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Bilingualism and aging: Reversal of the cognate advantage in older bilingual adults

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 July 2009

SAMANTHA SIYAMBALAPITIYA ,
HELEN J. CHENERY  and
DAVID A. COPLAND
SAMANTHA SIYAMBALAPITIYA*
Affiliation:
James Cook University
HELEN J. CHENERY
Affiliation:
University of Queensland
DAVID A. COPLAND
Affiliation:
University of Queensland
*
ADDRESS FOR CORRESPONDENCE Samantha Siyambalapitiya, Discipline of Speech Pathology, School of Public Health, Tropical Medicine and Rehabilitation Sciences, James Cook University, Townsville, Queensland 4811, Australia. E-mail: samantha.siyambalapitiya@jcu.edu.au
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Abstract

This study aimed to investigate cognate/noncognate processing distinctions in young adult bilinguals and examined whether the previously reported cognate facilitation effect would also be demonstrated in older adult bilinguals. Two groups of Italian–English bilingual participants performed lexical decisions in repetition priming experiments. Results for the younger bilinguals corresponded to previous findings, and indicated the expected reaction time advantage for cognates over noncognates. The older bilinguals, however, only demonstrated a cognate advantage in the within-language condition, and in fact, showed faster reaction times for noncognates when repetition was across languages. These findings are interpreted in the context of the revised hierarchical model and the bilingual interactive activation model and in light of findings regarding the effect of aging on language processing.

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Type
Articles
Information
Applied Psycholinguistics , Volume 30 , Issue 3 , July 2009 , pp. 531 - 554
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

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