Sharon Unsworth
Biographic Data
| ID | 1454094 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Sharon Unsworth |
| GIVEN NAMES | Sharon |
| FAMILY NAME | Unsworth |
| SIGNATURE | UNSWORTH S |
| AFFILIATIONS | Radboud University Nijmegen |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-0946-2362 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 38 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 24 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 37 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1999 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Child heritage speakers’ reading skills in the majority language and exposure to the heritage language support morphosyntactic prediction in speech
We examined the morphosyntactic prediction ability of child heritage speakers and the role of reading skills and language experience in predictive processing. Using visual world eye-tracking, we focused on predictive use of case-marking cues in Turkish with monolingual (N = 49, M AGE = 83 months) and heritage children, who were early bilinguals of Turkish and Dutch (N = 30, M AGE = 90 months). We found quantitative differences in the magnitude of…
Cross-linguistic influence in the acquisition of grammatical gender in Dutch as a heritage language in bilingual children
The influence of one of a bilingual’s languages on the other is known as cross-linguistic influence (CLI). In grammatical gender acquisition, CLI can occur during gender discovery, assignment and agreement. The present study investigates CLI in Dutch as a heritage language, a language with a non-transparent gender system, in two groups of bilingual children. One (i.e., Dutch-German bilingual children) is acquiring languages with similar gender sy…
How detailed do measures of bilingual language experience need to be? A cost–benefit analysis using the Q-BEx questionnaire
What is the optimal level of questionnaire detail required to measure bilingual language experience? This empirical evaluation compares alternative measures of language exposure of varying cost (i.e., questionnaire detail) in terms of their performance as predictors of oral language outcomes. The alternative measures were derived from Q-BEx questionnaire data collected from a diverse sample of 121 heritage bilinguals (5–9 years of age) growing up…
The role of linguistic context and language similarity in the relationship between language exposure and language proficiency in bilingual children
Amount of exposure has consistently been shown to influence language development in bilingual children. To date, it has been treated as a variable that affects language development in the same way in different groups of bilingual children, but insights from several fields suggest that the similarity between languages and the context in which they are acquired may play a modulating role. This study therefore investigated the relationship between a…
Shared syntax and cross-linguistic influence in bilingual children: Evidence from between- and within-language priming
This paper investigates the role of structural priming in cross-linguistic influence, a well-established yet poorly understood characteristic of bilingual language development. More specifically, we test the proposal that cross-linguistic influence may be conceptualized as between-language priming, that is, as the result of prior linguistic exposure ( Serratrice, 2016 ) and shared syntactic representations between languages ( Hartsuiker et al., 2…
The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on multilingual families in the Netherlands
As a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, public life in many countries ground to a halt in early 2020. The aims of this study were (i) to uncover the language practices of multilingual families during the pandemic, in general and especially regarding homeschooling; and (ii) to determine to what extent the changes in circumstance caused by the pandemic impacted children’s language use and proficiency, and family well-being. Parents from 587 families …
Unpacking the Richness of Language Experience as a Predictor of Bilingual Children’s Language Proficiency
The richness of bilingual children’s language experience is typically expressed as a composite score using parental questionnaire data. This study unpacks the concept of input richness by examining one such composite score (Q-BEx) to determine whether it reliably predicts children’s language abilities, is no more complex than required, and as user-friendly as possible. Data were collected from 173 bilingual children aged 5 to 8 across three count…
The Role of Cognates and Language Distance in Simultaneous Bilingual Children's Productive Vocabulary Acquisition
This study examined the influence of cognate status and language distance on simultaneous bilingual children's vocabulary acquisition. It aimed to tease apart effects of word-level similarities and language-level similarities, while also exploring the role of individual-level variation in age, exposure, and nontarget language proficiency. Children simultaneously acquiring two closely related languages (n = 203) or two more distant languages (n = …
Individual differences in structural priming in bilingual and monolingual children: The influence of perspective-taking
