From pitch to word : perception and learning of novel words with lexical tone and lexical stress in Cantonese-English bilingual children

Abstract

Word learning may not be as simple as it is seemed to be. It has been shown that word learning involving at least three dynamic cognitive processes: triggering, configuration and engagement. The three cognitive processes refer to different stages of learning. However, previous fast mapping and word learning studies mainly used picture naming and picture matching tasks as measures of learning performance, without considering any measures to differentiate learning into triggering, configuration and engagement. The current study aimed at investigating the three cognitive processes underlying word learning in both Cantonese and English in three groups of Cantonese-English bilingual preschoolers with different language dominance: Bilingual Cantonese Dominant, Balanced Bilingual and Bilingual English Dominant. The relationships between word learning and lexical pitch sensitivity were also examined. Our findings suggest that the three cognitive processes operate under different mechanisms and that within- and cross-language relationships are shown differentially in different cognitive processes. Based on the results from the current study, we propose a new theoretical bilingual word learning model.