Voluntary language switching in English–Spanish bilingual children

Abstract

Although bilingual children frequently switch between languages, the psycholinguistic mechanisms underlying the emerging ability to control language choice are unknown. We examined the mechanisms of voluntary language switching in English-Spanish bilingual children during a picture-naming task under two conditions: 1) single-language naming in English and in Spanish; 2) either-language naming, when the children could use whichever language they wanted. The mechanism of inhibitory control was examined by analyzing local switching costs and global mixing costs. The mechanism of lexical accessibility was examined by analyzing the properties of the items children chose to name in their non-dominant language. The children exhibited significant switching costs across both languages and asymmetrical mixing costs; they also switched into their non-dominant language most frequently on highly accessible items. These findings suggest that both lexical accessibility and inhibition contribute to language choice during voluntary language switching in children.

Task Irrelevant External Cues Can Influence Language Selection in Voluntary Object Naming: Evidence from Hindi-English Bilinguals

“…This asymmetry arises due to the greater amount of inhibition required to suppress a more dominant L1 while speaking in L2 [33]. Several studies have failed to observe this asymmetry [34],[35],[36],[37],[38], particularly during voluntary naming [8]. Since our participants were highly proficient in both their languages, it is possible that asymmetrical costs were not incurred during switching.…”

“…All two-way and three-way interactions were included except in cases where the model could not converge. In accordance with previous analysis on large psycholinguistic data [7],[8], the statistical significance of effects was determined using t values. Absolute t values greater than or equal to 1.96 were considered statistically significant; absolute t values greater than or equal to 1.65 but less than 1.96 were taken to be marginally significant.…”

“…While switching to a cue does not call for top-down decision making, voluntarily switching involves both top- down and bottom-up considerations. These may include switching history, language preference linked to dominance, and bottom-up cues related to stimulus [5],[6],[7],[8]. While many studies have examined how bilinguals name objects in cued naming paradigms [9],[10],[11],[12],[13],[14],[15], not much is known about how bilinguals voluntarily choose one language over another when given a free choice.…”

“…The authors found that participants engaged in “bottom-up” switching incurred no switch costs as their switches were driven by the lexical accessibility of the pictures. In another study, Gross and Kaushanskaya (2015) [8] studied bilingual children on a voluntary naming task. It was found that bilingual children switched to the non-dominant language only while naming highly accessible items.…”

A code-switching asymmetry in bilingual children: Code-switching from Dutch to Frisian requires more cognitive control than code-switching from Frisian to Dutch

“…As age (Best, Miller, & Jones, 2009), SES (Morton & Harper, 2007) and non-verbal IQ (Arffa, 2007; but see Ardila, Pineda, & Rosselli, 2000) have been shown to be related to cognitive functioning, we included these as control variables. Vocabulary and morphology scores in both languages were also taken into account as control variables, as previous research has shown that language proficiency may be related to both cognitive control (Bohlmann, Maier, & Palacios, 2015) and code-switching behaviour (Gross & Kaushanskaya, 2015;Yow et al, 2017). As expected, the children were quite proficient in both Dutch and Frisian, as revealed by their scores on Dutch and Frisian vocabulary (Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-III-NL (PPVT-III-NL), Schlichting, 2005; Frisian adaptation, Bosma, Blom, Hoekstra, & Versloot, 2016) and Dutch and Frisian morphology (Taaltoets Alle Kinderen; Verhoeven & Vermeer, 2002;Frisian adaptation, Blom & Bosma, 2016), presented in Table 2.…”