Grammatical gender in Romanian-French bilinguals

2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 390-412 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amelia Manolescu ◽  
Gonia Jarema
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Noun Phrase ◽  
Picture Naming ◽  
First Language ◽  
Naming Task ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Lexical Representation ◽  
Bilingual Lexicon ◽  
Gender Information ◽  
Gender System

We explored the way grammatical gender is represented in the bilingual mental lexicon in order to determine whether the grammatical gender of the first language (L1) affects the production of nouns in the second language (L2). Furthermore, we explored the representation of the Romanian “neuter” gender to see if it is distinct from the masculine and feminine. Romanian-French bilinguals were tested using a picture-naming task in L2 (Experiments 1 and 2) and a translation task from L1 to L2 (Experiment 3). Participants had to use either a bare noun (Condition 1) or a noun phrase (Condition 2). Responses were faster on gender congruent than on gender incongruent stimuli in both conditions, and neuter was found to be distinct from masculine and feminine. These results suggest that grammatical gender information is available at the level of lexical representation and that the bilingual lexicon is structured in a manner that allows information from the lexical level of both languages to interact. They also point to a tripartite gender system in Romanian.

Grammatical Gender in the German Multiethnolect

2021 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-29
Author(s):  
Peter Auer ◽  
Vanessa Siegel
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
First Language ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Grammatical Category ◽  
Immigrant Background ◽  
Frequent Use ◽  
Bare Nouns ◽  
Gender System ◽  
Germanic Languages

While major restructurings and simplifications have been reported for gender systems of other Germanic languages in multiethnolectal speech, this article demonstrates that the three-way gender distinction of German is relatively stable among young speakers from an immigrant background. We investigate gender in a German multiethnolect based on a corpus of approximately 17 hours of spontaneous speech produced by 28 young speakers in Stuttgart (mainly from Turkish and Balkan background). German is not their second language, but (one of) their first language(s), which they have fully acquired from childhood. We show that the gender system does not show signs of reduction in the direction of a two-gender system, nor of wholesale loss. We also argue that the position of gender in the grammar is weakened by independent innovations, such as the frequent use of bare nouns in grammatical contexts where German requires a determiner. Another phenomenon that weakens the position of gender is the simplification of adjective-noun agreement and the emergence of a generalized gender-neutral suffix for prenominal adjectives (that is, schwa). The disappearance of gender and case marking in the adjective means that the grammatical category of gender is lost in Adj + N phrases (without a determiner).

Transfer effects in learning a second language grammatical gender system

2006 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-29 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Sabourin ◽  
Laurie A. Stowe ◽  
Ger J. de Haan
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
First Language ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
L2 Acquisition ◽  
Gender Assignment ◽  
Similar System ◽  
Gender System ◽  
L1 And L2

In this article second language (L2) knowledge of Dutch grammatical gender is investigated. Adult speakers of German, English and a Romance language (French, Italian or Spanish) were investigated to explore the role of transfer in learning the Dutch grammatical gender system. In the first language (L1) systems, German is the most similar to Dutch coming from a historically similar system. The Romance languages have grammatical gender; however, the system is not congruent to the Dutch system. English does not have grammatical gender (although semantic gender is marked in the pronoun system). Experiment 1, a simple gender assignment task, showed that all L2 participants tested could assign the correct gender to Dutch nouns (all L2 groups performing on average above 80%), although having gender in the L1 did correlate with higher accuracy, particularly when the gender systems were very similar. Effects of noun familiarity and a default gender strategy were found for all participants. In Experiment 2 agreement between the noun and the relative pronoun was investigated. In this task a distinct performance hierarchy was found with the German group performing the best (though significantly worse than native speakers), the Romance group performing well above chance (though not as well as the German group), and the English group performing at chance. These results show that L2 acquisition of grammatical gender is affected more by the morphological similarity of gender marking in the L1 and L2 than by the presence of abstract syntactic gender features in the L1.

