Home Gender-inclusive morphology in Spanish: learnability, processing costs, and use
Article
Licensed
Unlicensed Requires Authentication

Gender-inclusive morphology in Spanish: learnability, processing costs, and use

  • Ezequiel M. Durand-López EMAIL logo and Kendra V. Dickinson
Published/Copyright: September 3, 2025

Abstract

In Spanish, the -e suffix as a gender-inclusive morpheme (e.g., elles son bonites) has been proposed as an alternative to traditional -o to refer to mixed-gender groups. Limited studies on this innovation suggest that the computation of inclusive morphology might not incur high processing costs. However, it is unclear whether native speakers who have acquired the Spanish binary grammatical system before puberty effectively process noun-adjective gender agreement with said inclusive language morpheme. Thirty-seven native speakers of Spanish completed a self-paced reading task and a sociolinguistic questionnaire. The former task contained sentences with (1) a subject comprised of two stereotypically masculine names (e.g., Pedro) and two stereotypically feminine names (e.g., María), (2) the verb están, and (3) an adjective with the traditional -o suffix or the inclusive -e suffix, and the latter included questions about language use and beliefs. Results show that while -e was associated with longer processing time overall, participants who reported using inclusive language most frequently showed no difference in processing -o and -e. Additionally, questionnaire data show that participant beliefs about learnability and usability of inclusive language mirror experimental findings. These results suggest that it is possible to acquire the -e morpheme in the L1 after puberty, with beliefs influencing the processing of these forms. Furthermore, the results highlight the roles of use of and exposure to inclusive gender in the language in order for speakers to acquire and process it.


Corresponding author: Ezequiel M. Durand-López, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA, E-mail:

Appendix A: List of experimental sentences.

  1. Mencionan que Juan, Silvia, Pedro y María están contentos/contentes en su trabajo.

  2. Comentan que Martín, Ana, Mateo y Juana están cansados/cansades por la mañana.

  3. Saben que José, Lola, Luisa y Julia están casados/casades con sus parejas.

  4. Dicen que Juan, Nadia, Marcos y Rita están despiertos/despiertes por la noche.

  5. Piensan que Pablo, Lucía, Néstor y Sandra están celosos/celoses en la relación.

  6. Observan que Raúl, Carmen, Paulo y Luisa están enfermos/enfermes por la gripe.

  7. Notan que Juan, Luisa, Martín y Sandra están atentos/atentes a las instrucciones.

  8. Consideran que José, Rita, Juan y Julia están cerrados/cerrades en su posición.

  9. Creen que Pablo, Juana, Raúl y María están nerviosos/nervioses por las elecciones.

  10. Ven que Pedro, Carmen, Mateo y Lucía están desnudos/desnudes en la playa.

  11. Ignoran que Marcos, Nadia, Néstor y Lola están molestos/molestes con la tarea.

  12. Opinan que Paulo, Ana, Martín y Silvia están bonitos/bonites en la imagen.

  13. Olvidan que Juan, María, Pablo y Sandra están metidos/metides en el crimen.

  14. Reportan que Néstor, Luisa, Raúl y Carmen están callados/callades en la clase.

  15. Entienden que Mateo, Rita, Luis y Nadia están abiertos/abiertes a la cooperación.

  16. Sienten que Martín, Juana, José y Rita están inquietos/inquietes por el futuro.

Appendix B: Sociolinguistic Questionnaire

Section A. Usage

  1. ¿Qué expresión es más probable que uses si estuvieras saludando a un grupo de personas de distintos géneros?

    What expression would you be most likely to use to greet a group of people of different genders?

    1. Hola a todos

    2. Hola a todas

    3. Hola a todos y todas

    4. Hola a todes

    5. Hola a todxs

    6. Hola a tod@s

    7. Hola a todas las personas

    8. Otra: ___________________

  2. Las Naciones Unidas define al lenguaje inclusivo como una manera de expresarse oralmente y por escrito sin referirse a un sexo, género social o identidad de género específicos. Se ha desarrollado una variedad de estrategias para el lenguaje inclusivo en la sociedad. ¿Qué estrategias para el lenguaje inclusivo escuchado/leído alguna vez? Marca todas las respuestas que te corresponden.

    The United Nations defines inclusive language as a “way of expressing oneself orally and in writing without discriminating against sex, social gender or gender identity”. A variety of strategies for inclusive language in society have been developed. What language strategies do you even know? Mark all the answers that apply to you.

    1. Usar el masculino y el femenino a la vez (todos y todas)

    2. -x (todxs)

    3. -e (todes)

    4. @ (tod@s)

    5. Otro: ______________

    6. No conozco ninguna de estas opciones.

  3. ¿Qué estrategia te parece mejor para el lenguaje inclusivo?