When speaking or writing, people tend to re-use the syntactic structures they recently encountered ( structural priming ). Individuals differ in the extent to which they are primed ( primeability ). Previous research has suggested that perspective-taking, that is, the ability to imagine the feelings, thoughts and perceptions of others, predicts the magnitude of priming in adults. The present study investigates if this also holds for monolingual a…
Cross-linguistic influence in the simultaneous bilingual child's lexicon: An eye-tracking and primed picture selection study
In a between-language lexical priming study, we examined to what extent the two languages in a simultaneous bilingual child's lexicon interact, while taking individual differences in language exposure into account. Primary-school-aged Dutch–Greek bilinguals performed a primed picture selection task combined with eye-tracking. They matched pictures to auditorily presented Dutch target words preceded by Greek prime words. Their reaction times and e…
Cognate facilitation in single- and dual-language contexts in bilingual children’s word processing
We examined the extent to which cognate facilitation effects occurred in simultaneous bilingual children’s production and comprehension and how these were modulated by language dominance and language context. Bilingual Dutch-German children, ranging from Dutch-dominant to German-dominant, performed picture naming and auditory lexical decision tasks in single-language and dual-language contexts. Language context was manipulated with respect to the…
Language processing in bilingual children: Why it matters, what we know and what is still missing
On the Relation Between Cross-Linguistic Influence, Between-Language Priming and Language Proficiency: Priming of Ungrammatical Adjective Placement in Bilingual Spanish-Dutch and French-Dutch Children
After hearing a structure in one language, bilinguals are more likely to produce the same structure in their other language. Such between-language priming is often interpreted as evidence for shared syntactic representations between a bilingual’s two languages and is positively related to proficiency. Recently, shared syntactic structures and structural priming have been invoked to explain cross-linguistic influence in bilingual children. This pa…
How to quantify bilingual experience? Findings from a Delphi consensus survey
While most investigations of bilingualism document participants’ language background, there is an absence of consensus on how to quantify bilingualism. The high number of different language background questionnaires used by researchers and practitioners jeopardises data comparability and cross-pollination between research and practice. Using the Delphi consensus survey method, we asked 132 panellists (researchers, speech and language therapists, …
So many variables, but what causes what
Paradis’ keynote article provides a comprehensive overview of factors influencing bilingual children’s dual language abilities. It includes the ‘usual suspects’, such as input quantity, and also highlights areas requiring further investigation, such as cognitive abilities. As such, it will no doubt serve as a valuable basis for the field as we move forward. Paradis quite rightly points out that whilst some of these factors may be unidirectionally…
Cross-linguistic influence during online sentence processing in bilingual children
To assess the presence of cross-linguistic influence, this study compared the processing of Dutch sentences by English–Dutch and German–Dutch bilingual and Dutch monolingual children in a self-paced listening task. We combined insights from studies on child bilingualism and adult second language acquisition. Sentence structures showing partial overlap between languages were investigated (long passives), as well as structures with complete or no o…
A review of questionnaires quantifying bilingual experience in children: Do they document the same constructs
Questionnaires documenting children's bilingual experience have been used frequently in research on language and cognitive development. However, there has been little investigation of the comparability between these tools. In this review, we (i) provide a list of available questionnaires used to quantify bilingual experience in children; (ii) identify the components of bilingual experience documented across questionnaires; and (iii) discuss the c…
Cross-linguistic influence in simultaneous and early sequential bilingual children: A meta-analysis
Although cross-linguistic influence at the level of morphosyntax is one of the most intensively studied topics in child bilingualism, the circumstances under which it occurs remain unclear. In this meta-analysis, we measured the effect size of cross-linguistic influence and systematically assessed its predictors in 750 simultaneous and early sequential bilingual children in 17 unique language combinations across 26 experimental studies. We found …
Differences in phonological awareness performance: Are there positive or negative effects of bilingual experience
Children who have knowledge of two languages may show better phonological awareness than their monolingual peers (e.g. Bruck & Genesee, 1995 ). It remains unclear how much bilingual experience is needed for such advantages to appear, and whether differences in language or cognitive skills alter the relation between bilingualism and phonological awareness. These questions were investigated in this cross-sectional study. Participants ( n = 294; 4–7…
