Cover not available
Part of
Cross-language Influences in Bilingual Processing and Second Language Acquisition
Edited by Irina Elgort, Anna Siyanova-Chanturia and Marc Brysbaert
[Bilingual Processing and Acquisition 16] 2023
► pp. 18–46

Chapter 2
Cross-language influences in the perception and production of L2 phonetics and phonology in young bilinguals

| University of Geneva

This chapter provides an overview of findings on cross-language influence in the phonetic and phonological domain in children exposed to two (or more) languages in early childhood. The chapter first summarizes theoretical models which have been used to account for cross-linguistic interaction. It then examines findings on speech perception and production. It reviews the acquisition of phonetic and prosodic contrasts, differentiation of acoustic features such as Voice Onset Time and rhythm, and development of syllable structure and segments. Finally, it addresses important themes in early bilingualism such as quantitative and qualitative aspects of language input, the influence of the lexicon, and differences between simultaneous and early sequential bilinguals.

Keywords: crosslinguistic interaction, early bilingualism, phonetic and phonological development, speech perception, speech production
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • 1.Models of cross-language influence in young bilinguals
  • 2.Speech perception and production in young bilinguals
    • 2.1Cross-language influence
    • 2.2Studies of cross-language influence in speech perception
      • 2.2.1Language discrimination and the rhythm typology
      • 2.2.2Speech discrimination: Contrasts that exist in one language
      • 2.2.3Speech discrimination: Contrasts that exist in both languages
      • 2.2.4Word learning: Contrasts that exist in both languages
      • 2.2.5Word learning: Contrasts that exist in one language
      • 2.2.6Conclusion: Cross-language influence in speech perception
    • 2.3Studies of cross-language influence in speech production
      • 2.3.1Methodological limitations
      • 2.3.2Voice Onset Time (VOT)
      • 2.3.3Rhythm
      • 2.3.4Syllable structure
      • 2.3.5Segmental acquisition
      • 2.3.6Conclusion: Cross-language influence in speech production
  • 3.Themes related to cross-language influence in young bilinguals
    • 3.1Language experience: Quantitative aspects
    • 3.2Language experience: Qualitative aspects
    • 3.3The developing lexicon
    • 3.4Simultaneous versus early sequential bilingualism
  • Conclusion
  • References
Published online: 1 May 2023
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/bpa.16.02keh
References (93)
Albareda-Castellot, B., Pons, F., & Sebastián-Gallés, N.
(2011) The acquisition of phonetic categories in bilingual infants: New data from an anticipatory eye movement paradigm. Developmental Science, 14, 395–401. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Almeida, L., Rose, Y., & Freitas, J.
(2012) Prosodic influence in bilingual phonological development: Evidence from a Portuguese-French first language learner. In A. Biller, E. Chung, & A. Kimball (Eds.), BUCLD 36: Proceedings of the 36th annual Boston University Conference on Language Development (pp. 42–52). Cascadilla Press.Google Scholar
Barlow, J., Branson, P., & Nip, I.
(2013) Phonetic equivalence in the acquisition of /l/ by Spanish–English bilingual children. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 16, 68–85. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bosch, L., & Sebastián-Gallés, N.
(1997) Native-language recognition abilities in 4-month-old infants from monolingual and bilingual environments. Cognition, 65, 33–69. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bosch, L., & Sebastián-Gallés
(2001) Evidence of early language discrimination abilities in infants from bilingual environments. Infancy, 2, 29–49. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bosch, L., & Sebastián-Gallés, N.
(2003a) Language experience and the perception of a voicing contrast in fricatives: Infant and adult data. In M. J. Solé, D. Recasens, & J. Romero (Eds.), International Congress of Phonetic Sciences (pp. 1987–1990), Barcelona.Google Scholar
(2003b) Simultaneous bilingualism and the perception of a language-specific vowel contrast in the first year of life. Language and Speech, 46, 217–243. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bullock, B., & Olson, D.
