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Lexical Knowledge and Access in Spanish Heritage Speakers
Silvina Montrul
3rd Heritage Language Summer Institute
Urbana, IL June 22-26, 2009
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Research projects at UIUC
1. Bilingual Past project: in depth-comparison of proficiency-matched L2 learners and heritage language speakers
2. Focus on form and reactivity to instruction in heritage language learners and heritage speakers (with Melissa Bowles)
3. Comparative heritage languages: Study of Spanish, Hindi and Romanian
4. The role of the contact language in heritage language grammars (Ji-Hye’s dissertation)
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Acknowledgements
• University of Illinois Campus Research Board (Beckman Award to Silvina Montrul, Spring 2005)
• The Center for Advanced Study (UIUC)• Research assistants and collaborators
Rebecca Foote Alyssa MartoccioSilvia Perpiñán Lucia AlzagaDan Thornhill Ben McMurrySusana Vidal Brad Dennison
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Heritage Language Grammars
• Distinctive gaps in heritage speakers’ grammatical knowledge (Montrul, 2008; O’Grady et al., 2001; Polinsky 2007; Rothman 2007).
• We know much less about lexical knowledge in heritage language grammars.
• What variables characterize heritage language speakers’ knowledge, retention and loss of words?
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Theoretical significance
• Is there a relationship between lexicon and grammar (Bates et al., 1994, Thal et al. 1997, Polinsky 2005)?
• Polinsky (1997, 2007) found that lexical knowledge was correlated with grammatical knowledge in Russian heritage speakers.
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Pedagogical Significance
• If there is a relationship between vocabulary size and grammatical knowledge, then vocabulary tests can be used as proficiency measures.
• Lexical decision tasks have been implemented as placement tests for language classes
• ESL (Meara & Jones 1987, 1988)• L2 acquisition of Spanish (Lam et al., 2003)• Spanish heritage speakers (Fairclough, 2008)
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Objective
• Discuss some results from a large-scale experimental study of Spanish L2 learners and Spanish heritage speakers.
• Several written and oral tasks testing knowledge of gender, cilices, tense, aspect, and mood.
• An on-line lexical decision task• An on-line translation judgment task
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Do heritage speakers have advantages over proficiency-matched
L2 learners due to their linguistic past?
Lexicon PhonologyMorphology and Syntax
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Participants
Baseline or control group 22 native speakers
Experimental Groups72 L2 learners of Spanish69 Spanish heritage speakers
All participants completed a language background questionnaire (6-page long for the heritage speakers)
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L2 learners
• Age 21.91 (18-25)• Native speakers of English• Raised in English-speaking families• Age of first exposure/acquisition of Spanish as a
second language between the ages of 12-25 (high school, college)
• Enrolled in Spanish language classes at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
• Advanced speakers were graduate students and Spanish language instructors with very high (some near-native) command of Spanish.
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Heritage speakers
• Age 22.64 (18-30)• Born in the US to Mexican parents• Exposed to English before age 5• At least one of the parents had to be a first
generation immigrant• Schooled in the US• Graduate and undergraduate students at the same
university, some of them enrolled in the same classes as the L2 learners
• Some advanced speakers were graduate students and Spanish teaching assistants
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Heritage Speakers: Some Descriptive Stats
First language: Spanish (57%), English (35%), both (8%)Parents: both parents from Mexico (88%) one parent from Mexico (12%)Language used at home
Only Spanish (44%), Spanish and English (56%)Languages parents spoke to participants
Spanish (80%), English (5%), both (15%)All participants had between 1-9 siblings and 20% lived with a
Spanish-speaking grandparentLanguage spoken with siblings
Spanish (20%), English (48%), both (38%)Relative strength of the languages48% felt Spanish was like a native language, 52% like a second
languageSelf rated proficiency: mean Spanish (3.9, range 1-5)
mean English (4.88, range 4-5). 100% wanted to improve their ability in Spanish for both
professional and personal reasons
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Spanish Proficiency Test
• Cloze part (fill in the blanks by selecting one of four possible responses) (DELE test) = 30 points
• Multiple choice vocabulary test (MLA) = 20 points
• Maximum 50 points• Has been widely used in many L2
acquisition studies
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Proficiency Scores
Native Speakers L2 Learners Her itage Speakers
Groups
20.00
30.00
40.00
50.00
Mean 48.5
SD 1.00
range 45-50
Mean 36.88
SD 8.17
range 15-48
Mean 35.34
SD 9.24
range 16-50
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Participants
Groups Proficiency scores (max = 50)
Native speakers (n = 22) 48.5
Heritage speakers (n = 69) Advanced (n = 32)
Intermediate (n = 24)
Low (n =13)
Overall
44.74
34.57
22.81
36.88
L2 Learners (n = 72) Advanced (n = 25)
Intermediate (n = 25)
Low (n = 22)
Overall
45.88
34.20
23.18
35.34
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Research questions
• Polinsky (2005) found that low proficiency Russian heritage speakers had selective control of word classes, retaining verbs better than nouns and adjectives. Do Spanish heritage speakers also have selective control of verbs?
