Bilingual Vocabulary Development in Mexican Indigenous Infants
The Effects of Language Exposure from Home and Mothers’ Language Dominance
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 20366935 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Stanislav Mulík (0000-0002-4556-2483, Pennsylvania State University, corresponding author), Natalia Arias-Trejo (0000-0002-4169-1616, Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Volume | 53 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 514-538 |
| Publication date | 2026-05-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Child Language (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0305-0009 • E-ISSN: 1469-7602 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1017/s0305000924000667 |
| PMID | 39980421 |
| OpenAlex | W4407817150 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 60 |
This study evaluates how language exposure and mothers’ language dominance relate to infants’ early bilingual vocabulary development in a low-socioeconomic status (SES) sample from an understudied population: Mexican Indigenous bilinguals. Thirty-two mother–child dyads participated. All mothers were bilingual speakers of Spanish and one of Mexican Indigenous languages, including Zapotec, Mixtec, and Otomi. Infants’ (between 16 and 37 months) vocabulary size was estimated in both languages using the Mexican Spanish version of the MacArthur-Bates CDI II. Infants’ language exposure, mothers’ bilingual profile, and their SES were estimated on numerical scales. The results of Spearman correlations showed infants’ vocabulary size in Spanish grows with age, while their vocabulary in the Indigenous language depends on relative language exposure. Mothers’ language dominance correlated with Indigenous language exposure and infants’ vocabulary size in the Indigenous language. These findings are discussed in the context of early bilingual vocabulary acquisition in speakers of minority languages
Developmental psychology · First language · Indigenous · Indigenous language · Language development · Linguistics · Neuroscience of multilingualism · Population · Socioeconomic status · Sociology · Vocabulary · Vocabulary development · Child and Animal Learning Development · Demography · Language Development and Disorders · Psychology · Reading and Literacy Development
Bilingualism in Development
The language‐specific nature of grammatical development
The role of home literacy and language environment on bilinguals' English and Spanish vocabulary development
SES differences in language processing skill and vocabulary are evident at 18 months
Assessing Language Dominance with the Bilingual Language Profile
Bilingual assessment
Size matters
The relation of input factors to lexical learning by bilingual infants
The measure matters
Early productive vocabulary predicts academic achievement 10 years later
MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories, Second Edition
The Neuroscience of Socioeconomic Status
Effects and noneffects of input in bilingual environments on dual language skills in 2 1⁄2-year-olds
Social factors in childhood bilingualism in the United States
Does input influence uptake? Links between maternal talk, processing speed and vocabulary size in Spanish‐learning children
Most people are not Weird
Perfil psicolingüístico de los bilingües otomí (hñäñho)-español, migrantes de Santiago Mexquititlán a Santiago de Querétaro, México
The relationship between bilingual exposure and vocabulary development
Lexical access and vocabulary development in very young bilinguals
The impact of a first-generation immigrant environment on the heritage language
Exposure to English Before and After Entry into Head Start1
Individual Differences in the Lexical Development of French–English Bilingual Children
Risk and protective environmental factors for early bilingual language acquisition
The psycholinguistics of bilingualism
Working towards Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Speech Assessments for South African Children
Documenting the acquisition of indigenous languages
Dual language exposure and early bilingual development
Te Reo Māori
Early lexical development in Spanish-speaking infants and toddlers
Bilingual signed and spoken language acquisition from birth
Sometimes larger, sometimes smaller
Indigenous children’s language
Growth in toddlers’ Spanish, English, and conceptual vocabulary knowledge
Interpreting the early language trajectories of children from low-SES and language minority homes
The neglected 95
Patterns of Interaction in the Lexical Growth in Two Languages of Bilingual Infants and Toddlers
Lexical Development in Bilingual Infants and Toddlers
The detailed age trajectory of oral vocabulary knowledge
| Highly cited | No |
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