scholarly journals Language interference and inhibition in early and late successive bilingualism

2017 ◽  
Vol 21 (5) ◽  
pp. 1009-1034 ◽  
Author(s):  
ELENI PERISTERI ◽  
IANTHI MARIA TSIMPLI ◽  
ANTONELLA SORACE ◽  
KYRANA TSAPKINI
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Age Of Onset ◽  
Mother Tongue ◽  
First Language ◽  
Naming Task ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Inhibitory Processes ◽  
Interference Resolution ◽  
Language Context ◽  
Language Conflict

The present study explores whether age of onset of exposure to the second language affects interference resolution at the grammatical gender level and whether cognitive functions contribute to interference resolution. Early and late successive Serbian–Greek bilinguals living in the second language context, along with monolinguals, performed a picture-word interference naming task in a single-language context and a non-verbal inhibition task. We found that gender interference from the first language was only present in late successive bilinguals. Early bilinguals exhibited no interference from the grammatical gender of their mother tongue and showed more enhanced inhibitory abilities than the rest of the groups in the non-verbal task. The distinct sizes of interference from the grammatical gender of the first language across the two bilingual groups is explained by early successive bilinguals’ more enhanced domain-general inhibitory processes in the resolution of between-language conflict at the grammatical gender level relative to late successive bilinguals.

Delayed picture naming in the first and second language

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Wouter P. J. Broos ◽  
Alice Bencivenni ◽  
Wouter Duyck ◽  
Robert J. Hartsuiker
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Reaction Time ◽  
Picture Naming ◽  
First Language ◽  
Naming Task ◽  
English Speakers ◽  
Lexical Retrieval ◽  
Production Stages ◽  
Complex Words ◽  
Phonological Complexity

Abstract Second language (L2) speakers produce speech more slowly than first language (L1) speakers. This may be due to a delay in lexical retrieval, but it is also possible that the delay is situated at later stages. This study used delayed picture naming to test whether late production stages (leading up to articulation) are slower in L2 than in L1. Dutch–English unbalanced bilinguals performed a regular and a delayed picture naming task in English and Dutch. Monolingual English controls performed these tasks in English. Speakers were slower when naming pictures in L2 during regular picture naming but not in delayed naming. Reaction time costs of using L2 did not vary with phonological complexity, but there was a larger L2 cost in accuracy with more complex words. We conclude that the very last stages prior to articulation are not significantly slower when bilinguals name pictures in their L2.

Individual differences predict ERP signatures of second language learning of novel grammatical rules

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emily S Nichols ◽  
Marc F Joanisse
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Individual Differences ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
First Language ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Grammatical Rule ◽  
Related Potentials ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Anterior Negativity

We investigated the extent to which second-language (L2) learning is influenced by the similarity of grammatical features in one’s first language (L1). We used event-related potentials to identify neural signatures of a novel grammatical rule - grammatical gender - in L1 English speakers. Of interest was whether individual differences in L2 proficiency and age of acquisition (AoA) influenced these effects. L2 and native speakers of French read French sentences that were grammatically correct, or contained either a grammatical gender or word order violation. Proficiency and AoA predicted Left Anterior Negativity amplitude, with structure violations driving the proficiency effect and gender violations driving the AoA effect. Proficiency, group, and AoA predicted P600 amplitude for gender violations but not structure violations. Different effects of grammatical gender and structure violations indicate that L2 speakers engage novel grammatical processes differently from L1 speakers and that this varies appreciably based on both AoA and proficiency.

scholarly journals English Speakers’ Implicit Gender Concepts Influence Their Processing of French Grammatical Gender: Evidence for Semantically Mediated Cross-Linguistic Influence

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elena Nicoladis ◽  
Chris Westbury ◽  
Cassandra Foursha-Stevenson
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Response Time ◽  
Response Times ◽  
First Language ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Word Embedding ◽  
English Speakers ◽  
French Words ◽  
L1 English ◽  
French Gender