    What do you think is the best strategy for inclusive language?

    1. Usar el masculino y el femenino a la vez (todos y todas)

    2. -x (todxs)

    3. -e (todes)

    4. @ (tod@s)

    5. Otro: ______________

    6. No estoy a favor del lenguaje inclusivo.

  4. Si has escuchado/leído lenguaje inclusivo en tu vida por parte de otras personas, ¿En qué ámbitos lo has encontrado?

    If you have encountered the use of inclusive language, in what contexts have you encountered it?

    1. En contextos académicos

    in academic contexts
    1. Con amigos

    with friends
    1. En la familia

    with familia
    1. En el trabajo

    at work
    1. Otros contextos:_________________

    other contexts
    1. Nunca he escuchado/leído usos del lenguaje inclusivo

    • I have never encountered uses of inclusive language

  5. ¿En qué medios has escuchado/leído el lenguaje inclusivo? In which modes have you encountered inclusive language?

    1. En la escritura

    in writing
    1. En el habla

    in speech
    1. Nunca he escuchado/leído usos del lenguaje inclusivo

    • I have never encountered uses of inclusive language

  6. ¿Usas el lenguaje inclusivo en tu vida? (puede ser mucho o solo un poco)

    Do you use inclusive language in your life? (it can be a lot or just a little)

    yes
    1. No

    no

    If YES, participant will continue to question 7 of this section.

    If NO, participant will skip to section B.

  7. ¿Qué estrategias sueles usar para el lenguaje inclusivo? Marca todas las respuestas que te corresponden.

    What strategies do you usually use for inclusive language? Mark all the answers that apply to you.

    1. Usar el masculino y el femenino a la vez (todos y todas)

    2. -x (todxs)

    3. -e (todes)

    4. @ (tod@s)

    5. Otro: ______________

  8. ¿Qué estrategia usas con más frecuencia?

    Which strategy do you use most frequently?

    1. Usar el masculino y el femenino a la vez (todos y todas)

    2. -x (todxs)

    3. -e (todes)

    4. -@ (tod@s)

    5. Otro: ______________

  9. ¿Con qué frecuencia usas el lenguaje inclusivo?

    How often do you use inclusive language?

    1. Siempre que puedo

    whenever possible
    1. Con mucha frecuencia

    frequently
    1. A veces

    sometimes
    1. Con poca frecuencia

    rarely
    1. Nunca

    never

  10. ¿En qué ámbitos usas el lenguaje inclusivo? Marca todas las respuestas que te corresponden.

    In what environments do you use inclusive language? Mark all the answers that apply to you

    1. En contextos académicos

    in academic contexts
    1. Con amigos

    with friends
    1. En la familia

    with familia
    1. En el trabajo

    at work
    1. Otros contextos:_________________

    other contexts

  11. ¿Usas la -e (ej. todes) como forma de lenguaje inclusivo?

    Do you use the -e as a form of inclusive language?

    yes
    1. No

    no

    If YES, participant will continue to question 12 of this section.

    If NO, participant will skip to section B.

  12. ¿Con qué frecuencia escribes o hablas con la -e (ej. todes) del lenguaje inclusivo?

    How frequently do you use the -e as an inclusive language form?

    1. Siempre que puedo

    whenever possible
    1. Con mucha frecuencia

    frequently
    1. A veces

    sometimes
    1. Con poca frecuencia

    rarely
    1. Nunca

    never

  13. ¿Con qué frecuencia escuchas o lees la -e (ej. todes) del lenguaje inclusivo?

    How frequently do you use the -e as an inclusive language form?

    1. Siempre que puedo

    whenever possible
    1. Con mucha frecuencia

    frequently
    1. A veces

    sometimes
    1. Con poca frecuencia

    rarely
    1. Nunca

    never

  14. ¿En qué ámbitos usas la -e (ej. todes) del lenguaje inclusivo?

    In what contexts do you use the -e for inclusive language?

    1. En contextos académicos

    in academic contexts
    1. Con amigos

    with friends
    1. En la familia

    with familia
    1. En el trabajo

    at work
    1. Otros contextos: ____________

    other contexts

Section B. Beliefs Questionnaire

  1. Estoy a favor del lenguaje inclusivo.

    ‘I am in favor of inclusive language.’

  2. Con práctica, se puede aprender a usar el lenguaje inclusivo.

    ‘With practice, you can learn to use inclusive language.’

