Language and Linguistics (26)
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition (17)
Applied Psycholinguistics (3)
Annual Review of Applied Linguistics (2)
Behavioral and Brain Sciences (1)
Studies in Second Language Acquisition (1)
Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists (23)
Cambridge Handbooks in Language and Linguistics (1)
Cambridge Handbooks of Linguistics (1)
In vivo molecular imaging reveals distinct distributions of the serotonin transporter, the major inhibitory and excitatory serotonin receptors
M. Savli, A. Bauer, D. Häusler, T. Kroll, A. Hahn, F. Rattay, M. Mitterhauser, W. Wadsak, S. Kasper, R. Lanzenberger
Journal: European Psychiatry / Volume 26 / Issue S2 / March 2011
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 April 2020, p. 953
Based on evidences in molecular neuroimaging, postmortem and genetic studies, impaired serotonergic neurotransmission has been implicated with affective disorders. Moreover, a growing number of evidences showed strong interrelations within the serotonergic system suggesting a common mechanism in the modulation of receptor and transporter densities.
Here we directly investigated the regional expression of the 5-HT1A, 5-HT2A and 5-HTT using PET and the three highly selective and specific radioligands [carbonyl-11C]WAY-100635, [18F]Altanserin and [11C]DASB in healthy subjects.
A total of 55 healthy subjects (5-HT1A: 36 subjects, 18 males, age = 26.0 ± 4.9; 5-HT2A: 19 subjects, 11 males, age = 28.2 ± 5.9; 5-HTT: 8 males, age = 28.12 ± 3.6) were included in this study. Binding potential (BPND) values were quantified according to the AAL parcellation scheme.
BPND values averaged over both hemispheres ranged from 0.40–6.35 for the 5-HT1A receptor; 0.01–2.01 for the 5-HT2A receptor and 0.09–2.05 for the 5-HTT, respectively. There was a specific topological pattern according to the ratio between the 5-HT1A, 5-HT2A receptors and 5-HTT ("fingerprints").
Such information can be essential for detecting potential local alterations in the ratio between different binding proteins on a network level in pathological conditions.
Moreover, these data might provide further insight in area-specific effects of frequently prescribed selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors (SSRI):
1) due to the distinct local receptor and transporter availability;
2) SSRI application alters the postsynaptic receptor expression and thus;
3) leads to a modified interaction of inhibitory and exhibitory receptors.
Domain-general inhibition ability predicts the intensity of inhibition on non-target language in bilingual word production: An ERP study
Chunyan Kang, Fengyang Ma, Shuhua Li, Judith F. Kroll, Taomei Guo
Journal: Bilingualism: Language and Cognition / Volume 23 / Issue 5 / November 2020
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 February 2020, pp. 1056-1069
Print publication: November 2020
This study investigated the predictive effects of executive functions on bilingual language control processes. We used a flanker task, a switching task and an n-back task to investigate inhibition, shifting, and updating, respectively. We adopted a cued language switching task to investigate the language control processes during bilingual word production. Results of linear mixed effects models showed that picture naming in switch trials was significantly slower and elicited larger stimulus-locked N2 and N400-like components. The results further showed that the flanker effect alone robustly predicted the variability of the N2 but not N400-like switch effects. These findings suggest that domain-general inhibition appears to predict the intensity of inhibition exerted on the lexical items in the non-target language during bilingual word production, but bilingual language control only partially overlaps with executive functions.
12 - Bilingualism and Education
from Part III - Reading and Writing
By Gigi Luk, Judith F. Kroll
Edited by John Dunlosky, Kent State University, Ohio, Katherine A. Rawson, Kent State University, Ohio
Book: The Cambridge Handbook of Cognition and Education
Print publication: 07 February 2019, pp 292-319
Language Use Across International Contexts: Shaping the Minds of L2 Speakers
Judith F. Kroll, Paola E. Dussias, María Teresa Bajo
Journal: Annual Review of Applied Linguistics / Volume 38 / September 2018
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 October 2018, pp. 60-79
Print publication: September 2018
Bilingualism is a complex life experience. Second language (L2) learning and bilingualism take place in many different contexts. To develop a comprehensive account of dual-language experience requires research that examines individuals who are learning and using two languages in both the first language (L1) and second language (L2) environments. In this article, we review studies that exploit the presence of an international research network on bilingualism to investigate the role of the environment and some the unique characteristics of L2 learning and bilingual language usage in different locations. We ask how the context of learning affects the acquisition of the L2 and the ability to control the use of each language, how language processing is changed by the patterns of language usage in different places (e.g., whether bilinguals have been immersed in the L2 environment for an extended period of time or whether they code-switch), and how the bilingualism of the community itself influences learning and language use.
