The impact of early bilingualism on controlling a language learned late: an ERP study

Abstract

This study asks whether early bilingual speakers who have already developed a language control mechanism to handle two languages control a dominant and a late acquired language in the same way as late bilingual speakers. We therefore, compared event-related potentials in a language switching task in two groups of participants switching between a dominant (L1) and a weak late acquired language (L3). Early bilingual late learners of an L3 showed a different ERP pattern (larger N2 mean amplitude) as late bilingual late learners of an L3. Even though the relative strength of languages was similar in both groups (a dominant and a weak late acquired language), they controlled their language output in a different manner. Moreover, the N2 was similar in two groups of early bilinguals tested in languages of different strength. We conclude that early bilingual learners of an L3 do not control languages in the same way as late bilingual L3 learners –who have not achieved native-like proficiency in their L2– do. This difference might explain some of the advantages early bilinguals have when learning new languages.

Voluntary language switching in English–Spanish bilingual children

“…The absence of asymmetrical switching costs in speed in unbalanced bilingual children in the current study is a departure from the predicted dominance-related asymmetry based on Green’s (1998) IC model and from findings documented during several cued switching studies in unbalanced bilingual adults (e.g., Campbell, 2005; Costa & Santesteban, 2004; Filippi et al, 2014; Gollan et al, 2014; Hernandez & Kohnert, 1999; Jackson et al, 2001; Linck et al, 2012; Martin et al, 2013; Meuter & Allport, 1999; Philipp et al, 2007; Wang et al, 2007, 2009). One interpretation of the absence of a significant dominance-related asymmetry is a developmental one.…”

“…Switching costs are assessed by comparing performance on switch trials , when participants are asked to switch into a different language from the one used on the previous trial, to performance on stay trials , when they use the same language as on the previous trial. Consistent with the predictions of the IC model, studies using a variety of paradigms have revealed asymmetrical switching costs in unbalanced bilinguals (e.g., Campbell, 2005; Costa & Santesteban, 2004; Filippi, Karaminis, & Thomas, 2014; Gollan, Kleinman, & Wierenga, 2014; Hernandez & Kohnert, 1999; Jackson, Swainson, Cunnington, & Jackson, 2001; Linck, Schwieter, & Sunderman, 2012; Martin et al, 2013; Meuter & Allport, 1999; Peeters, Runnqvist, Bertrand, & Grainger, 2014; Philipp, Gade, & Koch, 2007; Wang, Kuhl, Chen, & Dong, 2009; Wang, Xue, Chen, Xue, & Dong, 2007) and symmetrical switching costs in balanced bilinguals switching between languages of equal proficiency (e.g., Calabria, Hernandez, Branzi, & Costa, 2011; Costa & Santesteban, 2004; Costa, Santesteban & Ivanova, 2006; Martin et al, 2013), although there have also been exceptions to these findings (e.g., Calabria et al, 2011; Christoffels, Firk, & Schiller, 2007; Costa & Santesteban, 2004; Costa et al, 2006; Declerck, Koch, & Philipp, 2012; Martin et al, 2013; Prior & Gollan, 2011; Tarlowski, Wodniecka, & Marzecova, 2013; Verhoef, Roelofs, & Chwilla, 2009, 2010; Weissberger, Wierenga, Bondi, & Gollan, 2012). …”

A review of control processes and their locus in language switching

“…Similarly, Martin et al (2013) observed asymmetrical switch costs when second language learners switched between L1 (Spanish) and L3 (Catalan, with L2 being English) and symmetrical switch costs when highly proficient bilinguals switched between L1 (Spanish) and L3 (English, with L2 being Catalan). Martin et al (2013) found more converging evidence by contrasting highly proficient bilinguals that switched between L1 (Spanish) and L3 (English, with L2 being Catalan) and highly proficient bilinguals that switched between L1 (Spanish) and L2 (Catalan, with L3 being English), since no difference was found in terms of (a)symmetrical switch costs between these two groups.…”

“…The assumption of different language control processes due to language proficiency is mainly based on a lack of asymmetrical switch costs with highly proficient bilinguals (e.g., Calabria et al, 2011;Costa & Santesteban, 2004;Costa, Santesteban, et al, 2006;Christoffels et al, 2007;Martin et al, 2013;Meuter & Allport, 1999). These symmetrical switch costs across languages were first observed by Meuter and Allport (1999), who investigated the influence of language proficiency on switch costs by splitting their participants into highly proficient bilinguals and second language learners.…”

SUBTLEX-CAT: Subtitle word frequencies and contextual diversity for Catalan

“…Hence, virtually all Catalan speakers are bilinguals of Catalan and Spanish. Due to the particularities of this population-they are highly proficient bilinguals who commonly acquire both languages during early childhood and live immersed in both languages-it has been the focus of interest of a large number of psycholinguistic studies dealing with topics including bilingual memory (e.g., Ferré, Sánchez-Casas, & Guasch, 2006;Guasch, Sánchez-Casas, Ferré, & García-Albea, 2008Moldovan, Demestre, Ferré, & Sánchez-Casas, 2016); parallel activation of languages in bilinguals (e.g., Comesaña et al, 2015;Guasch, Ferré, & Haro, 2017); emotional processing in the two languages (e.g., Ferré, Anglada-Tort, & Guasch, 2018;Ferré, García, Fraga, Sánchez-Casas, & Molero, 2010;Ferré, Sánchez-Casas, & Fraga, 2013); the linguistic, cognitive, and neural consequences of bilingualism (e.g., Branzi, Calabria, Boscarino, & Costa, 2016;Calabria, Branzi, Marne, Hernández, & Costa, 2015;Kandel et al, 2016;Martin et al, 2013;Rodríguez-Pujadas et al, 2013); and language deterioration in demented bilinguals (e.g., Calabria et al, 2017;Calabria, Marne, Romero-Pinel, Juncadella, & Costa, 2014), among others.…”