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The storage and composition of inflected forms in adult-learned second language: A study of the influence of length of residence, age of arrival, sex, and other factors*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 April 2012

LAURA BABCOCK ,
JOHN C. STOWE ,
CHRISTOPHER J. MALOOF ,
CLAUDIA BROVETTO  and
MICHAEL T. ULLMAN
LAURA BABCOCK
Affiliation:
Brain and Language Laboratory, Department of Neuroscience, Georgetown University, Washington, DC, USA & Cognitive Neuroscience Sector, SISSA (Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati), Trieste, Italy
JOHN C. STOWE
Affiliation:
Brain and Language Laboratory, Department of Neuroscience, Georgetown University, Washington, DC, USA
CHRISTOPHER J. MALOOF
Affiliation:
Brain and Language Laboratory, Department of Neuroscience, Georgetown University, Washington, DC, USA
CLAUDIA BROVETTO
Affiliation:
Brain and Language Laboratory, Department of Neuroscience, Georgetown University, Washington, DC, USA & ANEP (Administración Nacional de Educación Pública), Montevideo, Uruguay
MICHAEL T. ULLMAN*
Affiliation:
Brain and Language Laboratory, Department of Neuroscience, Georgetown University, Washington, DC, USA
*
Address for correspondence: Michael Ullman, Brain and Language Lab, Department of Neuroscience, Georgetown University, Box 571464, Washington, DC 20057-1464, USA[email protected]
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Abstract

It remains unclear whether adult-learned second language (L2) depends on similar or different neurocognitive mechanisms as those involved in first language (L1). We examined whether English past tense forms are computed similarly or differently by L1 and L2 English speakers, and what factors might affect this: regularity (regular vs. irregular verbs), length of L2 exposure (length of residence), age of L2 acquisition (age of arrival), L2 learners’ native language (Chinese vs. Spanish), and sex (male vs. female). Past tense frequency effects were used to examine the type of computation (composition vs. storage/retrieval). The results suggest that irregular past tenses are always stored. Regular past tenses, however, are either composed or stored, as a function of various factors: both sexes store regulars in L2, but only females in L1; greater lengths of residence lead to less dependence on storage, but only in females; higher adult ages of arrival lead to more reliance on storage. The findings suggest that inflected forms can rely on either the same or different mechanisms in L2 as they do in L1, and that this varies as a function of multiple interacting factors.

Keywords

late-learned second language (L2)length of residence (LoR)age of arrival (AoA)declarative memoryprocedural memory
Type
Research Article
Information
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition , Volume 15 , Issue 4 , October 2012 , pp. 820 - 840
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

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Footnotes

*

Support for this project was provided to MTU by NSF SBR-9905273, NIH R01 MH58189, and NIH R01 HD049347, and to MTU and CB by NSF BCS 0001961. We would like to thank Elizabeth Prado and Matthew Walenski for helpful comments. We would also like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their input and suggestions.

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