• Does Age of Acquisition (AoA) of word interact with age of acquisition of the target language in L2 learners and heritage language speakers?
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Research questions
• Does accuracy in a lexical decision task correlate with accuracy on a written proficiency and other written measures of grammatical competence? Is the lexical decision task a reliable placement tool for both L2 learners and heritage language learners?
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Questions in Bilingual lexical processing
• What is the relationship between words and concepts in the bilingual lexicon?
• What is the architecture (organization) of the bilingual lexicon?
• What factors influence lexical access and speed during lexical processing by bilingual individuals?
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Some factors that influence speed of lexical processing
• Word frequency• Phonology• Morphological complexity• Syntactic category • Semantic priming• Lexical ambiguity• Imageability• Age of acquisition
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Lexical Access
• In L1 attrition, lexical access is assumed to be the aspect of language most susceptible to language loss (de Bot 1996, 1998; Weltens & Grendell 1993).
• Speakers encounter lexical retrieval difficulties in the L1 due to low level of activation and reduced proficiency.
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Frequency Effects in L1 Attrition
Hulsen (2000)• Study of lexical access in 3 generations of Dutch
immigrants to Australia• Picture naming and picture matching tasks
(production)• More frequent and cognate nouns are retained
and accessed faster than less frequent nouns in 1st, 2nd and 3rd generation speakers.
• Accuracy decreases and reaction times increases by generation 1>2 >3.
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Lexical Categories or Grammatical Class
• Distinction between NOUN, VERB, ADJECTIVE, etc.• NOUNS are referential, VERBS are relational,
ADJECTIVES are neither (Baker 2004)• NOUN-VERB distinction figures prominently in normal
L1 acquisition: In many languages, including Spanish and English, NOUNS are acquired before VERBS and ADJECTIVES (Clark 1993). In Chinese and Korean, VERBS are acquired before NOUNS (Choi 1998, Choi & Gopnik 1995)
• NOUNS and VERBS are selectively impaired in aphasia (Shapiro & Caramazza 2002)
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Polinsky (2005)
• Do incomplete learners of Russian (i.e., Russian heritage speakers) differ from complete speakers in their access to words in Russian?
• In L1 acquisition of Russian, NOUNS are acquired before VERBS. Is lexical access selective by lexical class in incomplete acquisition of Russian?
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Polinsky (2005)
• Study of 5 incomplete learners of Russian and 4 Russian native speakers
• Stimuli: VERBS, NOUNS and ADJECTIVES of low, mid and high frequency ranges (11 items per frequency range for each class)
• Cognates and latinate words were avoided• Experiment 1: lexical recognition task• Experiment 2: translation task
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Polinsky’s Findings
• Different control of word classes in the heritage speakers.
• Native speakers had balanced control of NOUNS, VERBS and ADJECTIVES
• Incomplete learners had faster reaction times in Experiment 1 and higher accuracy in Experiment 2 for VERBS.
• Primacy for VERBS in lexical retrieval• Explanation: semantic density of VERBS
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Vocabulary Recognition
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Translation
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Motivations for our Study
• Examine the effects of lexical class and AoA (and of frequency) in Heritage speakers (a case of incomplete L1 acquisition) and late L2 learners of Spanish.
• Practical implications: Many colleges and universities in the United States are developing lexical decision proficiency tests in order to place L2 learners and Heritage speakers into different proficiency levels in language programs.
• Assumption: size of vocabulary correlates with grammatical development.
