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16:30 - 18:00
Parallel sessions 6
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16:30 - 18:00
Room: HSZ - 7E02
Chair/s:
Tanja C Roembke, Matilde Ellen Simonetti
Bilinguals require language control to regulate the activation of their known languages. Language switching paradigms are commonly used to investigate the processes underlying bilingual language control. Several approaches fall under the umbrella term “language switching,” whose defining feature is the alternation between languages, thereby requiring bilinguals to select one language over another on each trial. In this symposium, five talks present innovative research using language switching to explore language control processes in both comprehension (Talks 1-2) and production (Talks 3-4). Across studies, different paradigms (e.g., picture naming, voluntary switching, sequential switching) and methodologies, from behavioral measures to virtual reality, are employed. The focus extends beyond single-word processing to include also sentence-level processing. In Talk 1, Aaron Vandendaele examines proactive control mechanisms during language switching using a semantic classification task involving written word categorization. Luigi Falanga (Talk 2) investigates the flexibility of control and the role of interference in language-switching comprehension tasks. His study explores how recent and ongoing cross-language interference influences comprehension in complex listening contexts. In Talk 3, Andrea Philipp discusses how between-language conflict at the lemma-level shapes language control during switching. She examines the impact of cross-language interference on lexical selection and how conflict resolution processes facilitate language switching. Finally, in Talk 4, Maria Sanchez investigates sentence production in interactions with virtual interlocutors. Her study uses both voluntary and cued language-switching paradigms to examine how speakers adapt their language choice based on the interlocutor’s accent and linguistic background. Together, these talks showcase new directions in the study of bilingual language control, illustrating how innovative paradigms and technologies are reshaping our understanding of the cognitive mechanisms underlying language switching.
Submission 317
Language Switching During Sentence Production
SymposiumTalk-04
Presented by: L. Maria Sanchez
L. Maria Sanchez 1, David Peeters 2, Esli Struys 1, Mathieu Declerck 1
1 Free University of Brussels, Belgium
2 Tilburg University, Netherlands
For years, bilingual language control has been investigated under strictly controlled lab conditions, where bilinguals produce switches at the single word level following arbitrary cues (e.g., colours or sounds) in front of a computer screen. This line of research has built the basis upon which we can begin to understand language control in a clear and controlled manner. However, much of what makes language in spontaneous interaction is often left outside the lab for the sake of experimental control. The present talk addresses two studies on language control that gradually re-incorporate some of the noise from everyday language use into the experimental design. In a first study, we compared cued and voluntary switching in the context of sentence production using an action description task that allowed for increased syntactic and lexical variability in the participants’ responses. In our second study, the action description task was completed in the context of an online game, in cued and voluntary switching conditions. French-English bilinguals had to adapt their language selection to fit the linguistic background of a series of animated interlocutors who spoke one or both of the participant’s languages. Furthermore, we investigated the effect of the interlocutor’s accent on the participant’s performance. Our findings suggest that contextual factors modulate participants’ reliance on bilingual language control. These results highlight the importance of studying language control in more linguistically and socially naturalistic environments.