Núria Sebastián‐gallé

Biographic Data

ID1463593
NAMENúria Sebastián‐gallé
GIVEN NAMESNúria
FAMILY NAMESebastián‐gallé
SIGNATUREGALLÉ N S
AFFILIATIONSUniversitat Pompeu Fabra
ORCID0000-0001-6938-2498
VERIFIEDYes
TOTAL WORKS36
TOTAL CITATIONS38
AUTHOR COUNT36
EDITOR COUNT0
FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR1993
LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR2025
H-INDEX2

  • Voice processing ability predicts second-language phoneme learning in early bilingual adults

    Open AccessGaël Cordero, Jazmin R Paredes-Paredes et al.ARTICLEBilingualism Language and Cognition2025

    Individuals differ greatly in their ability to learn the sounds of second languages, even when learning starts early in life. Recent research has suggested that the ability to identify the idiosyncratic acoustic variations introduced into the speech stream by the speaker might be relevant for second-language (L2) phoneme learning. However, only a positive correlation between voice recognition and phoneme learning has been shown. In the present st…

  • Cognate beginnings to bilingual lexical acquisition

    Open AccessGonzalo Garcia-Castro, Daniela S Avila-Varela et al.ARTICLEChild Development2025References: 55

    Recent studies suggest that cognateness boosts bilingual lexical acquisition. This study proposes an account in which language co-activation accelerates accumulation of word-learning instances across languages. This account predicts a larger cognate facilitation for words in the lower-exposure language than in the higher-exposure language, as the former receive co-activation from their translations more frequently. Bayesian Item Response Theory w…

  • Abstract processing of syllabic structures in early infancy

    Open AccessChiara Santolin, Konstantina Zacharaki et al.ARTICLECognition2024

    Syllables are one of the fundamental building blocks of early language acquisition. From birth onwards, infants preferentially segment, process and represent the speech into syllable-sized units, raising the question of what type of computations infants are able to perform on these perceptual units. Syllables are abstract units structured in a way that allows grouping phonemes into sequences. The goal of this research was to investigate 4-to-5-mo…

  • Before perceptual narrowing

    Open AccessKonstantina Zacharaki, Núria Sebastián‐galléARTICLEInfancy2022

    The present study investigates the precursors of representations of phonemes in 4.5‐month‐olds. The emergence of phonemes has been mainly studied within the framework of perceptual narrowing, that is, infants tuning to their native language and losing sensitivity to non‐native speech. One of the mechanisms behind this phenomenon is distributional learning. In this article, we tested the preference of 4.5‐month‐old infants using lists of pseudowor…

  • The ontogeny of early language discrimination

    Open AccessKonstantina Zacharaki, Núria Sebastián‐gallé et al.ARTICLECognition2021

  • Is there a bilingual disadvantage for word segmentation? A computational modeling approach

    Laia Fibla, Núria Sebastián‐gallé et al.PREPRINT2021

    Since there are no systematic pauses delimiting words in speech, the problem of word segmentation is formidable even for monolingual infants. We use computational modeling to assess whether word segmentation is substantially harder in a bilingual than a monolingual setting. Seven algorithms representing different cognitive approaches to segmentation are applied to transcriptions of naturalistic input to young children, carefully processed to gene…

  • Is there a bilingual disadvantage for word segmentation? A computational modeling approach

    Open AccessLaia Fibla, Núria Sebastián‐gallé et al.ARTICLEJournal of Child Language2021

    Since there are no systematic pauses delimiting words in speech, the problem of word segmentation is formidable even for monolingual infants. We use computational modeling to assess whether word segmentation is substantially harder in a bilingual than a monolingual setting. Seven algorithms representing different cognitive approaches to segmentation are applied to transcriptions of naturalistic input to young children, carefully processed to gene…

  • Experience with research paradigms relates to infants’ direction of preference

    Open AccessChiara Santolin, Gonzalo Garcia-Castro et al.ARTICLEInfancy2021

    Interpreting and predicting direction of preference in infant research has been a thorny issue for decades. Several factors have been proposed to account for familiarity versus novelty preferences, including age, length of exposure, and task complexity. The current study explores an additional dimension: experience with the experimental paradigm. We reanalyzed the data from 4 experiments on artificial grammar learning in 12‐month‐old infants run …

  • The development of gaze following in monolingual and bilingual infants

    Open AccessKrista Byers-Heinlein, Rachel Ka Ying Tsui et al.ARTICLEInfancy2021

    Determining the meanings of words requires language learners to attend to what other people say. However, it behooves a young language learner to simultaneously encode relevant non‐verbal cues, for example, by following the direction of their eye gaze. Sensitivity to cues such as eye gaze might be particularly important for bilingual infants, as they encounter less consistency between words and objects than monolingual infants, and do not always …

  • Language background shapes third-party communication expectations in 14-month-old infants

