Sentential context improves bilingual infants' use of phonetic detail in novel words (original) (raw)
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Using speech sounds to guide word learning: The case of bilingual infants
Child Development, 2007
Despite the prevalence of bilingualism, language acquisition research has focused on monolingual infants. Monolinguals cannot learn minimally different words (e.g., ‘‘bih’’ and ‘‘dih’’) in a laboratory task until 17 months of age (J. F. Werker, C. T. Fennell, K. M. Corcoran, & C. L. Stager, 2002). This study was extended to 14- to 20-month-old bilingual infants: a heterogeneous sample (English and another language; N 5 48) and two homogeneous samples (28 English – Chinese and 25 English – French infants). In all samples, bilinguals did not learn similar-sounding words until 20 months, indicating that they use relevant language sounds (i.e., consonants) to direct word learning developmentally later than monolinguals, possibly due to the increased cognitive load of learning two languages. However, this developmental pattern may be adaptive for bilingual word learning.
International Journal of Behavioral Development, 2014
Previous research indicates that monolingual infants have difficulty learning minimal pairs (i.e., words differing by one phoneme) produced by a speaker uncharacteristic of their language environment and that bilinguals might share this difficulty. To clearly reveal infants’ underlying phonological representations, we minimized task demands by embedding target words in naming phrases, using a fully crossed, between-subjects experimental design. We tested 17-month-old French-English bilinguals’ (N 1⁄4 30) and English monolinguals’ (N 1⁄4 31) learning of a minimal pair (/kεm/ – /gεm/) produced by an adult bilingual or monolingual. Infants learned the minimal pair only when the speaker matched their language environment. This vulnerability to subtle changes in word pronunciation reveals that neither monolingual nor bilingual 17-month-olds possess fully generalizable phonological representations.
How infants respond to familiar and novel words: comparing bilinguals and monolinguals
2006
Abstract Infants growing up bilingual provide a unique window into how the language environment interacts with word learning and word comprehension mechanisms. The present studies used a preferential looking paradigm to investigate monolingual and bilingual 18-month-old infants' responses to familiar and novel words. Monolinguals and bilinguals both responded to familiar words with increased attention to the target object.
2006
A basic question that arises with respect to early bilingual comprehension is whether, as in production, bilingual infants understand words from two languages that have the same meaning (translation equivalents). This study addresses this question using CDI-data from 31 children growing up bilingual in French and Dutch. Raters report that 13-month-old bilingual infants all understand translation equivalents; however, the extent to which children understand translation equivalents is marked by considerable interindividual variability. This understanding is related to how many meanings children understand: the more advanced infants’ comprehension skills are, the more meanings they know in two languages rather than just one.
The development of phonetic representation in bilingual and monolingual infants
Applied Psycholinguistics, 2007
The development of native language phonetic representations in bilingual infants was compared to that of monolingual infants. Infants (ages 6–8, 10–12, and 14–20 months) from English–French or English-only environments were tested on their ability to discriminate a French and an English voice onset time distinction. Although 6- to 8-month-olds responded similarly irrespective of language environment, by 10–12 months both groups of infants displayed language-specific perceptual abilities: the monolinguals demonstrated realignment to the native English boundary whereas the bilinguals began discriminating both native boundaries. This suggests that infants exposed to two languages from birth are equipped to phonetically process each as a native language and the development of phonetic representation is neither delayed nor compromised by additional languages.
Bilingual beginnings to learning words
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 2009
"At the macrostructure level of language milestones, language acquisition follows a nearly identical course whether children grow up with one or with two languages. However, at the microstructure level, experimental research is revealing that the same proclivities and learning mechanisms that support language acquisition unfold somewhat differently in bilingual versus monolingual environments. This paper synthesizes recent findings in the area of early bilingualism by focusing on the question of how bilingual infants come to apply their phonetic sensitivities to word learning, as they must to learn minimal pair words (e.g. ‘cat’ and ‘mat’). To this end, the paper reviews antecedent achievements by bilinguals throughout infancy and early childhood in the following areas: language discrimination and separation, speech perception, phonetic and phonotactic development, word recognition, word learning and aspects of conceptual development that underlie word learning. Special consideration is given to the role of language dominance, and to the unique challenges to language acquisition posed by a bilingual environment. Keywords: bilingualism; language development; infancy;"
Bilingualism in infancy: First steps in perception and comprehension
Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 2008
Many children grow up in bilingual families and acquire two first languages. Emerging research is advancing the view that the capacity to acquire language can be applied equally to two languages as to one but that bilingual and monolingual acquisition nonetheless differ in some nontrivial ways. To probe the first steps toward acquisition, researchers recently have begun to use experimental methods to study preverbal bilingual infants. We review the literature in this growing field, focusing on how infants growing up bilingual use surface acoustic information to separate, categorize and begin to learn their two languages. These new data invite the expansion of standard linguistic theories to account for how a single architecture can support the acquisition of two languages simultaneously.