Cross-linguistic influence in word order: Effects of age, dominance and surface overlap
The present study investigated cross-linguistic influence (CLI) in the word order of Dutch-English bilingual children, using elicited production and acceptability judgment tasks. The goal was to examine whether monolingual and bilingual children produced and/or accepted V2 word orders in English, as in * Yesterday painted she an apple . We investigated whether the likelihood of CLI was related to language dominance, age at testing, and the degree…
Using the peabody picture vocabulary test in L2 children and adolescents: Effects of L1
This study investigated to what extent the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT-4) is a reliable tool for measuring vocabulary knowledge of English as a second language (L2), and to what extent L1 characteristics affect test outcomes. The PPVT-4 was administered to Dutch pupils in six different age groups (4-15 years old) who were or were not following an English educational programme at school. Our first finding was that the PPVT-4 was not a re…
Testing the validity of the Cross-Linguistic Lexical Task as a measure of language proficiency in bilingual children
The Cross-linguistic Lexical Task (CLT; Haman, Łuniewska & Pomiechowska, 2015) is a vocabulary task designed to enable cross-linguistic comparisons both across and within (bilingual) children. In this paper we assessed the validity of the CLT as a measure of language proficiency in bilingual children, by determining the extent to which (i) age-matched, monolingual Spanish-speaking and Dutch-speaking children obtained similar scores, (ii) the CLT …
Unravelling upper-secondary school teachers’ beliefs about language awareness: From conflicts to challenges in the EFL context
This study presents an in-depth inquiry into teachers’ beliefs about a language awareness approach to secondary school foreign language education. The study aims to deepen our insight into (the differences in) teachers’ beliefs about language awareness and facilitate the discussion about including language awareness in foreign language curricula. Ten EFL teachers were interviewed about their beliefs about language awareness. Analysis of the inter…
Early child L2 acquisition: Age or input effects? Neither, or both
This paper explores whether there is evidence for age and/or input effects in child L2 acquisition across three different linguistic domains, namely morphosyntax, vocabulary, and syntax–semantics. More specifically, it compares data from English-speaking children whose age of onset to L2 Dutch was between one and three years with data from children whose age of onset was between four and seven years in their acquisition of verb morphology, verb p…
Beyond poverty: Engaging with input in generative SLA
A generative approach to language acquisition is no different from any other in assuming that target language input is crucial for language acquisition. This discussion note addresses the place of input in generative second language acquisition (SLA) research and the perception in the wider field of SLA research that generative SLA ‘ignores’ the input. This impression may have arisen because generative SLA researchers have tended not to systemati…
Age and input in the acquisition of grammatical gender in Dutch
This article investigates the effect of age of first exposure and the quantity and quality of input to which non-native acquirers (L2ers) are exposed in their acquisition of grammatical gender in Dutch. Data from 103 English-speaking children, preteens and adults were analysed for gender agreement on definite determiners. It was observed that although most learners regularly overgeneralized the common gender definite determiner de to neuter nouns…
Beyond poverty: Engaging with input in generative SLA
A generative approach to language acquisition is no different from any other in assuming that target language input is crucial for language acquisition. This discussion note addresses the place of input in generative second language acquisition (SLA) research and the perception in the wider field of SLA research that generative SLA ‘ignores’ the input. This impression may have arisen because generative SLA researchers have tended not to systemati…
The acquisition of grammatical gender in Dutch
International audience
Sociolinguistic variation in southern French schwa
This article examines the differing degrees to which young male and female speakers are apparently participating in a process of linguistic change currently taking place in southern French. Previous research suggests that younger females in southern France are adopting the treatment of schwa characteristic of the northern standard variety; but no study of linguistic change in southern French has yet been carried out through a direct, variationist…
L1 and L2 acquisition between sentence and discourse: Comparing production and comprehension in child Dutch
Sociolinguistic variation in southern French schwa
