Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-7qhmt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-17T12:30:49.544Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Language differentiation in early bilingual development*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

Fred Genesee*
Affiliation:
McGill University
Elena Nicoladis
Affiliation:
McGill University
Johanne Paradis
Affiliation:
McGill University
*
Psychology Department, McGill University, 1205 Dr Penfield Avenue, Montreal, Quebec, CanadaH3A. 1B1. email: genesee@ego.psych.mcgill.ca

Abstract

It has been claimed that children simultaneously acquiring two languages go through an initial stage when they are unable to differentiate between their two languages. Such claims have been based on the observation that at times virtually all bilingual children mix elements (e.g. lexical, morphological) from their two languages in the same utterance. That most, if not all, children acquiring two languages simultaneously mix linguistic elements in this way is widely documented. Although such code-mixing is not well understood or explained, there are a number of explanations unrelated to lack of language differentiation that may explain it. Moreover, while language differentiation is widely attested among bilingual children once functional categories emerge, usually during the third year, there is still some question as to how early in development differentiation is present. In this study, we examined language differentiation in five bilingual children prior to the emergence of functional categories (they ranged in age from 1;10 to 2;2 and in MLU from 1·23 to 2·08). They were observed with each parent separately and both together, on separate occasions. Our results indicate that while these children did code mix, they were clearly able to differentiate between their two languages. We also examine the possibility that the children's mixing is due to (a) their language dominance, and (b) their parents' rate of mixing. We could find no evidence that their mixing was due to parental input, but there was some evidence that language dominance played a role.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995

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.)

Footnotes

[*]

We would like to thank the parents and their children for their generous co-operation throughout this research. Revisions of this manuscript have benefited from helpful comments by two anonymous reviewers and the editor. We also thank the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Ottawa, Canada, for their financial support of this work (grant No. 410-91-1936).

References

REFERENCES

Bloom, L. (1973). One word at a time. The Hague: Mouton.Google Scholar
Brown, R. (1973). A first language: the early stages. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
de Houwer, A. (1990). The acquisition of two languages from birth: a case study. Cambridge: C. U. P.Google Scholar
Demetras, M. J., Post, K. N. & Snow, C. E. (1986). Feedback to first language learners: the role of repetition and clarification questions. Journal of Child Language 134, 275–92.Google Scholar
Dopke, S. (1992). One parent, one language: an interactional approach. Amsterdam: Benjamin.Google Scholar
Fantini, A. E. (1985). Language acquisition of a bilingual child. Clevedon: Multilingual Press.Google Scholar
Genesee, F. (1989). Early bilingual development: one language or two? Journal of Child Language 16, 161–79.Google Scholar
Genesee, F. & Bourhis, R. (1988). Evaluative reactions to language choice strategies: the role of socio-structural factors. Language and Communication 8, 229–50.Google Scholar
Goodz, N. S. (1989). Parental language mixing in bilingual families. Infant Mental Health Journal 10, 2543.Google Scholar
Goodz, N. S. (1994). Interactions between parents and children in bilingual families. In Genesee, F. (ed.), Educating second language children. New York: C. U. P.Google Scholar
Lanza, E. (1992). Can bilingual two-year-olds code-switch? Journal of Child Language 19, 633–58.Google Scholar
Leopold, W. (1978). A child's learning of two languages. In Hatch, E. (ed.), Second language acquisition: a book of readings. Rowley, MA: Newbury House.Google Scholar
Lindholm, K. J. & Padilla, A. M. (1978). Language mixing in bilingual children. Journal of Child Language 5, 327–35.Google Scholar
McWhinney, B. & Snow, C. (1990). The child language data exchange system: an update. Journal of Child Language 17, 457–72.Google Scholar
Meisel, J. M. (1990 a) (ed.) Two first languages: early grammatical development in bilingual children. Dordrecht: Foris.Google Scholar
Meisel, J. M. (1990 b). INFL-ection: subjects and subject-verb agreement. In Meisel, J. M. (ed.), Two first languages: early grammatical development in bilingual children. Dordrecht: Foris.Google Scholar
Meisel, J. M. (1994). Code-switching in bilingual children. Studies in second language acquisition. In press.Google Scholar
Myers-Scotton, C. (1993 a). Duelling languages: grammatical structure in codeswitching. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Myers-Scotton, C. (1993 b). Social motivations for codeswitching: evidence from Africa. Oxford: O. U. P.Google Scholar
Petersen, J. (1988). Word-internal code-switching constraints on a bilingual child's grammar. Linguistics 26, 479–93.Google Scholar
Poplack, S. (1980). Sometimes I'll start a sentence in Spanish y termino en Español: toward a typology of code-switching. Linguistics 18, 581618.Google Scholar
Ronjat, J. (1913). Le développement du langage observé chez un enfant bilingue. Paris: Champion.Google Scholar
Sridhar, S. N. & Sridhar, K. K. (1980). The syntax and psycholinguistics of bilingual code switching. Canadian Journal of Psychology 34, 407–16.Google Scholar
Swain, M. (1972). Bilingualism as a first language. Unpublished PhD dissertation, Psychology Department, University of California, Irvine.Google Scholar
Tabouret-Keller, A. (1963). L'acquisiton du langage parlé chez un petit enfant en milieu bilingue. Problèmes de Psycholinguistique 8, 205–19.Google Scholar
Vihman, M. (1985). Language differentiation by the bilingual child. Journal of Child Language 8, 239–64.Google Scholar
Volterra, V. & Taeschner, T. (1978). The acquisition and development of language by bilingual children. Journal of Child Language 5, 311–26.Google Scholar