Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dlnhk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-27T17:45:24.443Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Effects of early home language environment II: Speech comprehension and cognitive functions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 June 2017

LILY TAO  and
QING CAI
LILY TAO*
Affiliation:
Shanghai Key Laboratory of Brain Functional Genomics, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, East China Normal University School of Psychology, University of New South Wales
QING CAI
Affiliation:
Shanghai Key Laboratory of Brain Functional Genomics, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, East China Normal University NYU-ECNU Institute of Brain and Cognitive Science, New York UniversityShanghai
*
Address for correspondence: Lily Tao, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200062, China[email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

People who were mostly exposed to English with an accent in the early home environment are more native-like when performing various English tasks, compared to those who were mostly exposed to their non-English heritage language (Tao & Taft, 2016). The present study extends from the work of Tao and Taft (2016), further exploring the effects of early home language environment on linguistic and cognitive outcomes later in life. Three groups of young adult participants who differed in their early home language environment were examined on speech comprehension and executive function tasks. Results showed that people who were exposed mostly to non-English heritage languages have disadvantages relative to native monolingual speakers in the comprehension of certain types of stimuli, but show advantages in their executive functioning. Those exposed mostly to nonstandard English showed a less robust advantage in executive functions over native speakers, and showed no apparent disadvantage in speech comprehension.

Keywords

speech comprehensionaccent comprehensionexecutive functionsheritage languagebilingualism
Type
Research Article
Information
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition , Volume 21 , Issue 3 , May 2018 , pp. 537 - 549
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*The author would like to thank Prof Marcus Taft for assistance and guidance with various aspects of this study. This study was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 31400965) and Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (No. 2016HW021).

References

Abutalebi, J., & Green, D. W. (2007). Bilingual language production: The neurocognition of language representation and control. Journal of Neurolinguistics, 20, 242–275. doi: 10.1016/j.jneuroling.2006.10.003CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arbuthnott, K., & Frank, J. (2000). Trail Making Test, Part B as a measure of executive control: Validation using a set-switching paradigm. Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology, 22, 518–528. doi: 10.1076/1380-3395(200008)22:4;1-0;FT518CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Baddeley, A. D., Emslie, H., & Nimmo-Smith, I. (1992). The speed and capacity of language processing (SCOLP) test. Bury St Edmunds, UK: Thames Valley Test.Google Scholar
Baddeley, A. D., Gardner, J. M., & Grantham-McGregor, S. (1995). Cross-cultural cognition: Developing tests for developing countries. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 9, S173–S195. doi: 10.1002/acp.2350090711Google Scholar
Bialystok, E., Craik, F. I. M., Green, D. W., & Gollan, T. H. (2009). Bilingual minds. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 10, 89–129. doi: 10.1177 /1529100610387084CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bialystok, E., Craik, F. I. M., & Luk, G. (2008). Cognitive control and lexical access in younger and older bilinguals. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 34, 859–873. doi: 10.1037/0278-7393.34.4.859Google Scholar
Bosch, L., & Sebastián-Gallés, N. (2003). Simultaneous bilingualism and the perception of a language-specific vowel contrast in the first year of life. Language and Speech, 46, 217–243. doi: 10.1177/00238309030460020801CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bradlow, A. R., & Bent, T. (2008). Perceptual adaptation to non-native speech. Cognition, 106, 707–729. doi: 10.1016/j.cognition.2007.04.005Google Scholar
