The development of phonetic representation in bilingual and monolingual infants

Abstract

The development of native language phonetic representations in bilingual infants was compared to that of monolingual infants. Infants (ages 6–8, 10–12, and 14–20 months) from English–French or English-only environments were tested on their ability to discriminate a French and an English voice onset time distinction. Although 6- to 8-month-olds responded similarly irrespective of language environment, by 10–12 months both groups of infants displayed language-specific perceptual abilities: the monolinguals demonstrated realignment to the native English boundary whereas the bilinguals began discriminating both native boundaries. This suggests that infants exposed to two languages from birth are equipped to phonetically process each as a native language and the development of phonetic representation is neither delayed nor compromised by additional languages.

Productive Trilingualism in Infancy: What Makes it Possible?

“…Later on, in the second half of their first year, infants show changes in phonetic discrimination following exposure to the native language(s) (Werker & Tees, 1984). In the case of monolingual exposure, children demonstrate realignment to the phonetic boundaries of one language; in bilingual situations, language-specific perceptual abilities develop in two languages, at least for highly frequent phones (Burns, Yoshida, Hill, & Werker, 2007;Sundara, Polka, & Molnar, 2008). When it comes to learning regularities in the input, preverbal 12-month-old bilingual infants, as opposed to monolinguals, show no problem learning multiple speech structures at the same time (Kovacs & Mehler, 2009b).…”

Catégories phonologiques et représentation des mots dans le développement lexical de l’enfant bilingue

“…Une tendance similaire chez des enfants bilingues d'autres langues a été également observée dans un travail récent publié par Werker et collaborateurs (Burns et al, 2002). Dans une série d'expériences, ils ont examiné le décours du développement et la nature de représentations phonétiques relatives aux frontières catégorielles entre [b], [p] et [ph].…”

Investigation of Bilingualism Knowledge of Speech-Language Pathologists and Speech-Language Pathology Students

“…This view does not include stages of language unification but instead, distinctive linguistic systems from the onset of acquisition (Paradis, Genesee, & Crago, 2011). It hypothesizes that from infancy, there is a comprehensive ability to distinguish phonological systems from each language found in their environment from ages 10-12 months (Burns, Yoshida, Hill, & Werker, 2007). It expects expressive production to reflect an understanding of the separation of languages, including separate grammatical systems and lexicon.…”

“…The Dual Language System Hypothesis has gained the most support from recent research on speech perception, phonology, vocabulary, and morphosyntax (Paradis, et al 2011). Burns, Yoshida, Hill and Werker (2007) found that infants, 10-12 months of age, had the perceptual capacity to detect slight language-specific phonological differences between [p] and [b] production of English and French. Paradis (2001) tested the phonological production of English-French in 18-month old bilinguals.…”