El book or the libro? Insights from acceptability judgments into determiner/noun code-switches

Objectives/research questions:We used two types of acceptability judgments to experimentally test the predictions of two theoretical models of code-switching regarding the surface realization of the determiner in nominal constructions: lexicalist approaches within the Minimalist Program (MP) versus the Bilingual NP Hypothesis within the Matrix Language Frame Model (MLF).Methodology:Two separate groups of 40 early Spanish-English bilinguals evaluated the acceptability of sentences with code-switches between the determiner and the noun that reflected the predictions of the MP model, the MLF, of both or none. The first group rated them on a Likert scale, while the second group performed a two-alternative forced-choice acceptability task (2AFC).Data and analysis:Ratings from the Likert ratings were subjected to an analysis of variance while results from the 2AFC were analyzed using Thurstone’s Law of Comparative Judgment.Conclusions:Both experiments yielded converging evidence supporting the predictions of the MLF. Results from the 2AFC provided a more detailed picture that suggests also a (smaller) contribution of the language of the determiner.Originality:This is the first study to use acceptability judgments to directly contrast the predictions of these major theoretical models regarding switches between determiner and noun. An additional novelty is the use of the 2AFC and Thurstone’s Law of Comparative Judgment, which yielded a more detailed picture than the more commonly used Likert-scale ratings.Implications:Our results provide further support for Eppler, Luescher, and Deuchar’s recent claim that we can only advance our understanding of grammaticality in code-switching if we combine the insights of the different frameworks rather than considering them in isolation.Theoretical and Experimental Linguistic

Gender Assignment to Spanish Pseudowords by Monolingual and Basque-Spanish Bilingual Children

This study examines gender marking in the Spanish of Basque-Spanish bilingual children. We analyze data collected via a production task designed to elicit 48 DPs, controlling for gender of referents and for number and types of morphological cues to grammatical gender. The goals were to determine the extent to which participants rely on biological cues (female referent =\u3eFEM gender, male referent =\u3eMASC gender) and morpho-phonological cues (-a ending =\u3eFEM, -o ending =\u3eMASC, others =\u3eMASC or FEM) to assign gender to pseudowords/novel words; and whether bilinguals’ language dominance (Spanish strong/weak) has an effect. Data were collected from 49 5- to 6-year-old Spanish-speaking children—28 monolingual L1 Spanish (L1Sp) and 21 Basque-dominant (L1 Basque-L2 Spanish) bilinguals (BDB). Results reveal a general preference for MASC gender across conditions, especially in BDB children, who produced masculine modifiers for 83% of items, while the L1Sp children did so for only 63% of items. Regression analyses show that for both groups, morphological cues have more weight than the nature of the referent in participants’ assignment of gender to novel words, and that the L1Sp group is more attentive to FEM morphological markers than the BDB group, pointing towards the existence of differences in the strength of cue-patterns for gender marking

Testing alternative theoretical accounts of code-switching: Insights from comparative judgments of adjective–noun order

Objectives:Spanish and English contrast in adjective–noun word order: for example, brown dress (English) vs. vestido marrón (‘dress brown’, Spanish). According to the Matrix Language model ( MLF) word order in code-switched sentences must be compatible with the word order of the matrix language, but working within the minimalist program (MP), Cantone and MacSwan arrived at the descriptive generalization that the position of the noun phrase relative to the adjective is determined by the adjective’s language. Our aim is to evaluate the predictions derived from these two models regarding adjective–noun order in Spanish–English code-switched sentences.Methodology:We contrasted the predictions from both models regarding the acceptability of code-switched sentences with different adjective–noun orders that were compatible with the MP, the MLF, both, or none. Acceptability was assessed in Experiment 1 with a 5-point Likert and in Experiment 2 with a 2-Alternative Forced Choice (2AFC) task.Data and analysis:Data from both experiments were subjected to linear mixed model analyses. Results from the 2AFC task were also analyzed using Thurstone’s law of comparative judgment.Conclusions:We found an additive effect in which both the language of the verb and the language of the adjective determine word order.Originality:Both experiments examine adjective–noun word order in English–Spanish code-switched sentences. Experiment 2 represents a novel application of Thurstone’s law of comparative judgements to the study of linguistic acceptability which yielded clearer results than Likert scales. We found convincing evidence that neither the MLF nor the MP can fully account for the acceptability of adjective–noun switches.Implications:We suggest that advances in our understanding of grammaticality in code-switching will be achieved by combining the insights of the two frameworks instead of considering them in isolation, or by espousing a probabilistic model of code-switching.Theoretical and Experimental Linguistic

