Some wheres and whys in bilingual codeswitching: Directionality, motivation and locus of codeswitching in Russian-Hebrew bilingual children

2018 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 629-650 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rina Raichlin ◽  
Joel Walters ◽  
Carmit Altman

Aims and objectives: Differences in directionality, motivations and locus of codeswitching have been reported for children’s codeswitching, but these constructs have not been subjected to experimental study in order to examine how they may interact. This study investigated these variables in bilingual preschool children’s codeswitching. Methodology: Thirty-two Russian-Hebrew bilingual children (mean age 6;3) performed two tasks: Retelling of narratives manipulated for setting/topic and listener and Conversation with a bilingual adult. Retelling conditions included a Russian story retold to a Hebrew-speaking puppet, a Hebrew story retold to a Russian speaking puppet and a Mixed language story retold to a bilingual puppet. The Conversation task involved responses to questions in Russian, Hebrew and codeswitched speech about holidays and activities at home and in preschool. Data and Analysis: All children’s speech was audio recorded and transcribed using CHILDES conventions for data transcription. Codeswitched utterances were coded for the following: Directionality (Hebrew-to-Russian/Russian-to-Hebrew); Motivation (psycholinguistic/sociopragmatic); and Locus (intra-utterance/cross-speaker). Results: Overall children produced more codeswitching from Russian to Hebrew and did so more for psycholinguistic motivations (to maintain fluency or to overcome difficulties in lexical access). Originality: High rates of codeswitching occurred in this study, ranging from 15% to 22% for Conversation and Retelling, respectively (calculated as codeswitched instances per utterance). This high rate may be attributed to the experimental nature of the tasks, which intended to elicit codeswitching in children’s speech. Significance: Drawing from Green and Wei’s processing model, findings regarding directionality and motivation are discussed in terms of connectivity and activation.

1996 ◽  
Vol 34 (11) ◽  
pp. 125-132 ◽  
Author(s):  
Baozhen Wang ◽  
Wenyi Dong ◽  
Jinlan Zhang ◽  
Xiangdong Cao

The results of an experimental study conducted in a full-scale high rate pond system treating piggery wastewater at Jianfengshan Piggery, Panyu City, Guandong Province, are presented. The system consists of two advanced anaerobic ponds (AAP) in parallel, followed by an anaerobic transformation pond (ATP) and a five-cell algae-bacterial pond (ABP). The mechanism of the AAP is described and the hydraulic flow pattern analyzed. Fermentation pits (FP) built on the bottom performed very efficiently, operating like UASB in principle. A new concept of ATP is advanced, based on its ability to transform poorly degradable materials to more easily degradable ones. It was found in the study that the HRP system was more efficient, more reliable and saved 40% land area compared with a conventional pond system. Economic analyses of both the energy consumption and the benefit to the pond system of fish farming are also included in the paper.


2019 ◽  
Vol 29 (Supplement_4) ◽  
Author(s):  
M Shah ◽  
Q Jamali ◽  
F Aisha

Abstract Background Unsafe practices such as cutting umbilical cord with unsterilized instruments and application of harmful substances, are in practice in many rural areas of Pakistan, and associated with high risk of neonatal sepsis and mortality. Methods We conducted an implementation research in 2015 in Tharparkar district, in Sindh province of Pakistan to understand the feasibility and acceptability of community-based distribution of chlorhexidine (CHX) in rural Pakistan. For this cohort group-only study, 225 lady health workers (LHWs) enrolled 495 pregnant women. Enrolled women received 4% CHX gel and user’s instructions for newborn cord care. The LHWs also counseled women on the benefits and correct use of CHX. Study enumerators collected data from CHX receiving women 3 times: at around 2 weeks before delivery, within 24 hours after delivery, and on the 8th day after delivery. We implemented this study jointly in collaboration with Ministry of Health in Sindh province, Pakistan. Results Among enrolled participants, 399 women (81%) received only the first visit, 295 women (60%) received first two visits and 261 women (53%) received all three visits by enumerators. Among 399 women, who received CHX gel, counseling on its use and were respondent to the first round data collection, 78% remembered that the CHX gel to be applied to cord stump and surrounding areas immediately after birth; but less than a third (29%) forgot the need to keep the cord clean and dry. Among 295 respondents in the first two rounds of data collection, who delivered at home, 97% applied CHX to cord stump on the first day. Conclusions Community-based CHX distribution by LHWs, along with counseling to recipient women, resulted in a high rate of cord care with CHX among newborn delivered at home. Results from this study may help program implementers to consider expanding this intervention for improving newborn cord care on the first day of life in Pakistan. Key messages Community-based distribution of chlorhexidine for newborn cord care appears as highly acceptable and feasible in rural communities in Pakistan. Relevant program policy supporting community-based CHX distribution along with counseling by LHW may help expanding coverage of newborn cord care in rural communities in Pakistan.


