Schooling and home language usage matter in heritage bilingual processing : Sortal classifiers in Mandarin

Hao, Jiuzhou and Kubota, Maki and Bayram, Fatih and González Alonso, Jorge and Grüter, Theres and Li, Muhan and Rothman, Jason (2024) Schooling and home language usage matter in heritage bilingual processing : Sortal classifiers in Mandarin. Second Language Research. ISSN 0267-6583

Full text not available from this repository.

Abstract

Mandarin sortal classifiers simultaneously encode semantic and grammatical form class cues. Building on a second language (L2) study of Grüter et al. we used the same visual world eye-tracking experiment, designed to examine the relative use of the two cues, testing Mandarin heritage speakers (HSs) living in an English-speaking environment. Given the importance of understanding individual differences, the present study also examined if/how individual HSs may systematically differ as a function of experience with Mandarin. As a group, HSs – like the first language (L1) group in Grüter et al.’s study – showed a clear reliance on the grammatical form class cue. Nevertheless, individual HSs with Mandarin schooling and with more Mandarin social exposure/use showed more reliance on semantics, the L2 pattern observed in Grüter et al. We discuss why this latter pattern might have obtained (formal and informal literacy), while highlighting the value of individual difference approaches to understanding HS processing.

Item Type:
Journal Article
Journal or Publication Title:
Second Language Research
Uncontrolled Keywords:
Research Output Funding/yes_externally_funded
Subjects:
?? yes - externally fundededucationlinguistics and language ??
ID Code:
224711
Deposited By:
Deposited On:
09 Oct 2024 15:25
Refereed?:
Yes
Published?:
Published
Last Modified:
21 Nov 2024 10:30