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What do I choose? Influence of interlocutor awareness on bilingual language choice during voluntary object naming

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 July 2018

KEERTHANA KAPILEY  and
RAMESH KUMAR MISHRA
KEERTHANA KAPILEY
Affiliation:
Centre for Neural and Cognitive Sciences, University of Hyderabad, Gachibowli, Hyderabad, Telangana, India500046
RAMESH KUMAR MISHRA*
Affiliation:
Centre for Neural and Cognitive Sciences, University of Hyderabad, Gachibowli, Hyderabad, Telangana, India500046
*
Address for correspondence: Professor Ramesh Kumar Mishra, Center for Neural and Cognitive Science, University of Hyderabad[email protected]
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Abstract

In two experiments with Telugu–English bilinguals, we examined if bilingual speakers are sensitive towards an interlocutor's (cartoon) relative language proficiency when they voluntarily selected a language for object naming. After familiarization with four different cartoons with varied L2 proficiency, participants did a voluntary naming task. In Experiment 1, participants explicitly indicated their choice of language before naming objects. In Experiment 2, participants named the objects directly. In both experiments, language choices and switchrates were thoroughly modulated by the participants’ perceived linguistic ability of the cartoon. However, awareness of perceived proficiency of the cartoons did not modulate naming latency. These results provide strong support for the adaptive control hypothesis, showing that bilingual speakers are sensitive to their interlocutor's language needs and this influences how they plan their language use. The results provide evidence of speakers taking into consideration the language proficiency of interlocutors, suggesting extreme adaptability of the bilingual mind.

Keywords

bilingualismadaptive controllanguage proficiencyvoluntary naming
Type
Research Article
Information
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition , Volume 22 , Issue 5 , November 2019 , pp. 1029 - 1051
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

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Footnotes

We thank Seema Prasad for significant help in manuscript preparation and editing and Sangeeth for preparing the animation of the cartoons.

Supplementary material can be found online at https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728918000731

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