LECTURE 10

LANGUAGE ACQUISITION

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 INTRODUCTION

• Psycholinguistic discussion of language processing would not be

complete without consideration of bilingualism and second
language learning (Gleason & Ratner, 1998).

• Bilingualism is more common than monolingualism in the modern

world.

• First Language Acquisition (FLA) and Second Language Acquisition

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(SLA) are the main issues to be discussed, with a focus on SLA.

 FIRST LANGUAGE ACQUISITION (FLA)

• Children acquire an impressive amount of language in a comparatively

short time without much direct tuition and with remarkable commonality
(Shatz, 2007).

• Explaining what children acquire during language development is easier

than explaining how they do it (Gleason, 2005).

• Never has there been so much debate about the mechanisms of first3
language acquisition (Ellis, 2005).
 FIRST LANGUAGE ACQUISITION (FLA)

• Children learning their first language (L1) are eventually indistinguishable

from other native speakers of their speech community (Doughty, 2003).

• Yet, within the L1 speech community, there appears to be a considerable

diversity across L1 speakers’ command of their mother tongue, from their
pronunciation to their syntactic or pragmatic skills.

• Researchers could not provide a definite explanation, and they ventured

into innateness to seek explanations. 4
 SECOND LANGUAGE ACQUISITION (SLA)

• The field of SLA research investigates how people attain proficiency in a

language which is not their mother tongue.

• The interesting phenomenon of children acquiring two languages is

generally investigated in the field known as bilingualism.

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 SECOND LANGUAGE ACQUISITION (SLA)

• In the case of SLA by adults, we cannot say that the learners are
cognitively and biologically immature.

• The diagram below illustrates the fact that SL learners have a systematic
Interlanguage Grammar (IL) grammar – so-called because it is influenced
by both the first and the second language and has features of each.

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 SECOND LANGUAGE ACQUISITION (SLA)

• The term acquisition is used to refer to the gradual development of

stability in a language by using it naturally in communicative situations
with others who know the language.

• Activities associated with acquisition are those experienced by the young

child and by those who “pick up” a second language from long periods
spent in interaction, constantly using the language, with native speakers
of the language.
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 SECOND LANGUAGE ACQUISITION (SLA)

• The term learning, however, applies to a more conscious process of

accumulating knowledge of the features, such as linguistic features of a
language, typically in an institutional setting.

• Activities associated with learning have traditionally been used in second

language teaching in schools and have a tendency to result in more
knowledge “about” the language (as demonstrated in tests) than fluency
in actually using the language (as demonstrated in social interaction).
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 FACTORS AFFECTING SLA
❑AGE
• Could the age of onset of L2 learning cause different levels of final
proficiency?

• This question is usually considered under what is known as the Critical

Period Hypothesis (CPH).

• Is there an optimal time (or critical period) to acquire a second language?

• Usually, discussion of a possible critical period focuses on the area of

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phonological competence.
 FACTORS AFFECTING SLA
• People who begin SLA as adults tend to retain non-nativelike phonology
in the target language (TL).

• It is much more difficult to predict knowledge or ability in any of the other

areas of communicative competence (syntax, cohesion, sociolinguistics,
etc.) based on the age of acquisition.

• We can predict with fair certainty that people who start learning their L2
before age 7 will have nativelike L2 speech than those who start learning
after 14 or 15.
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 FACTORS AFFECTING SLA
❑INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES
• We can distinguish between 2 kinds of factors in which individuals can
vary: i)affective factors and ii)cognitive factors.

❖Affective Factors
• Have to do with the emotional side of learning a second language.
• AFs that have been studied include empathy, anxiety, inhibition, risk-
taking and motivation

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 FACTORS AFFECTING SLA
✓ two types of motivation: instrumental and integrative

• Instrumental motivation involves wanting to learn the L2 for a specific

goal or reason.

• Integrative motivation involves wanting to learn the L2 to learn more

about a particular culture or better fit into it.

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 FACTORS AFFECTING SLA

❖Cognitive Factors (AF)

• Involve the mechanics of how an
individual learns something.
• Different people learn using different
cognitive styles and different learning
strategies.
• The study of cognitive style often
focuses on a contrast between field
dependence and field independence.
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 FACTORS AFFECTING SLA
Field independent (FI) Field dependent (FD)

FI learners who are not distracted by FD learners are probably able to synthesise
irrelevant background information when the overall picture better than FI
trying to learn something.

FI learners are better able to pick out FD learners tend to do better on tasks that
relevant facts. involve synthesizing their knowledge.