Proglas ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Iliyana Dimitrova ◽  
◽  
◽  

he study examines some linguistic errors in the process of learning Bulgarian by Bulgarian-English bilingual children and by native English speakers who study Bulgarian as a second language. The emphasis is on some typical interference errors which are common (identical) for both the bilingual children’s speech and the speech of native English speakers learning Bulgarian as a second language. Based on the analyzed aberration corpus, the opinion we give is that many of the processes taking place during the acquisition of the Bulgarian language are the same for both bilingual children with English and native English speakers.


2019 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 501-521 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valery LIMIA ◽  
Şeyda ÖZÇALIŞKAN ◽  
Erika HOFF

AbstractMonolingual children identify referents uniquely in gesture before they do so with words, and parents translate these gestures into words. Children benefit from these translations, acquiring the words that their parents translated earlier than the ones that are not translated. Are bilingual children as likely as monolingual children to identify referents uniquely in gesture; and do parental translations have the same positive impact on the vocabulary development of bilingual children? Our results showed that the bilingual children – dominant in English or in Spanish – were as likely as monolingual children to identify referents uniquely in gesture. More importantly, the unique gestures, when translated into words by the parents, were as likely to enter bilingual and monolingual children's speech – independent of language dominance. Our results suggest that parental response to child gesture plays as crucial of a role in the vocabulary development of bilingual children as it does in monolingual children.


2015 ◽  
Vol 19 (5) ◽  
pp. 1057-1078 ◽  
Author(s):  
VIRGINIA C. MUELLER GATHERCOLE ◽  
IVAN KENNEDY ◽  
ENLLI MÔN THOMAS

The performance of bilingual children and adults in Wales on Welsh and English vocabulary and grammar and on cognitive measures is re-analysed in relation to SES indicators of parental education and parental professions. Results are reported for 732 participants ranging across seven age groups from age 3 to over 60 and from four home language types, monolingual English, and bilinguals with only English at home, Welsh and English at home, or only Welsh at home. Results reveal extensive evidence of SES influence on performance, and of a complex relation of exposure in the home and SES level on performance, modulated by the age of the participant and whether one is considering the majority or minority language.


2017 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 313-328
Author(s):  
Sunny K Park-Johnson

Aims: The present study investigates whether Korean-English (K-E) bilingual children develop subject auxiliary inversion (SAI) in English wh-questions differently from monolingual English (M-E) speaking children. Specifically, an experimental study was designed to determine whether there is an effect of subject person in their acquisition of SAI in English wh-questions, a factor that had been suggested but not tested as a contributing factor in SAI in a previous study. Design: Twenty-six K-E bilingual and 20 M-E preschool-aged children were recruited for an elicitation study testing the effect of person on the use of SAI in wh-questions in English. The experiment consisted of having children interact with puppets in a guessing game that elicited first, second, and third person object- what questions in English. Data and analysis: Data from the experiment were analyzed through a binomial logistic regression, which accounts for the binary nature of the data (auxiliary inversion: present or absent) and identified which variables contribute significantly to the presence and absence of SAI. Findings/conclusions: Results indicated a significant difference between K-E and M-E groups and a significant main effect for person on SAI for the K-E group. The paper proposes that the [prs] feature is part of the bundle of features that drives the movement of the features in T to C. Originality: The paper contributes evidence for a link between the person feature and SAI, a link that has not been seen before for wh-question research. Significance/implications: The new evidence of a possible link between subject person and auxiliary inversion may open a window to new avenues for wh-question acquisition research.


2020 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 207-220
Author(s):  
Mirosław Michalik ◽  
Ewa Czaplewska ◽  
Anna Solak ◽  
Anna Szkotak

The basic aim of the research presented in this paper was to check whether the language proficiency level of bilingual children with Polish as one of their languages is also related to the pace of speech, which is the result of two specific parameters i.e. articulation rate and speaking rate. It was assumed that children who use Polish more rarely and mostly at home will display slower speaking and articulation rates when contrasted with children who use Polish both at home and at school on an everyday basis. Participants were thirty-two children who speak Polish as one of two languages, the first research group consisting of sixteen Polish-French students at the age of 8.11 living in Wal-lonia. The second group consisted of sixteen Flemish-Polish students living in Flanders. Here the average age was 9.3 and subjects used Polish much less than their first group coun-terparts. The comparative analysis included the following parameters essential for the de-scription of the rate of speech: 1. basic: average speaking rate (phones/sec., syllables/sec, duration of pauses), average articulation rate (phones/sec., syllables/sec.), average ratio of pauses in speech sample (number and percentage), 2. accessory: average duration of all pauses (sec.), average duration of proper pauses (sec.), average duration of filled pauses (sec.), average duration of semi-filled pauses (sec.). The numerical data from the research was obtained with the use of free Audacity software. The results showed that there were no statistically significant differences between the two research groups in either the basic or the accessory speech rate parameters. In the Polish-French group the results were comparatively better but still statistically insignificant. It seems that the data obtained will confirm the need for considerable caution in the evalua-tion of the competence of bilingual children with high language skills. Similar to children with imbalanced bilingualism, these children may also, perhaps, require some extra time to deal with certain language tasks.


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