Effects of face masks on language comprehension in bilingual children

Abstract

Due to the COVID‐19 pandemic, many children receive language input through face coverings. The impact of face coverings for children's abilities to understand language remains unclear. Past research with monolingual children suggests that hearing words through surgical masks does not disrupt word recognition, but hearing words through transparent face shields proves more challenging. In this study, we investigated effects of different face coverings (surgical masks and transparent face shields) on language comprehension in bilingual children. Three‐year‐old English‐Mandarin bilingual children (N = 28) heard familiar words in both English and Mandarin spoken through transparent face shields, surgical masks, and without masks. When tested in English, children recognized words presented without a mask and through a surgical mask, but did not recognize words presented with transparent face shields, replicating past findings with monolingual children. In contrast, when tested in Mandarin, children recognized words presented without a mask, through a surgical mask, and through a transparent face shield. Results are discussed in terms of specific properties of English and Mandarin that may elicit different effects for transparent face shields. Overall, the present findings suggest that face coverings, and in particular, surgical masks do not disrupt spoken word recognition in young bilingual children.

Effects of environmental diversity on exploration and learning: The case of bilingualism.

“…At an individual and/or social level, racial or gender diversity can introduce a broader range of social categories in a learner’s environment. In a recent example, the coronavirus disease pandemic may have increased complexity of the social visual environment by introducing a wider variety of ways in which speech is presented given variable use of face coverings (Bayet, 2022; DeBolt & Oakes, 2023; Singh & Quinn, 2023; Singh et al, 2021b). In this way, it is not clear to what extent effects of linguistic complexity are unique in their impact on behavior.…”