. Exploration of these issues provides information useful to clinicians in setting priorities for intervention that take into account individuals' backgrounds as well as clinical factors.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1997

Age of second-language acquisition and perception of speech in noise.

To determine how age of acquisition influences perception of second-language speech, the Speech Perception in Noise (SPIN) test was administered to native Mexican-Spanish-speaking listeners who learned fluent English before age 6 (early bilinguals) or after age 14 (late bilinguals) and monolingual American-English speakers (monolinguals). Results show that the levels of noise at which the speech was intelligible were significantly higher and the benefit from context was significantly greater for monolinguals and early bilinguals than for late bilinguals. These findings indicate that learning a second language at an early age is important for the acquisition of efficient high-level processing of it, at least in the presence of noise.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1999

Balancing bilinguals: lexical-semantic production and cognitive processing in children learning Spanish and English.

The present study investigated developmental changes in lexical production skills in early sequential bilinguals, in both Spanish (L1) and English (L2), exploring the effects of age, years of experience, and basic-level cognitive processing (specifically the ability to resist interference) within a timed picture-naming task. To assess resistance to interference, naming was compared in low competition (blocked-single language) vs. high competition (mixed-alternating language) conditions. Participants were 100 individuals, 20 at each of 5 different age levels (5-7, 8-10, 11-13, 14-16, & young adults). All had learned Spanish as a first language in the home, with formal English experience beginning at 5 years. Gains were made in both languages across age. However, there was a developmental crossover from Spanish dominance in the youngest children, through a period of relatively balanced Spanish and English skills in middle childhood, culminating in a clear pattern of English dominance among adolescents and young adults. Although all groups experienced a greater slowing of response times in the mixed-language condition relative to the blocked-language condition, developmental changes in the pattern of speed-accuracy trade-offs in the mixed condition can be interpreted to reflect a change in the ability to resist cognitive interference during word production.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2000

Observed and reported expressive vocabulary and word combinations in bilingual toddlers.

The consistency of parental reports of expressive vocabulary and word combinations with observed expressive language among 21- to 27-month-old children exposed to English and Spanish on a regular basis was the focus of this investigation. Parental reports were obtained using the Spanish-English Vocabulary Checklist (Patterson, 1998), an adaptation of the Language Development Survey (Rescorla, 1989). The number of different words parents reported was correlated (r = .66) with the number of different words the children used during a 30-min videotaped interaction with the reporting parent. Parental reports of whether the child was combining words and estimates of proportion of the child's use of Spanish and English also were consistent with the children's language use during the 30-min language samples.

Child Language↗