Perceptual Representations in L1, L2 and L3 Comprehension: Delayed Sentence–Picture Verification

The reduced embodiment of a second language

“…As mentioned above, two previous studies that utilized a similar task yielded conflicting results. On the one hand, consistent with the results of the current study, Chen et al (2020) found a significant interaction between Shape Condition (match/mismatch) and Target Language (L1/L2/L3), in which the shape effect was significant only in the L1, but not in the L2 nor in the L3, of late trilinguals. On the other hand, Ahn and Jiang (2018), observed a significant shape effect during both L1 and L2 sentence reading.…”

“…First, the fact that a significant shape effect was found only in the L1 (on first-block trials), but not in the L2, of late bilinguals that have acquired and used their L2 primarily in formal settings, supports our initial prediction that among these type of bilinguals the mental representation resulting from L2 comprehension is less grounded in sensorimotor knowledge, relative to the L1, and is consistent with previous studies, showing limited activation of perceptual (e.g., Chen et al, 2020), motor (e.g., Vukovic & Shtyrov, 2014), and affective (e.g., Hsu et al, 2015) knowledge during L2 reading.…”

“…This increased variance (both between the two language groups and within the L2 group) may explain Ahn and Jiang's (2018) failure to exhibit a significant difference in the shape effect between L1 and L2 sentence reading. However, in the current study (as well as in Chen et al, 2020) the language variable (L1 vs. L2) was manipulated by examining the same bilinguals in their two languages (L1-Hebrew vs. L2-English), eliminating possible differences between L1 and L2 processing in terms of participants‘ linguistic and cultural background.…”

“…Namely, L1 sentences were predicted to substantially activate implied shape information. In addition, the L2 of this group of bilinguals was expected to produce weaker visual shape activations, relative to the L1, due to its formal manner of acquisition and use (Chen et al, 2020). Thus, the shape effect was predicted to be significantly reduced in the L2-task, relative to the L1-task.…”

“…Thus, there are good reasons to assume that the activation of perceptual visual knowledge during language comprehension would be restricted in a late and formally learned L2, in comparison to a naturally learned L1. However, this assumption still needs to be confirmed by further empirical evidence, since only a few studies to date have investigated visual simulations during L2 comprehension, either demonstrating activation of visual knowledge in both the L1 and the L2 (Ahn & Jiang, 2018; Koster, Cadierno & Chiarandini, 2018), or showing visual effects only in the L1 (Chen, Wang, Zhang & Liu, 2020).…”