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Method
• Experiment 1: Visual lexical decision task• Experiment 2: Visual translation judgment
task
Dependent variables: accuracy and reaction times
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Stimuli in each experiment
108 Spanish words (non-cognate)
NOUNS(HF LF)
VERBS (HF LF)
ADJECTIVES (HF LF)
Early L1-Early L2 12 12 12
Early L1-Late L2 12 12 12
Late L1-Early L2 12 12 12
Matched for frequency
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• Words were matched for frequency and syllable length across the three lexical classes
• Only 1/3 of words appeared in the two experiments• AoA was decided by consulting the Spanish version
of the MacArthur Communicative Development Inventory (CDI) for L1 acquisition and first year Spanish textbooks for L2 acquisition
• 108 filler items (36 nouns, 36 verbs, 36 adjectives)• Equal number of Non-words in each experiment
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Lexical Decision Task
• Subjects saw a string of letters in the center of a computer screen and had to indicate whether the string of letters formed a real word of Spanish or not.
pañal coler SI NO SI
NO
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Translation Judgment Task
• Spanish words were presented on a computer screen followed by an English word. Subjects were asked to decide as fast as possible whether the English word was an accurate translation of the Spanish word, by pressing YES or NO keys.
Pañal Diaper
SI NO
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Research Question # 1
• Do Spanish heritage speakers also have selective control of verbs?
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Lexical Decision Task
• 60 heritage speakers• 20 native speakers
Heritage Speakers’ Proficiency scores29 advanced21 intermediate10 low
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Results Native speakers: Accuracy
99.7 99.1 99.498 98.6 97.4
50
60
70
80
90
100
Nouns Verbs Adjectives
high frequency
low frequency
Main effect for frequencyF(1,19) 8.76, p = 0.008
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Heritage Speakers: Accuracy
97.6 97.5 96.694.2
90.893.4
50
60
70
80
90
100
Nouns Verbs Adjectives
high frequency
low frequency
Main effect for word class, for frequency and word class X frequency interaction
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ResultsNative speakers: Reaction Times
828851 857
891
989940
500
600
700
800
900
1000
1100
Nouns Verbs Adjectives
high frequency
low frequency
Main effect for frequencyF(1,19) 19.75, p < 0.01
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Heritage Speakers: Reaction Times
875903 891
1009 1026982
500
600
700
800
900
1000
1100
Nouns Verbs Adjectives
high frequency
low frequency
Main effect for frequency F(1,59) 72.1, p < 0.01
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Results
• Both native speakers and heritage speakers were more accurate with and responded faster to high frequency than with low frequency words.
• There was an effect of word class in the accuracy analysis only for the heritage speakers, as well as a class by frequency interaction.
• Heritage speakers were more accurate on high and low frequency nouns and least accurate with low frequency verbs.
• No effect of word class in reaction times.
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Heritage speakers: Proficiency analysis
• Main effect by level in both accuracy and RT.
• Main effect for frequency in accuracy and RT
• No effect for word class
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Primacy for verbs in accuracy for low and intermediate groups, but ns
Heritage speakers: Accuracy
95.6
94.1
90.3
98
95.3
91.6
97.6
94.1
89.8
84
86
88
90
92
94
96
98
100
advanced intermediate low
Nouns
Verbs
Adjectives
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No effect for Word class in RTs
Heritage speakers: RT
885
9851019
920
1006 1007
896
982959
500
600
700
800
900
1000
1100
advanced intermediate low
Nouns
Verbs
Adjectives
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Heritage speakers: Proficiency analysis
Heritage speakers: Accuracy
98.1% 98.0%
95.1%
93.1%
90.2%
85.5%
98.2% 98.3%
94.9%
97.8%
92.2%
88.3%
98.1%96.5%
92.6%
97.0%
91.7%
87.0%
75.0%
80.0%
85.0%
90.0%
95.0%
100.0%
advanced HHs intermediate HSs low HSs
Noun HF
Noun LF
Verb HF
Verb LF
Adjective HF
Adjective LF
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Heritage speakers: Proficiency analysis
Heritage Speakers: Reaction Times
500
600
700
800
900
1000
1100
1200
advanced HHs intermediate HSs low HSs
Noun HF
Noun LF
Verb HF
Verb LF
Adjective HF
Adjective LF
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Lexical Decision: Summary of results
• Main effect for frequency• Main effect for proficiency level• Advantage for nouns in Accuracy• Slowest on verbs and adjectives in
reaction times
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Results Translation Judgment Task
Heritage speakers: Accuracy
94.696.7 95.695.1
90.1 90.8
50
60
70
80
90
100
Nouns Verbs Ajectives
high frequency
low frequency
Main effect for word class, for frequency and word class X frequency interaction
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Results Translation Judgment Task
Heritage Speakers: Reaction Times
753
797
745773
888
836
500
600
700
800
900
1000
Nouns Verbs Ajectives
high frequency
low frequency
Main effect for word class and for frequency
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Summary
• If word class advantage, it is a noun advantage
• In the accuracy analysis, the heritage speakers were more accurate on high and low frequency nouns.
