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Acquisition Of Main-Clause Wh-Questions In Egyptian Arabic-English And Spanish-English Bilingual Children, Riham H. Mohamed

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This dissertation examines the production and judgment of Egyptian Arabic (henceforth EA) main-clause wh-questions in EA-English bilingual children living in Ontario, Canada, or in the United Kingdom. The three comparison groups are EA monolingual children and EA monolingual adults living in Egypt, and first-generation Egyptian immigrants. The results are compared to previous research on the acquisition of obligatory subject-verb (S-V) inversion in Spanish wh-questions.

The focus of this study is to investigate the potential role of cross-linguistic influence in narrow syntactic structures. Until fairly recently, it was believed that only structures that exhibit syntax-pragmatics interfaces are vulnerable to cross-linguistic influence …

Reading Strategy Intervention And Reading Comprehension Success In Bilingual Readers, Bailey Frid

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Previous research has found that specific reading strategies predict reading comprehension success in bilingual readers (Frid & Friesen, 2020; Friesen & Frid, 2021). Yet, the pattern in which readers recruit these strategies has not been investigated. In the first study, the patterns of strategy recruitment used by skilled vs. poor bilingual readers was analyzed with previously collected think-aloud data. Results showed that skilled bilingual readers recruit a variety of strategies, they pair necessary inferences with other strategies and utilize comprehension monitoring strategies. In contrast, poor readers perseverate on specific strategies, recruit fewer strategies in total and make more incorrect statements. …

The Effects Of Multilingualism And Music Experience On Tone And Vowel Discrimination Ability, Niloufar Ansari Dezfuly

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This study investigates the effects of language background (monolingual/bilingual and early/late bilingual exposure), knowledge of a tonal language and music experience on auditory discrimination by employing tone and vowel discrimination tasks. A total number of 8,769 observations were analyzed using logistic regression to answer the following questions: (1) Do vowel and tone discrimination abilities correlate with language background in diverse groups of speakers such as monolinguals and bilinguals of different types (early/late bilinguals)? (2) Does musical training affect tone and vowel discrimination? (3) Does knowledge of tonal language affect tone discrimination? The findings suggest that with regard to vowel discrimination, …

The Language Vitality Of Nahuatl In Santiago Tlaxco, Mexico, Grace Gomashie

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This thesis assesses the language vitality of Nahuatl (also known as Mexicano) in Santiago Tlaxco, a rural bilingual community in the municipality of Chiconcuautla, located in Puebla, Mexico, in the face of the growing trend of language endangerment for many Indigenous languages. It explores the linguistic use and attitudes of community members, and how they contribute to language maintenance and language shift of Nahuatl. The main research questions are: a) what are the language use patterns of the community? and b) what are the prevailing language attitudes of this Nahuatl-speaking community towards its Indigenous language? Data on the language practices …

Vitality Of Damana, The Language Of The Wiwa Indigenous Community, Tatiana L. Fernandez Fernandez

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The Wiwa are Indigenous[1] people who live in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta in Colombia. This project examines the vitality of Damana [ISO 693-3: mbp], their language, in two communities that offer bilingual high school education in Damana and Spanish. Its aim is to measure the level of endangerment of Damana according to the factors used in the UNESCO Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected through a questionnaire that gathered demographic and background language information, self-reported proficiency and use of Spanish and Damana [n=56]. Besides the questionnaire, interviews with teachers and …

The Relationship Between Theory Of Mind And Executive Function: Are They Two Facets Of The Same Process Or Two Distinct Processes?, Isu Cho

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This dissertation examines the relationship between Theory of Mind (ToM) and Executive Function (EF). There has been debate on whether ToM and EF are two facets of the same process or are two distinct processes. Distinguishing between these possibilities empirically is challenging because the two abilities have similar developmental timetables and ToM tasks typically place high demands on EF, with the consequence that ToM and EF performance measures may be artificially correlated. Three experiments explored the nature of this relationship. Experiments 1 and 2 tested whether socio-cultural factors known to influence individual differences in EF (i.e., bilingualism, country-of-origin) extend to …

The Effects Of Linguistic Labels On Object Categorization And Perception, Xuan Pan

