scholarly journals The Efficiency of Attentional Networks in Early and Late Bilinguals: The Role of Age of Acquisition

2011 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lily Tao ◽  
Anna Marzecová ◽  
Marcus Taft ◽  
Dariusz Asanowicz ◽  
Zofia Wodniecka
2003 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 117-128 ◽  
Author(s):  
KATHERINE W. HIRSH ◽  
CATRIONA M. MORRISON ◽  
SILVIA GASET ◽  
EVA CARNICER

We explored the role of age of acquisition in picture naming with a group of unbalanced, late bilinguals and a group of monolinguals. We hypothesised that we would find effects of L2 age of acquisition on L2 picture naming performance in late bilinguals if the age of acquisition effects we and others have found in L1 picture naming are not limited to language capabilities acquired early in the lifespan. In Experiment 1, late bilingual Spanish–English participants named a large set of pictures in their L2 (English). The most important predictor of naming ability was L2 age of acquisition. In Experiment 2, monolingual English participants named the same pictures. Naming speed was predicted by L1 age of acquisition. Hence speed of picture naming in a given language was predicted by age of acquisition values for that language, that is, L2 values predicted L2 performance (Experiment 1) and L1 values predicted L1 performance (Experiment 2). On the basis of these results we conclude that age of acquisition effects are not restricted to items learned before any putative critical period, but should be observed for items learned at any age. That is, age of acquisition effects are more likely to be due to the relative order in which items are acquired within a language.


2006 ◽  
Vol 34 (5) ◽  
pp. 999-1010 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fernando Cuetos ◽  
Bernardo Alvarez ◽  
María González-Nosti ◽  
Alain Méot ◽  
Patrick Bonin

2011 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 121-144 ◽  
Author(s):  
JUDITH A. GIERUT ◽  
MICHELE L. MORRISETTE

ABSTRACTThe effects of the age of acquisition (AoA) of words were examined in the clinical treatment of 10 preschool children with phonological delays. Using a single-subject multiple-baseline experimental design, children were enrolled in one of four conditions that varied the AoA of the treated words (early vs. late acquired) relative to their corresponding word frequency (high vs. low frequency). Phonological generalization to treated and untreated sounds in error served as the dependent variable. Results showed that late acquired words induced greater generalization, with an effect size four times greater than early acquired words, whereas the effects of word frequency were minimized. Results are discussed relative to hypotheses about the role of AoA in language acquisition and the relevance of this variable for phonological learning.


PLoS ONE ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 11 (5) ◽  
pp. e0155110 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alejandra Marful ◽  
Carlos J. Gómez-Ariza ◽  
Analía Barbón ◽  
Teresa Bajo
Keyword(s):  

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabriella Vigliocco ◽  
Marta Ponari ◽  
Courtenay Norbury

A recent study by Ponari et al. (2017), showed that emotional valence (i.e., whether a word evokes positive, negative or no affect) predicts age-of-acquisition ratings, and that up to the age of 8-9, children know abstract emotional words better than neutral ones. On the basis of these findings, emotional valence has been argued to provide a bootstrapping mechanism for the acquisition of abstract concepts. However, no previous work has directly assessed whether words’ valence, or valence of the context in which words are used, facilitates learning of unknown abstract words. Here, we investigate whether valence supports acquisition of novel abstract concepts. Seven to 10 years old children were taught novel abstract words and concepts (words typically learnt at an older age and that children did not know); words were either valenced (positive or negative) or neutral. We also manipulated the context in which words were presented: for one group of children, the teaching strategy emphasised emotional information; for the other, it emphasised encyclopaedic, non-emotional information. Abstract words with emotional valence were learnt better than neutral abstract words by children up to the age of 8-9, replicating previous findings; no effect of teaching strategy was found. These results indicate that emotional valence supports abstract concepts acquisition, and further suggest that it is the valence information intrinsic to the word’s meaning to have a role, rather than the valence of the context in which the word is learnt.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document