(2017) The sociophonetics of Spanish-English contact in the United States. In M. Yavaş, M. Kehoe, & W. Cardoso (Eds.), Romance-Germanic bilingual phonology (pp. 263–282). Equinox.Google Scholar
Bunta, F., & Ingram, D.
(2007) The acquisition of speech rhythm by bilingual Spanish- and English-speaking 4- and 5-year-old children. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 50, 999–1014. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Burnham, D., Singh, L., Mattock, K., Woo, P., & Kalashnikova, M.
(2018) Constraints on tone sensitivity in novel word learning by monolingual and bilingual infants: Tone properties are more influential than tone familiarity. Frontiers in Psychology, 8, 2190. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Burns, T. C., Yoshida, K. A., Hill, K., & Werker, J. F.
(2007) Bilingual and monolingual infant phonetic development. Applied Psycholinguistics, 28(3), 455–474. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Byers-Heinlein, K., Burns, T. C., & Werker, J. F.
(2010) The roots of bilingualism in newborns. Psychological Science, 21(3), 343–348. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Core, C., & Scarpelli, C.
(2015) Phonological development in young bilinguals: Clinical implications. Seminars in Speech and Language, 36, 100–108. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Curtin, S., Byers-Heinlein, K., & Werker, J.
(2011) Bilingual beginnings as a lens for theory development: PRIMIR in focus. Journal of Phonetics, 39, 492–504. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fabiano, L., & Goldstein, B.
(2005) Phonological cross-linguistic effects in bilingual Spanish-English children. Journal of Multilingual Communication Disorders, 3, 56–63. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fabiano-Smith, L., & Barlow, J.
(2010) Interaction in bilingual phonological acquisition: Evidence from phonetic inventories. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 13, 1–17. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fabiano-Smith, L., & Bunta, F.
(2012) Voice onset time of voiceless bilabial and velar stops in 3-year-old bilingual children and their age-matched monolingual peers. Clinical Linguistics & Phonetics, 26, 148–163. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fabiano-Smith, L., & Goldstein, B.
(2010) Phonological acquisition in bilingual Spanish-English speaking children. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 53, 1–19. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fennell, C., Byers-Heinlein, K., & Werker, J.
(2007) Using speech sounds to guide word learning: The case of bilingual infants. Child Development, 78, 1510–1525. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fennell, C., & Werker, J.
(2003) Early word learners’ ability to access phonetic detail in well-known words. Language & Speech, 46, 245–264. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Flege, J.
(1987) A critical period for learning to pronounce foreign languages? Applied Linguistics, 8, 162–177. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(1995) Second-language speech learning: Theory, findings, and problems. In W. Strange (Ed.), Speech perception and linguistic experience: Issues in cross-language research (pp. 233–273). York Press.Google Scholar
Flege, J. E., & Bohn, O. S.
(2021) The revised speech learning model (SLM-r). In R. Wayland (Ed.) Second language speech learning: Theoretical and empirical progress, (pp. 3–83), Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Garcia-Sierra, A., Rivera-Gaxiola, M., Percaccia, C., Conboy, B., Romo, H., Klarman, L., Ortiz, S., & Kuhl, P.
(2011) Bilingual language learning: An ERP study relating early brain responses to speech, language input, and later word production. Journal of Phonetics, 39, 546–557. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gildersleeve-Neumann, C., Kester, E., Davis, B., & Peña, E.
(2008) English speech sound development in preschool-aged children from bilingual English-Spanish environments. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 39, 314–328. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gildersleeve-Neumann, C., & Wright, K.
(2010) English speech acquisition in 3- to 5-year-old children learning Russian and English. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 41, 429–444. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Goldstein, B., Bunta, F., Lange, J., Rodriguez, J., & Burrows, L.
(2010) The effects of measures of language experience and language ability on segmental accuracy in bilingual children. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 19, 238–247. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Goldstein, B., Fabiano, L., & Washington, P.
(2005) Phonological skills in predominantly English-speaking, predominantly Spanish-speaking, and Spanish-English bilingual children. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 36, 201–218. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Goldstein, B., & Washington, P.
(2001) An initial investigation of phonological patterns in typically developing 4-year-old Spanish English bilingual children. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 32, 153–164. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Grabe, E., Post, B., & Watson, I.