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The linguistic relativity hypothesis (Whorf, 1956) claims that speakers of different languages perceive and conceptualize the world differently. Language-thought interaction is likely to be more complex in bilinguals because they have two languages that could influence their cognitive and perceptual processes.Lupyan’s (2012) Label-feedback Hypothesis proposes a mechanism underpinning language-thought interactions, arguingthat linguistic labels affect our conceptual and perceptual representations through top-down feedback.This thesis tested the Label-feedback Hypothesis by capitalizing on an interesting feature of Chinese. In English, most nouns do not provide linguistic clues to their categories (an exception issunflower), whereas in Chinese, some nouns provide explicit category …

Reading Comprehension And Strategy Use In English Language Learners And Monolingual Children, Katherine Schmidt

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Children with a home language other than English (English Language Learners, or, ELLs) need good English reading comprehension skills to be successful in Canada. This research examined the differences in reading comprehension between ELLs and monolinguals (EL1s), reading strategies used, and predictors of successful reading comprehension. 57 students in grade 4 and 5 participated: 27 EL1s and 32 ELLs. They were tested for vocabulary knowledge, reading fluency, decoding, and reading comprehension. EL1s performed significantly better on reading comprehension and most language measure tasks. For reading strategies, necessary inferencing and predicting were used significantly more by the EL1s than the ELLs, …

The Effects Of Proficiency And Task Context On L2-L1 Noncognate Masked Translation Priming In Chinese-English Bilinguals, Mark J. Mcphedran

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The masked translation priming effect was examined in Chinese-English bilinguals using three experimental paradigms: lexical decision, semantic categorization, and speeded episodic recognition. A machine-learning approach was used to assess the subject- and item-specific factors that contribute to the sizes of translation priming effects across these tasks. The factors that contributed to translation priming effects were found to be task specific. Priming effects in lexical decision were associated with higher self-rated listening and writing abilities in English, especially when primes were high-frequency and targets were low-frequency. Priming effects in semantic categorization were associated with more frequent use of English in daily …

Conceptual Representation In Bilinguals: A Feature-Based Approach, Eriko Matsuki

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

A challenge for bilinguals is that translation equivalent words often do not convey exactly the same conceptual information. A bilingual exhibits a “semantic accent” when they comprehend or use a word in one language in a way that is influenced by knowledge of its translation equivalent. Semantic accents are well-captured by feature-based models, such as the Distributed Conceptual Feature model and the Shared (Distributed) Asymmetrical model, however, few empirical studies have used semantic features to provide direct evidence for these models. The goal of this thesis is to use a feature-based approach to identify conceptual differences in translation equivalent words …

Reading Comprehension And Strategy Use In Fourth- And Fifth-Grade French Immersion Students, Bailey Frid

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The Simple View of Reading (Hoover & Gough, 1990) assumes that reading comprehension success is determined by decoding skill and language comprehension (e.g., vocabulary). However, the strategies readers recruit during text comprehension should also uniquely contribute to reading comprehension success in both their first and second language. Seventy fourth- and fifth-grade French immersion students were assessed on language proficiency measures and on strategy use during a reading comprehension task by using a think-aloud procedure. Results indicate that students used more complex strategies (i.e., background knowledge, predicting and visualizing) in their dominant language, and more textbase strategies (i.e., summarizing) in their …

Acquisition Of Catalan And Spanish Morphosyntax In The Catalan-Spanish Bilingual Context, Adriana Soto-Corominas

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This dissertation investigated the acquisition of Catalan and Spanish morphosyntax by early Catalan-Spanish bilinguals living in Catalunya, a province of Spain with widespread societal bilingualism. Specifically, it focused on the acquisition of six clitic pronouns in Catalan that have different representations in Spanish. Of the six, partitive en, oblique en, locative hi, and oblique hi do not have direct counterparts in Spanish, and correspond to ellipsis in the adult grammar. The accusative neuter clitic ho and masculine clitic l constitute a distinction based on specificity and gender not made in Spanish and both correspond to Spanish lo …

Variation In The Pronominal Clitic System Of P'Urhépecha-Spanish Bilinguals, Itziri Moreno Villamar

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This dissertation investigates linguistic variation and optionality in the Spanish clitic system of bilingual L1 P’urhépecha speakers from Michoacán, México to determine if interference from L1 features results in non-standard use of accusative and dative pronouns in L2 Spanish. Using the theoretical framework on feature/morphology mapping in bilinguals by Lardiere (2000, 2005, 2009) and Sánchez’s theories of functional interference and convergence (2003), I investigated three phenomena occurring in Spanish and Amerindian contact varieties or amongst bilingual speakers: neutralization of gender (and number) into an invariant accusative clitic lo, omission of anaphoric clitics, and liberal accusative clitic doubling. I also investigated …