Burman, D. D., Bitan, T., & Booth, J. R., (2008). Sex differences in neural processing of language among children. Neuropsychologia, 46, 1349–1362. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2007.12.021Google Scholar
Carlson, S. M., & Meltzoff, A. N. (2008). Bilingual experience and executive functioning in young children. Developmental Science, 11, 282–298. doi: 10.1111/j.1467 -7687.2008.00675.xGoogle Scholar
Cattani, A., Abbot-Smith, K., Farag, R., Krott, A., Arreckx, F., Dennis, I., & Floccia, C. (2014). How much exposure to English is necessary for a bilingual toddler to perform like a monolingual peer in language tests? International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders, 49, 649–671. doi: 10.1111/1460-6984.12082Google Scholar
Chiu, M. M., & McBride-Chang, C. (2006). Gender, context, and reading: A comparison of students in 43 countries. Scientific Studies of Reading, 10, 331–362. doi: 10.1207/s1532799xssr1004_1Google Scholar
Chondrogianni, V., & Marinis, T. (2011). Differential effects of internal and external factors on the development of vocabulary, tense morphology and morpho-syntax in successive bilingual children. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 1, 318–345. doi: 10.1075/lab.1.3.05choGoogle Scholar
Clarke, C. M., & Garrett, M. F. (2004). Rapid adaption to foreign-accented English. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 116, 3647–3658. doi: 10.1121/1.1815131CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Costa, A., Hernández, M., Costa-Faidella, J., & Sebastián-Gallés, N. (2009). On the bilingual advantage in conflict processing: Now you see it, now you don't. Cognition 113, 135–149. doi: 10.1016/j.cognition.2009.08.001Google Scholar
Cristia, A., Seidl, A., Vaughn, C., Schmale, R., Bradlow, A., & Floccia, C. (2012). Linguistic processing of accented speech across the lifespan. Frontiers in Psychology, 3: 479. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00479CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Delis, D. C., Kaplan, E., & Kramer, J. M. (2001). Delis-Kaplan Executive Function System (D-KEFS) examiner's manual. San Antonio, TX, USA: The Psychological Corporation.Google Scholar
Duñabeitia, J. A., Hernández, J. A., Antón, E., Macizo, P., Estévez, A., Fuentes, L. J., & Carreiras, M. (2014). The inhibitory advantage in bilingual children revisited: Myth or reality? Experimental Psychology, 61, 234–251. doi: 10.1027/1618-3169/a000243Google Scholar
Durrant, S., Delle Luche, C., Cattani, A., & Floccia, C. (2015). Monodialectal and multidialectal infants’ representation of familiar words. Journal of Child Language, 42, 447–465. doi: 10.1017/S0305000914000063Google Scholar
Fan, S. P., Liberman, Z., Keysar, B., & Kinzler, K. D. (2015). The exposure advantage: Early exposure to a multilingual environment promotes effective communication. Psychological Science, 26, 1090–1097. doi: 10.1177/ 0956797615574699Google Scholar
Fine, E. M., Delis, D. C., Wetter, S. R., Jacobson, M. W., Jak, A. J., McDonald, C. R., Braga, J. C., Thal, L. J., Salmon, D. P., & Bondi, M. W. (2008). Cognitive discrepancies versus APOE genotype as predictors of cognitive decline in normal-functioning elderly individuals: A longitudinal study. The American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 16, 366–374. doi: 10.1097/JGP.0b013e3181629957Google Scholar
Floccia, C., Butler, J., Girard, F., & Goslin, J. (2009). Categorization of regional and foreign accent in 5- to 7-year-old British children. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 33, 366–375. doi: 10.1177/0165025409103871Google Scholar
Floccia, C., Delle Luche, C., Durrant, S., Butler, J., & Goslin, J. (2012). Parent or community: Where do 20-month-olds exposed to two accents acquire their representation of words? Cognition, 124, 95–100. doi: 10.1016/j.cognition.2012.03.011CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Forster, K. I., & Forster, J. C. (2003). DMDX: A windows display program with millisecond accuracy. Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, and Computers, 35, 116–124. doi: 10.3758/BF03195503Google Scholar
Gollan, T. H., Fennema-Notestine, C., Montoya, R. I., & Jernigan, T. L. (2007). The bilingual effect on Boston Naming Test performance. Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society, 13, 197–208. doi: 10.1017/S1355617707070038Google Scholar