This article examines the differing degrees to which young male and female speakers are apparently participating in a process of linguistic change currently taking place in southern French. Previous research suggests that younger females in southern France are adopting the treatment of schwa characteristic of the northern standard variety; but no study of linguistic change in southern French has yet been carried out through a direct, variationist…
Paths of development in L1 and L2 acquisition: In honor of Bonnie D. Schwartz
L1 and L2 acquisition between sentence and discourse: Comparing production and comprehension in child Dutch
Age and input in the acquisition of grammatical gender in Dutch
This article investigates the effect of age of first exposure and the quantity and quality of input to which non-native acquirers (L2ers) are exposed in their acquisition of grammatical gender in Dutch. Data from 103 English-speaking children, preteens and adults were analysed for gender agreement on definite determiners. It was observed that although most learners regularly overgeneralized the common gender definite determiner de to neuter nouns…
The acquisition of grammatical gender in Dutch
International audience
Early successive bilingualism: Disentangling the relevant factors
It is not clear to us to what extent some of these TL properties, e.g. subject
Julia Herschensohn, Language development and age. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Pp. xiv+289
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Internal and external factors in child second language acquisition
An introduction to the journal is presented in which the editor discusses various articles published within the issue including one on morphosyntactic development and vocabulary, one on acquisition of grammatical gender, and one on the importance of the low proficiency in immigrant families
Assessing the role of current and cumulative exposure in simultaneous bilingual acquisition: The case of Dutch gender
This paper investigates the role of amount of current and cumulative exposure in bilingual development and ultimate attainment by exploring the extent to which simultaneous bilingual children's knowledge of grammatical gender is affected by current and previous amount of exposure, including in the early years. Elicited production and grammaticality judgement data collected from 136 English–Dutch-speaking bilingual children aged between three and …
Testing the Amelioration Hypothesis: Does the illusion hold for other scope phenomena
Preview this article: Testing the Amelioration Hypothesis: Does the illusion hold for other scope phenomena?, Page 1 of 1 /docserver/preview/fulltext/lab.3.3.15uns-1.gif
The role of age of onset and input in early child bilingualism in Greek and Dutch
The focus of this study is the acquisition of grammatical gender in Greek and Dutch by bilingual children whose other language is English. Although grammatical gender languages share the property of noun classification in terms of grammatical gender, there are important differences between the languages under investigation here in terms of both the morphological cues for gender marking available to the child and the developmental path followed by…
An investigation of factors affecting early foreign language learning in the Netherlands
The most recent data available on language teaching in Europe indicate that the number of pupils in primary education that are being taught at least one foreign language is on the rise, with pupils being offered foreign languages at an increasingly younger age (Eurydice Network, Eurostat, and Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency, 2008). The teaching of English in Dutch primary schools has been mandatory in the (pen)ultimate year of…
Contradictory information in the input as the cause of Multiple Grammars: Predictions for bilingual acquisition
Early child L2 acquisition: Age or input effects? Neither, or both
This paper explores whether there is evidence for age and/or input effects in child L2 acquisition across three different linguistic domains, namely morphosyntax, vocabulary, and syntax–semantics. More specifically, it compares data from English-speaking children whose age of onset to L2 Dutch was between one and three years with data from children whose age of onset was between four and seven years in their acquisition of verb morphology, verb p…
Beyond poverty: Engaging with input in generative SLA
A generative approach to language acquisition is no different from any other in assuming that target language input is crucial for language acquisition. This discussion note addresses the place of input in generative second language acquisition (SLA) research and the perception in the wider field of SLA research that generative SLA ‘ignores’ the input. This impression may have arisen because generative SLA researchers have tended not to systemati…
Unravelling upper-secondary school teachers’ beliefs about language awareness: From conflicts to challenges in the EFL context
This study presents an in-depth inquiry into teachers’ beliefs about a language awareness approach to secondary school foreign language education. The study aims to deepen our insight into (the differences in) teachers’ beliefs about language awareness and facilitate the discussion about including language awareness in foreign language curricula. Ten EFL teachers were interviewed about their beliefs about language awareness. Analysis of the inter…
