Cover not available
Part of
Cross-linguistic Transfer in Reading in Multilingual Contexts
Edited by Elena Zaretsky and Mila Schwartz
[Benjamins Current Topics 89] 2016
► pp. 145–170

The role of L1 and L2 reading on L1 preservation and positive cross-linguistic transfer among sequential bilinguals

| University of Massachusetts, Boston, USA

Previous research shows strong evidence of positive cross-linguistic transfer as a factor of L1 literacy. Moreover, research shows that L1 literacy supports the preservation of L1 language skills while learning L2, as oral and written languages are highly interdependent. Two theoretical frameworks can be instrumental in accounting for cross-linguistic transfer: The constructive analysis hypothesis suggests that the closer L1 and L2 are typologically, the more cross-linguistic transfer should be observed. The interdependence hypothesis postulates that bilingual transfer is also supported by L1 proficiency. These hypotheses were tested in oral language experiment, comparing typologically different languages (L1 Russian and L2 English) with different orthographic depth and language-specific characteristics. The study examines the use of morphosyntactic and lexical structures through story retelling in L1 and L2 by 13 Russian-English bilingual children (Mage = 8;2) who were readers in their L1 as well as in their L2. The results indicate a strong effect of L1 reading skills on children’s ability to use appropriate lexical and syntactic processes in their L1 and L2 narratives as well as on the reduction of L1 grammatical errors, one of the most sensitive aspects of Russian inflectional morphology. These results support the interdependence hypothesis of cross-linguistic transfer.

