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ABSTRACT
Acquisitionists generally assume a relation between code-mixing in young bilingual and trilingual children and language dominance. In our cross-sectional study we investigated the possible relation between code-mixing and language dominance in 122 children raised in Spain or Germany. They were bilingual, trilingual or multilingual, the latter acquiring more than three languages. The definition of language dominance is grounded on Birdsong’s (2014. Dominance in bilingualism: Foundations of measurement, with insights from the study of handedness. In C. Silva-Corvalán, & J. Treffers-Daller (Eds.), Language Dominance in Bilinguals: Issues of operationalization and measurement (pp. 85–105). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) distinction between domains and dimensions. The main result of our study is that code-mixing is rare in a monolingual setting which means that bilingual, trilingual and multilingual children are able to behave monolingually. Domain-specific language dominance can explain the relatively high mixing rate in the Catalan tests but concerning the dimensions of language dominance no relation was found between the children’s code-mixing and language (un)balance. A separate analysis of intra- and intersentential mixing reveals that intersentential mixing is determined by the typological proximity between the child's languages. All instances of intrasentential code-mixing, were insertional.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1 Abbreviated as CS.
2 Years;months,days.
3 A detailed description of the participants in our study will follow in section 4.1.
4 Abbreviated as MLU.
5 Abbreviated as UB.
6 Although language dominance is generally determined by measuring MLU or Upper Bound, we decided to use a measure of receptive vocabulary (size of receptive vocabulary, as measured by PPVT) for the following reasons: First, the children's results in the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test describe not only language performance but also language competence which is not clear when using the MLU to determine language dominance (De Houwer, Citation1990, p. 15). Second, it was not possible to measure the MLU for all children because at least 100 utterances in each of the children’s languages would be needed. This would have required a spontaneous recording of around 20 min. per language.
7 As a matter of fact, the study counts 126 children but there are no transcriptions available for three of them and one child was not predisposed to speak. The latter was also the youngest with 22 months (1;8). Therefore, in what follows, the total number of children will be 122.
8 An independent two-sample t-test reveals that there is no statistically significant difference between the mean age of the bilingual and the trilingual group assuming a random probability under 5%. (t = 0,85, df(102), p = 0,398). There is also no statistically significant difference between the mean age of the trilingual and the multilingual group (t = 0,23, df(9), p = 0,82) and between the bilingual and the multilingual group (t = 0,81, df(12), p = 0,433).
9 It is important to note that code-mixing is rather difficult to elicit. In cross-sectional studies bilingual children mix rarely their languages if addressed in one of their languages (mean mixing rate of 0.94% in Müller et al., Citation2015, p. 109). Patuto et al. (Citation2014) show that mixing is difficult, if not impossible to elicit in production, since it is generally assumed that bilingual speakers mix their languages spontaneously. In the study of Patuto et al. (Citation2014), bilingual children had to repeat a sentence with code-mixed material but, although they were able to repeat the sentence, they ‘corrected’ the mixed material and produced the sentence with lexical material from one of their languages. When repeating the sentence, they tended to choose the language of the last word of the adults’ utterance.
10 Admittedly, it is problematic to use a translation of the French and the Spanish PPVT in order to examine the children’s vocabulary size in Catalan. Such practice may result in obtaining items which are close in meaning but do not necessarily correspond in respect to other criteria, e.g. structural word complexity, cultural interpretation, familiarity, or frequency of occurrence (Peña, Citation2007). Nevertheless, looking at the French and Spanish PPVT in detail, even though the norming sample and the total number of test items differ, the distribution of the standard scores and the linguistic categories are the same (cf. Dunn et al., Citation1986; p. 40 and Dunn et al., Citation1993, p. 37). Since no other solution was available at the time of testing, the Catalan translation of the French and the Spanish PPVT were thus implemented in order to measure the Catalan receptive vocabulary.
