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Grammatical Constraints on Language Switching: Language Control is not Just Executive Control
Tamar H Gollan1, Matthew Goldrick2
1University of California, San Diego.
Journal of Memory and Language
|September 27, 2016
Summary
Bilinguals speaking mixed languages are slower and make more errors when language switches are frequent or ungrammatical. Executive functions impact language production but do not interact with grammatical constraints.
Area of Science:
- Psycholinguistics
- Cognitive Neuroscience
- Bilingualism Research
Background:
- Bilingual language selection involves complex cognitive processes.
- Understanding factors influencing language switching is crucial for psycholinguistics.
- Executive control and grammatical structures play key roles in bilingual speech production.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the influence of grammaticality and executive control on bilingual language selection.
- To examine production speed and intrusion errors in young and aging bilinguals.
- To determine how language switching rate and grammatical constraints affect mixed-language speech.
Main Methods:
- Elicited production of mixed-language connected speech in Spanish-English bilinguals.
- Manipulated grammaticality of language switches (grammatical vs. ungrammatical).
- Varied the rate of language switching (low vs. high) and assessed executive function abilities.
Main Results:
- Mixed-language speech was slower and less accurate with high switch rates, especially with ungrammatical switches.
- Executive function ability slowed production and increased intrusion errors generally.
- Aging bilinguals showed reduced monitoring ability, evidenced by fewer self-corrected intrusions.
Conclusions:
- Grammatical encoding significantly impacts bilingual language selection.
- Executive control influences bilingual language production post-sentence planning and lexical selection.
- Aging affects monitoring abilities in bilingual language production.
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