Shared spatial representations for physical locations and location words in bilinguals’ primary language

Abstract

The cognitive processing of persons fluent in two languages has received considerable research interest, resulting in an entire handbook devoted to the topic (Kroll & De Groot, 2005). Lexical decision and naming tasks, often coupled with priming procedures, have been used to assess how meaning is represented in the first and second languages. A common finding is that of processing asymmetry, in which the first language tends to dominate the second (e.g., Kroll & Stewart, 1994). For example, when a semantically related prime word is in one language and the target word to be classified or named is in another language, stronger priming effects occur from the first to the second language than in the opposite direction (Schoonbaert, Duyck, Brysbaert, & Hartsuiker, 2009). A popular model developed to explain such results is that of Kroll and Stewart, which specifies distinct lexical systems for the first and second languages. In the model, both lexical systems have links to a common conceptual system, but those links are weaker for the second language than for the first.Evidence of processing asymmetry for spatial information in the first and second languages was reported by Notebaert, De Moor, Gevers, and Hartsuiker (2007), using a method in which trials of a Simon task (Simon, 1990) for which stimulus location was irrelevant were mixed with trials of a task for which the meaning of a location word was relevant. For the Simon task, left and right keypress responses were assigned to the colors of red and green circles, presented randomly in left and right locations. When performed alone, this task yields a correspondence effect for stimulus and response locations called the Simon effect, for which reaction time (RT) is shorter when the locations correspond than when they do not (Lu & Proctor, 1995). For the task in which location information was relevant, the location words left and right were presented at the center of the display screen and were mapped incompatibly to the right and left keypresses. For monolingual participants, random intermixing of trials from the incompatibly mapped location-relevant tasks with trials from the Simon task results in an elimination of the Simon effect or a reversal to favor the noncorresponding response (Proctor, Marble, & Vu, 2000;Proctor & Vu, 2002). This influence of the incompatible location-word mapping on Simon task performance suggests that verbospatial information and visuospatial information share a semantic/conceptual representation, with stimuli in the Simon task tending to activate the response linked to the shared representation for the task of responding to location words. Notebaert et al. (2007) showed that, for bilingual participants, this influence of an incompatible location-word mapping on the Simon effect occurred only when the words were from the first language. For bilingual Dutch/ French participants, the Simon effect for the locationirrelevant stimuli reversed in the first of four trial blocks when the words were in the participants' first language For monoli...

More similitudes than differences between bilinguals and monolinguals on speeded and demand-varying executive tasks

“…This finding led them to propose that the BA might stem from a general-executive control superior ability, which was referred to as the BEPA hypothesis. The results of the present study concerning global RTs showed that bilinguals and monolinguals were equally fast across tasks, at odds with previous studies showing that bilinguals outperform monolinguals (Kousaie & Phillips, 2017;Vu et al, 2010). However, this outcome is in line with the conclusions of the latest review by Hilchey et al (2015), who revealed that the pattern of BEPA results has shifted from robust to uncommon.…”

“…NgF) as compared to bilinguals, and contradicting the predictions of the BEPA hypothesis. As far as we know, only two previous studies have reported similar results (Morales et al, 2013;Vu et al, 2010), and none did so using either flanker or no-go flanker paradigms. In fact, in studies with comparable designs to the current one, results show the opposite pattern (Emmorey et al, 2008;Jiao et al, 2019;Luk et al, 2010).…”

“…On the one hand, the bilingual executive processing advantage (BEPA) hypothesis was suggested after noticing that most of the reviewed studies frequently showed an advantage in terms of global reaction times (RT) instead of a specific inhibition-related one, which was less frequent (Hilchey & Klein, 2011). In particular, the BEPA hypothesis refers to a greater domain-general executive function in bilinguals evidenced by more efficient (in terms of RT) responses to both conflicting and non-conflicting conditions, that is, in either incongruent, congruent and control trials (Kousaie & Phillips, 2017;Vu, Ngo, Minakata, & Proctor, 2010; although see Kousaie & Phillips, 2012). Several authors proposed this executive-global processing BA may lie in the bilinguals' ability to update more efficiently and dynamically monitor the complex context demands regardless of conflict (Costa et al, 2009;Morales et al, 2015).…”

The location-, word-, and arrow-based Simon effects: An ex-Gaussian analysis

“…Both location words and arrows yield S-R mapping effects when the location information conveyed by them is relevant (Wang & Proctor, 1996) and Simon effects when it is irrelevant (Proctor & Vu, 2002). Moreover, the locationbased Simon effect is eliminated when location-based Simon task trials are intermixed with ones in which participants respond to the words left and right with incompatibly mapped keypresses (Notebaert et al, 2007;Proctor et al, 2000;Vu, Ngo, Minakata, & Proctor, 2010).…”