Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.
Department of English, Linguistics & Theatre Studies, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore.
Infancy. 2023 Nov-Dec;28(6):1030-1051. doi: 10.1111/infa.12562. Epub 2023 Oct 4.
We compared vocabulary sizes in comprehension and production between bilingual toddlers growing up in the United Kingdom (UK) and age-matched UK English monolinguals (12-36 months old) using parent-report vocabulary questionnaires. We found that bilingual toddlers' vocabulary sizes in English were smaller than the vocabulary sizes of their monolingual peers. Notably, this vocabulary gap was not found when groups were compared on conceptual vocabulary in comprehension. Conceptual scoring also reduced the vocabulary gap in production but group differences were still significant. Bilingual toddlers knew more words than monolinguals when words across their two languages were added together, for both comprehension and production. This large total vocabulary size could be attributed to a high proportion of doublets (cross-linguistic word pairs with the same meaning) in bilinguals' vocabularies. These findings are discussed in relation to language exposure, facilitation from cross-linguistic overlap and maturation constraints on vocabulary size.
我们使用家长报告词汇问卷比较了在英国长大的双语幼儿和年龄匹配的英国英语单语者（12-36 个月大）在理解和表达方面的词汇量。我们发现双语幼儿的英语词汇量比单语幼儿小。值得注意的是，当两组在理解方面的概念词汇方面进行比较时，并没有发现这种词汇差距。概念评分也减少了表达方面的词汇差距，但组间差异仍然显著。当将双语幼儿的两种语言中的词汇加起来时，他们在理解和表达方面都比单语幼儿知道更多的单词。这种庞大的总词汇量可以归因于双语词汇中大量的双词对（具有相同含义的跨语言词对）。这些发现与语言接触、跨语言重叠的促进以及词汇量受成熟度限制有关。
