Narrative comprehension and its associations with gender and nonverbal cognitive skills in monolingual and bilingual German preschoolers
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Carina Marie Wehmeier
Abstract
This paper investigates the development of narrative comprehension in monolingual and simultaneously bilingual German preschoolers, in relation to the children’s gender and their nonverbal cognitive skills. MAIN (Multilingual Assessment Instrument for Narratives) was used to assess narrative comprehension after telling (Baby Birds) and retelling (Cat) in 199 monolinguals and 66 simultaneous bilinguals. The groups did not differ significantly concerning their nonverbal cognitive skills and German language proficiency. Both the monolingual and the bilingual children were divided into three age groups (4;6–4;11, 5;0–5;5, 5;6–5;11). The narrative comprehension results pointed to significant age effects only for the monolinguals, in both elicitation modes. No gender effects were found for any group. For the nonverbal cognition and narrative comprehension measures, weak correlations obtained for both monolinguals and bilinguals. These results strengthen the idea that narrative comprehension is related to nonverbal cognitive skills of monolingual and bilingual preschoolers.
Abstract
This paper investigates the development of narrative comprehension in monolingual and simultaneously bilingual German preschoolers, in relation to the children’s gender and their nonverbal cognitive skills. MAIN (Multilingual Assessment Instrument for Narratives) was used to assess narrative comprehension after telling (Baby Birds) and retelling (Cat) in 199 monolinguals and 66 simultaneous bilinguals. The groups did not differ significantly concerning their nonverbal cognitive skills and German language proficiency. Both the monolingual and the bilingual children were divided into three age groups (4;6–4;11, 5;0–5;5, 5;6–5;11). The narrative comprehension results pointed to significant age effects only for the monolinguals, in both elicitation modes. No gender effects were found for any group. For the nonverbal cognition and narrative comprehension measures, weak correlations obtained for both monolinguals and bilinguals. These results strengthen the idea that narrative comprehension is related to nonverbal cognitive skills of monolingual and bilingual preschoolers.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Acknowledging our reviewers vii
- Cross-linguistic development of narrative comprehension from A to Z 1
- Narrative comprehension in Lebanese Arabic-French bilingual children 31
- Inferential comprehension, age and language 61
- Bilingual Turkish-Swedish children’s understanding of MAIN picture sequences 99
- Narrative comprehension in simultaneously bilingual Finnish-Swedish and monolingual Finnish children 149
- Narrative comprehension by Croatian-Italian bilingual children 5–7 years old 171
- Bilingual children’s lexical and narrative comprehension in Dutch as the majority language 197
- Why do you think the boy would be unhappy if he saw what the cat was eating? 231
- Narrative comprehension and its associations with gender and nonverbal cognitive skills in monolingual and bilingual German preschoolers 269
- Bilingualism effects in the narrative comprehension of children with Developmental Language Disorder and L2-Greek 297
- Commentary 331
- Index 337
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Acknowledging our reviewers vii
- Cross-linguistic development of narrative comprehension from A to Z 1
- Narrative comprehension in Lebanese Arabic-French bilingual children 31
- Inferential comprehension, age and language 61
- Bilingual Turkish-Swedish children’s understanding of MAIN picture sequences 99
- Narrative comprehension in simultaneously bilingual Finnish-Swedish and monolingual Finnish children 149
- Narrative comprehension by Croatian-Italian bilingual children 5–7 years old 171
- Bilingual children’s lexical and narrative comprehension in Dutch as the majority language 197
- Why do you think the boy would be unhappy if he saw what the cat was eating? 231
- Narrative comprehension and its associations with gender and nonverbal cognitive skills in monolingual and bilingual German preschoolers 269
- Bilingualism effects in the narrative comprehension of children with Developmental Language Disorder and L2-Greek 297
- Commentary 331
- Index 337