  3. No se necesita el lenguaje inclusivo porque el masculino género (ej. todos) ya incluye a todas las personas.

    ‘Inclusive language is not necessary, because the generic masculine already includes all people.’

  4. El uso de lenguaje inclusivo es gramaticalmente incorrecto.

    ‘The use of inclusive language is grammatically incorrect.’

  5. El uso de la -e (ej. todes) del lenguaje inclusivo es gramaticalmente incorrecto.

    ‘The use of -e for inclusive language is grammatically incorrect.’

  6. Es difícil comprender cuando las otras personas usan el lenguaje inclusivo.

    It is difficult to understand inclusive language when other people use it.

  7. Es difícil escribir/hablar usando el lenguaje inclusivo.

    ‘It is difficult to use inclusive language when speaking.’

  8. Siento que tardo más en leer cuando se usa una palabra con la -e del lenguaje inclusivo.

    ‘I feel that I take longer to read words that use the inclusive -e.’

Section C. Demographics

  1. ¿En qué año naciste?

    What year were you born?

  2. ¿Cuál es tu género?

    What is your gender?

  3. ¿En qué país hispanohablante has vivido la mayor parte de tu vida?

    Where were you born?

  4. ¿Hablas una lengua aparte del español? Si es que sí, indica la lengua y tu nivel.

    Do you speak a language other than Spanish? If so, indicate the language and your level.

  5. ¿Qué nivel de educación has alcanzado?

    What is the highest level of education you have reached?

  6. ¿A qué clase social dirías que perteneces?

    What socioeconomic group would you say you below to?

Appendix C: Participant demographic and inclusive language use tables

Table C1:

Gender breakdown of inclusive language users versus non-users.

Inclusive language use Male Female Trans feminine Gender fluid
Non-user 14 8 0 1
User 4 9 1 0
Table C2:

Inclusive language users’ reported frequency of use by gender.

Reported frequency of use Male Female Trans feminine Gender fluid
As much as possible 4 9 1 0
Frequently 1 0 0 0
Sometimes 5 1 0 0
Infrequently 3 0 1 0
Table C3:

Inclusive language users’ reported frequency of use by country.

Reported frequency of use Argentina Peru Chile Bolivia
As much as possible 2 0 0 1
Frequently 1 0 0 0
Sometimes 5 1 0 0
Infrequently 3 0 1 0

References

Alarcos Llorach, Emilio. 1994. Gramática de la lengua española. Madrid: Espasa.Search in Google Scholar

Anderson, Stephen R. 2015. Morphological change. In Claire Bowern & Bethwyn Evans (eds.), The Routledge handbook of historical linguistics, 264–285. Milton Park, Abingdon, UK: Routledge.Search in Google Scholar

Auer, Edward T. & Paul A. Luce. 2005. Probabilistic phonotactics in spoken word recognition. In David B. Pisoni & Robert E. Remez (eds.), The handbook of speech perception, 610–630. Oxford: OUP.10.1002/9780470757024.ch25Search in Google Scholar

Baker, Mark C. 2008. The syntax of agreement and concord. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511619830Search in Google Scholar

Barrera Linares, Luis. 2019. Relación género/sexo y masculino inclusivo plural en español. Literatura y lingüística 40. 327–354. https://doi.org/10.29344/0717621x.40.2070.Search in Google Scholar

Bates, Douglas. 2006. [R] lmer, p-values and all that. R-help mailing list. Available at: https://stat.ethz.ch/pipermail/r-help/2006-May/094765.html.Search in Google Scholar

Bates, Douglas, Martin Maechler, Ben Bolker & Steve Walker. 2015. Fitting linear mixed-effects models using lme4. Journal of Statistical Software 67(1). 1–48. https://doi.org/10.18637/jss.v067.i01.Search in Google Scholar

Bonnin, Juan E. & Alejandro A. Coronel. 2021. Attitudes toward gender-neutral Spanish: Acceptability and adoptability. Frontiers in Sociology 6. 1–10. https://doi.org/10.3389/fsoc.2021.629616.Search in Google Scholar

Burani, Cristina & Alessandro Laudanna. 1992. Units of representation for derived words in the lexicon. In Ram Frost & Leonard Katz (eds.), Orthography, phonology, morphology and meaning, 361–376. Amsterdam: Elsevier.10.1016/S0166-4115(08)62803-4Search in Google Scholar

Bybee, Joan. 2015. Language change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Search in Google Scholar

Cabello Pino, Manuel. 2020. Esbozo de una bibliografía crítica sobre–x-y–e-como alternativas al masculino genérico en español (2014–2019). Tonos Digital 39.Search in Google Scholar

