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

La morfología verbal temprana en español

The development of the first verb forms in children's speech is currently under debate. Some researchers have proposed a rapid acquisition of morphology and syntax as a result of the general linguistic knowledge which is part of our innate endowment. Others have proposed a gradual and piecemeal knowledge for the first use of verbs and verbal structures,following the ccverb-island hypothesisu of Tomasello. This paper examines these issues in Spanish. Data from three monolingual Spanish children are analyzed. Children's ages are: from 1;3 to 2;6;fiom 1;8 to 2;l; and from 1 ;5 to 2;2. Our analysis showed gradual verbal learning for Spanish children,with a veiy restricted use of productive verb type forms. This suggests a piecemeal learning of verbs, [.e. Spanish children start to use verbs one by one, with very specific forms. We also found that Spanish-speaking children's early verb structures are based on limited, verb-specific knowledge.Finally, our results showed different patterns for each child.Actualmente hay autores que proponen una adquisición rúpida de la morfologia y sintaxis como resultado de un conocimiento gramatical generalizado, aunque algunos aceptan que ese conocimiento no se.manifiesta del todo en la superficie debido a,factores diversos. Por otro lado, se encuentra un grupo de investigadores que consideran que el desarrollo inicial de la morfologia verbal se produce de modo gradual y no  generalizado, apoyando -en mayor o menor medida- la "hipótesis de las islas verbales" de Tomasello, tanto en lo que se rejiere a los primeros verbos como a las primeras estructuras oracionales del habla infantil. Nuestro objetivoes abordar estas cuestiones en español. Hemos analizado el habla de tres sujetos monolingiies españoles cuyas edades son: desde 1;3 hasta 2;6; desde 1;8 hasta 2;1; y desde 1;5 hasta 2;2. Nuestros resultados muestran que los niños comienzan a hacer uso muy restringido de las formas verbalesproductivas. Ello parece sugerir que el aprendizaje de los verbos en español es un aprendizaje fragmentado que se inicia verbo-a-verbo, con una incorporación muy gradual de nuevas formas al paradigma verbal. Además, hemos encontrado que las primeras estructuras oracionales son, igualmente, restringidas; es decir, los primeros verbos no aparecen encombinaciones variadas en el habla temprana. Por Último, nuestros resultados muestran patrones diferentes para cada uno de los 3 niños

Executive control in older Welsh monolinguals and bilinguals

Evidence for a bilingual advantage in executive control has led to the suggestion that being bilingual might protect against late-life cognitive decline. We assessed the performance of socially homogeneous groups of older (≥ 60 years) bilingual Welsh/English (n = 50) and monolingual English (n = 49) speakers on a range of executive control tasks yielding 17 indices for comparison. Effect sizes (> .2) favoured monolinguals on 10 indices, with negligible differences observed on the remaining 7 indices. Univariate analyses indicated that monolinguals performed significantly better on two of 17 indices. Multivariate analysis indicated no significant overall differences between the two groups in performance on executive tasks. Older Welsh bilinguals do not show a bilingual advantage in executive control, and where differences are observed, these tend to favour monolinguals. A possible explanation may lie in the nature of the sociolinguistic context and its influence on cognitive processing in the bilingual group