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  • Chan & Monaghan (2019)

    Accepted author manuscript, 230 KB, PDF document

    Available under license: CC BY-NC: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

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Simulating Bilingual Word Learning: Monolingual and Bilingual Adults’ Use of Cross-Situational Statistics

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Published
Publication date24/07/2019
Host publicationProceedings of the 41st Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society
PublisherCognitive Science Society
Pages1472-1478
Number of pages7
<mark>Original language</mark>English
Event41st Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society - Palais des Congrès de Montréal , Montreal, Canada
Duration: 24/07/201927/07/2019
Conference number: 41st
https://cognitivesciencesociety.org/cogsci-2019/

Conference

Conference41st Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society
Abbreviated titleCOGSCI '19
Country/TerritoryCanada
CityMontreal
Period24/07/1927/07/19
Internet address

Conference

Conference41st Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society
Abbreviated titleCOGSCI '19
Country/TerritoryCanada
CityMontreal
Period24/07/1927/07/19
Internet address

Abstract

Children learning language in multilingual settings have to learn that objects take different labels within each different language to which they are exposed. Previous research has shown that adults can learn one-to-one and two-to-one word-object mappings via cross-situational statistical learning (CSSL), and that socio-pragmatic cues may differentially influence monolingual and bilingual adults’ learning of such mappings. However, the extent to which monolingual and bilingual learners can keep track of multiple labels from multiple speakers has not yet been investigated. We manipulated the number of speakers in a CSSL task that involved learning both mapping types. We successfully replicated previous studies that found that both monolinguals and bilinguals could learn both types of mappings via CSSL. In addition, we found that bilinguals showed a steeper learning rate for two-to-one mappings than monolinguals, and bilinguals were more likely to accept two words for the same object than monolinguals. These results show that the effect of speaker identity on tracking word-object mappings varies according to language experience.