Clahsen, Harald & Claudia Felser. 2006. Grammatical processing in language learners. Applied Psycholinguistics 27(1). 3–42. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0142716406060024.Search in Google Scholar

Clahsen, Harald & Claudia Felser. 2018. Some notes on the shallow structure hypothesis. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 40(3). 693–706. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0272263117000250.Search in Google Scholar

Cremades, Raúl & Ignacio Fernández-Portero. 2022. Actitudes del alumnado universitario ante el lenguaje inclusivo y su debate en los medios de comunicación. CÍRCULO de Linguística Aplicada a la Comunicación 89. 89–115.10.5209/clac.79503Search in Google Scholar

Fox, Jon & Sanford Weisberg. 2018. An R companion to applied regression. California: Sage Publications.10.32614/CRAN.package.carDataSearch in Google Scholar

Futrell, Richard, Edward Gibson, Harry J. Tily, Idan Blank, Anastasia Vishnevetsky, Steven T. Piantadosi & Evelina Fedorenko. 2021. The natural stories corpus: A reading-time corpus of English texts containing rare syntactic constructions. Language Resources and Evaluation 55. 63–77. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10579-020-09503-7.Search in Google Scholar

Giammatteo, Mabel. 2020. El género gramatical en español y la disputa por el género. Cuarenta naipes 2(3). 177–198.Search in Google Scholar

Guasch, Marc, Roger Boada, Pilar Ferré & Rosa Sánchez-Casas. 2013. NIM: A web-based Swiss army knife to select stimuli for psycholinguistic studies. Behavior Research Methods 45. 765–771. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13428-012-0296-8.Search in Google Scholar

Guidotti-Hernández, Nicole M. 2017. Affective communities and millennial desires: Latinx, or why my computer won’t recognize Latina/o. Cultural Dynamics 29(3). 141–159. https://doi.org/10.1177/0921374017727853.Search in Google Scholar

Gustafsson Sendén, Marie, Emma Renström & Lindqvist Anna. 2021. Pronouns beyond the binary: The change of attitudes and use over time. Gender & Society 35(4). 588–615. https://doi.org/10.1177/08912432211029226.Search in Google Scholar

Hawkins, Roger & Florencia Franceschina. 2004. Explaining the acquisition and non-acquisition of determiner-noun gender concord in French and Spanish. Language Acquisition and Language Disorders 32. 175–206.10.1075/lald.32.10hawSearch in Google Scholar

Hopp, Holger. 2010. Ultimate attainment in L2 inflection: Performance similarities between nonnative and native speakers. Lingua 120(4). 901–931. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lingua.2009.06.004.Search in Google Scholar

Jegerski, Jill. 2014. Self-paced reading. In Jill Jegerski & Bill VanPatten (eds.), Research methods in second language psycholinguistics, 20–49. New York: Routledge.10.4324/9780203123430Search in Google Scholar

Lenth, Russell V. 2023. emmeans: Estimated marginal means, aka least-squares means. R package version 1.8.9. Available at: https://CRAN.R-project.org/package=emmeans.Search in Google Scholar

Marchesini, Ismael D. 2019. La influencia del lenguaje inclusivo en la categorización de los géneros. Buenos Aires: Facultad de Psicología, Universidad de Buenos Aires dissertation.Search in Google Scholar

Martínez, Angelita. 2019. La cultura como motivadora de sintaxis. El lenguaje inclusivo. Cuadernos de la ALFAL 11(2). 186–198.Search in Google Scholar

Menegotto, Andrea. 2020. Español 2G y español 3G: propiedades morfosintácticas y semánticas del lenguaje inclusivo. Cuarenta naipes 2(3). 207–232.Search in Google Scholar

Morgan-Short, Kara & Janet G. van Hell (eds.). 2023. The Routledge handbook of second language acquisition and neurolinguistics. Milton Park, Abingdon, UK: Routledge.10.4324/9781003190912Search in Google Scholar

Nadal, Laura & Antonella Bove. 2024. Gender doublets as a mark of gender inclusive language: An experimental study on language processing. International Journal of Linguistics 16(1). 38–57. https://doi.org/10.5296/ijl.v16i1.21597.Search in Google Scholar

Papadopoulos, Ben. 2022. A brief history of gender-inclusive Spanish. DEP: Deportate, Esuli, Profughe 48(1). 41–48.Search in Google Scholar

Patev, Alison J., Chelsey E. Dunn, Cristina B. Hood & Jessica M. Barber. 2019. College students’ perceptions of gender-inclusive language use predict attitudes toward transgender and gender nonconforming individuals. Journal of Language and Social Psychology 38(3). 329–352. https://doi.org/10.1177/0261927x18815930.Search in Google Scholar