Gollan, T. H., & Goldrick, M. (2012). Does bilingualism twist your tongue? Cognition, 125, 491–497. doi: 10.1016/j.cognition.2012.08.002Google Scholar
Gollan, T. H., Montoya, R. I., Fennema-Notestine, C., & Morris, S. K. (2005). Bilingualism affects picture naming but not picture classification. Memory and Cognition, 33, 1220–1234. doi: 10.3758/BF03193224Google Scholar
Gordon-Salant, S., & Fitzgibbons, P. J., (1997). Selected cognitive factors and speech recognition performance among young and elderly listeners. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 40, 423–431. doi: 10.1044/jslhr.4002.423CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Green, D. W. (1998). Mental control of the bilingual lexico-semantic system. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 1, 67–81. doi: 10.1017/S1366728998000133CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hoff, E., Rumiche, R., Burridge, A., Ribot, K. M., & Welsh, S. N. (2014). Expressive vocabulary development in children from bilingual and monolingual homes: A longitudinal study from two to four years. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 29, 433–444. doi: 10.1016/j.ecresq.2014.04.012Google Scholar
Kovács, Á. M., & Mehler, J. (2009). Cognitive gains in 7-month-old bilingual infants. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 106, 6556–6560, doi: 10.1073/pnas.0811323106Google Scholar
Kroll, J. F., Dussias, P. E., Bogulski, C. A., & Valdés Kroff, J. (2012). Juggling two languages in one mind: What bilinguals tell us about language processing and its consequences for cognition. In Ross, B. (Ed.), The psychology of learning and motivation (Vol. 56, pp. 229–262). Waltham, MA, USA: Academic Press. doi: 10.1016/B978-0-12-394393-4.00007-8Google Scholar
Kroll, J. F., & Gollan, T. H. (2014). Speech planning in two languages: What bilinguals tell us about language production. In Goldrick, M., Ferreira, V., & Miozzo, M. (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of language production (pp. 165–181). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. doi: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199735471.013.001Google Scholar
Marzecová, A., Asanowicz, D., Krivá, L., & Wodniecka, Z. (2012). The effects of bilingualism on efficiency and lateralization of attentional networks. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 16, 608–623. doi: 10.1017/S1366728912000569Google Scholar
Mattys, S. L., Davis, M. H., Bradlow, A. R., & Scott, S. K. (2012). Speech recognition in adverse conditions: A review. Language and Cognitive Processes, 27, 953–978. doi: 10.1080/01690965.2012.705006Google Scholar
May, J., Alcock, K. J., Robinson, L., & Mwita, C. (2001). A computerized test of speed of language comprehension unconfounded by literacy. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 15, 433–443. doi: 10.1002/acp.715Google Scholar
Maye, J., Aslin, R. N., & Tanenhaus, M. K. (2008). The weckud wetch of the wast: Lexical adaptation to a novel accent. Cognitive Science, 32, 543–562. doi: 10.1080/03640210802035357Google Scholar
McCarthy, K. M., Mahon, M., Rosen, S., & Evans, B. G. (2014). Speech perception and production by sequential bilingual children: A longitudinal study of voice onset time acquisition. Child Development, 85, 1965–1980. doi: 10.1111/cdev.12275Google Scholar
Miyake, A., Friedman, N. P., Emerson, M. J., Witzki, A. H., Howerter, A., & Wager, T. D. (2000). The unity and diversity of executive functions and their contributions to complex frontal lobe tasks: A latent variable analysis. Cognitive Psychology, 41, 49–100. doi: 10.1006/cogp.1999.0734Google Scholar
Paap, K. R., & Greenberg, Z. I. (2013). There is no coherent evidence for a bilingual advantage in executive processing. Cognitive Psychology, 66, 232–258. doi: 10.1016/j.cogpsych.2012.12.002Google Scholar
Paap, K. R., Johnson, H. A., & Sawi, O. (2015). Bilingual advantages in executive functioning either do not exist or are restricted to very specific and undetermined circumstances. Cortex, 69, 265–278. doi: 10.1016/j.cortex.2015.04.014Google Scholar
Paradis, J. (2011). The impact of input factors on bilingual development: Quantity versus quality. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 1, 67–70. doi: 10.1075/lab.1.1.09parGoogle Scholar
Raven, J., Raven, J. C., & Court, J. H. (1998). Manual for Raven's progressive matrices and vocabulary scales. Section 4: The advanced progressive matrices. San Antonio, TX, USA: Harcourt Assessment.Google Scholar