Dual Route Model Of Idiom Processing In The Bilingual Context, Tianshu Zhu

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The dual route model predicts that idiomatic phrases show a processing advantage over matched novel phrases. This model postulates that familiar phrases are processed by a faster direct route, and novel phrases are processed by an indirect route. This thesis investigated the role of familiar form and concept in direct route activation. Study 1 provided norming evidence for experimental stimuli selection. Study 2 examined whether direct route can be activated for translated Chinese idioms in Chinese-English bilinguals. Bilinguals listened to the idiom up until the last word (e.g., draw a snake and add), then saw either the idiom ending (e.g., …

The Role Of Individual Differences In Bilingual Language Processing, Emily S. Nichols

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

In this thesis, I investigated the neural correlates of bilingualism, and how individual differences in both brain and behaviour affect second language processing. To date, theories of bilingualism have tended to treat bilinguals as a uniform group, while in practice they vary greatly in both experience and ability. By examining how individual differences in proficiency and age of acquisition contribute to second language learning and processing, I sought to address this issue. In chapter two, I used event-related potentials to investigate how age of acquisition and proficiency modulate processing of a novel versus a grammatical rule that is similar across …

Student Programming And Identity In French Language Studies At An Ontario College, Crystal Brown

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This research set out to investigate the following questions: Why do students enroll in French, and in what ways do the students position themselves to learning French? What kinds of social issues do they confront when coming back? How do such issues impact their identities? Using the frameworks developed within sociocultural second language acquisition, identity, and motivational theories, this exploratory study includes semi-structured interviews and an online survey. Some of the reasons why students come back to the college system to study French include family background, political decisions, patriotism, gainful employment, cosmopolitanism, globalization and travel and retirement. Studying languages seems …

Language Contact And Identity In Roman Britain, Robert Jackson Woodcock

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Language is one of the most significant aspects of cultural identity. This thesis examines the evidence of languages in contact in Roman Britain in order to determine the role that language played in defining the identities of the inhabitants of this Roman province.

All forms of documentary evidence from monumental stone epigraphy to ownership marks scratched onto pottery are analyzed for indications of bilingualism and language contact in Roman Britain. The language and subject matter of the Vindolanda writing tablets from a Roman army fort on the northern frontier are analyzed for indications of bilingual interactions between Roman soldiers and …

Balanced Bilinguals' Unique Emotional Expressiveness, Maya Salloum

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

In the contemporary globalized world, with diverse situations of language contact emerging, bilingualism is taking on dynamic new forms, yielding a new kind of bilinguals: balanced. Adopting a stance of resistance to the monolingual bias and with a view to refining the frameworks applied to the study of bilinguals, this research examines how balanced bilinguals process and express their emotions in each of their languages. This is a qualitative study that incorporates narrative inquiry and uses the narratives and autobiographical memories of five balanced bilinguals, of different language pairs and age/gender groups to better understand how these balanced bilinguals perceive …

The Influence Of Proficiency And Age Of Acquisition On Second Language Processing: An Fmri Study Of Mandarin-English Bilinguals, Emily S. Nichols

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Research investigating the neural correlates of second language (L2) processing has usually studied age of acquisition (AoA) and proficiency separately. Presently, we examined both in parallel, treated as continuous variables. We used fMRI to study neural activity for L2 processing in adult native Mandarin speakers who are L2 English speakers. Behavioral measures of language proficiency and AoA were obtained from subjects prior to performing a picture-word matching task during an fMRI scan. Brain activity during L2 English processing was shown to be independently affected by AoA and proficiency; activity in left superior temporal gyrus and right parahippocampal gyrus was modulated …

Phonological Priming In Japanese-English Bilinguals: Evidence From Lexical Decision And Erp, Eriko Ando

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

One of the main questions in bilingualism is whether the representations activated from one language influence processing of the other language. The current study investigated this issue by examining masked phonological priming effects in Japanese-English bilinguals when English words (e.g., guy) were primed by phonologically related logographic (Kanji) words (e.g., 害, /gai/, “harm”) and also when English words (e.g., guide) were primed by phonologically similar phonogram (Katakana) words (e.g.,サイド, /saido/,”side”). In Experiment 1, lexical decisions to English words were facilitated when they were preceded by phonologically similar versus dissimilar primes, particularly when the primes were one-Kanji words and when they …