Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Visual Cues for Language Selection in Bilinguals

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Attention and Vision in Language Processing

Abstract

Bilinguals need to select the right language for the particular context they are in, but how do they do this? One possibility is that they exploit visual cues from the context such as people’s faces, so that recognition of the face increases the availability of the language associated with that face. This chapter first examines the degree to which bilinguals activate multiple languages and how this is constrained by linguistic cues and then discusses three new lines of research that investigate visual language cueing. Specifically, these new research lines suggest effects on language processing of (a) the language associated with familiar people’s faces (e.g., German for Angela Merkel); (b) language that people associate with the race of unknown faces (e.g., Chinese for an Asian face, English for a white face); (c) language associated with cultural icons (e.g., Russian for a picture of the Kremlin).

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 109.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 139.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 139.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References

  • Abutalebi, J. (2008). Neural aspects of second language representation and language control. Acta Psychologica, 128, 466–478.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Colomè, A. (2001). Lexical activation in bilinguals’ speech production: Language-specific or language-independent? Journal of Memory and Language, 45, 721–736.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • De Bruijn, E. R. A., Dijkstra, T., Chwilla, D. J., & Schriefers, H. J. (2001). Language context effects on interlingual homograph recognition: Evidence from event-related potentials and response times in semantic priming. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 4, 155–168.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dijkstra, T., Timmermans, M., & Schriefers, H. (2000). On being blinded by your other language: Effects of task demands on interlingual homograph recognition. Journal of Memory and Language, 42, 445–464.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dijkstra, T., & Van Heuven, W. J. B. (2002). The architecture of the bilingual word recognition system: From identification to decision. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 5, 175–197.

    Google Scholar 

  • Duyck, W., Van Assche, E., Drieghe, D., & Hartsuiker, R. J. (2007). Visual word recognition by bilinguals in a sentence context: Evidence for nonselective lexical access. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 33, 663–679.

    Google Scholar 

  • Elston-Güttler, K. E., Gunter, T. C., & Kotz, S. A. (2005). Zooming into L2: Global language context and adjustment affect processing of interlingual homographs in sentences. Cognitive Brain Research, 25, 57–70.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gollan, T. H., Schotter, E. R., Gomez, J., Murillo, M., & Rayner, K. (2014). Multiple levels of bilingual language control: Evidence from language intrusions in reading aloud. Psychological Science, 25, 585–595.

    Google Scholar 

  • Green, D. W. (1986). Control, activation, and resource: A framework for the control of speech in bilinguals. Brain and Language, 27, 210–223.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hartsuiker, R. J. & Declerck, M. (2009, September). Albert Costa y Julio Iglesias move up but Fidel Castro stays put: Language attraction in bilingual language production. Paper presented at the AMLaP 2009 conference, Barcelona, Spain.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ivanova, I., & Costa, A. (2008). Does bilingualism hamper lexical access in speech production? Acta Psychologica, 127, 277–288.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Jared, D., Pei Jun Poh, R., & Pavio, A. (2013). L1 and L2 picture naming in Mandarin-English bilinguals: A test of bilingual dual coding theory. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 16, 383–396.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kroll, J. F., & Bialystok, E. (2013). Understanding the consequences of Bilingualism for language processing and cognitive control. Journal of Cognitive Psychology, 25, 497–514.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kroll, J. F., & McClain, R. (2013). What bilinguals tell us about culture, cognition, and language. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 110, 11219–11220.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lagrou, E., Hartsuiker, R. J., & Duyck, W. (2011). Knowledge of a second language influences auditory word recognition in the native language. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 37, 952–965.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lagrou, E., Hartsuiker, R. J., & Duyck, W. (2013). The influence of sentence context and accented speech on lexical access in second-language auditory word recognition. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 16, 508–517.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lemhöfer, K., Dijkstra, T., & Michel, M. C. (2004). Three languages, one echo: Cognate effects in trilingual word recognition. Language and Cognitive Processes, 19, 585–611.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Li, Y., Yang, J., Scherf, K. S., & Li, P. (2013). Two faces, two languages: An fMRI study of bilingual picture naming. Brain and Language, 127, 452–462.

    Google Scholar 

  • Libben, M. R., & Titone, D. A. (2009). Bilingual lexical access in context: Evidence from eye movements during reading. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 35, 381–390.