Bilingualism as a desirable difficulty: Advantages in word learning depend on regulation of the dominant language
CARI A. BOGULSKI, KINSEY BICE, JUDITH F. KROLL
Bilingualism imposes costs to language processing but benefits to word learning. We test a new hypothesis that relates costs in language processing at study to benefits in learning at test as desirable difficulties. While previous studies have taught vocabulary via bilinguals' native language (L1), recent evidence suggests that bilinguals acquire regulatory skill in the L1 to coordinate the use of each language. We hypothesized that L1 regulation underlies the observed costs and benefits, with word learning advantages depending on learning via the L1. Four groups learned novel Dutch words via English translations: English monolinguals, and English–Spanish, Spanish–English, and Chinese–English bilinguals. Only English–Spanish bilinguals demonstrated a word learning advantage, but they adopted a costly study strategy compared to monolinguals. The results suggest that bilingual advantages in vocabulary learning depend on learning via the L1 or dominant language because learning via the L1 allows bilinguals to engage regulatory skills that benefit learning.
Bilingualism reveals fundamental variation in language processing
MELINDA FRICKE, MEGAN ZIRNSTEIN, CHRISTIAN NAVARRO-TORRES, JUDITH F. KROLL
Journal: Bilingualism: Language and Cognition / Volume 22 / Issue 1 / January 2019
Print publication: January 2019
Although variation in the ways individuals process language has long been a topic of interest and discussion in the psycholinguistic literature, only recently have studies of bilingualism and its cognitive consequences begun to reveal the fundamental dynamics between language and cognition. We argue that the active use of two languages provides a lens through which the interactions between language use, language processing, and the contexts in which these take place can be fully understood. Far from bilingualism being considered a special case, it may provide the common basis upon which the principles of language learning and use can be modeled.
Can the critical period be saved? A bilingual perspective
ELLEN BIALYSTOK, JUDITH F. KROLL
The idea that there is a critical period (CP) for language acquisition that starts sometime after birth and ends sometime around puberty has been central to language studies since Chomsky's paradigm shift that embedded language acquisition into human biological development (for discussion, see Bialystok & Kroll, in press). From early on, the critical period argument was loosely extended to include second language (L2) acquisition, an idea buttressed largely by anecdote: "children learn foreign languages so much better than adults" in spite of evidence to the contrary (Goldberg, Paradis & Crago, 2008; Snow, 1987). The review by Mayberry and Kluender (2017) describes the existing literature on L2 acquisition and adds recent empirical evidence from investigations of individuals learning American Sign Language (ASL) at different ages, often as a first language (L1) to offer important clarifications and insights to this debate. Their argument rests on a clear distinction between processes used in L1 or L2 acquisition to re-evaluation of some of the more extreme claims of the CP view. In brief, they argue that L2 acquisition is not a good test of the CP argument, a point with which we agree. However, our view is that CP effects on language acquisition are even more limited than Mayberry and Kluender suggest and we offer two further arguments to support their own formidable evidence and conclusion.
Experimental platform for the investigation of magnetized-reverse-shock dynamics in the context of POLAR
On the Cover of HPL
HPL Laboratory Astrophysics
B. Albertazzi, E. Falize, A. Pelka, F. Brack, F. Kroll, R. Yurchak, E. Brambrink, P. Mabey, N. Ozaki, S. Pikuz, L. Van Box Som, J. M. Bonnet-Bidaud, J. E. Cross, E. Filippov, G. Gregori, R. Kodama, M. Mouchet, T. Morita, Y. Sakawa, R. P. Drake, C. C. Kuranz, M. J.-E. Manuel, C. Li, P. Tzeferacos, D. Lamb, U. Schramm, M. Koenig
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 July 2018, e43
The influence of a strong external magnetic field on the collimation of a high Mach number plasma flow and its collision with a solid obstacle is investigated experimentally and numerically. The laser irradiation ( $I\sim 2\times 10^{14}~\text{W}\cdot \text{cm}^{-2}$ ) of a multilayer target generates a shock wave that produces a rear side plasma expanding flow. Immersed in a homogeneous 10 T external magnetic field, this plasma flow propagates in vacuum and impacts an obstacle located a few mm from the main target. A reverse shock is then formed with typical velocities of the order of 15–20 $\pm$ 5 km/s. The experimental results are compared with 2D radiative magnetohydrodynamic simulations using the FLASH code. This platform allows investigating the dynamics of reverse shock, mimicking the processes occurring in a cataclysmic variable of polar type.
