Using whole-word production measures to determine the influence of phonotactic probability and neighborhood density on bilingual speech production

• Skott E. Freedman ^[1] ; Jessica A. Barlow ^[2]
  1. [1] Ithaca College

     Ithaca College

     City of Ithaca, Estados Unidos

     
  2. [2] San Diego State University

     San Diego State University

     Estados Unidos

     
• Localización: International Journal of Bilingualism: interdisciplinary studies of multilingual behaviour, ISSN 1367-0069, Vol. 16, Nº. 4, 2012, págs. 369-387
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Numerous lexical and sublexical factors have been reported to influence speech production in monolinguals (Storkel, 2001; Vitevitch, 2002); however, whole-word production analyses have rarely been used to measure such influences. The present study investigated the effects of phonotactic probability and neighborhood density on bilingual speech production using whole-word production measures (Ingram, 2002). Five typically developing English–Spanish bilingual children were administered a picture-naming task in English and Spanish in which stimuli varied in sublexical and lexical parameters. Their English and Spanish productions were compared with those of five age-matched monolingual English- and Spanish-speaking children, respectively. No differences were found between bilinguals and monolinguals in the respective languages; however, bilinguals evidenced greater phonological complexity in Spanish than English on words with low phonotactic probability and low neighborhood density. Whole-word approximation remained similar between languages. Findings are interpreted in the context of crosslinguistic influences of sublexical and lexical factors on speech production.