(1999) The acquisition of rhythm in English and French. Proceedings of the Intonational Congress of Phonetic Sciences, 2, 1201–1204.Google Scholar
Hambly, H., Wren, Y., McLeod, S., & Roulstone, S.
(2013) The influence of bilingualism on speech production: A systematic review. International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders, 48, 1–24. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Havy, M., Bouchon, C., & Nazzi, T.
(2016) Phonetic processing when learning words: The case of bilingual infants. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 40, 41–52. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hoff, E., Core, C., Place, S., Rumiche, R., Señor, M., & Parra, M.
(2012) Dual language exposure and early bilingual development. Journal of Child Language, 39, 1–27. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Höhle, B., Bijeljac-Babic, R., & Nazzi, T.
(2020) Variability and stability in early language acquisition: Comparing monolingual and bilingual infants’ speech perception and word recognition. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 23, 56–71. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Johnson, C., & Wilson, I.
(2002) Phonetic evidence for early language differentiation: Research issues and some preliminary data. International Journal of Bilingualism, 6, 271–289. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kartushina, N., & Frauenfelder, U.
(2014) On the effects of L2 perception and of individual differences in L1 production on L2 pronunciation. Frontiers in Psychology, 5, Article 1246. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Keffala, B., Barlow, J., & Rose, S.
(2018) Interaction in Spanish-English bilingual’s acquisition of syllable structure. International Journal of Bilingualism, 22, 16–37. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Keffala, B., Scarpino, S., Hammer, C., Rodriguez, B., Lopez, L., & Goldstein, B.
(2020) Vocabulary and phonological abilities affect dual language learners’ consonant production accuracy within and across languages: A large-scale study of 3- to 6-year-old Spanish–English dual language learners. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 29, 1196–1211. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kehoe, M.
(2015) Cross-linguistic interaction: A retrospective and prospective view. In E. Babatsouli & D. Ingram (Eds.), Proceedings of the International Symposium on Monolingual and Bilingual Speech 2015 (pp. 141–167). Retrieved on 26 July 2022 from [URL]
(2018) The development of rhotics. A comparison of monolingual and bilingual children. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 21, 710–731. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kehoe, M., Friend, M., & Poulin-Dubois, D.
(2021) Relations between phonological production, grammar and the lexicon in bilingual French-English children. International Journal of Bilingualism, 25, 1576–1596. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kehoe, M., & Girardier, C.
(2020) What factors influence phonological production in French-speaking bilingual children, aged three to six years? Journal of Child Language, 47, 945–981. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kehoe, M., & Havy, M.
(2019) Bilingual phonological acquisition: The influence of language-internal, language-external and lexical factors. Journal of Child Language, 46, 292–333. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kehoe, M., & Kannathasan, K.
(2021) Development of voice onset time in monolingual and bilingual French-speaking children. Lingua, 252, 102937. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kehoe, M., Lleó, C., & Rakow, M.
(2004) Voice onset time in bilingual German-Spanish children. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 7, 71–88. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2011) Speech rhythm in the pronunciation of German and Spanish monolingual and German-Spanish bilingual 3-year-olds. Linguistische Berichte, 227, 323–351.Google Scholar
Keshavarz, M., & Ingram, D.
(2002) The early phonological development of a Farsi- English bilingual child. The International Journal of Bilingualism, 6, 255–269. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kupisch, T., Barton, D., Lein, T., Schröder, J., Stangen, I., & Stöhr, A.
(2014) Acquisition outcomes across domain in adult heritage speakers of French. Journal of French Language Studies, 24, 347–376. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Law, N., & So, L.
(2006) The relationship of phonological development and language dominance in bilingual Cantonese-Putonghua children. International Journal of Bilingualism, 10, 405–428. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lleó, C.
(2015) On the permeability of German-Spanish bilinguals’ phonological grammars. In E. Babatsouli & D. Ingram (eds.), Proceedings of the International Symposium on Monolingual and Bilingual Speech 2015 (pp. 196–206). Retrieved on 26 July 2022 from [URL]
Lleó, C., & Cortés, S.