FI learners do better on language tests that FD learners demonstrate broader

focus on analytic tasks such as providing communicative competence in that they are
the correct grammatical form in a sentence. more concerned with getting the message
across than with the grammatical accuracy
of the form of their message.
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 VARIETIES OF BILINGUALISM
• Because language in all its complexity can be acquired through a variety
of modalities – sounds (speech), sight (writing), and visual motion (signs)
– an adequate concept of a bilingual should allow for any of these
realisations.

• Thus, we may say that a person is bilingual if he or she knows (1) two
languages in the same modality or (2) two languages based on different
modalities.

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VARIETIES OF BILINGUALISM

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 SEQUENTIAL AND SIMULTANEOUS
LEARNING SITUATIONS
• There are essentially two conditions to which a person may become
bilingual:

1. The two languages can be acquired sequentially, such as the

second language being learned later at school.

2. The two languages can be acquired simultaneously, such as when

the young child is exposed to 2 different languages in the home
simultaneously.
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 SEQUENTIAL LEARNING OF TWO
LANGUAGES
First language in the home,
second language in the
community
Development of a second
language
(Tabors & Snow, 1994)
Young children can learn a
second language faster than the
first
Parents speak one language and the community at large
speaks another. The parents could be immigrants, foreign
residents, etc.
(1) As they come to understand that others do not
understand their home language, they give up trying
to communicate in the home language outside of the
home. They are silent.
(2) They abandon their home language in favor of
communication through gesture.
(3) They produce abbreviated utterances without function
words.
(4) Finally, they begin to produce grammatical utterances
in appropriate situations.
It is often the case that young children can learn an entire
language in a year or less. The learning of a second
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language is facilitated by the prior learning of the first
language.
 SIMULTANEOUS LEARNING
One person speaks one
language only, or, one person
speaks two languages
Developmental stages in
bilingual language learning
The IP – 1L situation is better
There are two situations in which a child may learn two (or
more) languages at the same time: (1) Each person speaks one
language only to the child – One Person-One Language, or (2)
Each person speaks the same two languages to the child: One
Person-Two Languages.
Children learning two first languages simultaneously follow the
same route as other children learning their first language (Lyon,
1996). In the two-and three-word stages some mixing might
occur between the two languages, especially for 1P-2L learners.
It seems more likely to be the case that the child in the IP – 1L
situation will learn the two languages faster than the child in the
1P – 2L situation and attain a higher level of proficiency. This
would be due to consistency.
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 DIFFERENT CATEGORIES OF BILINGUALS

• Several terms such as balanced bilinguals, dominant bilinguals,

passive(recessive) bilinguals and semilinguals have been used to
categorise bilinguals according to the perceived degree of proficiency
they have in both languages.

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 Balanced bilingual Dominant bilinguals Passive (recessive) Semilinguals, or
bilinguals limited bilinguals

• Bilinguals who are fully • Bilinguals who are • Bilinguals who are • Bilinguals who appear to
competent in both dominant in one language. gradually losing have limited level of
languages. • Researchers will often refer competence in one proficiency in both first and
• It describes those who are to their less dominant language, usually because second language.
thought to have perfect language as the of disuse. • Hansegard (1968)
control of both languages in subordinate language. • The ability to understand described semilingualism in
all settings. • The term ‘dominance’ may but not produce meaningful terms of deficit in six
• Balanced bilingualism is not apply to all domains. utterances. language competences.
close to impossible to • Example: an Italian- • Example : a Dutch migrant ❑ size of vocabulary
achieve and is therefore German teacher may be in Australia may find ❑ correctness of language
very rare. fluent in both Italian and himself isolated from the ❑ unconscious processing of
• Example : German-French German, but always Dutch-speaking community language
bilingual may be able to discusses soccer in Italian as his daily encounters are ❑ Language creation
speak both languages as he mainly play soccer with English-speaking ❑ Mastery of the functions of
fluently, but is likely to use with his Italian-speaking Australian. Overtime, his the language
German exclusively in friends and talks ‘soccer’ in level in Dutch may ❑ Meanings and imagery
certain situations. Italian. deteriorate owing to the
long period of non-use.
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 THE BILINGUAL BRAIN
1) Is there Hemispheric Specialization for Language?
Researchers Findings
Albert and Obler (1978), Karanth and Report greater involvement of the right hemisphere in
Rangamani (1988), and Wuillemin, bilinguals than in monolinguals.
Richardson, and Lynch (1994)
Albert and Obler (1978) argue that ‘the right hemisphere
plays a major role in the learning of a second language,
even in adulthood’ (p.243).
Soares (1982, 1984), Walters and Zatorre Found no difference between bilinguals and monolinguals.
(1978), and Zatorre (1989)
Soares (1984) found no lateralization differences across
the bilinguals’ two languages (Portuguese/English).

Galloway and Scarcella (1982) In a Spanish-English dichotic listening study, they found no
evidence for the right hemisphere being involved more 22 in
the initial stages of informal, adult, SLA.
 2) Does the age at which a second language is learned relate to
lateralisation?