Testing alternative theoretical accounts of code-switching:Insights from comparative judgments of adjective-noun order

Objectives:Spanish and English contrast in adjective–noun word order: for example, brown dress (English) vs. vestido marrón (‘dress brown’, Spanish). According to the Matrix Language model ( MLF) word order in code-switched sentences must be compatible with the word order of the matrix language, but working within the minimalist program (MP), Cantone and MacSwan arrived at the descriptive generalization that the position of the noun phrase relative to the adjective is determined by the adjective’s language. Our aim is to evaluate the predictions derived from these two models regarding adjective–noun order in Spanish–English code-switched sentences.Methodology:We contrasted the predictions from both models regarding the acceptability of code-switched sentences with different adjective–noun orders that were compatible with the MP, the MLF, both, or none. Acceptability was assessed in Experiment 1 with a 5-point Likert and in Experiment 2 with a 2-Alternative Forced Choice (2AFC) task.Data and analysis:Data from both experiments were subjected to linear mixed model analyses. Results from the 2AFC task were also analyzed using Thurstone’s law of comparative judgment.Conclusions:We found an additive effect in which both the language of the verb and the language of the adjective determine word order.Originality:Both experiments examine adjective–noun word order in English–Spanish code-switched sentences. Experiment 2 represents a novel application of Thurstone’s law of comparative judgements to the study of linguistic acceptability which yielded clearer results than Likert scales. We found convincing evidence that neither the MLF nor the MP can fully account for the acceptability of adjective–noun switches.Implications:We suggest that advances in our understanding of grammaticality in code-switching will be achieved by combining the insights of the two frameworks instead of considering them in isolation, or by espousing a probabilistic model of code-switching.</jats:sec

Crowdsourcing and minority languages: the case of Galician inflected infinitives

Results from a crowdsourced audio questionnaire show that inflected infinitives in Galician are still acceptable in a broad range of contexts, different from those described for European Portuguese. Crucially, inflected infinitives with referential subjects are widely accepted only inside strong islands in Galician (complements of nouns, adjunct clauses). They are widely rejected in non-islands, notably in the complements of epistemic/factive verbs, in contrast with Portuguese and older varieties of Galician (Gondar 1978, Raposo 1987). Statistical analysis shows, however, that, in the complements of epistemic/factive (and desiderative) verbs, inflected infinitives are significantly more acceptable in instances of control, whether partial or exhaustive. In fact, there is no significant difference between these two types of control in Galician, unlike in Portuguese, where inflection is generally better in instances of partial control and is not acceptable in instances of exhaustive local subject control (Modesto 2010, Sheehan 2018). We propose an analysis of this pattern in terms of phase theory. The inflectional domain of non-finite clauses remains visible to the thematic domain of the next clause up, according to the less strict version of the Phase Impenetrability Condition (Chomsky 2001), allowing control to take place. Pronouns/or pronominal inflections in the inflectional domain of visible non-finite clauses therefore get controlled. In islands, however, material in the inflectional domain remains free/referential. Despite this basic pattern, the data are characterized by substantial interspeaker variation. Statistical analysis shows that gender, urban/rural birthplace and mother tongue are all significant factors in this variation, while age and region of birth are not. Most notably, urban-born male bilinguals with Spanish as their mother tongue consistently rate the sentences higher on the Likert scale. Overall, the results show that crowdsourcing can lead to empirically robust syntactic descriptions of minority languages which are likely to be subject to substantial sociolinguistic variation and where judgements from a single social group may be misrepresentative of the general picture. The study also highlights, however, the challenges associated with using crowd-sourced audio-questionnaires of this kind in languages of this kind and the need for statistical analysis of results to control for substantial amounts of variation