• In the speed analysis, heritage speakers were faster with high and low frequency nouns.
• They are slowest and least accurate with low frequency verbs and adjectives
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Translation Judgment: Proficiency Analysis
Heritage speakers: Accuracy
50.0%
60.0%
70.0%
80.0%
90.0%
100.0%
advanced HSs intermediate HSs low HSs
Noun HF
Noun LF
Verb HF
Verb LF
Adjective HF
Adjective LF
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Translation Judgment: Proficiency Analysis
Heritage speakers: Reaction Times
500
600
700
800
900
1000
advanced HSs intermediate HSs low HSs
Noun HF
Noun LF
Verb HF
Verb LF
Adjective HF
Adjective LF
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Primacy of Nouns for Adv. and Interm.
Heritage speakers: Accuracy
97
94
91
95
9291
96
92
88
80
90
100
advanced HSs intermediate HSs low HSs
Nouns
Verbs
Adjectives
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Slower on Verbs than on Nouns and Adjectives
Heritage speakers: RT
740757
796826 816
880
748
803
841
500
600
700
800
900
1000
advanced HSs intermediate HSs low HSs
Nouns
Verbs
Adjectives
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Translation Judgment: Summary of Results
• Accuracy: Advantage for Nouns• RT: slower on verbs• Proficiency effect
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Conclusion
• Advantage for verbs may be possible at lowest levels of proficiency.
• In general, this study found an advantage for high frequency words and NOUNS.
• Difference between Spanish and Russian verbs and nouns?
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Research Question # 2
• Does Age of Acquisition (AoA) of word interact with age of acquisition of the target language in L2 learners and heritage language speakers?
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Age of Acquisition effects in monolingual lexical processing
Bonin, Barry, Méot & Calard (2004)Age of acquisition (AoA) in these studies
refers to the age at which words are first learned in their spoken and written form.
AoA effect: words acquired early in life are processed faster and more accurately than those acquired later.
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Locus of AoA effects
1. Phonological2. Semantic3. Process of mapping between different
lexical representations (orthographic, semantic, phonological)
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Bilingual processing
AoA also affects lexical processing in a second language
Izura & Ellis (2004) found that the lexical decision speed of words in Spanish (the L1 of the Spanish-English bilinguals tested) was predicted by AoA of words in Spanish.
In a translation judgment task, speed in English (the L2) was predicted by AoA of English words.
Support for Mapping Hypothesis (Ellis & Lambon-Ralph, 2000)
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Izura & Ellis (2004)
• Words used were 80% NOUNS, the rest were ADJECTIVES and VERBS
• Age of acquisition of bilinguals ranged from 6-24
• AoA of words was decided by asking subjects when they thought they had acquired words
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Age of Acquisition in Second Language Acquisition and Bilingualism
Age of Acquisition: age at which the L1 and the L2 of bilinguals/second language learners were acquired.
Early bilinguals: L1 and L2 acquisition takes place simultaneously or sequentially, before the onset of puberty (within the Critical Period)
Late bilinguals: L2 acquisition takes place after puberty, after the foundations of the L1 are in place.
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AoA is correlated with bilingual outcomes or ultimate attainment
L2 AcquisitionThe earlier the AoA of an L2 the more native-like
the bilingual is likely to become in the L2, especially in phonology and morphosyntax.
L1 attrition and/or incomplete acquisitionThe earlier the AoA of an L2 the less nativelike
the bilingual is likely to become in the L1, especially in phonology and morphosyntax.