Reitan, R. M. (1992). Trail Making Test Manual for administration and scoring. Mesa, AZ, USA: Reitan Neuropsychology Laboratory.Google Scholar
Samuel, A. G., & Kraljic, T. (2009). Perceptual learning for speech. Attention, Perception, and Psychophysics, 71, 1207–1218. doi: 10.3758/APP.71.6.1207CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sánchez-Cubillo, I., Periáñez, J. A., Adrover-Roig, D., Rodríguez-Sánchez, J. M., Ríos-Lago, M., Tirapu, J., & Barceló, F. (2009). Construct validity of the Trail Making Test: Role of task-switching, working memory, inhibition/interference control, and visuomotor abilities. Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society, 15, 438–450. doi: 10.1017/S1355617709090626Google Scholar
Sebastián-Gallés, N., & Bosch, L. (2002). Building phonotactic knowledge in bilinguals: Role of early exposure. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 28, 974–989. doi: 10.1037//0096-1523.28.4.974Google Scholar
Sebastián-Gallés, N., & Bosch, L. (2009). Developmental shift in the discrimination of vowel contrasts in bilingual infants: Is the distributional account all there is to it? Developmental Science, 12, 874–887. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-7687.2009.00829.xGoogle Scholar
Sebastián-Gallés, N., Echeverría, S., & Bosch, L. (2005). The influence of initial exposure on lexical representation: Comparing early and simultaneous bilinguals. Journal of Memory and Language, 52, 240–255. doi: 10.1016/j.jml.2004.11.001Google Scholar
Sidaras, S. K., Alexander, J. E. D., & Nygaard, L. C. (2009). Perceptual learning of systematic variation in Spanish-accented speech. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 125, 3306–3316. doi: 10.1121/1.3101452Google Scholar
Sirin, S. R. (2005). Socioeconomic status and academic achievement: A meta-analytic review of research. Review of Educational Research, 75, 417–453. doi: 10.3102/00346543075003417Google Scholar
Stevens, C., Lauinger, B., & Neville, H. (2009). Differences in the neural mechanisms of selective attention in children from different socioeconomic backgrounds: An event-related brain potential study. Developmental Science, 12, 634–646. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-7687.2009.00807.xGoogle Scholar
Stroop, J. R. (1935). Studies of interference in serial verbal reactions. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 18, 643–662. doi: 10.1037/h0054651Google Scholar
Tao, L., Marzecová, A., Taft, M., Asanowicz, D., & Wodniecka, Z. (2011). The efficiency of attentional networks in early and late bilinguals: The role of age of acquisition. Frontiers in Psychology, 2: 123. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2011.00123Google Scholar
Tao, L., & Taft, M. (2016). Effects of early home language environment on perception and production of speech. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1017/S1366728916000730Google Scholar
Tao, L., & Taft, M. (2017). Influences of cognitive processing capacities on speech perception in young adults. Frontiers in Psychology, 8: 266. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2011.00123Google Scholar
Tao, L., Taft, M., & Gollan, T. H. (2015). The bilingual switching advantage: Sometimes related to bilingual proficiency, sometimes not. Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society, 21, 531–544. doi: 10.1017/S1355617715000521CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Trude, A. M., & Brown-Schmidt, S. (2012). Talker-specific perceptual adaptation during online speech perception. Language and Cognitive Processes, 27, 979–1001. doi: 10.1080/01690965.2011.597153Google Scholar
Unsworth, S. (2016). Quantity and quality of language input in bilingual language development. In Nicoladis, E. & Montanari, S. (Eds.). Bilingualism across the lifespan: Factors moderating language proficiency (pp. 103–121). Washington, DC, US: American Psychological Association. doi: 10.1037/14939-007Google Scholar
Wallentin, M. (2009). Putative sex differences in verbal abilities and language cortex: A critical review. Brain and Language, 108, 175–183. doi: 10.1016/j.bandl.2008.07.001Google Scholar
Zwitserlood, P. (1989). The locus of the effects of sentential-semantic context in spoken-word processing. Cognition, 32, 25–64. doi: 10.1016/0010-0277(89)90013-9Google Scholar