(2013) Modeling the outcome of language contact in the speech of German-Spanish and Catalan-Spanish bilingual children. International Journal of the Sociology of Language, 221, 101–125. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lleó, C., Kuchenbrandt, I., Kehoe, M., & Trujillo, C.
(2003) Syllable final consonants in Spanish and German monolingual and bilingual acquisition. In N. Müller (Ed.), (Non)vulnerable domains in bilingualism (pp. 191–220). John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mack, M.
(1990) Phonetic transfer in a French-English bilingual child. In P. Nelde (Ed.), Language attitudes and language conflict (pp. 107–124). Dümmler.Google Scholar
Macken, M. A., & Barton, D.
(1980a) The acquisition of the voicing contrast in English: A study of voice onset time in world-initial stop consonants. Journal of Child Language, 7, 41–74. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(1980b) The acquisition of the voicing contrast in Spanish: A phonetic and phonological study of word-initial stop consonants. Journal of Child Language, 7, 433–458. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mattock, K., Polka, L., Rvachew, S., & Krehm, M.
(2010) The first steps in word learning are easier when the shoes fit: Comparing monolingual and bilingual infants. Developmental Science, 13, 229–243. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mayr, R., Howells, G., & Lewis, R.
(2015) Asymmetries in phonological development: the case of word-final cluster acquisition in Welsh-English bilingual children. Journal of Child Language, 42, 146–179. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mayr, R., & Montanari, S.
(2015) Cross-linguistic interaction in trilingual phonological development: The role of the input in the acquisition of the voicing contrast. Journal of Child Language, 42, 1006–1035. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mayr, R., & Siddika, A.
(2018) Inter-generational transmission in a minority language setting: Stop consonant production by Bangladeshi heritage children and adults. International Journal of Bilingualism, 22, 255–284. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
McCarthy, K., Mahon, M., Rosen, S., & Evans, B.
(2014) Speech perception and production by sequential bilingual children: A longitudinal study of Voice Onset Time acquisition. Child Development, 85, 1965–1980. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mehler, J., Jusczyk, P., Lambertz, G., Halsted, N., Bertoncini, J., & Amiel-Tison, C.
(1988) A precursor of language acquisition in young infants. Cognition, 29, 143–178. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Meinhold, G., & Stock, E.
(1980) Phonologie der deutschen Gegenwartssprache. Bibliographisches Institut Leipzig.Google Scholar
Menke, M.
(2018) Development of Spanish rhotics in Spanish-English bilingual children in the United States. Journal of Child Language, 45, 788–806. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mok, P.
(2011) The acquisition of rhythm by three-year-old bilingual and monolingual children. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 14, 458–472. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2013) Speech rhythm of monolingual and bilingual children at age 2;6: Cantonese amd English. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 16, 693–703. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Morrow, A., Goldstein, B., Gilhool, A., & Paradis, J.
(2014) Phonological skills in English language learners. Language, Speech and Hearing Services in Schools, 45, 26–39. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Paradis, J., & Genesee, F.
(1996) Syntactic acquisition in bilingual children: Autonomous or interdependent? Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 18, 1–25. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Payne, E., Post, B. Astruc, A., Prieto, P., & Vanrell, M.
(2012) Measuring child rhythm. Language and Speech, 55, 203–229. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Persici, V., Vihman, M. M., Burro, R., & Majorano, M.
(2019) Lexical access and competition in bilingual children: The role of proficiency and the lexical similarity of the two languages. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 179, 103–125. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Poarch, G. J., & van Hell, J. G.
(2012) Cross-language activation in children’s speech production. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 111, 419–438. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ramon-Casas, M., Fennell, C., & Bosch, L.
(2017) Minimal-pair word learning by bilingual toddlers: The Catalan /e/-/ϵ/ contrast revisited. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 20, 649–656. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ramon-Casas, M., Swingley, D., Sebastián-Gallés, N., & Bosch, L.