    Google Scholar 

  • Morris, M. W., & Zhang, S. (2013). Reply to Yang and Yang: Culturally primed first-language intrusion into second-language processing is associative spillover, not strategy. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 110.

    Google Scholar 

  • Poulisse, N., & Bongaerts, T. (1994). 1st Language use in 2nd-language production. Applied Linguistics, 15, 36–57.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Paivio, A., & Lambert, W. (1981). Dual coding and bilingual memory. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 20, 532–539.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rayner, K. (1998). Eye movements in reading and information processing: 20 years of research. Psychological Bulletin, 24, 372–422.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schwartz, A. I., & Kroll, J. F. (2006). Bilingual lexical activation in sentence context. Journal of Memory and Language, 55, 197–212.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Spivey, M. J., & Marian, V. (1999). Cross talk between native and second languages: Partial activation of an irrelevant lexicon. Psychological Science, 10, 281–284.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Thierry, G., & Wu, Y. J. (2007). Brain potentials reveal unconscious translation during foreign-language comprehension. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 104, 12530–12535.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Titone, D., Libben, M., Mercier, J., Whitford, V., & Pivneva, I. (2011). Bilingual lexical access during L1 sentence reading: The effects of L2 knowledge, semantic constraint, and L1-L2 intermixing. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 37, 1412–1431.

    Google Scholar 

  • Van Assche, E., Duyck, W., Hartsuiker, R. J., & Diependaele, K. (2009). Does bilingualism change native-language reading? Cognate effects in a sentence context. Psychological Science, 20, 923–927.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Van Assche, E., Drieghe, D., Duyck, W., Welvaert, M., & Hartsuiker, R. J. (2011). The influence of semantic constraints on bilingual word recognition during sentence reading. Journal of Memory and Language, 64, 88–107.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Van Assche, E., Duyck, W., & Hartsuiker, R. J. (2012). Bilingual word recognition in a sentence context. Frontiers in Psychology, 3, 174.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Van Berkum, J. J. A., Van den Brink, D., Tesink, C. M. J. Y., Kos, M., & Hagoort, P. (2008). The neural integration of speaker and message. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 20, 580–591.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Van Hell, J. G., & De Groot, A. M. B. (2008). Sentence context modulates visual word recognition and translation in bilinguals. Acta Psychologica, 128, 431–451.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Van Hell, J. G., & Dijkstra, T. (2002). Foreign language knowledge can influence native language performance in exclusively native contexts. Psychonomic Buletin and Review, 9, 780–789.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Van Heuven, W. J. B., Dijkstra, T., & Grainger, J. (1998). Orthographic neighborhood effects in bilingual word recognition. Journal of Memory and Language, 39, 458–483.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Woumans, E., Martin, C. D., Vanden Bulcke, C., Van Assche, E., Costa, A., Hartsuiker, R. J., & Duyck, W. (in press). Can faces prime a language? Psychological Science.

    Google Scholar 

  • Yang, S., & Yang, H. (2013). Does bilingual fluency moderate the disruption effect of cultural cues on second-language processing? Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 110.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zhang, S., Morris, M. W., Cheng, C.-Y., & Yap, A. J. (2013). Heritage-culture images disrupt immigrants’ second-language processing through triggering first-language interference. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 110, 11272–11277.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgments

Hans Rutger Bosker is thanked for very insightful comments on an earlier version of this paper.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Experimental Psychology, Ghent University, Henri Dunantlaan 2, 9000, Ghent, Belgium

    Robert J. Hartsuiker

Authors
  1. Robert J. Hartsuiker
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Robert J. Hartsuiker .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Neural and Cognitive Sciences, University of Hyderabad, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India

    Ramesh Kumar Mishra

  2. Centre of Behavioural and Cognitive Sciences, University of Allahabad, Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh, India

    Narayanan Srinivasan

  3. Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

    Falk Huettig

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2015 Springer India

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Hartsuiker, R.J. (2015). Visual Cues for Language Selection in Bilinguals. In: Mishra, R., Srinivasan, N., Huettig, F. (eds) Attention and Vision in Language Processing. Springer, New Delhi. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-81-322-2443-3_8

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation