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Transfer from implicit to explicit phonological abilities in first and second language learners*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 April 2016

CARESSA JANSSEN ,
ELIANE SEGERS ,
JAMES M. MCQUEEN  and
LUDO VERHOEVEN
CARESSA JANSSEN*
Affiliation:
Radboud University, Behavioural Science Institute, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
ELIANE SEGERS
Affiliation:
Radboud University, Behavioural Science Institute, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
JAMES M. MCQUEEN
Affiliation:
Radboud University, Behavioural Science Institute, Nijmegen, The Netherlands Radboud University, Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, Nijmegen, The Netherlands Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
LUDO VERHOEVEN
Affiliation:
Radboud University, Behavioural Science Institute, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
*
Address for correspondence: Caressa Janssen, Radboud University, Montessorilaan 3, PO Box 9104, 6500 HE Nijmegen, The Netherlandsc.janssen@pwo.ru.nl
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Abstract

Children's abilities to process the phonological structure of words are important predictors of their literacy development. In the current study, we examined the interrelatedness between implicit (i.e., speech decoding) and explicit (i.e., phonological awareness) phonological abilities, and especially the role therein of lexical specificity (i.e., the ability to learn to recognize spoken words based on only minimal acoustic-phonetic differences). We tested 75 Dutch monolingual and 64 Turkish–Dutch bilingual kindergartners. SEM analyses showed that speech decoding predicted lexical specificity, which in turn predicted rhyme awareness in the first language learners but phoneme awareness in the second language learners. Moreover, in the latter group there was an impact of the second language: Dutch speech decoding and lexical specificity predicted Turkish phonological awareness, which in turn predicted Dutch phonological awareness. We conclude that language-specific phonological characteristics underlie different patterns of transfer from implicit to explicit phonological abilities in first and second language learners.

Keywords

implicit phonological abilitiesexplicit phonological abilitiessecond language learninglinguistic transfer
Type
Research Article
Information
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition , Volume 20 , Issue 4 , August 2017 , pp. 795 - 812
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

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Footnotes

*

This work was supported by the NWO-NIHC (Dutch Organization for Scientific Research-National Initiative Brain and Cognition) [056-33-017]

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