Beyond typical learning: Variation in language experience as a lens to the developing mind
Judith F. Kroll, Andrea Takahesu Tabori, Emily Mech
Journal: Applied Psycholinguistics / Volume 38 / Issue 6 / November 2017
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 September 2017, pp. 1336-1340
Infants are exposed to the language of the environment in which they are born and, in most instances, become native speakers of that language. Although the history of research on language acquisition provides a colorful debate on the specific ways that nature and nurture shape this process (e.g., MacWhinney, 1999; Pinker, 1995), its primary focus has been on typically developing children exposed to a single language from birth. Pierce, Genesee, Delcenserie, and Morgan (2017) turn the table on this discussion to argue that critically important lessons can be learned by shifting the focus from typically developing children to children for whom the trajectory of language learning follows a different course. Some of the variation in language development reflects attributes of child learners themselves, such as whether they are born hearing or deaf and whether they have conditions that disrupt their ability to fully perceive the speech input to which they are exposed. Other variations reflect attributes of the external conditions in which learners develop, including whether they remain in their country of birth or move to a location in which another language is spoken, whether exposure to the native language is continuous or disrupted, and whether they are exposed to a second language (L2) early or late in development. For deaf children, there is also variation in whether their parents or caregivers are themselves deaf or hearing and able to expose them to sign language during infancy. Pierce et al. use the diversity of early language experience as a tool to examine the relation between phonological working memory and language development and to begin to suggest how conditions that may produce costs or benefits in language learning may be related to one another.
Emoticons in informal text communication: a new window on bilingual alignment*
LAURIE BETH FELDMAN, CECILIA R. ARAGON, NAN-CHEN CHEN, JUDITH F. KROLL
The study of emoticon use in text communication is in its early stages (Aragon, Feldman, Chen & Kroll, 2014), with even less known about how emoticons function in multilingual environments. We describe a preliminary longitudinal analysis of text communication in an online bilingual scientific work environment and demonstrate how patterns of emoticon use constitute a novel yet systematic nonverbal aspect of communication. Specifically, coordination over bilingual speakers entails reductions in emoticon diversity over time that are greater for those who communicate in their L2 than in their L1. An analogous but weaker pattern is evident for lexical diversity in L2 but not L1. We hypothesize that reductions in emoticon diversity in the L2 are likely to reflect social contributions to alignment rather than purely proficiency.
Emoticons in text may function like gestures in spoken or signed communication
Journal: Behavioral and Brain Sciences / Volume 40 / 2017
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 26 April 2017, e55
We draw parallels between emoticons in textual communication and gesture in signed language with respect to the interdependence of codes by describing two contexts under which the behavior of emoticons in textual communication resembles that of gesture in speech. Generalizing from those findings, we propose that gesture is likely characterized by a nuanced interdependence with language whether signed, spoken or texted.
Short-pulse laser-driven x-ray radiography
HEDP and HPL 2016
E. Brambrink, S. Baton, M. Koenig, R. Yurchak, N. Bidaut, B. Albertazzi, J. E. Cross, G. Gregori, A. Rigby, E. Falize, A. Pelka, F. Kroll, S. Pikuz, Y. Sakawa, N. Ozaki, C. Kuranz, M. Manuel, C. Li, P. Tzeferacos, D. Lamb
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 September 2016, e30
We have developed a new radiography setup with a short-pulse laser-driven x-ray source. Using a radiography axis perpendicular to both long- and short-pulse lasers allowed optimizing the incident angle of the short-pulse laser on the x-ray source target. The setup has been tested with various x-ray source target materials and different laser wavelengths. Signal to noise ratios are presented as well as achieved spatial resolutions. The high quality of our technique is illustrated on a plasma flow radiograph obtained during a laboratory astrophysics experiment on POLARs.
