Recognition of a word and its meaning benefits from the sensorimotor information about concepts. However, this phenomenon has been underexplored in second-language (L2) speakers who may rely on more “shallow” representations. Using a megastudy dataset, I investigated how sensorimotor strength affects first-language (L1) and L2 word recognition performance. Bayesian hierarchical regressions revealed that variables associated with physical sensations (interoceptive strength, motor action) and communication experience (head or mouth movement, auditory strength) produced strong effects in both groups. On the other hand, variables associated with concrete objects (visual, haptic experience) and with taste/smell (olfactory, gustatory experience) influenced L1 word recognition performance to a larger extent than in L2. In L2, reliance on semantic information during word recognition was reduced, with stronger effects of lexical variables compared to L1. The findings provide implications for understanding L2 processing mechanisms and demonstrate the usefulness of megastudy datasets in investigating L2 conceptual representations.

Bilinguals use languages strategically and make decisions differently depending on the language context. Here, we explored whether verbal feedback modulates language use and risk-taking in bilinguals engaged in a coin-drawing game that incentivises lying. In the game, participants announced bets in Chinese or English, and feedback on the outcome of the current bet was given in the same language. They selected Chinese over English after receiving positive feedback in Chinese, and no language difference was found when feedback was provided in English. They also tended to take more risks after receiving positive than negative feedback. Furthermore, participants were more likely to switch from one language to the other following negative feedback as compared to positive feedback, and when telling the truth, they were faster after negative than positive feedback. Thus, the language in which bilinguals receive feedback constrains language use, which may have implications for understanding interactions in multilingual communities.

This study tracked the referential production of 25 Japanese-English returnee children for 5 years upon their return to Japan from an English-dominant environment (Mean age = 9.72 at the time of return) and compared their referential strategies to 27 Japanese monolinguals and 27 English monolinguals, age-matched to the returnee’s age at time of return. Returnees used more redundant noun phrases (NPs) in both languages to maintain references compared to monolingual peers. In English, no changes in NP use were noted over time, but increased exposure to English led to fewer redundant NPs when maintaining references. In their native Japanese (L1), returnees used less NPs for maintaining references and more NPs for reintroducing references, indicating improved reference tracking longitudinally. In sum, returnees’ referential production is more sensitive to L1 re-exposure effects than second language (L2) attrition and crucially, increased L2 exposure minimizes redundant referent production among bilingual returnee children.

In recent decades, many eye-tracking studies have demonstrated that both languages of bilingual speakers are activated while processing phonological input in only one. To date, there have been no eye-tracking co-activation studies assessing word recognition among trilinguals. The present research investigates co-activation in all three languages of 48 Russian (Heritage Language)/Hebrew (Societal Language)/English (Third Language) speakers using a trilingual visual world paradigm experiment. The results paint a picture of a highly interactive multilingual lexicon, in line with findings from prior studies on bilingualism. Although accuracy was not affected by competition conditions, reaction times and eye-fixation proportions showed slow-down and distraction in the presence of cross-linguistic competitors, albeit to different extents across the three experiments, evidencing effects of language dominance and acquisition order. This study makes considerable contributions to our understanding of the dynamics of trilingual language processing and discusses findings in the context of existing bilingual processing models.

The ability to understand and speak more than one language (i.e., bilingualism) may provide benefits to preserving social cognition against normal age-related deteriorations. This study examined how variations in bilingual language experience influence theory-of-mind (ToM) understanding in late adulthood. One hundred and five cognitively healthy older adults (Mage = 66.23 years, range = 56–79) and 80 young adults (Mage = 22.03 years, range = 19–30), who were bilingual speakers, completed a ToM task battery, a self-report questionnaire on their language background, and a battery of general cognition assessments. We found an overall age-related decline in ToM, where older adults made more errors in inferring others’ mental states compared with young adults. Importantly, an earlier L2 age of acquisition (L2AoA) predicted better ToM performance among older adults, over and above the effects of age, education, and general cognition. The results suggest that early bilingual acquisition may enhance social cognitive processes during development and contribute to intact ToM abilities in older adult bilinguals.

Collocations, defined as sequences of frequently co-occurring words, show a processing advantage over novel word combinations in both L1 and L2 speakers. This collocation advantage is mainly observed for canonical configurations (e.g., provide information), but collocations can also occur in variation configurations (e.g., provide some of the information). Variation collocations still show a processing advantage in L1 speakers, but generally not in L2 speakers. The present eye-tracking-while-reading experiment investigated word order variation by passivising collocations (e.g., information was provided) in L1 and advanced L2 speakers of English. Altering word order did not eliminate the collocation advantage in either L1 or L2 speakers. The collocation effect was independent of contextual predictability and modulated by L2 proficiency. Results support the view that collocations are stored and retrieved via semantic representation rather than as holistic form chunks and that collocation processing does not qualitatively differ between L1 and advanced L2 speakers.

