This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Citation Map Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Mondt, K. Articles by Denolin, V. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

An fMRI study of level of proficiency as a predictor of neurocognitive convergence for L1/L2 during a lexicosemantic task in a paediatric population

Vrije Universiteit Brussel, kamondt{at}vub.ac.be

Danielle Balériaux

Université Libre de Bruxelles-Hôpital Erasme

Thierry Metens

Université Libre de Bruxelles-Hôpital Erasme

Philippe Paquier

Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Université Libre de Bruxelles-Hôpital Erasme and Universiteit Antwerpen

Piet Van de Craen

Vrije Universiteit Brussel

Maurits Van den Noort

Vrije Universiteit Brussel

Vincent Denolin

Université Libre de Bruxelles-Hôpital Erasme

Studies on bilingualism from a neurocognitive perspective have begun to attract considerable interest recently. Contextual variables — such as age of acquisition, level of proficiency and frequency of use — have been identified as significantly impacting on the convergence or divergence of representations in first language (L1) and second (L2) language acquisition. The neurocognitive effect of bilingualism in paediatric populations, nevertheless, has not been widely investigated. Results from recent bilingual neuroimaging studies of word processing are discussed and compared to results obtained from a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study of bilingual primary school children executing a productive lexicosemantic task. Previous studies indicate `level of proficiency' as a determinant of convergence of L1/L2 patterns during lexicosemantic tasks. Our results suggest that level of proficiency may be an inadequate predictor of convergence at least in paediatric populations, and demonstrate early influence of sequential bilingualism on the mother tongue as well.

Key Words: bilingualism • paediatric bilingual populations • fMRI in SLA • convergence hypothesis • effects of L2 proficiency • verb generation in bilinguals

Second Language Research, Vol. 25, No. 1, 107-134 (2009)
DOI: 10.1177/0267658308098998


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?