Input matters: speed of word recognition in 2-year-olds exposed to multiple accents

Although studies investigating language abilities in young children exposed to more than one language have become common, there is still surprisingly little research examining language development in children exposed to more than one accent. Here, we report two looking-while-listening experiments ex...

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Main Authors: Buckler, Helen, Oczak-Arsik, Sara, Siddiqui, Nazia, Johnson, Elizabeth K.
Format: Article
Published: Elsevier 2017
Subjects:
Online Access:https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/45300/
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author Buckler, Helen
Oczak-Arsik, Sara
Siddiqui, Nazia
Johnson, Elizabeth K.
author_facet Buckler, Helen
Oczak-Arsik, Sara
Siddiqui, Nazia
Johnson, Elizabeth K.
author_sort Buckler, Helen
building Nottingham Research Data Repository
collection Online Access
description Although studies investigating language abilities in young children exposed to more than one language have become common, there is still surprisingly little research examining language development in children exposed to more than one accent. Here, we report two looking-while-listening experiments examining the impact of routine home exposure to multiple accents on 2-year-olds’ word recognition abilities. In Experiment 1, we found that monolingual English-learning 24-month-olds who routinely receive exposure to both Canadian English and a non-native variant of English are less efficient in their recognition of familiar words spoken in Canadian English than monolingual English-learning 24-month-olds who hear only Canadian English at home. In Experiment 2, we found that by 34 months of age all children recognize words equally quickly regardless of their accent exposure at home. We conclude that monolingual toddlers in some locations may form a less homogeneous population than past work has assumed, a factor that should be considered when drawing generalizations about language development across different populations.
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spelling nottingham-453002020-05-04T18:58:56Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/45300/ Input matters: speed of word recognition in 2-year-olds exposed to multiple accents Buckler, Helen Oczak-Arsik, Sara Siddiqui, Nazia Johnson, Elizabeth K. Although studies investigating language abilities in young children exposed to more than one language have become common, there is still surprisingly little research examining language development in children exposed to more than one accent. Here, we report two looking-while-listening experiments examining the impact of routine home exposure to multiple accents on 2-year-olds’ word recognition abilities. In Experiment 1, we found that monolingual English-learning 24-month-olds who routinely receive exposure to both Canadian English and a non-native variant of English are less efficient in their recognition of familiar words spoken in Canadian English than monolingual English-learning 24-month-olds who hear only Canadian English at home. In Experiment 2, we found that by 34 months of age all children recognize words equally quickly regardless of their accent exposure at home. We conclude that monolingual toddlers in some locations may form a less homogeneous population than past work has assumed, a factor that should be considered when drawing generalizations about language development across different populations. Elsevier 2017-08-04 Article PeerReviewed Buckler, Helen, Oczak-Arsik, Sara, Siddiqui, Nazia and Johnson, Elizabeth K. (2017) Input matters: speed of word recognition in 2-year-olds exposed to multiple accents. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 164 . pp. 87-100. ISSN 1096-0457 Word recognition Speech perception Language acquisition Accents Multicultural Multilingual http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022096517304344 doi:10.1016/j.jecp.2017.06.017 doi:10.1016/j.jecp.2017.06.017
spellingShingle Word recognition
Speech perception
Language acquisition Accents
Multicultural
Multilingual
Buckler, Helen
Oczak-Arsik, Sara
Siddiqui, Nazia
Johnson, Elizabeth K.
Input matters: speed of word recognition in 2-year-olds exposed to multiple accents
title Input matters: speed of word recognition in 2-year-olds exposed to multiple accents
title_full Input matters: speed of word recognition in 2-year-olds exposed to multiple accents
title_fullStr Input matters: speed of word recognition in 2-year-olds exposed to multiple accents
title_full_unstemmed Input matters: speed of word recognition in 2-year-olds exposed to multiple accents
title_short Input matters: speed of word recognition in 2-year-olds exposed to multiple accents
title_sort input matters: speed of word recognition in 2-year-olds exposed to multiple accents
topic Word recognition
Speech perception
Language acquisition Accents
Multicultural
Multilingual
url https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/45300/
https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/45300/
https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/45300/