Efficiency of the bilingual mind
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Luna Filipović
Abstract
Multiple factors operate when a bilingual mind processes and stores information and they operate in unison, sometimes cooperating and sometimes competing. The central argument in this chapter is that it is the inherent drive for efficiency in communication that underlies interactions among these factors. The support for this argument is drawn from an eclectic array of empirical investigations into bilingual processing, memory retrieval, and language acquisition. The efficiency argument helps answer some pertinent questions in the field, such as when and why we can expect language transfer. The need for considering both naturalistic (corpus or elicited) and experimental data is highlighted together with the benefits of combining typological insights into language contrasts with psycholinguistic findings about language processing.
Abstract
Multiple factors operate when a bilingual mind processes and stores information and they operate in unison, sometimes cooperating and sometimes competing. The central argument in this chapter is that it is the inherent drive for efficiency in communication that underlies interactions among these factors. The support for this argument is drawn from an eclectic array of empirical investigations into bilingual processing, memory retrieval, and language acquisition. The efficiency argument helps answer some pertinent questions in the field, such as when and why we can expect language transfer. The need for considering both naturalistic (corpus or elicited) and experimental data is highlighted together with the benefits of combining typological insights into language contrasts with psycholinguistic findings about language processing.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Editors and contributors vii
- Foreword ix
- Introduction 1
-
Part I. Multilingual contrasts: Interfaces and integrations
- Methodological approaches in the study of linguistic relativity 17
- Frequency of use and basic vocabulary 45
- A contrastive study of colour terms in French and German causal constructions 73
- Compound verbs in English and Bulgarian and the relativity debate 97
- HERE, NEAR, FAR 121
- Cognitive maps of landmark orientation 151
- Is space-time metaphorical mapping universal? 183
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Part II. Bilingual processing: Language representation and language use
- Efficiency of the bilingual mind 205
- About phonological, grammatical, and semantic accents in bilinguals’ language use and their cause 229
- Aging and bilingual processing 263
- L1-based prototypicality effects in L2 vocabulary learning 287
- Finding a wooden jandal in the jandal wood 309
- Name index 333
- Subject index 335
- Language index 337
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Editors and contributors vii
- Foreword ix
- Introduction 1
-
Part I. Multilingual contrasts: Interfaces and integrations
- Methodological approaches in the study of linguistic relativity 17
- Frequency of use and basic vocabulary 45
- A contrastive study of colour terms in French and German causal constructions 73
- Compound verbs in English and Bulgarian and the relativity debate 97
- HERE, NEAR, FAR 121
- Cognitive maps of landmark orientation 151
- Is space-time metaphorical mapping universal? 183
-
Part II. Bilingual processing: Language representation and language use
- Efficiency of the bilingual mind 205
- About phonological, grammatical, and semantic accents in bilinguals’ language use and their cause 229
- Aging and bilingual processing 263
- L1-based prototypicality effects in L2 vocabulary learning 287
- Finding a wooden jandal in the jandal wood 309
- Name index 333
- Subject index 335
- Language index 337