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Method
• Same tasks• Subset of heritage speakers and L2
learners matched for proficiency (n =28 per group)
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Words and main variable manipulated
group AoA Spanish
AoA of words
pañal“diaper”
perro“dog”
correo“mail”
Heritage speakers
early early early late
L2 learners
late late early early
Between group variables
within group variables
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Example words for each word AoA category
Early L1-Early L2
Early L1-Late L2
Late L1-Early L2
NOUN lápiz (pencil) pañal (diaper) correo (mail)
VERB besar (to kiss) barrer (to sweep)
resumir (to summarize)
ADJECTIVE
cansado (tired) travieso (naughty)
soltero (unmarried)
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Hypotheses: between groupsThe heritage speakers may show an advantage over
the L2 learners in both accuracy and reaction times with Spanish words acquired early in L1 acquisition, but late in L2 acquisition (Early L1-Late L2) and with words acquired early in L1 acquisition and early in L2 acquisition (Early L1-Early L2), since the heritage speakers will have acquired all of these early words at a much younger age than the late L2 learners.
The heritage speakers may also show an advantage over the late L2 learners with words acquired late in L1 acquisition but early in L2 acquisition (Late L1-Early L2), or the two groups may show similar results, depending on when each group acquired these words.
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Hypotheses: Within groups• The heritage speakers will be faster and
more accurate in their responses to Early L1-Late L2 and Early L1-Early L2 words in comparison to Late L1-Early L2 words.
• The L2 learners will pattern in the opposite direction, with an accuracy and reaction time advantage for the Late L1-Early L2 and the Early L1-Early L2 words over the Early L1-Late L2 words.
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Results Lexical Decision Task
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Summary of Results: Accuracy
• Main effect for word AoA and word AoA by group interaction
• Overall accuracy rates in the two participant groups were similar (no main effect for group).
• The heritage speakers showed the predicted accuracy advantage over the L2 learners for Early L1-Late L2 words.
• However, they were not more accurate than L2 learners in either of the other two word AoA categories.
• The L2 learners were less accurate with Early L1-Late L2 words (mean = 91%) than with Late L1-Early L2 words (mean = 96%)
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Results Lexical Decision Task: Accuracy
50
60
70
80
90
100
Early L1-Early L2 Early L1-Late L2 Late L1-Early L2
Heritage speakers
L2 learners
71
Summary of Results: Reaction times
• Main effect for AoA and AoA by group interaction.
• The L2 learners were faster than the heritage speakers in all three word AoA conditions (but non-significant).
• The predicted speed advantage for the heritage speakers over the L2 learners was not borne out.
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Results Lexical Decision Task: RT
500
600
700
800
900
1000
Early L1-Early L2 Early L1-Late L2 Late L1-Early L2
Heritage speakers
L2 learners
73
• Within groups, the heritage speakers were fastest to respond to Early L1-Early L2 words.
• They were next fastest to respond to Early L1-Late L2 words and slowest to respond to Late L1-Early L2 words, as predicted.
• The L2 learners were also fastest to respond to Early L1-Early L2 words, but patterned differently with the other word AoA categories, responding next fastest to Late L1-Early L2 words, and slowest to Early L1-Late L2 words, as predicted.
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Translation Judgment Task
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Results Translation Judgment Task
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Summary of Results
• The heritage speakers showed an accuracy advantage over the L2 learners for the Early L1-Late L2 words, but the L2 learners were faster than the heritage speakers in all three word AoA conditions (although non-significant).
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Within-group differences results patterned as expected
• heritage speakers showed a speed advantage for both Early L1-Early L2 and Early L1-Late L2 translation pairs over Late L1-Early L2 translation pairs
• L2 learners showed an accuracy advantage for Early L1-Early L2 pairs and Late L1-Early L2 word pairs over Early L1-Late L2 pairs, and a speed advantage for Early L1-Early L2 pairs over Early L1-Late L2 pairs.
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• However, as in Experiment 1, heritage speakers showed a speed and accuracy advantage for Early L1-Early L2 word pairs over Early L1-Late L2 word pairs.
• This is in contrast to our predictions, based on the assumption that both of these word AoA categories were acquired early in Spanish and in English for these participants.
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Results Translation Judgment Task: Accuracy
50
60
70
80
90
100
Early L1-Early L2 Early L1-Late L2 Late L1-Early L2
Heritage speakers
L2 learners
80
Results Translation Judgment Task: RT
500
600
700
800
900
1000
Early L1-Early L2 Early L1-Late L2 Late L1-Early L2
Heritage speakers
L2 learners
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Conclusion
• Predictions based on AoA of L1 and L2 were generally not borne out in the results.