Bilingual speakers are prompted to remain in a single language, switch between languages, or codeswitch by regulating the concurrent activation of their language systems and adapting to the demands of the communicative context. Unlike studies that compare language switching in bilinguals in distinct interactional and geographical contexts, this study investigates heritage bilinguals who may be required to manage their home and societal languages differently within the course of a day. We examined how this variation affects linguistic and cognitive factors in spoken production. Critically, picture naming in Spanish and English appeared to rely on different mechanisms of cognitive control: greater reliance on proactive control led to decreased performance in Spanish picture naming but increased performance in English. Although convergent with findings that L2-immersed bilinguals prefer proactive control strategies, the findings with heritage bilinguals suggest that recruitment of cognitive control during speech planning is more dynamic than has been previously reported.

Many erroneous literal translations, often produced by low-proficiency bilinguals, can be attributed to a tendency to favor typical translation equivalents; however, the underlying neural mechanism remains poorly understood. This study investigated this typicality effect in real-time translation with the event-related brain potential (ERP) technique. Mandarin Chinese–English bilinguals were presented with a Chinese verb phrase (e.g., kāi chuānghù “open the window” or kāi diànnăo “turn on the computer”) followed by an English verb (e.g., open (a typical translation) or turn on (an atypical translation)) and judged whether the English verb was an appropriate/congruent translation of the verb in the Chinese verb phrase previously presented (e.g., kāi). Compared to typical translation equivalents, atypical equivalents elicited an N400, indicating retrieval difficulty, and an f-PNP in congruent trials, reflecting the effort to inhibit typical translations and integrate atypical ones. This pattern may arise from differences in resting-level activation between typical and atypical equivalents.

This study investigated the neural mechanisms underlying bilingual speech perception of competing phonological representations. A total of 57 participants were recruited, consisting of 30 English monolinguals and 27 Spanish-English bilinguals. Participants passively listened to stop consonants while watching movies in English and Spanish. Event-Related Potentials and sLORETA were used to measure and localize brain activity. Comparisons within bilinguals across language contexts examined whether language control mechanisms were activated, while comparisons between groups assessed differences in brain activation. The results showed that bilinguals exhibited stronger activation in the left frontal areas during the English context, indicating greater engagement of executive control mechanisms. Distinct activation patterns were found between bilinguals and monolinguals, suggesting that the Executive Control Network provides the flexibility to manage overlapping phonological representations. These findings offer insights into the cognitive and neural basis of bilingual language control and expand current models of second language acquisition.

Although accumulating evidence has demonstrated the foreign language (FL) effect in various scenarios, it remains underexplored whether the FL effect (FLe) would be modulated by the affective valence of scenarios. Hence, we investigated the FLe on the perception of egoistic lies and altruistic lies behaviorally and electrophysiologically. Behavior results showed that compared to using a native language (NL), using a FL led to more agreement with egoistic lies but a comparable level with altruistic lies. Electrophysiological results showed that skin conductance responses (SCRs) elicited by the truth were stronger in the FL compared to that in the NL, whereas SCRs elicited by lies, although strong, exhibited less sensitivity to the altruistic/egoistic condition. SCRs suggested that increased cognitive thinking and reduced affective thinking may contribute to the FLe on egoistic lies dependently or interactively, but these mechanisms cannot accommodate altruistic lies. The results implied the FLe is more stable and obvious in negative contexts.

Despite often featuring in theoretical accounts, the exact impact of typological similarity on non-native language comprehension and its corresponding neural correlates remains unclear. We examined the modulatory role of typological similarity in syntactic violation processing in the non-native language Spanish, for example [el volcán] versus [*la volcán], and in cross-linguistic influence. Participants were Italian late learners of Spanish (similar language pair) or German late learners of Spanish (less similar language pair). We measured P600 amplitudes, accuracy and response times. In line with our predictions, we found a larger P600 effect and differential CLI effects for Italian-Spanish speakers compared to German-Spanish speakers. Behaviourally, Italian-Spanish speakers responded slower compared to German-Spanish speakers. Together, these results indicate typological similarity effects in non-native comprehension as reflected in a processing advantage for typologically similar languages, but only at the neural level. These findings have critical implications for the interplay of different languages in the multilingual brain.

This study investigates the stability and instability of the language control network in bilinguals using longitudinal resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI) data. We compared the language control network of Chinese university students majoring in English with those not, using three other functional networks as controls. Results indicate that the English major group exhibits reduced stability and increased instability in the language control network compared with the non-English major group. This suggests that second language (L2) learning experience may induce adaptive neural changes. Moreover, the coexistence of stability and instability in the language control network appears less modular in the English major group, implying a more integrated response to language experience. Notably, these results were not observed in the control networks. Overall, these findings enhance the understanding of bilingual language control and the impact of L2 learning on neural plasticity.

