Doctoral Dissertation Research: The effect of bilingual language exposure on bilingual children's phonological categorization and lexical processing efficiency

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This dissertation research project will examine how language abilities in bilingual children fluctuate as a result of the surrounding language context. Specifically, the investigators will test how exposure to native English, native Spanish, and Spanish-accented English affects the ability of Spanish-English bilingual children to produce and understand English words. The project will expand the current literature on how sounds and words are learned from their environment, and how speech change occurs in both production and perception. The findings will enhance caregivers' and educators' understanding of the impact of the everyday language environments encountered by bilingual children on their language development. With multilingual schools and families becoming increasingly common in the US, children experience significant fluctuations in their language environments, both at home and at school. Therefore, it is important to understand the impact of the different linguistic environments on children's language development. To understand how language environment affects children's language abilities, the researchers will recruit Spanish-English bilingual children ages 6 to 9 to complete phonological and lexical production and perception tasks in English. Immediately prior to completing these tasks, children will be presented with stories in English, Spanish, or Spanish-accented English. Measures of phonological and lexical processing after each exposure type will be compared. The children will also complete language assessments in English and Spanish for a full language profile. Comparison of exposure effects on production vs. perception as well as comparison of changes at the word (lexical access) and sound (phonological) level will directly illustrate how language exposure affects language ability in bilingual children.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.