3-037 - Code-switching in Children: Cross-linguistic Studies Reveal No Cost to Language Processing or Linguistic Competence

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

Code-switching (CS), or using two or more languages in a conversation, is a natural phenomenon in bilinguals’ everyday lives. Despite earlier attempts to understand the impact of CS on children’s language development, the relationship between CS, language processing and linguistic competence remains largely unknown. This symposium presents results from cross-linguistic studies with bilingual children aged 2.5 to 8 years old, providing evidence that CS does not always negatively influence language processing or linguistic competence, as most adult studies have shown. Paper 1 compared 25 English and French monolingual and English-French bilingual toddlers’ use of code-switched versus same-language disfluencies in predicting speaker’s intended referent. Toddlers used both types of disfluencies similarly in predicting speaker’s referent, with no processing cost incurred for the code-switched disfluencies. Paper 2 examined CS and verbal task-switching in 43 English-Mandarin 8-year-old children Singaporean children. Results revealed that children were able to comprehend code-switched utterances and produced responses to these quickly, without incurring comprehension or production costs. Paper 3 examined CS and linguistic competency in 55 English-Mandarin bilingual preschoolers in Singapore. Those who code-switched more with peers had a greater level of expressive linguistic competency in one language with no weaker competency in the other language, compared to those who code-switched less. Furthermore, amount of CS positively predicted teachers’ ratings of language competencies 6 months later. Finally, the discussant will deliberate on the link between code-switching and various outcomes in children. The significance of these findings for bilingual children’s language and cognitive development will also be discussed.

Sub Unit

• Language, Communication

Chair

• Carissa Kang, Dept. of Human Development, College of Human Ecology, Cornell University

Discussant

• Casey Lew-Williams, Princeton University

Individual Presentations

• Toddlers' Comprehension of Code-Switched Disfluencies: Mixing Does Not Cause Mix-up - Presenting Author: Elizabeth Morin-Lessard, Concordia University; Krista Byers-Heinlein, Concordia University

• Code-Switching and Executive Function in 8-year-old English-Chinese Singaporean Children Reveals an Indirect Relation - Presenting Author: Carissa Kang, Dept. of Human Development, College of Human Ecology, Cornell University; Barbara Catherine Lust, Cornell University

• Code-switching with Peers is Positively Associated with Language Competency - Presenting Author: W. Quin Yow, Singapore University of Technology & Design; Suzanne Flynn, MIT