The time course of cross-language activation in deaf ASL–English bilinguals*
JILL P. MORFORD, CORRINE OCCHINO-KEHOE, PILAR PIÑAR, ERIN WILKINSON, JUDITH F. KROLL
Journal: Bilingualism: Language and Cognition / Volume 20 / Issue 2 / March 2017
What is the time course of cross-language activation in deaf sign–print bilinguals? Prior studies demonstrating cross-language activation in deaf bilinguals used paradigms that would allow strategic or conscious translation. This study investigates whether cross-language activation can be eliminated by reducing the time available for lexical processing. Deaf ASL–English bilinguals and hearing English monolinguals viewed pairs of English words and judged their semantic similarity. Half of the stimuli had phonologically related translations in ASL, but participants saw only English words. We replicated prior findings of cross-language activation despite the introduction of a much faster rate of presentation. Further, the deaf bilinguals were as fast or faster than hearing monolinguals despite the fact that the task was in their second language. The results allow us to rule out the possibility that deaf ASL–English bilinguals only activate ASL phonological forms when given ample time for strategic or conscious translation across their two languages.
21 - Selection and control in bilingual comprehension and production
from Part VI - Control
By Judith F. Kroll, Jason W. Gullifer, Rhonda McClain, Eleonora Rossi, María Cruz Martín
Edited by John W. Schwieter, Wilfrid Laurier University, Ontario
Book: The Cambridge Handbook of Bilingual Processing
Published online: 05 November 2015
Print publication: 06 August 2015, pp 485-507
Bimodal bilingualism reveals mechanisms of cross-language interaction*
JUDITH F. KROLL, KINSEY BICE
In the recent swell of research on bilingualism and its consequences for the mind and the brain, there has been a warning that we need to remember that not all bilinguals are the same (e.g., Green & Abutalebi, 2013; Kroll & Bialystok, 2013; Luk & Bialystok, 2013). There are bilinguals who acquired two languages in early childhood and have used them continuously throughout their lives, bilinguals who acquired one language early and then switched to another language when they entered school or emigrated from one country to another, and others who only acquired a second language (L2) as an adult. Among these forms of bilingualism there are differences in both the context and amount of time spent in each language and differences in the status of the languages themselves. The L2 may be a majority language, spoken by almost everyone in the environment, or a minority language, spoken only by a few. The native or first language (L1) may also be the dominant language or may have been overtaken by the influence of the L2 given the circumstances imposed by the environment. Likewise, the L1 and L2 may vary in how similar they are structurally, whether they share the same written script, or whether one language is spoken and the other signed.
Accessing word meaning in beginning second language learners: Lexical or conceptual mediation?*
GREGORY J. POARCH, JANET G. VAN HELL, JUDITH F. KROLL
Journal: Bilingualism: Language and Cognition / Volume 18 / Issue 3 / July 2015
Print publication: July 2015
We tested the predictions of the Revised Hierarchical Model (Kroll & Stewart, 1994) to examine how children map novel words to concepts during early stages of L2 learning. Fifth grade Dutch L2 learners with 8 months of English instruction performed a translation recognition task followed by translation production in both directions. The children were already sensitive to L2 word meaning in translation recognition, showing longer RTs and lower accuracies for semantically related than semantically unrelated word pairs. In translation production, they were faster in backward than forward direction as predicted by the RHM. Critically, these children had learned L2 words in contexts enriched by pictures and listening/speaking exercises. Depending on the task, Dutch beginning L2 learners exploit conceptual information during L2 processing and map L2 word-forms to concepts. This study also contributes to accumulating evidence that manner of L2 instruction may majorly impact the activation of lexical and conceptual information during translation.
Lexical constraints in second language learning: Evidence on grammatical gender in German *
SUSAN C. BOBB, JUDITH F. KROLL, CARRIE N. JACKSON
The present study asked whether or not the apparent insensitivity of second language (L2) learners to grammatical gender violations reflects an inability to use grammatical information during L2 lexical processing. Native German speakers and English speakers with intermediate to advanced L2 proficiency in German performed a translation-recognition task. On critical trials, an incorrect translation was presented that either matched or mismatched the grammatical gender of the correct translation. Results show interference for native German speakers in conditions in which the incorrect translation matched the gender of the correct translation. Native English speakers, regardless of German proficiency, were insensitive to the gender mismatch. In contrast, these same participants were correctly able to assign gender to critical items. These findings suggest a dissociation between explicit knowledge and the ability to use that information under speeded processing conditions and demonstrate the difficulty of L2 gender processing at the lexical level.