Using two-alternative forced choice tasks and Thurstone’s law of comparative judgments for code-switching research

This article argues that 2-alternative forced choice tasks and Thurstone’s law of comparative judgments (Thurstone, 1927) are well suited to investigate code-switching competence by means of acceptability judgments. We compare this method with commonly used Likert scale judgments and find that the 2-alternative forced choice task provides granular details that remain invisible in a Likert scale experiment. In order to compare and contrast both methods, we examined the syntactic phenomenon usually referred to as the Adjacency Condition (AC) (apud Stowell, 1981), which imposes a condition of adjacency between verb and object. Our interest in the AC comes from the fact that it is a subtle feature of English grammar which is absent in Spanish, and this provides an excellent springboard to create minimal code-switched pairs that allow us to formulate a clear research question that can be tested using both methods.Theoretical and Experimental Linguistic

On the Grammaticality of Passivization In Bilingual Compound Verbs

Objectives/Research Questions: We examined stative and eventive passive bilingual compound verbs (BCVs) in Spanish/English code-switching. Of particular interest to us was the availability of passivization in bilingual eventive passive hacer “do” constructions, purportedly banned in bilingual speech due to a universal syntactic restriction. Methodology: A total of 119 bilinguals from Northern Belize and 36 from Southwest United States completed a two-alternative forced-choice acceptability task and a language background questionnaire. Data and Analysis: The analysis was conducted using Thurstone’s Law of Comparative Judgment. Conclusion: For stative passive BCVs, results revealed that Spanish/English bilinguals from both contexts gave the highest ratings to code-switched constructions without the light verb hacer. For eventive passive BCVs, however, Belize bilinguals gave preferential ratings to passive constructions with the light verb hacer. Conversely, US bilinguals rejected them. Notably, among Belize bilinguals, eventive passive BCVs that were rated as most acceptable were constructions with no gender agreement between the light verb and the feminine antecedent noun. Originality: This is the first cross-community analysis that investigates stative and eventive passive BCVs in Spanish/English code-switching. Implications: Our findings show that the light verb hacer is compatible with both stative and eventive passive BCVs. Crucially, context-specific linguistic norms and social factors rather than a universal syntactic restriction primarily determine the availability of passivization in eventive passive BCVs. Our theorizing of code-switching grammars, thus, necessitates careful consideration of invariant and variable production patterns that are profoundly shaped by historical and sociolinguistic conditions

Eye Tracking Investigation Into Semantic Convergence In Fully Fluent Spanish-English Bilingual Adults

Aims and Objectives: This article examines semantic convergence of bilinguals’ two languages in the case of words that overlap semantically but are not fully isomorphic in meaning and application. To what extent do the type of bilingual, type of category, and relative semantic width across the languages matter? Design: The primary method involves eye tracking while participants chose pictures corresponding to an English word heard. The data examine potential differences in simultaneous Spanish–English bilinguals’, early Spanish L1–English L2 bilinguals’, and monolingual English speakers’ durations and numbers of fixations on potential candidates for referents. Data and Analysis: Thirty-eight participants were administered the task in relation to 48 English words from three types of words (classical, radial, and homophonic), half with wider semantic extension in English, half with wider semantic extension in Spanish. Durations and numbers of fixations were analyzed with ANOVAs with participant group, word type, and semantic width treated as variables. Findings/Conclusions: Data revealed minimal influences from Spanish on English with homophonic words, but for classical categories, and to some extent radial categories, bilinguals showed influence from Spanish on English words: participants considered referents that would be relevant for Spanish but not English. Originality: Eye tracking provides a window into the online processing of words and their referents, and thus provides more subtle clues to bilinguals’ processing of these categories relative to monolinguals’. The results support a special status relative to semantic convergence for words whose referents correspond to categories whose members lie close together in the conceptual space. Significance/Implications: For us to best account for semantic convergence in bilingual speakers, these data indicate that the type of category and the category structure in the conceptual space matter, the relative widths of the categories in bilinguals’ two languages matter, the task demands matter, and the type of bilingual matters