Visual attention and quantifier-spreading in heritage Russian bilinguals

Bibliographic Data

ID11655794
AuthorsI A Sekerina (0000-0003-3859-3000, City University of New York, corresponding author), Antje Sauermann (0000-0002-8698-7402, University of Potsdam)
Year2014
Volume31
Issue1
Pages75-104
Publication date2014-07-04
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSecond language Research (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0267-6583 • E-ISSN: 1477-0326
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/0267658314537292
OpenAlexW2331519367
LanguageEN
Citations received38
References cited33

It is well established in language acquisition research that monolingual children and adult second language learners misinterpret sentences with the universal quantifier every and make quantifier-spreading errors that are attributed to a preference for a match in number between two sets of objects. The present Visual World eye-tracking study tested bilingual heritage Russian–English adults and investigated how they interpret of sentences like Every alligator lies in a bathtub in both languages. Participants performed a sentence–picture verification task while their eye movements were recorded. Pictures showed three pairs of alligators in bathtubs and two extra objects: elephants (Control condition), bathtubs (Overexhaustive condition), or alligators (Underexhaustive condition). Monolingual adults performed at ceiling in all conditions. Heritage language (HL) adults made 20% q-spreading errors, but only in the Overexhaustive condition, and when they made an error they spent more time looking at the two extra bathtubs during the Verb region. We attribute q-spreading in HL speakers to cognitive overload caused by the necessity to integrate conflicting sources of information, i.e. the spoken sentences in their weaker, heritage, language and attention-demanding visual context, that differed with respect to referential salience

Age of Acquisition · Cognition · Cognitive psychology · Context (archaeology · Geography · Heritage language · Linguistics · Quantifier (linguistics · Salience (neuroscience · Sentence · Verb · Neurobiology of Language and Bilingualism · Psychology · Reading and Literacy Development · Second Language Acquisition and Learning

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub