This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted 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 HighWire Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Baker, W. Articles by Trofimovich, P. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Interaction of Native- and Second-Language Vowel System(s) in Early and Late Bilinguals

Brigham Young University, wendy_baker{at}byu.edu

Pavel Trofimovich

Concordia University

The objective of this study was to determine how bilinguals' age at the time of language acquisition influenced the organization of their phonetic system(s). The productions of six English and five Korean vowels by English and Korean monolinguals were compared to the productions of the same vowels by early and late Korean-English bilinguals varying in amount of exposure to their second language. Results indicated that bilinguals' age profoundly influenced both the degree and the direction of the interaction between the phonetic systems of their native (L1) and second (L2) languages. In particular, early bilinguals manifested a bidirectional L1-L2 influence and produced distinct acoustic realizations of L1 and L2 vowels. Late bilinguals, however, showed evidence of a unidirectional influence of the L1 on the L2 and produced L2 vowels that were "colored" by acoustic properties of their L1. The degree and direction of L1-L2 influences in early and late bilinguals appeared to depend on the degree of acoustic similarity between L1 and L2 vowels and the length of their exposure to the L2. Overall, the findings underscored the complex nature of the restructuring of the L1-L2 phonetic system(s) in bilinguals.

Key Words: age • bilingualism • individual differences • Korean • vowel systems

Language and Speech, Vol. 48, No. 1, 1-27 (2005)
DOI: 10.1177/00238309050480010101


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

This article has been cited by other articles:

				W. Baker, P. Trofimovich, J. E. Flege, M. Mack, and R. Halter Child-adult differences in second-language phonological learning: the role of cross-language similarity. Language and Speech, January 1, 2008; 51(Pt 4): 317 - 342. [Abstract] [PDF]