Visual attention span (VAS) refers to the number of visual elements processed simultaneously in a multielement array. It is causally related to reading skills and may be impaired in readers with dyslexia. VAS is influenced by orthographic depth with opaque orthographies boosting it. Such orthography-specific VAS modulations are subject to crosslinguistic interactions in early biliterates, leading to advantages associated with learning to read in an opaque orthography. However, little is known about potential VAS bootstrapping effects in late biliterates. This study investigates potential VAS modulation in late biliterates with and without dyslexia. Participants were first language (L1) Italian native speakers (transparent orthography) learning English as a second language (L2). Our results show that the VAS capacity of typical readers is modulated by English orthographic knowledge, providing the first evidence that experience with a nonnative orthography boosts VAS skills also in late biliterates. This effect was reduced in dyslexic learners, possibly due to a VAS deficit.

This study investigates linguistic convergence in Spanish–English bilinguals’ demonstrative use in English (this/that) and Spanish (este/ese). Participants completed a task that tested the influence of speaker-referent distance on demonstrative use. Study 1 includes Spanish-speaking monolinguals in Mexico, English-speaking monolinguals in the USA, and Spanish–English bilinguals who were born in the USA or arrived at a young age. Results show that speaker-referent distance constrained all groups’ demonstrative use; however, this effect was weaker in the bilinguals’ Spanish as compared to the Spanish-speaking monolinguals. Study 2 focuses on the bilinguals’ demonstratives. Group-level and individual analyses present evidence for linguistic convergence: the bilinguals’ usage patterns were similar across their languages. Additionally, language dominance predicted usage patterns: the more English-dominant the participant, the greater the likelihood of producing proximal demonstratives for near and far referents alike. This pattern mirrors common diachronic changes, supporting the view that bilinguals may propel language change.

A comprehensive database of emotional prototypicality (EmoPro) scores for 1,122 words in second-language (L2) English was provided and aided in selecting L2 English emotion-label words. EmoPro refers to the degree to which a word clearly represents or conveys an emotion. The results showed that EmoPro was influenced by various factors, including valence, arousal, socialness, age of acquisition (AoA) and concreteness. EmoPro in the L2 context demonstrated its ability to predict naming and lexical decision performance. The similarities observed between EmoPro in the L2 and in the first language (L1) exhibited comparable correlations with other emotional and semantic factors and shared associations with predictors in the L1. This study also serves as a valuable tool for research on L2 emotion words, especially in the selection of prototypical emotion-label words in L2 English.

Previous research has found that metaphor comprehension is often more challenging in L2 than in L1 because of the prioritization of literal meanings, but the effect of cross-cultural conceptual differences and the role of inhibitory control during L2 metaphor processing remain uninvestigated. We explored these through a metaphor-induced lexical forgetting paradigm (Experiment 1), a metaphor interpretation task (Experiment 2), and an eye-tracking reading task (Experiment 3) to evaluate competing theories. Inhibitory control did not play a significant role during reading culturally congruent metaphors as it did for culturally incongruent ones. However, interpreting both kinds of L2 metaphors involved more inhibitory control than literals, even after explicit explanatory contexts. Although literal meanings (and culturally incongruent L1 metaphorical meanings) of L2 metaphors may always be activated, inhibition involvement depends on both task requirements and metaphor properties. These can be explained by the extended graded salience view and the predictive processing framework.

This study examined the linguistic and cognitive characteristics of two groups of Italian preschoolers with developmental language disorder (DLD): one group of monolingual Italian speakers and another of Italian-Slovenian bilinguals. The assessment focused on executive functions (EFs) (i.e., phonological working memory and inhibitory control) and linguistic abilities, which involved a multilevel analysis of discourse production. The bilingual group outperformed the monolingual group on tasks measuring EFs. While the two groups showed similar performance across several linguistic measures, the bilingual children demonstrated superior grammatical comprehension, albeit with high variability. A similar level of variability was observed in the bilingual group’s phonological discrimination abilities. Both grammatical comprehension and phonological discrimination were significantly correlated with EFs. These findings are discussed in the context of current theories of linguistic development in bilingual children with DLD.

Effects of language switching in bilinguals have been extensively investigated, but the majority of studies have focused on switching in language production. Here we explored intrasentential switching between Chinese and English, employing a self-paced reading paradigm, with Chinese/English using radically different orthographic systems. In addition, we investigated whether L2 (English) proficiency influences switch costs. Results revealed that switch costs emerged only when switching into L1 (Chinese); by contrast, when switching into L2, a less reliable facilitatory effect was observed. L2 proficiency affected reading speed for English stimuli, but it did not directly modulate switch costs. Moreover, we have integrated various findings from previous research and identified that the use of different comparison patterns is a major contributing factor to the inconsistency in results among prior studies. We suggest that in cross-script language switching, switch costs stem from a general cognitive control mechanism rather than from activation within the bilingual mental lexicon.