    Open AccessMarcelo Colomer, Núria Sebastián‐gallé et al.ARTICLECognition2020

  • Infants' expectations about the recipients of infant-directed and adult-directed speech

    Open AccessGaye Soley, Núria Sebastián‐gallé et al.ARTICLECognition2020

  • Multimodal Language Learning

    Open AccessMargherita Fort, Núria Sebastián‐gallé et al.ARTICLELanguage Learning2018References: 8

  • Impact of Bilingualism on Infants' Ability to Learn From Talking and Nontalking Faces

    Open AccessMargherita Fort, Alba Ayneto‐gimeno et al.ARTICLELanguage Learning2018Cited by: 1References: 67

    To probably overcome the challenge of learning two languages at the same time, infants raised in a bilingual environment pay more attention to the mouth of talking faces than same-age monolinguals. Here we examined the consequences of such preference for monolingual and bilingual infants' ability to perceive nonspeech information coming from the eyes or the mouth region of talking faces. Using a learning procedure, we recorded 15-month-olds' and …

  • On the role of frequency-based cues in the segmentation strategies of adult OV-VO bilinguals

    Irene de la Cruz-Pavía, Gorka Elordieta et al.ARTICLEInternational Journal of…2015

    The present investigation seeks to determine whether and under what circumstances can adult bilinguals deploy segmentation strategies characteristic of their two languages, or of their dominant language. To that end, we inquired whether the context language employed during the segmentation experiment (i.e., the language in which participants receive the instructions of the experiment) modulates the bilinguals' segmentation preferences given an am…

  • How does the bilingual experience sculpt the brain?

    Open AccessAlbert Costa, Núria Sebastián‐gallé et al.ARTICLENature Reviews Neuroscience2014

  • The Roots of Language Learning

    Open AccessMónika Molnár, Núria Sebastián‐gallé et al.ARTICLELanguage Learning2014Cited by: 1References: 2

  • EsPal

    Open AccessAndrew Duchon, Mauricio Perea et al.ARTICLEBehavior Research Methods2013

  • First and Second Language Speech Perception

    Open AccessNúria Sebastián‐gallé, Núria Sebastián‐Gallés et al.ARTICLELanguage Learning2012Cited by: 7References: 43

    In the process of language learning, individuals must acquire different types of linguistic knowledge, such as the sounds of the language (phonemes), how these may be combined to form words (phonotactics), and morphological rules. Early and late bilinguals tend to perform like natives on second language phonological tasks that involve pre-lexical processes (e.g., categorization or identification of isolate phonemes) but their performance decrease…

  • Bilingual Language Acquisition

    Open AccessNúria Sebastián‐gallé, Núria Sebastián-GallésARTICLEHuman Development2010

    Studies of preverbal infants exposed to a bilingual environment have unveiled the existence of important similarities, but also significant differences in the way monolinguals-to-be and bilinguals-to-be solve the problem of language acquisition. In this paper, I review these studies and I argue that some apparent bilingual failures are the consequence of experimental designs conceived to test monolingual infants. When properly analyzed, these dat…

  • On the bilingual advantage in conflict processing

    Open AccessAlbert Costa, Mireia Hernández et al.ARTICLECognition2009

  • Language‐specific stress perception by 9‐month‐old French and Spanish infants

    Open AccessKatrin Skoruppa, Francoise Pons et al.ARTICLEDevelopmental Science2009

    During the first year of life, infants begin to have difficulties perceiving non-native vowel and consonant contrasts, thus adapting their perception to the phonetic categories of the target language. In this paper, we examine the perception of a non-segmental feature, i.e. stress. Previous research with adults has shown that speakers of French (a language with fixed stress) have great difficulties in perceiving stress contrasts (Dupoux, Pallier,…

  • Persistent stress ‘deafness’

    Open AccessEmmanuel Dupoux, Núria Sebastián‐gallé et al.ARTICLECognition2008

  • Bilingualism aids conflict resolution

    Open AccessAlbert Costa, Mireia Hernández et al.ARTICLECognition2008

  • The influence of initial exposure on lexical representation

    Open AccessNúria Sebastián‐gallé, Núria Sebastián-Gallés et al.ARTICLEJournal of Memory and Language2005

  • Simultaneous Bilingualism and the Perception of a Language-Specific Vowel Contrast in the First Year of Life

    Open AccessLaura Bosch, Núria Sebastián‐gallé et al.ARTICLELanguage and Speech2003Cited by: 29References: 40

    Behavioral studies have shown that while young infants can discriminate many different phonetic contrasts, a shift from a language-general to a language-specific pattern of discrimination is found during the second semester of life, beginning earlier for vowels than for consonants. This age-related decline in sensitivity to perceive non-native contrasts has been generally attested in monolinguals. In order to analyze the impact of bilingual expos…