Visual attention and quantifier-spreading in heritage Russian bilinguals
- It is well established in language acquisition research that monolingual children and adult second language learners misinterpret sentences with the universal quantifier every and make quantifier-spreading errors that are attributed to a preference for a match in number between two sets of objects. The present Visual World eye-tracking study tested bilingual heritage Russian–English adults and investigated how they interpret of sentences like Every alligator lies in a bathtub in both languages. Participants performed a sentence–picture verification task while their eye movements were recorded. Pictures showed three pairs of alligators in bathtubs and two extra objects: elephants (Control condition), bathtubs (Overexhaustive condition), or alligators (Underexhaustive condition). Monolingual adults performed at ceiling in all conditions. Heritage language (HL) adults made 20% q-spreading errors, but only in the Overexhaustive condition, and when they made an error they spent more time looking at the two extra bathtubs during the VerbIt is well established in language acquisition research that monolingual children and adult second language learners misinterpret sentences with the universal quantifier every and make quantifier-spreading errors that are attributed to a preference for a match in number between two sets of objects. The present Visual World eye-tracking study tested bilingual heritage Russian–English adults and investigated how they interpret of sentences like Every alligator lies in a bathtub in both languages. Participants performed a sentence–picture verification task while their eye movements were recorded. Pictures showed three pairs of alligators in bathtubs and two extra objects: elephants (Control condition), bathtubs (Overexhaustive condition), or alligators (Underexhaustive condition). Monolingual adults performed at ceiling in all conditions. Heritage language (HL) adults made 20% q-spreading errors, but only in the Overexhaustive condition, and when they made an error they spent more time looking at the two extra bathtubs during the Verb region. We attribute q-spreading in HL speakers to cognitive overload caused by the necessity to integrate conflicting sources of information, i.e. the spoken sentences in their weaker, heritage, language and attention-demanding visual context, that differed with respect to referential salience.…
Verfasserangaben: | Irina A. SekerinaORCiDGND, Antje SauermannORCiDGND |
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URN: | urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-404870 |
Titel des übergeordneten Werks (Englisch): | Postprints der Universität Potsdam : Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe |
Schriftenreihe (Bandnummer): | Zweitveröffentlichungen der Universität Potsdam : Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe (404) |
Publikationstyp: | Postprint |
Sprache: | Englisch |
Datum der Erstveröffentlichung: | 17.05.2018 |
Erscheinungsjahr: | 2015 |
Veröffentlichende Institution: | Universität Potsdam |
Datum der Freischaltung: | 17.05.2018 |
Freies Schlagwort / Tag: | Russian; eye-tracking; heritage language; quantifier-spreading; universal quantifiers; visual attention |
Ausgabe: | 404 |
Seitenanzahl: | 30 |
Quelle: | Second Language Research 31 (2015) Nr. 1, S. 75–104, DOI: 10.1177/0267658314537292 |
Organisationseinheiten: | Humanwissenschaftliche Fakultät |
DDC-Klassifikation: | 3 Sozialwissenschaften / 37 Bildung und Erziehung / 370 Bildung und Erziehung |
4 Sprache / 40 Sprache / 400 Sprache | |
8 Literatur / 80 Literatur, Rhetorik, Literaturwissenschaft / 800 Literatur und Rhetorik | |
Peer Review: | Referiert |
Publikationsweg: | Open Access |
Fördermittelquelle: | Sage |
Lizenz (Deutsch): | Keine öffentliche Lizenz: Unter Urheberrechtsschutz |
Externe Anmerkung: | Bibliographieeintrag der Originalveröffentlichung/Quelle |