Differences in phonological awareness performance: Are there positive or negative effects of bilingual experience
Children who have knowledge of two languages may show better phonological awareness than their monolingual peers (e.g. Bruck & Genesee, 1995 ). It remains unclear how much bilingual experience is needed for such advantages to appear, and whether differences in language or cognitive skills alter the relation between bilingualism and phonological awareness. These questions were investigated in this cross-sectional study. Participants ( n = 294; 4–7…
Cross-linguistic influence in word order: Effects of age, dominance and surface overlap
The present study investigated cross-linguistic influence (CLI) in the word order of Dutch-English bilingual children, using elicited production and acceptability judgment tasks. The goal was to examine whether monolingual and bilingual children produced and/or accepted V2 word orders in English, as in * Yesterday painted she an apple . We investigated whether the likelihood of CLI was related to language dominance, age at testing, and the degree…
Using the peabody picture vocabulary test in L2 children and adolescents: Effects of L1
This study investigated to what extent the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT-4) is a reliable tool for measuring vocabulary knowledge of English as a second language (L2), and to what extent L1 characteristics affect test outcomes. The PPVT-4 was administered to Dutch pupils in six different age groups (4-15 years old) who were or were not following an English educational programme at school. Our first finding was that the PPVT-4 was not a re…
Testing the validity of the Cross-Linguistic Lexical Task as a measure of language proficiency in bilingual children
The Cross-linguistic Lexical Task (CLT; Haman, Łuniewska & Pomiechowska, 2015) is a vocabulary task designed to enable cross-linguistic comparisons both across and within (bilingual) children. In this paper we assessed the validity of the CLT as a measure of language proficiency in bilingual children, by determining the extent to which (i) age-matched, monolingual Spanish-speaking and Dutch-speaking children obtained similar scores, (ii) the CLT …
Cross-linguistic influence during online sentence processing in bilingual children
To assess the presence of cross-linguistic influence, this study compared the processing of Dutch sentences by English–Dutch and German–Dutch bilingual and Dutch monolingual children in a self-paced listening task. We combined insights from studies on child bilingualism and adult second language acquisition. Sentence structures showing partial overlap between languages were investigated (long passives), as well as structures with complete or no o…
A review of questionnaires quantifying bilingual experience in children: Do they document the same constructs
Questionnaires documenting children's bilingual experience have been used frequently in research on language and cognitive development. However, there has been little investigation of the comparability between these tools. In this review, we (i) provide a list of available questionnaires used to quantify bilingual experience in children; (ii) identify the components of bilingual experience documented across questionnaires; and (iii) discuss the c…
Cross-linguistic influence in simultaneous and early sequential bilingual children: A meta-analysis
Although cross-linguistic influence at the level of morphosyntax is one of the most intensively studied topics in child bilingualism, the circumstances under which it occurs remain unclear. In this meta-analysis, we measured the effect size of cross-linguistic influence and systematically assessed its predictors in 750 simultaneous and early sequential bilingual children in 17 unique language combinations across 26 experimental studies. We found …
On the Relation Between Cross-Linguistic Influence, Between-Language Priming and Language Proficiency: Priming of Ungrammatical Adjective Placement in Bilingual Spanish-Dutch and French-Dutch Children
After hearing a structure in one language, bilinguals are more likely to produce the same structure in their other language. Such between-language priming is often interpreted as evidence for shared syntactic representations between a bilingual’s two languages and is positively related to proficiency. Recently, shared syntactic structures and structural priming have been invoked to explain cross-linguistic influence in bilingual children. This pa…
How to quantify bilingual experience? Findings from a Delphi consensus survey
While most investigations of bilingualism document participants’ language background, there is an absence of consensus on how to quantify bilingualism. The high number of different language background questionnaires used by researchers and practitioners jeopardises data comparability and cross-pollination between research and practice. Using the Delphi consensus survey method, we asked 132 panellists (researchers, speech and language therapists, …
Psychology (32 works) · Linguistics (27 works) · Language Development and Disorders (25 works) · Reading and Literacy Development (23 works) · Neurobiology of Language and Bilingualism (19 works) · Neuroscience of multilingualism (18 works) · Computer Science (16 works) · Language proficiency (9 works) · Philosophy (9 works) · Cognition (8 works)