| dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/11401/77596 | |
| dc.description.sponsorship | This work is sponsored by the Stony Brook University Graduate School in compliance with the requirements for completion of degree. | en_US |
| dc.format | Monograph | |
| dc.format.medium | Electronic Resource | en_US |
| dc.language.iso | en_US | |
| dc.publisher | The Graduate School, Stony Brook University: Stony Brook, NY. | |
| dc.type | Dissertation | |
| dcterms.abstract | The bilingual experience is fundamentally different from the monolingual experience. This is due in part to the bilingual's need to be ready to process multiple languages, while at the same time, needing to choose which language to speak while keeping in mind which language(s) the addressee understands. As a result of these demands on bilingual language comprehension and production, some have claimed that bilinguals have enhanced cognitive control when compared to monolinguals (e.g., Bialystok, 2009). Bilinguals may have more experience in adapting to a partner's perspective (as advantage in perspective-taking has been established for bilingual children, e.g., Goetz, 2003 and for bilingual adults, e.g., Rubio-Fernández & Glucksberg, 2012). The present set of studies used a series of interactive referential communication tasks designed to test the relationship between cognitive control and perspective-taking in 48 English monolinguals and in 48 bilinguals who learned both Spanish and English early in life. All subjects did all tasks. Subjects first completed a set of cognitive control measures (i.e., Stroop, Trail-Making Test, Berg's Card Sorting Task, Attentional Blink) as well as demographic and proficiency questionnaires, and then participated as either director or matcher in collaborative tasks with confederate partners. In Study 1(language comprehension), subjects took on the matcher role and received instructions on how to arrange a set of tangrams. Their reaction times in interpreting referring expressions for the tangrams were measured, including when the confederate departed from their previously-introduced terminology by introducing a new label (i.e., breaking a conceptual pact, e.g., Metzing & Brennan, 2003). In Study 2A (language production), subjects entrained on same or different labels (e.g., couch versus sofa) with two confederates, and then took on the director role and referred to the pictures while working with only one partner at a time (perspective-blocked) or while working with both partners simultaneously (perspective-mixed). Which label subjects chose and their speaking latencies were measured. Study 2B extended the perspective-switching comparison to between-language switching; the bilinguals again took on the director role and referred to pictures that they had either shared with only one partner and in only one language, or that they had shared with both partners across both languages, with partner perspective either blocked or mixed. The predictions were that bilinguals would show advantages over monolinguals in both cognitive control and perspective-taking in dialogue. Instead, the sample of bilinguals was overall slower and in some cases performed worse on the typical cognitive control tasks than the monolingual sample. This may be due in part to variability in age of second language acquisition and English proficiency, as well as external factors such as socioeconomic status, which differed between the monolingual and bilingual samples. Bilinguals were also slower than monolinguals to refer to targets during the matching tasks, and they were especially slow when they needed to switch between both partner and language. For both bilinguals and monolinguals, there was a positive relationship between cognitive control and perspective-taking during language comprehension, so that individuals with higher cognitive control overall (as measured by performance on the Trail-Making Test) were faster at recovering from and making a perspective-switch after the partner broke a conceptual pact. These individuals with higher cognitive control were also more likely to show partner-specific adaptation during language production and reuse the consistent label with a given partner, even when they were working with two partners simultaneously and there was competition (i.e., they had used different terms with different partners), requiring a switch between partner perspectives. This is the first set of studies to compare the same bilingual and monolingual individuals in both comprehension and production tasks. The findings, which link cognitive control and perspective-taking in dialogue, suggest a more complex relationship between bilingual experience and cognitive abilities than has been previously supposed. Theoretical and methodological implications are discussed. | |
