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Onset of word form recognition in English, Welsh, and English–Welsh bilingual infants

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 June 2007

MARILYN MAY VIHMAN ,
GUILLAUME THIERRY ,
JARRAD LUM ,
TAMAR KEREN-PORTNOY  and
PAM MARTIN
MARILYN MAY VIHMAN
Affiliation:
University of York
GUILLAUME THIERRY
Affiliation:
University of Wales, Bangor
JARRAD LUM
Affiliation:
Deakin University, Melbourne
TAMAR KEREN-PORTNOY
Affiliation:
University of York
PAM MARTIN
Affiliation:
University of Wales, Bangor
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Abstract

Children raised in the home as English or Welsh monolinguals or English–Welsh bilinguals were tested on untrained word form recognition using both behavioral and neurophysiological procedures. Behavioral measures confirmed the onset of a familiarity effect at 11 months in English but failed to identify it in monolingual Welsh infants between 9 and 12 months. In the neurophysiological procedure the familiarity effect was detected as early as 10 months in English but did not reach significance in monolingual Welsh. Bilingual children showed word form familiarity effects by 11 months in both languages and also revealed an online time course for word recognition that combined effects found for monolingual English and Welsh. To account for the findings, accentual, grammatical, and sociolinguistic differences between English and Welsh are considered.

Type
Articles
Information
Applied Psycholinguistics , Volume 28 , Issue 3 , July 2007 , pp. 475 - 493
Copyright
© 2007 Cambridge University Press

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