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Selectivity in bilingual nonspeech label learning

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2020

Katharine GRAF ESTES ,
Dylan M. ANTOVICH  and
Erica L. VERDE
Katharine GRAF ESTES*
Affiliation:
University of California, Davis, USA
Dylan M. ANTOVICH
Affiliation:
University of California, Davis, USA
Erica L. VERDE
Affiliation:
University of California, Davis, USA
*
*Corresponding author: Katharine Graf Estes 1 Shields Ave. Davis, CA95618USA, 530-297-4498. E-mail: kgrafestes@ucdavis.edu
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Abstract

This research investigates selectivity in word learning for bilingual infants. Previous work demonstrated that bilingual infants show greater openness to non-native language sounds in object labels than monolinguals (Hay et al., 2015; Singh, 2018). It remains unclear whether bilingual openness extends to nonspeech sounds. We presented 14- and 19-month-old bilinguals with object labels consisting of nonspeech tones. Monolinguals recently displayed learning of the same labels at 14 months, but not 19 months (Graf Estes et al., 2018). In contrast, bilinguals failed to learn the labels. We propose that hearing phonological variation across two languages helps bilinguals reject nonspeech word forms.

Keywords

language acquisitioninfancybilingualismword learningphonological developmentperceptual narrowing
Type
Brief Research Report
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 48 , Issue 3 , May 2021 , pp. 634 - 644
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press

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