| dcterms.abstract | The bilingual experience is fundamentally different from the monolingual experience. This is due in part to the bilingual's need to be ready to process multiple languages, while at the same time, needing to choose which language to speak while keeping in mind which language(s) the addressee understands. As a result of these demands on bilingual language comprehension and production, some have claimed that bilinguals have enhanced cognitive control when compared to monolinguals (e.g., Bialystok, 2009). Bilinguals may have more experience in adapting to a partner's perspective (as advantage in perspective-taking has been established for bilingual children, e.g., Goetz, 2003 and for bilingual adults, e.g., Rubio-Fernández & Glucksberg, 2012). The present set of studies used a series of interactive referential communication tasks designed to test the relationship between cognitive control and perspective-taking in 48 English monolinguals and in 48 bilinguals who learned both Spanish and English early in life. All subjects did all tasks. Subjects first completed a set of cognitive control measures (i.e., Stroop, Trail-Making Test, Berg's Card Sorting Task, Attentional Blink) as well as demographic and proficiency questionnaires, and then participated as either director or matcher in collaborative tasks with confederate partners. In Study 1(language comprehension), subjects took on the matcher role and received instructions on how to arrange a set of tangrams. Their reaction times in interpreting referring expressions for the tangrams were measured, including when the confederate departed from their previously-introduced terminology by introducing a new label (i.e., breaking a conceptual pact, e.g., Metzing & Brennan, 2003). In Study 2A (language production), subjects entrained on same or different labels (e.g., couch versus sofa) with two confederates, and then took on the director role and referred to the pictures while working with only one partner at a time (perspective-blocked) or while working with both partners simultaneously (perspective-mixed). Which label subjects chose and their speaking latencies were measured. Study 2B extended the perspective-switching comparison to between-language switching; the bilinguals again took on the director role and referred to pictures that they had either shared with only one partner and in only one language, or that they had shared with both partners across both languages, with partner perspective either blocked or mixed. The predictions were that bilinguals would show advantages over monolinguals in both cognitive control and perspective-taking in dialogue. Instead, the sample of bilinguals was overall slower and in some cases performed worse on the typical cognitive control tasks than the monolingual sample. This may be due in part to variability in age of second language acquisition and English proficiency, as well as external factors such as socioeconomic status, which differed between the monolingual and bilingual samples. Bilinguals were also slower than monolinguals to refer to targets during the matching tasks, and they were especially slow when they needed to switch between both partner and language. For both bilinguals and monolinguals, there was a positive relationship between cognitive control and perspective-taking during language comprehension, so that individuals with higher cognitive control overall (as measured by performance on the Trail-Making Test) were faster at recovering from and making a perspective-switch after the partner broke a conceptual pact. These individuals with higher cognitive control were also more likely to show partner-specific adaptation during language production and reuse the consistent label with a given partner, even when they were working with two partners simultaneously and there was competition (i.e., they had used different terms with different partners), requiring a switch between partner perspectives. This is the first set of studies to compare the same bilingual and monolingual individuals in both comprehension and production tasks. The findings, which link cognitive control and perspective-taking in dialogue, suggest a more complex relationship between bilingual experience and cognitive abilities than has been previously supposed. Theoretical and methodological implications are discussed. | |
| dcterms.available | 2017-09-20T16:52:57Z | |
| dcterms.contributor | Samuel, Arthur | en_US |
| dcterms.contributor | Brennan, Susan E | en_US |
| dcterms.contributor | Freitas, Antonio | en_US |
| dcterms.contributor | Huffman, Marie. | en_US |
| dcterms.creator | Batres, Karla Maria | |
| dcterms.dateAccepted | 2017-09-20T16:52:57Z | |
| dcterms.dateSubmitted | 2017-09-20T16:52:57Z | |
| dcterms.description | Department of Experimental Psychology. | en_US |
| dcterms.extent | 141 pg. | en_US |
| dcterms.format | Application/PDF | en_US |
| dcterms.format | Monograph | |
| dcterms.identifier | http://hdl.handle.net/11401/77596 | |
| dcterms.issued | 2013-12-01 | |
| dcterms.language | en_US | |
| dcterms.provenance | Made available in DSpace on 2017-09-20T16:52:57Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1
Batres_grad.sunysb_0771E_11505.pdf: 2221791 bytes, checksum: 0e1c40bbadd991f87558244af3ceec21 (MD5)
Previous issue date: 1 | en |
| dcterms.publisher | The Graduate School, Stony Brook University: Stony Brook, NY. | |
| dcterms.subject | Bilingualism, Cognitive Control, Dialogue, Partner Adaptation, Perspective-Taking, Referential Communication | |
| dcterms.subject | Cognitive psychology | |
| dcterms.title | Bilingual Cognitive Control and Perspective-Monitoring in Dialogue | |
| dcterms.type | Dissertation | |