Second language (L2) learners often show influence from their first language (L1) in all domains of language. This cross-linguistic influence could, in some cases, be mediated by semantics. The purpose of the present study was to test whether implicit English gender connotations affect L1 English speakers’ judgments of the L2 French gender of objects. We hypothesized that gender estimates derived from word embedding models that measure similarity of word contexts in English would affect accuracy and response time on grammatical gender (GG) decision in L2 French. L2 French learners were asked to identify the GG of French words estimated to be either congruent or incongruent with the implicit gender in English. The results showed that they were more accurate with words that were congruent with English gender connotations than words that were incongruent, suggesting that English gender connotations can influence grammatical judgments in French. Response times showed the same pattern. The results are consistent with semantics-mediated cross-linguistic influence.

scholarly journals Comparing the cognate effect in spoken and written second language word production

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Merel Muylle ◽  
Eva Van Assche ◽  
Robert Hartsuiker
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Picture Naming ◽  
Language Production ◽  
Naming Task ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Word Production ◽  
Error Pattern ◽  
Underlying Processes

Cognates – words that share form and meaning between languages – are processed faster than control words. However, it is unclear whether this effect is merely lexical (i.e., central) in nature, or whether it cascades to phonological/orthographic (i.e., peripheral) processes. This study compared the cognate effect in spoken and typewritten production, which share central, but not peripheral processes. We inquired whether this effect is present in typewriting, and if so, whether its magnitude is similar to spoken production. Dutch-English bilinguals performed either a spoken or written picture naming task in English; picture names were either Dutch-English cognates or control words. Cognates were named faster than controls and there was no cognate-by-modality interaction. Additionally, there was a similar error pattern in both modalities. These results suggest that common underlying processes are responsible for the cognate effect in spoken and written language production, and thus a central locus of the cognate effect.

scholarly journals Stability and Change in Grammatical Gender: Pronouns in Heritage Scandinavian

2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 441-480 ◽  
Author(s):  
Janne Bondi Johannessen ◽  
Ida Larsson
Keyword(s):  
Noun Phrase ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Gender Agreement ◽  
Heritage Speakers ◽  
Heritage Languages ◽  
Stability And Change ◽  
Pronominal Gender ◽  
Gender System ◽  
Internal Agreement

Previous studies on gender in Scandinavian heritage languages in America have looked at noun-phrase internal agreement. It has been shown that some heritage speakers have non-target gender agreement, but this has been interpreted in different ways by different researchers. This paper presents a study of pronominal gender in Heritage Norwegian and Swedish, using existing recordings and a small experiment that elicits pronouns. It is shown that the use of pronominal forms is largely target-like, and that the heritage speakers make gender distinctions. There is, however, some evidence of two competing systems in the data, and there is a shift towards a two-gender system, arguably due to koinéization.

Evidence for long-term cross-language repetition priming in low fluency Chinese–English bilinguals

2009 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 13-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
LI LI ◽  
LEI MO ◽  
RUIMING WANG ◽  
XUEYING LUO ◽  
ZHE CHEN
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Implicit Memory ◽  
Explicit Memory ◽  
Repetition Priming ◽  
First Language ◽  
Memory Task ◽  
Lexical Representation ◽  
Priming Paradigm ◽  
Cross Language

Previous studies have found that proficiency in a second language affects how the meanings of words are accessed. Support for this hypothesis is based on data from explicit memory tasks with bilingual participants who know two languages that are relatively similar phonologically and orthographically (e.g., Dutch–English, French–English). The present study tested this hypothesis with Chinese–English bilinguals using an implicit memory task – the cross-language repetition priming paradigm. Consistent with the result of Zeelenberg, R. and Pecher, D. (2003), we obtained reliable effects of long-term cross-language repetition priming using a conceptual implicit memory task. Overall, the four experiments support the Revised Hierarchical Model as they demonstrate that low fluency bilinguals can only access the conceptual representation of the second language via the lexical representation of the first language.

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