Peirce, Jonathan W. 2007. PsychoPy: Psychophysics software in Python. Journal of Neuroscience Methods 162. 8–13. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jneumeth.2006.11.017.Search in Google Scholar

Pesce, Agustina & Edgardo D. Etchezahar. 2019. Actitudes y uso del lenguaje inclusivo según el género y la edad. Búsqueda 6(23). https://doi.org/10.21892/01239813.472.Search in Google Scholar

Qualtrics. 2023. Qualtrics [Software]. Available at: https://www.qualtrics.com.Search in Google Scholar

Quinn, Alanna. 2018. Grammatical gender acquisition in L2 Spanish. Undergraduate Library Research Awards 1. Available at: https://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/ulra/awards/2018/1.Search in Google Scholar

R Core Team. 2023. R: A language and environment for statistical computing. Vienna: R Foundation for Statistical Computing. Available at: http://www.R-project.org/.Search in Google Scholar

Remigio, Maria Teresa & Arlene D. Talosa. 2021. Students’ general attitude in gender-inclusive language. International Journal of Evaluation and Research in Education 10(3). 864–870. https://doi.org/10.11591/ijere.v10i3.21573.Search in Google Scholar

Slemp, Katie. 2020. Latin@s or Latinxs? Innovation in Spanish gender inclusive oral expression. In Angelica Hernández & M. Emma Butterworth (eds.), Proceedings of the 2020 annual Conference of the Canadian Linguistic Association, 1–15. Ottawa, Ontario: Canadian Linguistic Association.Search in Google Scholar

Slemp, Katie. 2021. Attitudes towards varied inclusive language use in Spanish on Twitter. Working papers in Applied Linguistics and Linguistics at York 1. 60–74. https://doi.org/10.25071/2564-2855.6.Search in Google Scholar

Stetie, Noelia Ayelén, Camila Martínez Rebolledo & Gabriela Mariel Zunino. 2023. Diversidad de género y variación lingüística en el español de América: procesamiento de estereotipos y morfología de género en Argentina y Chile. Revista de Estudos da Linguagem 31(2).10.17851/2237-2083.31.2.636-687Search in Google Scholar

Stetie, Noelia Ayelén & Gabriela Mariel Zunino. 2022. Non-binary language in Spanish? Comprehension of non-binary morphological forms: A psycholinguistic study. Glossa: A Journal of General Linguistics 7(1). 1–38. https://doi.org/10.16995/glossa.6144.Search in Google Scholar

Stetie, Noelia Ayelén & Gabriela Mariel Zunino. 2024. Do gender stereotypes bias the processing of morphological innovations? The case of gender-inclusive language in Spanish. Psychology of Language and Communication 28(1). 446–469.10.58734/plc-2024-0016Search in Google Scholar

Vergoossen, Hellen P., Philip Pärnamets, Emma A. Renström & Marie Gustafsson Sendén. 2020. Are new gender-neutral pronouns difficult to process in reading? The case of hen in Swedish. Frontiers in Psychology 11. 574356. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.574356.Search in Google Scholar

Vitevitch, Michael S. & Paul A. Luce. 2004. A web-based interface to calculate phonotactic probability for words and nonwords in English. Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, & Computers 36(3). 481–487. https://doi.org/10.3758/bf03195594.Search in Google Scholar

Vitevitch, Michael S. & Paul A. Luce. 2005. Increases in phonotactic probability facilitate spoken nonword repetition. Journal of Memory and Language 52(2). 193–204. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2004.10.003. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0749596X04001196.Search in Google Scholar

White, Lydia. 2020. Linguistic theory, universal grammar, and second language acquisition. In Bill Van Patten & Jessica Williams (eds.), Theories in second language acquisition, 19–39. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers.10.4324/9780429503986-2Search in Google Scholar

Zarwanitzer, Ana & Carlos Gelormini-Lezama. 2023. Reading times of sentences with inclusive language in Spanish: A psycholinguistic study. Vertex 34(159). 40–46. https://doi.org/10.53680/vertex.v34i159.366.Search in Google Scholar

Zunino, Gabriela Mariel & Noelia Ayelén Stetie. 2022. Binary or non-binary? Gender morphology in Spanish: Differences dependent on the task. Alfa: Revista de Linguística 66. e14546.10.1590/1981-5794-e14546Search in Google Scholar

Published Online: 2025-09-03
Published in Print: 2025-09-25

© 2025 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

Downloaded on 11.10.2025 from https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/shll-2025-2013/html?recommended=sidebar
Scroll to top button