Hostname: page-component-89b8bd64d-7zcd7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-05-10T17:54:22.820Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The complexity-cost factor in bilingualism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 June 2013

Julia Festman
Julia Festman*
Affiliation:
University of Potsdam, Potsdam Research Institute for Multilingualism, 14476 Potsdam, Germany. festman@uni-potsdam.de http://www.uni-potsdam.de/prim/staff/festman.html
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Language processing changes with the knowledge and use of two languages. The advantage of being bilingual comes at the expense of increased processing demands and processing costs. I suggest considering bilingual complexity including these demands and costs. The proposed model claims effortless monolingual processing. By integrating individual and situational variability, the model would lose its idealistic touch, even for monolinguals.

Information

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 36 , Issue 4 , August 2013 , pp. 355 - 356
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Erten, I. H. & Razı, S. (2009) The effects of cultural familiarity on reading comprehension. Reading in a Foreign Language 21:60–77.Google Scholar
Gollan, T. H., Montoya, R. I., Fennema-Notestine, C. & Morris, S.K. (2005) Bilingualism affects picture naming but not picture classification. Memory & Cognition 33:1220–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gollan, T. H., Montoya, R. I. & Werner, G. A. (2002) Semantic and letter fluency in Spanish-English bilinguals. Neuropsychology 16:562–76.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Green, D. W. (1986) Control, activation and resource: A framework and a model for the control of speech in bilinguals Brain and Language 27:210–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Guo, T. & Peng, D. (2006) ERP evidence for parallel activation of two languages in bilingual speech production. NeuroReport 17:1757–60.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Meuter, R. & Allport, A. (1999) Bilingual language switching in naming: Asymmetric costs of language selection. Journal of Memory and Language 40:25–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parker Jones, 'Ō., Green, D. W., Grogan, A., Pliatsikas, C., Filippopolitis, K., Ali, N., Lee, H. L., Ramsden, S., Gazarian, K., Prejawa, S., Seghier, M. L. & Price, C. J. (2012) Where, when and why brain activation differs for bilinguals and monolinguals during picture naming and reading aloud. Cerebral Cortex 22:892–902.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sorace, A. (2011) Pinning down the concept of “interface” in bilingualism. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism 1:1–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar