Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gxg78 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T12:45:16.508Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Bilingual parents' modeling of pragmatic language use in multiparty interactions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 April 2011

MEDHA TARE  and
SUSAN A. GELMAN
MEDHA TARE*
Affiliation:
University of Virginia
SUSAN A. GELMAN
Affiliation:
University of Michigan
*
ADDRESS FOR CORRESPONDENCE Medha Tare, Department of Psychology, University of Virginia, P.O. Box 400400, Charlottesville, VA 22904. E-mail: mtare@umich.edu
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Parental input represents an important source of language socialization. Particularly in bilingual contexts, parents may model pragmatic language use and metalinguistic strategies to highlight language differences. The present study examines multiparty interactions involving 28 bilingual English- and Marathi-speaking parent–child pairs in the presence of monolingual bystanders (children's mean ages = 3 years, 2 months and 4 years, 6 months). Their language use was analyzed during three sessions: parent and child alone, parent and child with the English speaker, and parent and child with the Marathi speaker. Parents demonstrated pragmatic differentiation by using relatively more of the bystander's language; however, children did not show this sensitivity. Further, parents used a variety of strategies to discuss language differences, such as providing and requesting translations; children translated most often in response to explicit requests. The results indicate that parents model pragmatic language differentiation as well as metalinguistic talk that may contribute to children's metalinguistic awareness.

Type
Articles
Information
Applied Psycholinguistics , Volume 32 , Issue 4 , October 2011 , pp. 761 - 780
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Akhtar, N. (2005). The robustness of learning through overhearing. Developmental Science, 8, 199–209.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Au, T., & Glusman, M. (1990). The principle of mutual exclusivity in word learning: To honor or not to honor? Child Development, 61, 1474–1490.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bell, A. (1984). Language style as audience design. Language in Society, 13, 145–204.Google Scholar
Bialystok, E. (1988). Levels of bilingualism and levels of linguistic awareness. Developmental Psychology, 24, 560–567.Google Scholar
Bialystok, E. (2001). Bilingualism in development: Language, literacy, and cognition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Callanan, M. A., & Sabbagh, M. A. (2004). Multiple labels for objects in conversations with young children: Parents’ language and children's developing expectations about word meanings. Developmental Psychology, 40, 746–763.Google Scholar
Carlson, S. M., & Meltzoff, A. N. (2008). Bilingual experience and executive functioning in young children. Developmental Science, 11, 282–298.Google Scholar
Comeau, L., & Genesee, F. (2001). Bilingual children's repair strategies during dyadic communication. In Cenoz, J. & Genesee, F. (Eds.), Trends in bilingual acquisition (pp. 229–256). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Comeau, L., Genesee, F., & Lapaquette, L. (2003). The modeling hypothesis and child bilingual codemixing. International Journal of Bilingualism, 7, 113–126.Google Scholar
Comeau, L., Genesee, F., & Mendelson, M. (2007). Bilingual children's repairs of breakdowns in communication. Journal of Child Language, 34, 159–174.Google Scholar
Cummins, J. (1978). Bilingualism and the development of metalinguistic awareness. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 9, 131–149.Google Scholar
De Houwer, A. (1990). The acquisition of two languages: A case study. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
De Houwer, A. 2009. Bilingual first language acquisition. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.Google Scholar
Deuchar, M., & Quay, S. (1999). Language choice in the earliest utterances: A case study with methodological implications. Journal of Child Language, 26, 461–475.Google Scholar
Diesendruck, G. (2005). The principles of conventionality and contrast in word learning: An empirical examination. Developmental Psychology, 41, 451–463.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fenson, L., Dale, P. S., Reznick, J. S., Bates, E., Thal, D. J., & Pethick, S. J. (1994). Variability in early communicative development. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, 59(5, Serial No. 42), 1–173.Google Scholar
Fishman, J. A. (1991). Reversing language shift: Theoretical and empirical foundations of assistance to threatened languages. Clevedon: Multilingual Mattters.Google Scholar