(2009) Vowel categorization during word recognition in bilingual toddlers. Cognitive Psychology, 59, 96–121. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ramus, F., Nespor, M., & Mehler, J.
(1999) Correlates of linguistic rhythm in the speech signal. Cognition, 73, 265–292. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Rivera-Gaxiola, M., Silva-Pereyra, J., & Kuhl, P.
(2005) Brain potentials to native and non-native speech contrasts in 7- and 11-month-old American infants. Developmental Science, 8, 162–172. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ruiz-Felter, R., Cooperson, S., Bedore, L., & Peña, E.
(2016) Influence of current input-output and age of first exposure on phonological acquisition in early bilingual Spanish-English-speaking kindergarteners, International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders, 51, 36–383. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Schmidt, E., & Post, B.
(2015) Language interaction in the development of speech rhythm in simultaneous bilinguals. In E. Delais-Roussarie, M. Avanzi, & S. Herment (Eds.), Prosody and language in contact (pp. 271–291). Springer. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Schnitzer, M., & Krasinski, E.
(1994) The development of segmental phonological production in a bilingual child. Journal of Child Language, 21, 585–622. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(1996) The development of segmental phonological production in a bilingual child: A contrasting second case. Journal of Child Language, 23, 547–571. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sebastián-Gallés, N., & Bosch, L.
(2009) Developmental shift in the discrimination of vowel contrasts in bilingual infants: Is the distributional account all there is to it? Developmental Science, 12, 874–887. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sim, J., & Post, B.
(2022) Variation in quality of maternal input and development of coda stops in English-speaking children in Singapore. Journal of Child Language, 49, 1147–1172. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Singh, L., Fu, C., Seet, X., Tong, A., Wang, J., & Best, C.
(2018) Developmental change in tone perception in Mandarin monolingual, English monolingual, and Mandarin–English bilingual infants: Divergences between monolingual and bilingual learners. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 173, 59–77. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Singh L., Poh, F., & Fu C.
(2016) Limits on monolingualism? A comparison of monolingual and bilingual infants’ abilities to integrate lexical tone in novel word learning. Frontiers in Psychology, 7, 992.Google Scholar
Stoehr, A., Benders, T. van Hell, J., & Fikkert, P.
(2018) Heritage language exposure impacts voice onset time of Dutch–German simultaneous bilingual preschoolers. Bilingualism: Language & Cognition, 21(3), 598–617. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Stoehr, A., Benders, T., van Hell, J., & Fikkert, P.
(2019) Bilingual preschoolers’ speech is associated with non-native maternal language input. Language Learning and Development, 15, 75–100. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sundara, M., & Scutellaro, A.
(2011) Rhythmic distance between language affects the development of speech perception in bilingual infants. Journal of Phonetics, 39, 505–513. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Tamburelli, M., Sanoudaki, E., Jones, G., & Sowinska, M.
(2015) Acceleration in the bilingual acquisition of phonological structure: Evidence from Polish-English children. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 18, 713–725. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Unsworth, S.
(2016) Quantity and quality of language input in bilingual language development. In E. Nicoladis & S. Montanari (Eds.), Lifespan perspectives on bilingualism (pp. 136–196). Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Vihman, M. M.
(2002) Getting started without a system: From phonetics to phonology in bilingual development. International Journal of Bilingualism, 6, 239–254. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2016) Prosodic structures and templates in bilingual phonological development. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 19, 69–88. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Werker, J., & Curtin, S.
(2005) PRIMIR: A developmental framework of infant speech processing. Language Learning and Development, 1, 197–234. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Werker, J., Fennell, C., Corcoran, K., & Stager, C.
(2002) Infants’ ability to learn phonetically similar words: Effects of age and vocabulary. Infancy, 3, 1–30. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Yang, J., & Fox, R.
(2017) L1–L2 interactions of vowel systems in young bilingual Mandarin-English children. Journal of Phonetics, 65, 60–76. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Yang, J., Fox, R., & Jacewicz, E.
(2015) Vowel development in an emergent Mandarin-English bilingual child: a longitudinal study. Journal of Child Language, 42, 1125–1143. DOI logoGoogle Scholar