• No age effects of language in the acquisition of words, unlike morphosyntax and phonology.
• Word AoA was found to be significant within each group in the two experiments, confirming previous findings in the psycholinguistics literature (Carroll & White 1973a,b; Ellis & Morrison, 1998; Ellis & Lambon Ralph, 2000; Izura & Ellis 2002, 2004).
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Conclusion
• Age of language acquisition does not confer an overall speed advantage in lexical access, though it may confer an accuracy advantage, at least for words that are learned later in the course of L2 acquisition, but early in L1 acquisition.
• This supports the idea that there is no critical period for the acquisition of lexical items, though it must be kept in mind that we only investigated lexical access in a visual comprehension task.
83
Research questions # 3
• Does accuracy in a lexical decision task correlate with accuracy on a written proficiency and other written measures of grammatical competence?
• Is the lexical decision task a reliable placement tool for both L2 learners and heritage language learners?
84
Vocabulary and Proficiency in L2 acquisition
Meara & Jones (1988) and Meara & Buxton (1987): found correlations for L2 learners of English between a lexical decision task and the Cambridge Proficiency Exam.
• Lam, Pérez-Leroux, & Ramírez (2003) found a correlation between knowledge of vocabulary and a proficiency test in Spanish L2 (Canadian University)
• Assumption: more words, more exposure, better proficiency skills
85
Vocabulary and syntactic development in heritage grammars
• Polinsky (2007) found that vocabulary proficiency correlated positively with structural accuracy in Russian heritage speakers
• Those speakers who knew more basic words from a list of 200 items exhibited better control of agreement, case markers, and subordination in spontaneous speech.
86
Fairclough (2008)
• Investigated whether the lexical decision task was a good tool for language placement for both L2 learners of Spanish and Spanish heritage speakers.
• She found high positive correlations (r above .7) between a cloze test and accuracy on a lexical decision task in both groups.
87
Fairclough’s results
group N Pearson coefficient
L2 learners 55 0.786*
Heritage speakers
51 0.772*
Total 106 0.906*
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Fairclough (2008)
Decisión Léxica
.6.5.4.3.2.1
Cloze-Test
25
20
15
10
5
0
-5
Grupo
SL
LH
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Our Study
• We had a total of 108 words selected from Léxico Informatizado del Español (LEXEP, 2000).
• But our results are very similar to those reported by Fairclough (2008).
90
Heritage Speakers: Proficiency Test
91
Heritage Speakers: Lexical Decision Task
92
Heritage speakers: Correlation
Significant positive correlation between two scores
r = 0.647**
p < 0.001
93
L2 learners: Proficiency Test
94
L2 learners: Lexical Decision Task
95
L2 learners
Significant positive correlation between two scores
r = 0.678**
p < 0.001
96
Conclusion
• Although we have not used our results as a placement measure, they do confirm that accuracy in lexical access and overall grammatical proficiency are correlated in the two populations.
• Many people have raised concerns about our use of a written proficiency measure originally developed for L2 students with heritage language students.
• Our research shows that the proficiency test we use is not only reliable (Cronbach alpha above .80) but also suitable for heritage language learners.
• This does not mean that the ACTFL OPI (A measure of oral proficiency as demonstrated by Valdés 1997) will have the same results with the two groups.
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BIG QUESTION
• Theoretical relationship between grammar and the lexicon.
• Nativist position: word learning and grammatical development proceed in a different way and at different pace because grammar and the lexicon are separate.
• Emergentism: There is no separate grammar. It is learned with the same general learning principles as the lexicon.
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Minimalism
• Lexical, grammatical and abstract features all form part of the lexicon.
• Functional categories (grammatical words) are part of the lexicon, so the fact that we find a correlation between grammatical functors and grammar is not surprising at all (we are correlating the same thing) (Bates & Goodman, 1997).
99
• What is interesting is that we are finding a correlation between knowledge of content words (nouns, verbs and adjectives) and GRAMMAR, which are assumed to be learned very differently and to be handled by different mechanisms.
• No one has proposed that grammar can begin in the absence of lexicon.
• Computational mechanisms for grammar must be in place in order for the grammar to use the lexicon
100
Muchas gracias
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