Galambos, S. J., & Goldin-Meadow, S. (1990). The effects of learning two languages on levels of metalinguistic awareness. Cognition, 34, 1–56.Google Scholar
Genesee, F., Boivin, I., & Nicoladis, E. (1996). Talking with strangers: A study of bilingual children's communicative competence. Applied Psycholinguistics, 17, 427–442.Google Scholar
Hakuta, K., & D'Andrea, D. (1992). Some properties of bilingual maintenance and loss in Mexican background high-school students. Applied Linguistics, 13, 72–99.Google Scholar
Hart, B., & Risley, T. R. (1992). American parenting of language-learning children: Persisting differences in family–child interactions observed in natural home environments. Developmental Psychology, 28, 1096–1105.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Huttenlocher, J., Vasilyeva, M., Cymerman, E., & Levine, S. (2002). Language input and child syntax. Cognitive Psychology, 45, 337–374.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ianco-Worrall, A. (1972). Bilingualism and cognitive development. Child Development, 43, 1390–1400.Google Scholar
Kasuya, H. (1998). Determinants of language choice in bilingual children: The role of input. International Journal of Bilingualism, 2, 327–346.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kasuya, H. (2002). Bilingual context for language development. In Blum-Kulka, S. & Snow, C. E. (Eds.), Talking to adults: The contribution of multiparty discourse to language acquisition (pp. 295–326). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Koppe, R., & Meisel, J. M. (1995). Code-switching in bilingual first language acquisition. In Milroy, L. & Muysken, P. (Eds.), One speaker, two languages: Cross-disciplinary perspectives on code-switching (pp. 276–301). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Lanza, E. (2001). Bilingual first language acquisition: A discourse perspective on language contact in parent–child interaction. In Cenoz, J. & Genesee, F. (Eds.), Trends in bilingual acquisition (pp. 201–230). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Lanza, E. (2007). Multilingualism and the family. In Auer, P. & Wei, L. (Eds.), Handbook of multilingualism and multilingual communication (pp. 45–67). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
MacWhinney, B., & Snow, C. (1990). The child language data exchange system: An update. Journal of Child Language, 17, 457–472.Google Scholar
Malakoff, M., & Hakuta, K. (1991). Translation skill and metalinguistic awareness in bilinguals. In Bialystok, E. (Ed.), Language processing in bilingual children (pp. 141–166). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Montanari, S. (2009). Pragmatic differentiation in early trilingual development. Journal of Child Language, 36, 597–627.Google Scholar
Muysken, P. (2000). Bilingual speech. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Muysken, P., Kook, H., & Vedder, P. (1996). Papiamento/Dutch code-switching in bilingual parent–child reading. Applied Psycholinguistics, 17, 485–505.Google Scholar
Nicoladis, E., & Genesee, F. (1996). A longitudinal study of pragmatic differentiation in young bilingual children. Language Learning, 46, 439–464.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pan, B. A. (1995). Code negotiation in bilingual families: “My body starts speaking English.” Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 16, 315–327.Google Scholar
Pearson, B. Z. (2007). Social factors in childhood bilingualism in the United States. Applied Psycholinguistics, 28, 399–410.Google Scholar
Perez-Bazan, M. J. (2002, October). Family matters: Determiners of language choice in early bilingual development. Paper presented at the Second University of Vigo International Symposium on Bilingualism, Galicia, Spain.Google Scholar
Quay, S. (2008). Dinner conversations with a trilingual two-year-old: Language socialization in a multilingual context. First Language, 28, 5–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rosenblum, T., & Pinker, S. A. (1983). Word magic revisited: Monolingual and bilingual children's understanding of the word–object relationship. Child Development, 54, 773–780.Google Scholar
Siegal, M., Iozzi, L., & Surian, L. (2009). Bilingualism and conversational understanding in young children. Cognition, 110, 115–122.Google Scholar
Snow, C. E., & Ferguson, C. A. (1977). Talking to children: Language input and acquisition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Tare, M., & Gelman, S. A. (2010). Can you say it another way? Cognitive factors in bilingual children's pragmatic language skills. Journal of Cognition and Development, 11, 137–158.Google Scholar
Vedder, P., Kook, H., & Muysken, P. (1996). Language choice and functional differentiation of languages in bilingual parent–child reading. Applied Psycholinguistics, 17, 461–484.Google Scholar
Wali, K. (2005). Marathi. Munich: LINCOM GmbH.Google Scholar