No abstract

No abstract

This study investigated whether the effect of exposure to code‐switching on bilingual children's language performance varied depending on verbal working memory (WM). A large sample of school‐aged Spanish–English bilingual children (N = 174, Mage = 7.78) was recruited, and children were administered language measures in English and Spanish. The frequency with which the children were exposed to code‐switching was gathered through parent report. For children with high verbal WM, greater exposure to code‐switching was associated with higher levels of language ability. In contrast, for children with lower verbal WM, greater exposure to code‐switching was associated with lower levels of language ability. These findings indicate that children's cognitive processing capacity dictates whether exposure to code‐switching facilitates or hinders language skills.

No abstract

Code‐switching occurs regularly in the input to bilingual children. Yet, the effect of code‐switched input on language development is unclear. To test whether word learning would be affected by code‐switching, Spanish–English bilingual children (N = 45, 19 boys, MeanAge = 5.05 years; ethnicity: 37 Hispanic/Latino, six Non‐Hispanic/Latino, two unreported) were taught English‐like novel words in two conditions. In the English‐only condition, definitions for novel words were provided entirely in English. In the code‐switch condition, definitions for novel words were provided in English and Spanish, incorporating code‐switches. Children required fewer exposures to retain novel words in the code‐switch than the English‐only condition and this effect was not moderated by children's language ability or exposure to code‐switching, suggesting that code‐switched input does not pose word‐learning risks to bilingual children, including children with lower levels of language ability.