Visual Word Recognition by Trilinguals Orthographic, phonologic and semantic similarity effects between languages Jean-Marc LAVAUR, Xavier APARICIO, Lisa VANDEBERG & Ton DIJKSTRA International Congress of Psychology Berlin, Germany, July 2008

How many multilinguals in Europe? 23 official languages in the European Union L1: dominant language (generally but not always the native language) L2: English for most countries and speakers (but English could also be found as a L3) L3: very diverse, depending on different factors (geographical, cultural, institutional, etc.) Diminuer la photo, trouver nombre de langue parlées. L’anglais pt aussi la l3

Multilingualism and Cognitive Psychology Important number of researches concerning Bilingualism in Cognitive Psychology A large part of the researches concern the study of the bilingual mental lexicon Next step: focus on multilingual communication and lexical processing le

The Multilingual Lexicon The mental lexicon is a part of human memory (Dijkstra, 2005) It contains all kinds of information we know concerning languages and words: -orthography -phonology -semantics -syntax -additional information: languages (in multilinguals)

How to access the multilingual lexicon? Language selective access: organized by language (Gerard & Scarborough, 1989) LIRE DIRE French lexicon LIRE FIRE HIRE English lexicon LIRA ARIA Spanish lexicon Language non-selective access: organized by features (Dijkstra, Van Jaarsveld & Ten Brinke, 1998) LIRE DIRE FIRE HIRE LIRA ARIA French/English/Spanish shared lexicon LIRE

Model of the architecture of the multilingual lexicon Different units are involved in orthographic processing: BIA+ Model (Dijkstra & Van Heuven, 2002) L1/L2/L3

Relations between words of different languages (Lavaur & Font, 1998) -Strong orthographic and phonological overlap between languages and words: Example: Amour Love Amor -Weak orthographic and phonological overlap between languages and words: Enlever les espaces, refaire l’animation Example: Viande Meat Carne

Cognates Cognates are words for which the orthography, phonology CLASSE CLASS CLASE Cognates are words for which the orthography, phonology and meaning are similar/identical in different languages (Bogaards, 1994) Facilitatory or inhibitory effects depending, in part, on the task context. Rajouter que les effets peuvebt etre facilitateurs ou inhibiteurs en fction de la tache

Noncognates POMME MANZANA APPLE Revoir les couleurs descendre le texte Identical/Similar semantics in the three languages, different orthography and phonology in all the three languages.

Double Cognates BALLE CIEL CIELO BALL PELOTA SKY ROMAN NOVEL NOVELA Coller novel et novela identical/similar semantics in the three languages, identical /similar orthography in only two languages

Triple Cognates ARTISTE ARTISTA ARTIST Changer couleurs identical / similar semantics and orthography and phonology in all three languages

Objectives How does the memory of trilinguals work when the L1 is not explicitely solicited, or the influence is supposed to be limited to one of the two other languages ? If the L1 has an influence, generalized to all the languages, what consequences on the working of trilingual memory?

Hypothesis 1: Influence or no influence of the native language Lexical decision task: If L1 has an influence, cognates words with French in English and/or Spanish will be recognized faster than words with different forms in these languages (noncognates)  Cognate facilitation effect Language decision task: If L1 has an influence, cognates words with French in English and/or Spanish will be processed more slowly than words with different forms in these languages (noncognates) Effet de la L1, changer le titre  Cognate inhibition effect

Hypothesis 2: Additional cognate effect Lexical decision task: words that have the same form in all languages (triple cognates) will be recognized faster than words with (partially) different forms (double cognates/noncognates)  Additional facilitation effect Language decision task: words that have the same form in all languages (triple cognates) will be processed more slowly than words with (partially) different forms (double cognates/noncognates)  Additional inhibition effect

FALDA * SKIRT Language Decision English Spanish The participant has to decide as quickly and accurately as possible to which language the word belongs. FALDA * * SKIRT Faire les modifications dans le texte English Spanish

Population and material Population: 24 undergraduate trilinguals, native speakers of French, with English as a second language and Spanish as a third language. Material: 70 French-English-Spanish translation equivalents X 3 language decisions Specific words 14 Cognates L1-L2 L1-L3 L2-L3 L1-L2-L3 Procedure: each participant performs 3 language decision tasks, respectively L1-L2, L1-L3 et L2-L3.

Results: interaction effects between language and category -Specific words processed faster in L1L2 and L2L3 decisions -No effect in L1L3 decision due to specific patterns between L1 and L3 Specific words are globally processed faster

Discussion Experiment 1 Language specific words are generally processed better than cognates. Cognates have an influence on visual word processing. Native language has an influence on the processing of other languages. Results supporting a non specific access to the mental lexicon.

money nouse * Lexical Decision YES NO The participant has to decide as quickly and accurately as possible if the letterstring is an existing word or not. money nouse * * Faire les modifications dans le texte YES NO

Method Experiment 2 Population: same participants as in experiment 1 Material: 72 French-English-Spanish translation equivalents: Specific words 24 Cognates L1-L2 L1-L2-L3 Procedure: each participant performs the 2 lexical decision tasks, respectively L2 et L3.

English Lexical Decision No standard cognate effect for L1-L2 cognates vs L2 control words - L1-L2-L3 cognates got a faster response Enlever english fillers et non words et mettre mots spécifiques. Enlever les écarts types

Spanish Lexical Decision Cognate effect for French-English-Spanish cognates relative to Spanish control words Triple cognates were not recognized significantly faster than double cognates. Virer les fillers et les non words. Mettre mots spécifiques

Discussion Experiment 2a: English lexical decision In English LD, Cognate effect for L1-L2-L3 cognates Cognates in 3 languages were recognized faster than L1-L2 cognates During recognition of words in a second language, even a third non-native language (L3) exerts an influence on recognition performance.

Discussion Experiment 2b: Spanish lexical decision Cognate effect for L1-L3 cognates L1-L2-L3 cognate effect relative to Spanish specific words. Triple cognates were not recognized significantly faster than double cognates. Reformuler la présentation des résultats

General Discussion Results are supporting a non-selective access to the mental lexicon. Specific words are processed faster than other kinds of words in Language Decision, and more slowly in Lexical Decision. Shared patterns between languages have an influence on word visual processing. Influence of native language on the two other languages’ processing. Revoir les résultats en général

Thanks for your attention! « In varietate concordia »