On the consequences of bilingualism: We need language and the brain to understand cognition
JUDITH F. KROLL
In the last two decades there has been an explosion of research on bilingualism and its consequences for the mind and the brain (e.g., Kroll & Bialystok, 2013). One reason is that the use of two or more languages reveals interactions across cognitive and neural systems that are often obscured in monolingual speakers of a single language (e.g., Kroll, Dussias, Bogulski & Valdes Kroff, 2012). From this perspective, the interest in bilingualism is about developing a platform to ask questions about the ways that cognitive and neural networks are engaged during language use, in different learning environments, and across the lifespan. Another reason is that an emerging body of research on the consequences of bilingualism suggests that language experience changes cognition and the brain (e.g., Abutalebi, Della Rosa, Green, Hernandez, Scifo, Keim, Cappa & Costa, 2012; Bialystok, Craik, Green, & Gollan, 2009). Some of these changes have been claimed to produce cognitive advantages (see Bialystok et al., for a review of bilingual advantages and disadvantages).
What bilinguals do with language that changes their minds and their brains
Judith F. Kroll, Melinda Fricke
Journal: Applied Psycholinguistics / Volume 35 / Issue 5 / September 2014
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 August 2014, pp. 921-925
In the last two decades, there has been an upsurge of research on bilingualism recognizing that bilinguals may be more representative language users than their monolingual peers (e.g., Kroll, Dussias, Bogulski, & Valdes Kroff, 2012). The excitement about bilinguals is related not only to their neglected status in the past literature but also to a set of twin discoveries that have catapulted research on bilingualism into central view in psycholinguistics, cognitive and developmental neuroscience, and gerontology. One of these discoveries is that both languages are active when bilinguals read, listen to speech, and plan speech in either of their two languages (for a review, see Kroll et al., 2012). The other discovery is that bilingualism appears to confer a set of consequences to domain general cognition and to the neural structures that support it (e.g., Bialystok, Craik, Green, & Gollan, 2009). Those consequences are observed across the lifespan and are particularly evident when cognitive resources are challenged because of the normal or pathological trajectory of aging (e.g., Gold, Kim, Johnson, Kriscio, & Smith, 2013). The focus of the new research is on how these two discoveries might be related. The parallel activity of the two languages and the interactions across them require that the bilingual develops skill in language selection to enable fluent performance. The hypothesis that has guided the recent flurry of research is that bilingual minds and brains change as a consequence of having to regulate the two languages. In their Keynote Article, Baum and Titone provide a comprehensive and current summary of the existing evidence on this hypothesis.
The Multilingual Lexicon: The Cognitive and Neural Basis of Lexical Comprehension and Production in Two or More Languages
Judith F. Kroll, Jason W. Gullifer, Eleonora Rossi
Journal: Annual Review of Applied Linguistics / Volume 33 / March 2013
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 November 2013, pp. 102-127
Recent studies have shown that when bilinguals or multilinguals read written words, listen to spoken words, or plan words that they intend to speak in one language alone, information in all of the languages that they know is momentarily active. That activation produces cross-language competition that sometimes converges to facilitate performance and sometimes diverges to create costs to performance. The presence of parallel activation across languages has been documented in comprehension, in studies of word recognition, and also in production, in studies of lexical speech planning. The observation that one of the two or more languages cannot be switched off at will is particularly surprising in production, where the intention to express a thought should be guided by conceptually driven processes. Likewise, in comprehension, recent studies show that placing words in sentence context in one language alone is insufficient to restrict processing to that language. The focus of current research on the multilingual lexicon is therefore to understand the basis of language nonselectivity, to consider how the language in use is ultimately selected, and to identify the cognitive consequences of having a lexical system that is open to influence by the languages not in use. In this article, we review the recent cognitive and neural evidence on each of these issues, with special consideration to the question of how the nature of the evidence itself shapes the conclusions drawn about the organization and access to the lexicon in individuals who speak more than one language.