Researchers Findings
Genesee, Hamers, Found that the age at which a L2 is learned affected lateral dominance.
Lambert, Mononen, Seitz,
and Stark (1978) There were three groups of adult bilinguals; those who came bilingual :-
1.Infancy
* They monitored the left and 2.From around 4 – 6 years of age
right hemisphere EEG 3.From adolescence
(electroencephalogram)
activity of adult bilinguals
Found that the left hemisphere was more involved than the right for the infancy and
processing French or English
words. childhood bilinguals, while the reverse was the case for the adolescent bilinguals.

Sussman, Franklin, and Showed that early bilinguals (L1 and L2 acquired prior to age 6) revealed left-
Simon (1982) hemisphere dominance for both languages, while late bilinguals (L2 acquired after
age 6) revealed left-hemisphere dominance only for L1 and symmetrical hemisphere
involvement for L2 23
 Researchers Findings
Wuillemin, Reported greater right-hemisphere involvement for older learners of both English and Tok
Richardson, and Pidgin (acquired the languages after the age of 8 years) than for younger learners.
Lynch (1994)
Vaid (1987) Reported that left hemisphere was more affected in late bilinguals (acquired L2 between
the ages of 10 and 14) than in early bilinguals (acquired L2 before the age of 4).

Gordon and Zatorre Found no difference in hemispheric dominance between two groups of English-Spanish
(1981) bilinguals, with one group having acquired L2 around the age of 9 and another having
acquired it around the age of 13.

They argued that the left hemisphere was primarily involved in processing both languages
of bilinguals, and that this pattern appeared to remain stable during development.
Klein, Zatorre, Milner, Used PET to compare cerebral blood flow when English-French bilinguals repeated words
Meyer, and Evans in L1 or L2, with the L2 being learned after the age of 5 years. There was relatively little
(1994) difference, with the two languages activating similar brain areas.

Kim, Relkin, Lee, and Used fMRI and found in a silent reading task that within Broca’s area a L2 acquired in
Hirsch (1997) adulthood is spatially separated from the native language, while the native and L2 tend to
be represented close to one another when both languages are acquired early in life.
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 SUMMARY OF FINDINGS

• The findings presented are not consistent, and variables that determine
hemispheric location in the bilingual brain may not yet have been identified.

• One such factor may be the age at which the second language was learned.

• The distribution of speech areas in the brain appears to be related to various

factors, including, for example, what task bilinguals are given (comprehension
vs. production), when a second language is acquired, and what method of
analysis is used.
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 CODE-SWITCHING/MIXING

• Code-switching refers to the phenomenon of a bi/multilingual

speaker switching languages between utterances within the
same discourse.

• Code-mixing, on the other hand, refers to the phenomenon of

a speaker mixing more than one language within the same
utterance within a discourse.
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 CODE-SWITCHING/MIXING

• Examples:
✓Code-switching: “Kamu gila kah? I will never do that!”
(Translation: Are you crazy? I will never do that!”)

✓Code-mixing: “Are you gila? I will never buat tu!”

(Translation: Are you crazy? I will never do that!”)
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 CODE-SWITCHING/MIXING

• Individuals code-switch/mix for various reasons:

❑Creating comfort when discussing sensitive issues

A: Again, without a group. Am I diseased?

B: No. Just put usaha sikit semua suka. Dallying the work then semua panik
sebelum due date.
No. Just put in more effort, and then all will like you. Dallying the work, then
all will panic when the due date is nearing.
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 CODE-SWITCHING/MIXING

• Individuals code-switch/mix for various reasons:

❑Direct quoting someone else
A: After all that drama, she had the nerve to say, “You mau join kah, tamau
join kah, I tak kisah pun.”
After all that drama, she had the nerve to say, “you want to join or not, I
don’t care.”

B: Hmm…that’s too bad.

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 CODE-SWITCHING/MIXING

• Individuals code-switch/mix for various reasons:

❑Being emphatic about something

A: Did you hear? Peter broke his leg during the game.

B: Kasihan dia. Hope he feels better soon.

Pity him. Hope he feels better soon.

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 CODE-SWITCHING/MIXING

• Individuals code-switch/mix for various reasons:

❑Lexical need or no equal translation

A: What’s for lunch today?

B: Rendang. I brought more.

Rendang – a type of meat dish eaten with rice.

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 CODE-SWITCHING/MIXING
• There are many social and psychological reasons for the code-
switching/mixing phenomenon among bi/multilingual speakers.

• For instance, creating solidarity and enforcing one’s ethnic identity

are influential factors in code-switch/mix.

• However, they are not the focus of psycholinguistics; those reasons

are explored further in sociolinguistics and pragmatics. 32