Keywords: bilingual transfer, language-specific structures, lexicon, literacy, morphosyntax
Published online: 3 October 2016
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/bct.89.07zar
References
Abu-Rabia, Salim
(2001) Testing the interdependence hypothesis among native adult bilingual Russian-English students. Journal of Psycholinguistic Research 30: 437–455. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Brysbaert, Mark & Wouter Duyck
(2010) Is it time to leave behind the revised hierarchical model of bilingual language processing after fifteen years of service? Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 13(3): 359–371. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cenoz, Jasone
(2001) The effect of linguistic distance, L2 status and age on cross-linguistic influence in third language acquisition. In Jasone Cenoz, Britta Hufeisen & Ulrike Jessner (eds.), Cross-linguistic influence in third language acquisition, 8–20. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.Google Scholar
(2003) The role of typology in the organization of the multilingual lexicon. In Jasone Cenoz, Britta Hufeisen & Ulrike Jessner (eds.), The multilingual lexicon, 103–116. Kluwer Academia Publishers. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chacón Beltràn, Ruben
(2006) Towards a typological classification of false friends (Spanish-English). RESLA 19: 29–39.Google Scholar
Cho, Jeung-Ryeul & Catherine McBride-Chang
(2005) Levels of phonological awareness in Korean and English: A 1-year longitudinal study. Journal of Educational Psychology 9: 564–571. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cummins, Jim
(2000) Language, power and pedagogy: Bilingual children in crossfire. Ontario, Canada: Matters.Google Scholar
(2004) Review of Oller & Eilers’ language and literacy in bilingual children. Journal of Child Language 31(2): 424–429. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2001) Empowering minority students: A framework for intervention. Harvard Educational Review 71(4): 656–675. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cunningham, Anne E., Kathryn E. Perry & Keith E. Stanovich
(2001) Converging evidence for the concept of orthographic processing. Reading and Writing 14: 549–568. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Deacon, S. Helene, Lesly Wade-Woolley & John Kirby
(2009) Flexibility in young second-language learners: Examining the language specificity of orthographic processing. Journal of Research in Reading 32(2): 215–229. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Dijkstra, Ton, Mark Timmermans & Herbert Schriefers
(2000) On being blinded by your other language: Effects of task demands on interlingual homograph recognition. Journal of Memory and Language 42: 445–464. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Durgunoğlu, Aydin Y
(2002) Cross-linguistic transfer in literacy development and implications for language learners. Annals of Dyslexia 52: 189–204. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Durgunoğlu, Aydin Y., Montserrat Mir & Sofia Ariño-Martin
(2002) The relationship between bilingual children’s reading and writing in their two languages. In Sarah Ransdell & Marie-Laure Barbier (eds.), Psycholinguistic approaches to understanding second-language writing, 81–100. Dordrecht: Kluwer.Google Scholar
Durgunoğlu, Aydin Y., William E. Nagy & Barbara J. Hancin-Bhatt
(1993) Cross-language transfer of phonological awareness. Journal of Educational Psychology 85: 453–465. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Geva, Esther & Linda Siegel
(2000) Orthographic and cognitive factors in the concurrent development of basic reading skills in two languages. Reading and Writing 12(1–2): 1–30. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Isurin, Ludmila
(2005) Cross linguistic transfer in word order: Evidence from L1 forgetting and L2 acquisition. In James Cohen, Kara T. McAlister, Kellie Rolstad & Jeff MacSwan (eds.), Proceedings of the 4th International Symposium on Bilingualism, 1115–1130. Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.
Jia, Gisela & Doris Aaronson
(2003) A longitudinal study of Chinese children and adolescents learning English in the United States. Applied Psycholinguistics 24: 131–161. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Jia, Gisela, Doris Aaronson & Yanhong Wu
(2002) Long-term attainment of bilingual immigrants: Predictive factors and language group differences. Applied Psycholinguistics 23: 599–622. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kaushanskaya, Margarita & Viorica Marian
(2007) Bilingual language processing and interference in bilinguals: Evidence from eye tracking and picture naming. Language and Learning 57(1): 119–163. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2009) Bilingualism reduces native-language interference during novel-word learning. Journal of Experimental Psychology 35(3): 829–835.Google Scholar
Kerek, Eugenia & Pekka Niemi
(2009) Russian orthography and learning to read. Reading in a Foreign Language 21(1): 1–21.Google Scholar
Kohnert, Kathryn J., Elizabeth Bates & Arturo E. Hernandez
(1999) Balancing bilinguals: Lexical-semantic production and cognitive processing in children learning Spanish and English. Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research 42: 1400–1413. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Köpke, Barbara
(2007) Language attrition at the crossroads of brain, mind, and society. In Barbara Köpke, Monica Schmid, Merel Keijzer & Susan Dostert (eds.), Language attrition: Theoretical perspectives, 9–39. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kroll, Judith F. & Erika Stewart
(1994) Category interference in translation and picture naming: Evidence for asymmetric connections between bilingual memory representations. Journal of Memory and Language 33: 149–174. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lado, Robert
(1964) Language teaching: A scientific approach. New York: McGraw Hill.Google Scholar
Lardiere, Donna
(2009) Some thoughts on the contrastive analysis of features in second language acquisition. Second Language Research 25(2): 173–227. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Leikin, Mark, Mila Schwartz & David Share
(2010) General and specific benefits of bi-literate bilingualism: A Russian-Hebrew study of beginning literacy. Reading and Writing 23(3–4): 269–292. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lesaux, Nonie K., Esther Geva, Keiko Koda, Linda S. Siegel & Timothy Shanahan
(2008) Development of literacy in second-language learners. In Diane August & Timothy Shanahan (eds.), Developing reading and writing in second-language learners: Lessons from the report of the national literacy panel on language-minority children and youth, 27–60. New York, NY: Routledge.Google Scholar
McElree, Brian, Gisela Jia & Annie Litvak
(2000) The time course of conceptual processing in three bilingual populations. Journal of Memory and Language 42: 229–254. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Melby-Lervåg, Monica & Ame Lervåg
(2011) Cross-linguistic transfer of oral language, decoding, phonological awareness and reading comprehension: A meta-analysis of the correlational evidence. Journal of Research in Reading 34(1): 114–135. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Odlin, Terence
(1989) Language transfer: Cross-linguistic influence in language learning. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Polinsky, Maria
(2006) Acquisition of Russian: Uninterrupted and incomplete scenarios. 1–64. Glossos. The Slavic and East European Language Research Center. Retrieved from [URL]Google Scholar
Proctor, C. Patrick, Diane August, Maria S. Carlo & Catherine Snow
(2006) The intriguing role of Spanish language vocabulary knowledge in predicting English reading comprehension. Journal of Educational Psychology 98(1): 159–169. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sparks, Richard, Jon Patton, Leonore Granschow & Nancy Humbach
(2009) Long-term crosslinguistic transfer of skills from L1 to L2. Language Learning 59(1): 203–243. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Tunmer, William E. & James W. Chapman
(2001) The relation of metalinguistic abilities, phonological recoding skill and the use of sentence context to beginning reading development: A longitudinal study. Paper presented at the NATO Advanced Study Institute, II Cicco, Italy.Google Scholar
Yeni-Komshian, Grace H., James E. Flege & Serena Liu
(2000) Pronunciation proficiency in the first and second languages of Korean-English bilinguals. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 3: 131–149. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zaretsky, Elena & Eva Bar-Shalom
(2010) Does reading in shallow L1 orthography slow attrition of language-specific morphological structures? Clinical Linguistics & Phonetics 24(4–5): 401–415. DOI logoGoogle Scholar