11 The children’s language dominance is sometimes unknown due to two reasons. First, for some children there is no PPVT available. Second, difficulties arise when comparing the results of the PPVT and the results of the Wechsler Intelligence Test, which was used during a time of testing when the German version of the PPVT was still not available (Petermann, Citation20112). There are children who were too young or too old, making it impossible to convert the age-based scaled scores (with a mean of 10) of the Wechsler Intelligence Test into IQ-points (Lenhard et al., Citation2015), a necessary step in order to determine the children’s language dominance.
12 This result corresponds to 36 of the 38 balanced trilingual children (the other minority language, namely English, was not tested). Notice that only two of the 38 balanced trilingual children were tested in all three languages and the latter show a balanced relation among their three L1s. More research is needed which measures all three languages in the trilingual children.
13 This is a relevant fact. From the 45 children who code-mixed, we will only refer to a total amount of 43 since there is data available on language dominance for only these 43 children.
14 There were no bilingual Catalan-Spanish children tested in both languages. Therefore, we do not know whether there is a difference in the mixing behaviour of bilingual and trilingual children. We carried out two quantitative analyses, one including the Catalan tests and one excluding them, in order to find out whether societal bilingualism has an impact on the mixing behaviour of the tri- and multilingual children.
15 The illustration of the data in figure 7 parallels the one in figure 6.
16 We are aware of the fact that the group of children who mixed their languages is relatively small. Nevertheless, this shows that the children behaved according to the monolingual setting as outlined in the study.
17 It is noteworthy that the statistical analysis was carried out with the percentages of mixing for the corresponding children who code-mix and not with the absolute number of code-mixing of each child.
18 For a detailed analysis of the parental questionnaires see Arnaus Gil, Müller, Sette & Hüppop (Citation2019).
19 Statistical relevance is given by a random probability under 5%.
20 In addition to measuring language dominance based on the receptive vocabulary of the child, a reviewer suggested exploring the correlation between the children’s general verbosity and the proportion of CS in future research. In this respect, it is possible to assume that children who talk more (e.g. produce longer speech samples) also code-switch more.
21 The statistical programme calculated a negative value for t because the mean value of the first group (balanced)) was lower (2,17) than the one of the second group (unbalanced, 2,46).
22 Regarding the criteria of constituency, Muysken (Citation1997) proposes that when the switched element is a single, well-defined constituent it is likely that insertion is the underlying process. For peripherality, he claims that a mixed element at the periphery of an utterance indicates the process of alternation. The term nestedness means that there exists a structural relation between the mixed element and the preceding and following elements in the respective other language. Given this structural relation, insertion is probable. Concerning selectivity, it can be said that if the mixed element is selected by an element in the other language, insertion seems to be the underlying process. Linear equivalence between the languages involved, for example the same word order, indicates alternation or congruent lexicalisation. With regard to length and complexity, Muysken suggests that the more words a mixed fragment contains, the more likely it is alternation. The same applies for complexity. Bidirectionality refers to the fact that no matrix language can be determined within a mixed utterance indicating, therefore, a shared structure. This criterion might help to identify the process of congruent lexicalisation. The way the mixed utterance is embedded in discourse can also be indicative of the CS process. This is explained in more detail in the analysis of example (3). Looking at the structural position of the mixed element, a switch at a major clause boundary has to be distinguished from one internal to a phrase. The latter is more likely when talking about insertion or congruent lexicalisation. If a change between two languages is flagged by a pause or a particle like ‘euh’ alternation between codes seems more probable. With single mixed words it is also important to consider their lexical category. Whereas content words are likely to be insertions, mixing discourse particles and adverbs may indicate the process of alternation. Adapting means that a mixed fragment is adapted morphologically or syntactically to the other language. Given this modification, insertion or congruent lexicalisation is more likely.
23 The negation of features 2, 4–10 and 12 results in the respective other CS process, for example selected element = insertion/congruent lexicalisation and non selected element = alternation (feature 4).