Linguistics Colloquium: Hamutal Kreiner

Hamutal Kreiner,  Ruppin Academic Center

Title: Bilingual Performance: The dynamic relationship between long-term and short-term cross-language processes

Abstract:
The performance of bilingual speakers at any particular moment is determined by factors that operate on different timescales. For example, Age of Acquisition and frequency of exposure have a long-term accumulating influence on proficiency. At the same time, context driven language shifts or emotional factors are known to have immediate effects on language performance. I will present three studies using different methods and examining different bilingual populations to shed light on the dynamic relationship between long-term and short-term cross-language processes. The first study focused on lexical access processes examining Tip-of-the-Tongue (TOT) rates. The second, focused on morpho-syntactic processes examining grammatical gender agreement. The last study focused on prediction processes using a gating paradigm. Taken together, the findings demonstrate the combined effects of short-term and long-term processes involved in modulating the bilingual speaker’s performance. In view of the findings, I will propose an account for dynamic, context-sensitive processes and long-term accumulating processes under a unified theoretical framework.

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