Foucart Alice, Martin Clara D, Moreno Eva M, Costa Albert
Center for Brain and Cognition, University Pompeu Fabra.
Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language.
J Exp Psychol Learn Mem Cogn. 2014 Sep;40(5):1461-9. doi: 10.1037/a0036756. Epub 2014 May 5.
Why is it more difficult to comprehend a 2nd (L2) than a 1st language (L1)? In the present article we investigate whether difficulties during L2 sentence comprehension come from differences in the way L1 and L2 speakers anticipate upcoming words. We recorded the brain activity (event-related potentials) of Spanish monolinguals, French-Spanish late bilinguals, and Spanish-Catalan early bilinguals while reading sentences in Spanish. We manipulated the ending of highly constrained sentences so that the critical noun was either expected or not. The expected and unexpected nouns were of different gender so that we could observe potential anticipation effects already on the article. In line with previous studies, a modulation of the N400 effect was observed on the article and the noun, followed by an anterior positivity on the noun. Importantly, this pattern was found in all 3 groups, suggesting that, at least when their 2 languages are closely related, bilinguals are able to anticipate upcoming words in a similar manner as monolinguals.
为什么理解第二语言（L2）比第一语言（L1）更难呢？在本文中，我们研究了二语句子理解过程中的困难是否源于第一语言和第二语言使用者预测即将出现的单词的方式差异。我们记录了西班牙语单语者、法语 - 西班牙语晚期双语者和西班牙语 - 加泰罗尼亚语早期双语者在阅读西班牙语句子时的大脑活动（事件相关电位）。我们对高度受限句子的结尾进行了操控，以便关键名词是可预测的或不可预测的。可预测和不可预测的名词具有不同的性，这样我们就可以在文章中观察到潜在的预测效应。与之前的研究一致，在文章和名词上观察到了N400效应的调制，随后在名词上出现了前部正波。重要的是，在所有三组中都发现了这种模式，这表明，至少当他们的两种语言密切相关时，双语者能够以与单语者相似的方式预测即将出现的单词。
