The effects of bilingualism on children's cross-situational word learning under different variability conditions

In the current study, we examined the separate and combined effects of exemplar and speaker variability on monolingual and bilingual children's cross-situational word learning performance. Results revealed that children's word learning performance did not differ when the input varied in a single dimension (i.e., exemplars or speakers) compared with a condition with no variability independent of their linguistic background. However, when performance in conditions that varied in a single dimension (i.e., exemplars or speakers) was compared with a condition that varied in multiple dimensions (i.e., exemplars and speakers), bilingual word learning advantages were observed; bilinguals were more likely to learn word-referent associations than monolinguals. Together, results suggest that children can learn and generalize word-referent associations from input that varies in exemplars and speakers and that bilingualism may bolster learning under conditions of increased input variability.