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Article published In:
Journal of Second Language Studies
Vol. 1:1 (2018) ► pp.199–230

Associative networks from L2 words in early and late Vietnamese-English bilinguals

| University of Texas at Arlington
| University of Texas at Arlington

This study investigates whether highly-proficient Vietnamese-English bilinguals can activate associations in a native-like way from studying L2 words, whether these L2 associations interact with L1 words, and whether this depends on when they started learning L2 English. The results suggest that early bilinguals have native-like L2 English associative networks and these networks are interconnected with L1 Vietnamese words. Late bilinguals, in contrast, seem to indicate that their L2 English associative networks might be activated less automatically, and they are not so strongly connected with L1 words. This pattern of results are discussed in terms of how age of L2 exposure might affect the development of L2 associative networks.

Keywords: masked priming, DRM lists, speeded old-new task, early and late bilinguals
Article outline
  • Experiment 1 – L2 primes
    • Experiment 1a
      • Methods
        • Participants
        • Materials and design
        • Procedure
      • Results
      • Discussion
    • Experiment 1b
      • Methods
        • Participants
        • Materials and design
        • Procedure
      • Results
      • Discussion
  • Experiment 2 – L1 primes
    • Methods
      • Participants
      • Materials and design
      • Procedure
    • Results
    • Discussion
  • General discussion
  • Acknowledgements
  • References


This article is currently available as a sample article.

Published online: 7 May 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/jsls.17020.huy
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